How to Write a Research Proposal for a Thesis or Dissertation

A research proposal is where you prove that the study has a clear problem, that your questions can actually be answered, and that the method you have chosen can produce the evidence you need.

This guide is for an students preparing a thesis, dissertation or final-year research project. I will show you what normally belongs in the proposal, what each section is meant to accomplish, and how the sections must connect. I will also carry one topic through the guide so that you can see the difference between receiving a heading such as “problem statement” and knowing what to write under it.

The working topic used throughout this guide:
Exposure to social media misinformation and trust in electoral institutions among first-time voters in Ghana.

This is a teaching example, not a completed study. The suggested questions, variables and methods are illustrations that would still need to be adjusted to a real department, study area, population, timetable and evidence base.

First, check the rules of your own department

There is no universal proposal template that every university and discipline uses in exactly the same order. A department may expect three chapters and another department may just expect you to write only one chapter. A laboratory-based programme may organise the proposal around materials, procedures and experiments. A design programme may include a practice-based component. Some departments require an abstract, budget or hypotheses and some others do not.

In short, just use your school’s handbook first, then use a general guide like this one to understand what the required sections are doing.

Before you begin the full draft, confirm these points:

• the prescribed proposal template and order of headings

• the word or page limit

• the required citation style and edition

• whether the proposal must use chapters or unnumbered sections

• whether an abstract, hypothesis, conceptual framework, work plan or budget is compulsory

• the ethics approval process and the point at which you may begin collecting data

• the date, format and assessment criteria for a proposal defence, if one is required.

If your departmental template disagrees with the order in this guide, follow the departmental template. Do not lose marks while trying to prove that another university arranges proposals differently.
I mean, just compare your department's template to this guide and do your sections following this guide.
You get it?

What your proposal must convince the reader of

A good proposal answers six practical questions. If one answer is missing, the proposal usually feels incomplete even when all the headings are present.

This is why a proposal is an argument for a study that is important enough to conduct and realistic enough to complete. Punch (2016) treats proposal development as the work of planning and designing the research, while Creswell and Creswell (2023) emphasise matching the research problem and questions with an appropriate qualitative, quantitative or mixed-methods approach. The details vary, but that alignment does not.

The usual contents of a proposal

For a three-chapter proposal, the contents commonly look like this. Your handbook may rename, combine or omit some items.

Notice what is not normally in a proposal: completed findings, a discussion of results, conclusions drawn from data you have not collected, or recommendations presented as though the study is finished. You may state the study’s expected contribution, but do not invent expected results, since you have not collected data and analysed it yet.

Build one line of alignment before writing the chapters

Students often write Chapter One, choose a questionnaire later and then discover that the questions in the questionnaire do not measure the objectives. You can prevent that by preparing a one-page alignment sheet before producing the full work.

Read the table from top to bottom. You will see that, the method exists to answer the question; the question exists to meet the objective; the objective exists to address the problem. If an item does not connect, revise it before expanding the chapter.

Write a title that your proposed design can defend

A workable title normally identifies the central phenomenon or variables, the population and, when useful, the setting. It should be specific without becoming a paragraph.

Consider these two versions:

• Risky for a one-time survey: The influence of exposure to social media misinformation on trust in electoral institutions among first-time voters in Ghana.

• Safer for an association study: Exposure to social media misinformation and trust in electoral institutions among first-time voters in Ghana.

The word influence can imply a causal effect. A cross-sectional survey that measures exposure and trust at the same time may show an association, but it usually cannot establish by itself that one caused the other. The second title states the relationship without promising more than the proposed design can support. If your design genuinely supports a causal claim, explain how, and do not make causality a matter of wording alone. You get it?

Avoid padding such as “A study to investigate…” when the rest of the title already identifies the study. Also check every important noun. “Young people” is not automatically the same population as “first-time voters,” and “electoral institutions” must eventually be defined, and not just treated as a vague collective label.

