It’s impossible to finalize the introduction to an article without knowing the results.

I love to write the introduction to an article because I am very familiar with the literature about the topic I write about which is now largely about research methods. The problem – and inefficiency is—that I can write three or four different introductions because it is not hard for me to spot gaps in the literature or subtle differences in viewpoints among the experts. Familiarity with the literature is one reason why the most senior person on a team is generally the one that writes the introduction.

It is far easier to sharpen focus an introduction that lays down the need for the research AFTER you are aware of what findings you are going to prioritize. If you are in the social and applied sciences, you may have already sketched out a few tables and figures that will be at the core of your findings/results section.

The introduction builds an argument for why the research is imporant. Without knowing most of your results, you can distract the reader or even overwhelm them by writing an introduction that very broad. It can introduce ideas and topics that you will never return to.

The Introduction Foreshadows the Discussion Section

As I mentioned in an earlier post about the discussion section (https://wp.me/pdIcJA-m9), you will return to the people cited and the topics addressed when you get to the meat of the disucssion section. There you will establish what it is your research adds to the literature that you said in the introduction was missing. It is also where you will acknowledge the part of the need that you could not not address. These are the gaps in the literature that remain.

Three Strategies for Pinpointing the Need for Research

Many students assume that establishing the need for a research study means that there is nothing in the literature about it. This is a risky strategy because it is impossible to prove.

Three stratergies for pinpointing the need for research:

• It is identified as an area that needs further research in someone else’s article.
• Experts on the topic express different points of view on the topic.
• The topic has not been widely studied or not been studied with the method you expect to use.