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Once you have chosen an initial broad topic for your research paper, narrow your focus on that topic to make a more precise point. Narrowing the focus of your topic will limit the bulk of material you have to cover and make your topic and supporting information specific, relevant, and easy to understand. Below are a few steps to follow that may help you narrow your topic:

1. Decide if Your Topic Needs to Be More Narrow

A. First, use common sense. Consider the required length of your research paper. Ask yourself: “Can I properly cover this topic in the number of pages or words allotted?” For example, if the topic you have chosen for a two to

three page paper is “philosophy,” you will definitely want to narrow your topic down. You certainly cannot cover the entire concept of philosophy in a few pages!

B. The number of potential resources you find while doing your preliminary for information can indicate that you need to narrow your topic. For example, the assignment requires that you consult and list six to eight reference sources. As you search for sources on the internet and in the library’s catalog, you come up with forty books and one hundred websites related to your topic. You should see this as a cue to make your topic more specific. As you limit your topic, you also limit the pool of resources from which to draw until only those that are relevant to your narrow topic remain.

2. Narrow the Scope of Your Topic

A. As you attempt to limit your focus, ask yourself questions that pick apart the content of the broad topic. This way, you may find a smaller Chunk(narrow topic) of the larger whole(broad topic) with which to work. Some example questions could be:

o What part of this topic interests me the most?

o Is there a certain perspective from which I want to view this topic?

o Would I like to learn more about a specific issue concerning this topic?

You can also use the five W’s method. When considering your topic, ask “who, what, where, when, and why?” and see if the answer to any of these can be used as a separate narrow topic.

B. Another way to limit your topic is to do son in gradual steps. Start with your broad topic, go through a sequence of increasingly specific questions about it, and then do the same for each of the answers to your questions. Through this process, you will whittle your topic until you are left with a specific focus. This mention is helpful because you can see exactly how your narrow topic evolves from the original broad topic. Continuing with the sample topic of “philosophy” here is and example:

Question: Answer:

1. What is my broad topic? Philosophy

2. What aspect of philosophy Important philosophers

can I focus on?

3. Who is once important philosopher The philosopher Rene Descartes

I can focus on?

4. What information about this The philosopher Rene

philosopher can I research Descartes view of the

and discuss in my paper? Human self.

With your narrowed focus, you next need to transform your limited topic into a working thesis with which to being writing. See the writing center handout “Developing a Working Thesis” for more information.

Information adapted from:

Hamid, Sarah. Writing a Research Paper. OWL at Purdue Univeristy. 12 Mar. 2004

<http://owl.english.purude.edu/workshops/hypertext/researchW/index.html>