Preliminary pages: prepare the document properly

Title page

Use the exact institutional wording and arrangement in your handbook. A title page commonly contains the title, student’s name and identification number, department and institution, programme, supervisor, the statement explaining why the proposal is submitted, and the month and year.

A simple content model is:

EXPOSURE TO SOCIAL MEDIA MISINFORMATION AND TRUST IN ELECTORAL INSTITUTIONS AMONG FIRST-TIME VOTERS IN GHANA

Student Name
Student ID

Supervisor: […]
Month, Year

Do not copy this layout if your department provides a branded title-page template.

Chapter One: establish the study, not just the topic

Background to the study

The background helps the reader understand the setting of the problem. It is not a collection of broad statements about how “technology has changed the world.” Every paragraph should move the reader closer to the exact issue the study will address.

For the topic used as example in this article, a useful background might move through these connected areas:

1. what misinformation is and how it differs from deliberate disinformation;

2. how people encounter political information across social, traditional and interpersonal media;

3. why trust in electoral institutions matters to political participation and legitimacy;

4. what is already known in Ghana or comparable settings; and

5. why first-time voters require focused examination.

The sequence is a writing logic, not a requirement to place one idea in each paragraph. Use credible evidence at each point. For example, Gadjanova et al. (2022) show that social-media-originated misinformation in Ghana can circulate through interconnected online, traditional and everyday interpersonal spaces. That is useful background because it challenges the assumption that only direct social media users encounter online misinformation. It does not, by itself, prove that misinformation lowers trust in electoral institutions. Your writing must distinguish what a source supports from what you still want to investigate.

A background paragraph should normally do more than report a citation:

Claim: explain the idea relevant to your study.
Evidence: present what a credible source actually found or argued.
Interpretation: explain why that evidence matters to your problem.
Connection: lead the reader to the next part of the argument.

Do not begin every paragraph with an author’s name. The idea should lead; the citation should support it.

Hope you get it?

Now, let's go to the statement of the problem or problem statement

Statement of the problem

The problem statement is not the same as the topic, and it is not a dramatic complaint that misinformation is “very bad.” It identifies a specific uncertainty, contradiction, inadequacy or practical difficulty that research can address.

A strong problem statement normally establishes:

• the situation or knowledge we would reasonably need

• credible evidence showing what is currently known or happening

• the precise empirical, contextual, theoretical or methodological gap

• why leaving the gap unresolved matters

• the focused response proposed by the study

Weak version:

Social media misinformation is a serious problem in Ghana. Many young people use social media, and they no longer trust institutions. Therefore, this study will investigate the topic.

This version above makes unsupported claims, does not identify which institutions or young people are involved, and jumps from social media use to distrust without evidence. Can you see that for yourself?

A better problem logic:

Research in Ghana has shown that misinformation can move between social media, traditional media and everyday interpersonal communication, shaping how both direct and indirect users encounter questionable information (Gadjanova et al., 2022). Ghanaian research has also examined misinformation in specific contexts such as COVID-19 communication (Tabong & Segtub, 2021). However, those studies do not by themselves establish how reported exposure to electoral misinformation relates to trust in electoral institutions among people participating in a national election for the first time. If this population is absorbed into broad adult samples, experiences associated with entering the electoral process may remain unclear. The proposed study will therefore examine the association between reported exposure to social media misinformation and trust in in the electoral institutions among a clearly defined population of first-time voters.

That paragraph is a model of reasoning, not permission to stop searching. Before using the claimed gap in a real proposal, conduct a thorough and current review. A gap exists because the literature demonstrates it, not because the student has not yet found a paper. I guess you have read the article where we explained how to get literature and how to identify the gap.

Purpose or general objective

The purpose statement gives the study’s overall intention in one clear sentence. It should use a verb that matches the design.

Purpose: The purpose of the proposed study is to examine the relationship between reported exposure to social media misinformation and trust in the electoral institutions among first-time voters in Ghana.

If the study is qualitative, the wording may instead be “to explore how first-time voters interpret…” If it is experimental, explanatory language may be appropriate when supported by the design. Do not select verbs because they sound advanced or because you think you understand english and want to show us you do.

