Sharing Research Knowledge Before the Study

Key terms

Call for proposals

Funder

Grant

Grantsmanship

Parsimony

Primary source

Proposal

Reviewer

Before actually entering the field or initiating an experimental-type, naturalistic, or mixed-method inquiry, you most likely will have to commit your specific research ideas to paper in the form of a text document. This document, referred to as a proposal, is simply a text or record that describes why and how you “propose” to carry out your research idea. The document details the rationale and the main thinking and action processes you intend to implement. Sections contained in the document typically include the significance of your idea, justification for the need for your research using supportive literature, a statement as to your specific research question or query, specific hypotheses if applicable, your procedures, the analytical plan, ethical considerations, and the informed consent process. This chapter discusses the importance of sharing your research thinking and action processes before entering the field or conducting the inquiry and describes basic approaches.

Reasons for sharing before field engagement

Preparing a document or proposal before engaging in research actions is an important aspect of the research process for several reasons. First, as we discussed in Chapter 12, for any type of research study, you will need to submit a written proposal to a human subject board or research committee of your institution. That is, before starting any type of study, institutional review board (IRB) approval for the conduct of the study must be obtained; otherwise, you are not legally and ethically permitted to implement your research plan. Large health systems, academic institutions, and health and human service settings that have significant research volume usually have their own human subject review committee and establish their own formats for submitting a proposal. Therefore it is important to contact the research office at your institution to secure its specific instructions for writing and submitting a proposal to its office for their review.

Another important reason to prepare a proposal before starting an inquiry is to obtain financial support for the research activity. Most research, regardless of the research tradition and even if it is a pilot study, requires resources to implement. Think of the amount of time and effort that may be required of you and an interviewer, statistical consultant, or others to conduct your study. Consider the costs of materials you may need (e.g., audio or video machine, paper, disks, special computer software programs) or the costs associated with mailings and telephoning. Additionally, you may want to provide a small “honorarium” to study participants as a way of thanking them for their time and effort, a common practice in research. Thus, writing a proposal to request a small or large amount of funds to support the conduct of a study may be critical. Even a small amount (e.g., $150 to $500) can help offset the costs associated with conducting a range of studies and data collection actions, such as conducting a systematic and comprehensive literature review, doing naturalistic or experimental-type meta-analysis, forming a focus group, extracting information from charts, and testing the acceptability of a battery of standardized tests. There are numerous places to seek funding for large or small amounts, including sources internal to your department (e.g., student research funds), referred to as intramural funding programs, and external sources (e.g., federal agency, health foundation), referred to as extramural funding.

Yet another important reason to write a proposal is to have a record of the specific thinking and action processes you plan to implement that you can then share with colleagues to obtain their feedback. Obtaining feedback about your research plan before implementation is an important aspect of the research process. It helps to sharpen your thinking and actions and place your efforts within the larger context of the scientific and consumer communities. Also, a documented plan can serve as your own reference or guide as you proceed with a study.

At some point in your student or professional life and involvement in the world of research, you will need to write a research proposal. Preparing a proposal is not really as intimidating as it may sound. The document can be as brief as 2 to 5 pages for an IRB submission or as lengthy as 40 or more pages when submitting a detailed research plan for consideration of funding from an external agency. Proposal writing is a technical skill. As such, proposals follow particular formats and structures that can be easily learned and applied.

Because committing your ideas to text in the form of a proposal is part of the thinking processes in research, this chapter describes the basic elements of preparing a proposal to document a study and to seek funding. Many types of proposals are written to obtain funding from external sources, such as those written to conduct a conference, purchase equipment, train students or health and human service professionals, and evaluate demonstration projects or service programs. Each type of proposal follows a different format. In this chapter, however, we discuss writing a proposal for research, whether for an experimental-type, naturalistic, or mixed-method study.

A research proposal to secure funding from a particular source is referred to as a “grant.” The process of identifying a suitable funding source and writing the proposal is referred to as grantsmanship. A research grant will usually provide monies for salary support for the investigator and his or her team, the specific materials needed to carry out the research (e.g., supplies, telephone calls, mailings), data analysis, and travel to professional meetings. Because obtaining money is part of the reality of being involved in research, we start by describing key aspects of grantsmanship.

