To be able to conduct research effectively, you must first find and formulate a research question that can be examined and answered in a structured manner. Your supervisor will generally help you in this process. Whether you have to formulate your research question fairly independently or whether it is suggested by a department or the supervisor typically depends on the subject you are engaged in. Topics in the Natural Sciences are more likely to be formulated in close collaboration with a supervisor or a department, whereas research questions in the Humanities or Social Sciences tend to be formulated by the student first and then later tweaked by the supervisor.

In either case, there are some basic rules to follow when finding your topic:

1. find a question that poses a real and verifiable problem within your field of study,

2. find a unique ‘lens’ with which to tackle the problem

3. keep it simple, manageable and executable.

There is little point in devising a research question that is simply too broad to tackle in the allocated time frame, no matter how pertinent it may be to human knowledge. A research question that is formulated in terms that are too broad runs the risk of going astray in the research process and may ultimately fail to support your thesis.  Research for a PhD degree should be conducted independently by the student. This means that the student must devise his or her own schedule of intensive research, set medium and long term goals, formulate plans to meet those goals and meet deadlines and manage the process closely. This includes controlling any unforeseen changes to plans in order to keep an eye on the overarching goal.

Effective research includes that you take initiatives to make an original contribution to the field of your research and that you develop communication skills which allow you to express your conclusions effectively. While the onus of this work lies primarily with the student, he or she will be supported considerably by a supervisor or supervising committee. The supervisor should be able to help students in delineating projects, timelines and give general guidelines. The supervisor or supervising committee is typically also involved in giving the student exposure to international conferences in the field or access to publications within which some of the ongoing work can be published. In very general terms, a PhD student is expected to publish at least one article in a relevant publication and attend no less than two or three conferences on average. Submission of such work and presentation of one’s material at a conference provides an ideal framework to practice defending your conclusion and get feedback on the work conducted so far.

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