Specific objectives

Specific objectives divide the purpose into answerable pieces. They describe what the study will determine, not the administrative activities required to complete it.

Activities pretending to be objectives:

• To distribute questionnaires to respondents.

• To use SPSS to analyse the data.

• To review the literature on misinformation.

Haha. Never say the above are your objectives. No. Those are tasks, not research objectives. So please be careful.

Better objectives for the study i am using as an example are:

1. To describe first-time voters’ reported exposure to electoral misinformation on social media.

2. To assess first-time voters’ reported trust in electoral institutions.

3. To determine whether reported exposure to social media misinformation is statistically associated with trust in the electoral institutions.

Three good objectives are usually okay. Don't write plenty. Each additional objective requires literature, measurement, analysis, time and space in the final report.

Research questions

Turn each objective into a question without changing its meaning:

1. What forms and levels of exposure to electoral misinformation on social media do first-time voters report?

2. What levels of trust do first-time voters report in the electoral institutions?

3. What association exists between reported exposure to social media misinformation and trust in the electoral institutions?

Question 3 should not ask “What are the effects?” if the design only estimates association. The wording of the question, title, analysis and eventual conclusion must agree.

Hypotheses, when they are needed

Not every proposal requires hypotheses. They are most useful when a quantitative study will test a specified relationship or difference. I also want you to know that is not all quantitative study that test hypothesis. A qualitative study that seeks participants’ meanings would normally use open research questions instead.

Null hypothesis (H0): There is no statistically significant association between reported exposure to social media misinformation and trust in the electoral institutions among the first-time voters included in the study.

You can also state the alternative hypothesis. Do not create a hypothesis for every descriptive objective, and do not predict a negative relationship unless theory or previous evidence justifies the direction.

Significance of the study

Significance explains who could use the knowledge and how. It should not promise that your project will “solve misinformation in Ghana.”

No ooooo 😂

For this example, a careful significance section could discuss how the findings may:

• help electoral education bodies understand how first-time voters report encountering questionable electoral claims;

• help media-literacy educators identify specific points of confusion or verification behaviour;

• provide a context-focused evidence for scholars studying political communication and institutional trust; and

• inform a later, larger or longitudinal study without claiming national generalisability from a limited sample.

Link each benefit to the data you will actually collect. A survey of students at one institution cannot directly represent every first-time voter in Ghana, as an example.

Scope and delimitations

Delimitations are boundaries you intentionally set: population, location, period, concepts and the aspects of the issue included. Limitations are constraints that may affect interpretation despite reasonable planning. The two are related but not interchangeable.

Do not write “lack of time and money” as the whole limitations section. Explain the methodological consequence and what you will do to reduce it.

Operational definition of key terms

This is not a dictionary definition per say. The reader needs to know what the term means in this study and, for measurable constructs, how it will be recognised or scored.

For the topic i am using as an example,

Operational definitions protect the study from moving targets. They also reveal whether your proposed questionnaire can measure what the title promises.

Chapter Two: build a literature review that leads to the study

A literature review is not a queue of summaries beginning “According to…” It should explain what the field knows, how that knowledge was produced, where findings differ, and what your study can reasonably add.

Booth and colleagues (2024) frame research as moving from a focused topic to a productive question and a consequential problem, then building an argument with reasons and evidence. That is a useful test for Chapter Two. Your sources are not decorations; they are the evidence through which you establish the problem and design a defensible response.

Organise by ideas that serve the research questions

For the worked topic, a possible structure is:

1. Conceptual review: misinformation, disinformation, exposure and institutional trust;

2. Theoretical framework: the theory chosen to explain why exposure and trust might be related;

3. Empirical theme 1: how electoral or political misinformation is encountered and evaluated;

4. Empirical theme 2: trust in electoral institutions and how it has been measured;

5. Empirical theme 3: evidence involving young or first-time voters, especially in Ghana and comparable contexts;

6. Synthesis and gap: what the combined evidence supports, disputes and leaves unresolved

7. Conceptual framework: the proposed relationship among the study’s main constructs and relevant background factors.

This structure is not a demand for exactly seven headings. It demonstrates how to group related scholarship around the study and not just review papers in the order you downloaded them or whatever.