Where to seek support for a research idea

Obtaining funds to support your research activity is one of the main reasons to prepare a research proposal, particularly for large-scale studies or studies requiring specialized or costly equipment or procedures. Finding a funding source for your research idea can be challenging. The funding environment for research is constantly changing, and the priorities and interests of various sources of funding are always being modified in response to advances in health care, new developments in knowledge, societal trends, and congressional activity. Therefore, finding the right funder for your particular research idea may take time and require knowledge of multiple sources that provide information about a wide range of funding opportunities. In this section, we outline some of the major sources of funding for health and human services research.

Where can you find a potential funding source? Your own department, professional organization, student association, reference librarian, and the Internet are all worthwhile places to begin your search for support of your research idea. For example, your own department may have a research fund to support pilot efforts of faculty, students, or professionals; this should be the first place you inquire. Many professional associations also provide small grants, which may range from $2,000 to $50,000 or more, and predoctoral and postdoctoral research stipends. There are also special listservs and Internet-based grant-seeking programs that you can join that will help identify sources of funding based on keywords that reflect your research interests.

Funders usually post on their Web pages and in newsletters what is known as a call for proposals, which is a notice of an opportunity to submit a proposal on a specific topic of interest to an agency or funder. Agencies publish announcements describing a problem area and inviting interested parties to propose ways to investigate all or part of the problem. These announcements vary considerably in the detail used to describe the research they would like to see submitted. The federal government tends to provide explicit descriptions of what needs to be included in grant proposals. Foundations and private companies tend to be much more general as to the format for a research proposal.

The U.S. government remains the largest source of research money available for health-related issues. It is a huge enterprise comprising an array of departments, agencies, institutes, bureaus, and centers. Although there are pockets of money for health and human service professionals throughout the federal government, two departments have a focused interest in health and human services: the Public Health Service within the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), which supports the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the U.S. Department of Education. Within the Department of Education, the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services (OSERS) has a variety of programs of potential interest to the health professions, as does the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR). We have also found that the Department of Agriculture funds research related to environmental health, nutrition, and exercise and the Department of Defense is a source to consider for veterans’ health. Internationally, there are numerous funds that support inquiry, with eligibility for the most part depending on the countries or regions applying.

Private foundations are another source of funding for health and human service research. More than 70,000 foundations in the United States offer grants to individuals, institutions, and other not-for-profit groups. The four types are independent foundations, company-sponsored foundations, operating foundations, and community foundations. Generally, only the first two types provide research support to independent investigators, although all four types offer potential funding opportunities.

Finally, industry such as drug companies, equipment manufacturers, automobile manufacturers, and companies related to or concerned with public health, specific areas of health, and health care often have money available for small research projects. Many large corporations have funds for research projects that advance their interests. A main interest of companies in the private sector is often the testing or evaluation of their own products. For example, an equipment manufacturer may want a new assistive device evaluated for its utility and acceptability, or a company may pay for the development and evaluation of a health-education video that promotes their product.

We recommend that you examine the Web sites of potential funding sources to gain an understanding of the types of research questions and queries they seek to fund and to identify the particular format they require for a proposal submission. As you search for appropriate funding sources, you may discover that your research idea is not of interest to agencies. This does not mean that your idea is without merit, but it does indicate that you will need to rethink or rework your idea to match socially and congressionally sanctioned public health concerns that are embraced by funding agencies. You may find that your research idea is too advanced or “futuristic” to be of interest to funders or that although it is of great interest to your own profession, it is not considered significant from a broad public health perspective. Thus, it is necessary to cast a wide net and look for funding from a range of sources. Of particular importance in finding a match between a funder and your idea are the values of the funder. Make sure that you read the call for proposals, and all other information including the agency mission, previously funded work, publications, and materials carefully and critically to ensure a fit between the values of your research and the funder’s mission.

Consider this example. Suppose you are interested in investigating the extent to which HIV prevention for adolescents is improved through a program of free condom distribution along with instructions for use. You would not apply to a funder that does not approve of premarital sexual activity or birth control to seek funding for such a project.

Who reads a proposal?

When you write a research proposal, it will be read and evaluated by a particular audience, referred to as the reviewer. The reviewer(s) of your proposal may be your research professor; your peers; the head of your clinical or academic department; a diverse committee of consumers, providers, and researchers who review for an institution’s human subject review board; or a group of scientists or scholars from various disciplines. As such, you can be assured that the persons who review your proposal will come from diverse backgrounds and have various levels of exposure and knowledge of the phenomenon you seek to investigate, as well as their own professional standards as to what constitutes scientific inquiry.

