Your research proposal is your opportunity to show your prospective supervisor that you have interesting ideas, and that you have some idea of how to test them.
It should consist of about two sides of A4, including references and it should include:
- clear empirical objective
- some idea of the research methods you would use
- some theoretical background
Firstly you need to lay out the theoretical background to your research question, and then provide a rationale for testing a hypothesis or two. You should briefly outline your methods, your sample, and the various techniques you hope to use. Finally give a brief statement of how the data will be analysed, and outline what various findings might lead to.