Conceptual review: define by comparing scholarship

When researchers use a term differently, show the distinction and select a definition suitable for your study. In this case (with the topic i am using as example), I would explain the difference between misinformation, which can be false or misleading regardless of intent, and disinformation, which involves deliberate deception. I would then explain why my instrument can measure the concept I chose.

I won't merge “seeing misinformation,” “believing misinformation” and “sharing misinformation.” They are different phenomena. If my objective concerns exposure, a questionnaire that measures only sharing behaviour does not answer it.

You get it right?

Theoretical framework: use theory, do not display it

A theoretical framework should help explain the mechanism or expectations behind the study. It should not be a biography of the theorist followed by a diagram that never appears again.

For any theory you consider, answer:

• What does the theory claim?

• Which concepts in the theory correspond to this your study?

• How has the theory been used in related research?

• What does it help you expect or interpret?

• What part of the present problem does it not explain well?

Choose a theory after reading the relevant literature.

Empirical review: compare purpose, context, method and evidence

Using my topic as example again, two Ghanaian studies illustrate why comparison matters. Gadjanova et al. (2022) examine how misinformation moves across an interconnected media ecosystem and distinguish first-hand from indirect social media users. Tabong and Segtub (2021) examine COVID-19 misinformation and political narratives on social media in Ghana. Both make misinformation in Ghana empirically relevant, but their research problems, contexts and outcomes are not identical to trust in electoral institutions among first-time voters. Your review should explain both the contribution and the boundary of each source.

A useful synthesis paragraph often follows this logic:

Shared finding or debate: what several studies collectively suggest.
Difference: how their settings, samples, concepts or methods differ.
Evaluation: what those differences mean for the strength or transferability of the evidence.
Gap: the precise question still unresolved.
Study response: how your proposed design addresses part of that gap.

Explain why the new context changes the question, population, mechanism, measurement or practical decision.

Conceptual framework: show the proposed relationships

For my quantitative study example, the framework might place reported exposure to social media misinformation as the predictor and institutional trust as the outcome. Relevant factors such as political interest, education, partisanship, media literacy or previous institutional experience may need consideration if the literature shows that they can affect the relationship.

A framework arrow means “this is the relationship the study proposes to examine.” It does not prove causality. Make sure the questionnaire and analysis reflect the framework.

End Chapter Two with a demonstrated gap

Your gap paragraph should be the conclusion of the review. State what is established, what remains uncertain, why it matters, and the modest contribution of your proposed study. If the evidence shows that the question has already been answered well, refine the study and don't try to force a false claim of originality.

Chapter Three: explain exactly how the questions will be answered

“The study will use quantitative methods and questionnaires” is not a methodology chapter. The reader needs to see why the design fits the question, who can provide the evidence, how they will be selected, what will be measured, and how the resulting data will be analysed responsibly.

Research approach and design

State the approach and the specific design, then justify both. For the objectives of my example topic, a quantitative cross-sectional survey could estimate reported exposure, reported trust and their association during a defined period. Its advantage is that it can collect standardised responses from a sample efficiently. Its limitation is that measurement at one period makes temporal order and causal inference difficult.

Do not write that the study is quantitative just because it uses a questionnaire. Questionnaires can contain qualitative questions, and numbers do not make a weak measure valid.

Study setting

Name the actual places from which participants will be recruited and describe only characteristics relevant to sampling or interpretation. A page of district history copied from a website does not strengthen the method.

If recruitment occurs at two universities in Greater Accra, say so. Do not retain “among first-time voters in Ghana” in a way that implies a nationally representative sample unless the sampling design supports that scope.

Target population and eligibility

Define the population from which the sample should come. Then state inclusion and exclusion criteria.