When you submit a proposal to your professor, department, or institution or to an external source such as a funding agency, reviewers will evaluate it using various criteria. Usually, the evaluative criteria will be specified in your syllabus or in a call for proposals. For the most part, reviewers are asked to evaluate whether your research plan contributes to knowledge building, is feasible, is scientifically valid, and is worth the costs that you have budgeted. Some reviews are qualitative, and you will receive written comments, whereas others are quantitative and you will receive a score. Writing a proposal is a purposeful process and as such must be carefully crafted to match the evaluative criteria and the background and knowledge base of the audience or reviewer. Thus, before writing down your ideas, it is important to know who evaluates your proposal and the evaluative criteria that will be applied.

Suppose you need to submit a proposal to obtain funding from an agency. By going on the Internet, you identify several potential funding sources that may be appropriate or relevant to your research interest. In reading the directions for proposal development and submission on their Web pages, you learn that one agency emphasizes “innovation,” whereas another agency is concerned with “dissemination” of research findings. Although your basic research idea may not change, in writing the proposal, you would emphasize different aspects of your research plan on the basis of the evaluative criteria and specific interest of the target audience.

In writing a proposal, you also need to define your key concepts carefully and articulate your ideas clearly so that they can be adequately understood by reviewers from diverse disciplines and life experiences. A concept that is core to your discipline may not be relevant to another or may be defined very differently.

Consider the term “disability.” In most health care agencies that provide services, disability is defined as a bodily impairment that influences a major daily function for a prolonged period of time. However, in other disciplines such as contemporary disability studies, the term may refer to the social, economic, and environmentally designed barriers to function, having nothing to do with an embodied diagnosis.1 Defining terms and ensuring that your definitions are consistent with the interests of the funding agency are key to success in grant seeking.

Thus, in writing a proposal, you need to adapt to the lens of your reviewers and define and reference all key terms. In this respect, preparing a proposal is similar to sharing information in the form of a report, which we discuss in Chapter 22. That is, as in report writing, constructing a proposal is purposeful and targets a particular reader or audience, in this case the reviewer.

Writing a research proposal

The principles and processes involved in writing a proposal are similar to those for sharing information and reporting your study at its completion (see Chapter 22).

Basic Principles

There are five basic principles for writing a research proposal: clarity, precision, parsimony, coherence, and attention to structure. Each of these should guide how you write, regardless of the specific purpose of the proposal.1

By “clarity,” we mean that the proposal needs to be easily understood regardless of the reviewer. If a report is vague, verbose, or overly complex in writing style, your research ideas will not be successfully conveyed. By “precision,” we mean explicating each thinking and action plan. As long as you do not exceed the page limit imposed by the funder, err on the side of detail. Consider adding tables, illustrations, and timelines, if allowable, to explicate further your thinking and action. Precision also applies to appearance, grammar, and spelling. Be consistent in headings and subheadings, be vigilant in checking and correcting grammatical errors and spelling, and create a document that is easily legible.

Parsimony is another important principle that should guide your proposal writing. Even when detailing your thinking and action, if the proposal is too lengthy or too wordy, it will be difficult for reviewers to understand your key points. So it is important to be “pithy” and keep your proposal to the point. A proposal is written using simple, direct statements. It is not a place to experiment with a creative writing style or prose.

Coherence, the fourth principle, refers to consistency among and within sections of your proposal (content and format). This element if often overlooked but critical, because you do not want to contradict yourself.

For example, in a proposal to conduct research on a cognitive-behavioral approach to treating depression, if you define depression exclusively as a chemical imbalance, you would not have a rationale for your intervention. Or suppose you plan to travel by airplane to disseminate findings of your work. If you do not include a budget item for out-of-state travel, reviewers would question if the resources that you are seeking would be sufficient to support your objectives and promises.

The fifth principle involves the need for “attention to structure,” such as ensuring that all references are correctly cited, that proposal instructions are carefully followed, and, as we noted earlier, that the proposal is easy to read, with no typos, incorrect spellings, or glaring grammatical errors. We cannot emphasize enough the critical need to follow instructions so that reviewers do not have to hunt for required information. Use techniques such as cross-referencing sections and evaluative criteria to show the reviewers that you value their time and effort.