For this topic, the proposal must decide whether a first-time voter is:

• a person who registered for the first time before a named election;

• a person who was eligible to vote for the first time; or

• a person who actually voted in a national election for the first time.

Those groups overlap but are not realy really the same. The screening questions must reflect the definition.

Sample size and sampling procedure

State where the sampling frame will come from, how the sample size will be justified and how selection will occur. Do not choose “10% of the population” simply because it is easy or do not just write any number you like just like that. The appropriate justification depends on the design, intended analysis, population information, precision, anticipated non-response and departmental expectations.

A complete sampling account might explain:

• the estimated size and source of the accessible population;

• the sample-size method and every assumption entered into it;

• whether probability or non-probability sampling is used and why;

• the stages of selection, if sampling occurs through regions, districts, institutions or groups;

• how participants within each site will be selected; and

• what adjustment is made for expected non-response.

If you recruit whoever sees a link in a WhatsApp group, describe it honestly as a non-probability process and limit the claims accordingly. Do not call it simple random sampling because the form was shared widely.

Variables and measurement

Translate each concept into evidence that can actually be collected.

Where a suitable validated instrument exists, examine the original source, permissions, population and evidence of validity before adapting it. Cite the instrument. If you modify wording or create new items, explain how those decisions will be reviewed and piloted. Do not just go and copy someone's unattributed scale.

Data collection instrument

Describe the proposed questionnaire by section, not only by number of questions. For example:

• Section A: eligibility and relevant background information

• Section B: social media use and defined misinformation-exposure items

• Section C: institutional trust items

• Section D: verification behaviour or other construct included in the stated framework

Every section must serve an objective, an ethical screening need or a justified analytical control. Remove interesting questions that you do not plan to analyse.

Pilot testing and measurement quality

A pilot is a small rehearsal of the proposed process, not an early release of the final study. It can expose ambiguous language, broken form logic, an unrealistic completion time, inaccessible response options and recruitment problems.

Explain how content relevance and clarity will be reviewed, how the pilot participants relate to the target population, what aspects of the procedure will be tested, and how revisions will be recorded. For multi-item measures, name the reliability evidence you intend to examine, but do not treat one coefficient as proof that the instrument measures the correct concept. Validity is an argument supported by several forms of evidence.

Data collection procedure

Walk the readers through what will happen:

1. obtain departmental and ethics approval where required

2. obtain permission from recruitment sites or gatekeepers

3. pilot and revise the instrument

4. approach eligible participants using the stated sampling procedure

5. provide the information sheet and obtain informed consent

6. collect responses without coercion

7. store the data securely

8. document response and exclusion decisions before analysis.

These are genuine sequential activities, so presenting them in order is useful.

Data analysis plan

Saying “The data will be entered into SPSS and presented in tables” tells the reader which software may be used, not how the research questions will be answered. Organise the plan by question.

Name the statistical technique only after checking that the proposed variables and sampling design make it appropriate. Explain missing-data handling, data screening and assumption checks at a level expected by your programme. Do not mention that you will do some advanced analysis that you cannot explain or that your sample cannot support.

Ethical considerations

Ethics is not satisfied by one sentence saying “respondents will be assured of confidentiality.” Explain how participants’ autonomy, privacy and welfare will be protected in the actual procedure.

For this politically sensitive topic, I would just address at least:

• Approval: which institutional body must approve the study before recruitment or data collection

• Informed consent: what participants will be told about the purpose, procedure, risks, benefits and contact details

• Voluntary participation: how refusal or withdrawal will occur without penalty

• Data minimisation: why each personal detail is needed

• Privacy: where and how recruitment and completion will occur

• Confidentiality or anonymity: which promise is accurate (data are not anonymous if identifiers or traceable contact details are collected)

• Political sensitivity: how questions will avoid exposing party preference or creating unnecessary risk;

• Data security: encryption or password protection, access control, retention period and secure deletion; and

• Use of social media content: whether quotes, usernames, screenshots or group content could identify people, even when an account is publicly visible.

Do not begin collecting “a few responses” while waiting for approval if your institution requires prior ethics clearance. Pilot data involving human participants may also require approval.

If your study is qualitative or mixed methods, the logic changes

The three-chapter structure may remain, but the questions, sampling, quality criteria and analysis should change with the design.

A qualitative version

A qualitative purpose might be:

To explore how first-time voters interpret disputed electoral claims encountered on social media and how those interpretations shape the way they discuss trust in electoral institutions.

The proposal would justify a qualitative design, recruit participants who can speak meaningfully about that experience, use interviews or focus groups where appropriate, explain how data sufficiency will be judged, and present a transparent plan for coding and thematic or other suitable analysis. It would discuss credibility, reflexivity and the handling of contradictory cases.

A mixed-methods version

Mixed methods is not “questionnaires plus interviews” by default. State why one form of data is insufficient, which strand comes first, how participants or findings connect across strands, where integration occurs, and what the combined evidence can explain that each strand could not explain alone. Creswell and Creswell (2023) distinguish qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods choices precisely because the approach should fit the problem and questions.

References: make every source traceable

Use the style required by your department. APA Style is common across many social and behavioural sciences, but it is not compulsory everywhere. The seventh edition of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association covers student paper elements, headings, tables, figures, in-text citations and reference entries. If your school requires Harvard, Chicago, IEEE, Vancouver or another style, use that instead and apply it consistently.

The reference list contains the works actually cited in the proposal. A bibliography may include other works consulted, but include one only if your department asks for it. Do not list sources you have not read or used.

Before submission, check that:

• every in-text citation has a matching reference entry;

• every reference entry is cited in the text;

• author names and publication years agree in both places;

• journal titles, volume, issue, pages and DOI or URL are accurate;

• you have cited the original source of a theory, instrument or definition where possible

• paraphrased ideas are cited even when you did not copy the exact wording.

A reference manager can reduce clerical errors, but it cannot decide whether you cited the correct work so check every record against the source.

Appendices: include what the reader needs to inspect

Proposal appendices commonly include:

• the proposed questionnaire, interview guide, observation schedule or extraction form

• participant information sheet and consent form

• permission or introduction letters, if already available

• additional technical material required by the department.

Okay.

My advice is

Do not try to make the proposal sound intelligent by making it difficult to read. Your supervisor should be able to identify the problem, follow the evidence, match each question to a method and see the boundaries of the study without guessing. Clear writing is not a sign that the research is simple. It is evidence that you have made the decisions carefully.

Also expect the proposal to change. Preliminary reading may expose a weak assumption, and your supervisor may narrow the population, and a pilot may reveal that an item is misunderstood. Revision is not proof that the first proposal failed. It is part of turning an interesting topic into research that can be completed and defended.

References and further reading

American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.). https://doi.org/10.1037/0000165-000

Booth, W. C., Colomb, G. G., Williams, J. M., Bizup, J., & FitzGerald, W. T. (2024). The craft of research (5th ed.). University of Chicago Press. Publisher page

Creswell, J. W., & Creswell, J. D. (2023). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches (6th ed.). SAGE Publications. Publisher page

Gadjanova, E., Lynch, G., & Saibu, G. (2022). Misinformation across digital divides: Theory and evidence from Northern Ghana. African Affairs, 121(483), 161–195. https://doi.org/10.1093/afraf/adac009

Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Department of Communication Design. (n.d.). Guidelines for MComm/MPhil research proposal. https://decode.knust.edu.gh/graduate/guidelines-mcommmphil-research-proposal

Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology. (n.d.). General thesis structure. KNUST thesis-writing guide

Punch, K. F. (2016). Developing effective research proposals (3rd ed.). SAGE Publications. Publisher page

Tabong, P. T.-N., & Segtub, M. (2021). Misconceptions, misinformation and politics of COVID-19 on social media: A multi-level analysis in Ghana. Frontiers in Communication, 6, Article 613794. https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2021.613794