The Topic and Research Question

How to Find a Topic and a Research Question

Bogdan G. Popescu
bogdan.popescu@johncabot.edu

John Cabot University

Table of Contents

  1. From Curiosity to Topic
  2. Topic vs. Research Question
  3. Finding and Exploring the Literature
  4. Crafting a Strong Research Question
  5. Evaluating Your Question: Why It Matters

Organization

Before we delve into how to find a question or how to find a topic, we need to organize our space.

Create a folder called “project_x” with the following subfolders (you will change the “x” to a relevant keyword later).

Topic vs. Question

We will distinguish between:

  • Topic: a broad area or theme you’re interested in studying
  • Research Question: a specific, focused question that helps you investigate something within that topic

Research Topic

Intro

A research topic comes from:

  • your curiosity (influenced by events and processes around us)
  • the events, issues, or processes we observe in the world around us
  • the theories and frameworks that you have read (ideally in the academic literature)

Choosing a Topic

How To Find a Topic

  1. What’s a big question you’ve always wondered about?
  2. What’s something people always argue about that you’d like to understand better?

Note: the question should be relevant (present in the news).

  1. See what topics have been published in the leading journals in the last two years

Choosing a Topic

How To Find a Topic

These are topics (and subtopics) that have been published in American Journal of Political Science since Jan 2024

  1. Democratic Backsliding and Political Legitimacy
  • Citizens as a democratic safeguard
  • Populism, legitimacy, and the law
  1. Identity, Ethnicity, and Conflict
  • Administrative units shape ethnic identity
  • Colonial legacies and ethnic party formation

Choosing a Topic

How To Find a Topic

These are topics (and subtopics) that have been published in American Journal of Political Science since Jan 2024

  1. Experimental Methods and Policy Interventions
  • Citizen engagement and Public goods
  • Gender quotas and electoral backlash
  1. Global South and Postcolonial Politics
  • The colonial origins of intergroup inequality
  • The subnational politics of repression in Africa

Choosing a Topic

Advice

  1. Am I excited to spend time thinking and writing about it?
  1. Start broad and narrow down as you read more.
  1. Avoid using AI to generate your topic — this should come from your own curiosity and from the constraints (topics published recently) indicated

Example:

  • Big Topic: climate change
  • Narrower Topic: youth activism and climate change
  • Question: how TikTok is used to spread climate change awareness among teens

Choosing a Topic

Exercise 1

Spend 5 minutes coming up with a topic based on specific curiosity questions (not research questions)

Example:

  • Q1: Can one person really make a difference in the fight against climate change? → Wildfires and Collective Action
  • Q2: My cousin drives an electric car—does that help? → Technology and Climate Change
  • Q3: Should plastic be banned? → Policy Effectiveness and Climate Change
  • Q4: Do gender quotas produce backlash from men in parliaments? → Political Representation and Rhetoric

Choosing a Topic

Exercise 2: Making the Topic Yours

Circle 2-3 questions that most interest you.

When you circle them, spend 5 minutes writing 1–2 sentences for each of the following questions:

  • Why does this matter to me?
  • What do I think is true about this?
  • What aspect of the problems do I want to know more about?

Choosing a Topic

Exercise 2: Making the Topic Yours

Example: Q4: Do gender quotas produce backlash from men in parliaments? → Political Representation and Rhetoric

1. Why does this matter to me?

Because it reveals how efforts to improve representation can unintentionally provoke resistance from those who feel their power is threatened. Understanding that backlash helps explain why progress on gender equality is often uneven or fragile.

2.What do I think is true about this?

I think it’s true that some men respond defensively to gender quotas—not just out of self-interest, but because they view them as unfair or symbolic rather than merit-based.

3. What aspect of the problem do I want to know more about?

I want to understand how backlash manifests—whether it affects legislative behavior, cooperation, or public rhetoric—and whether it can be mitigated through institutional design or framing strategies.

Topic

Finding the Topic

The topic may also potentially change once you become a bit more familiar with the literature.

The next step will be to join an intellectual conversation by becoming familiar with the literature

We will have a dedicated session later for how to do a literature review.

Finding the Topic

To Do

Make a list of articles that are close to your personal interest.

After clarifying why your topic matters to you, the next step is to find out how other scholars have approached it.

  • Search online (Google Scholar) for 3 articles directly related to your topic.
  • Type in the two factors you might be interested in. For example:
    • “youth activism and climate change”
    • “citizen participation and democratic backsliding”
    • “colonial legacies and quality of bureaucracy”
    • “gender quotas and political rhetoric”

Finding the Topic

Example

Let’s imagine I am interested in “gender quotas and political rhetoric”

Finding the Topic

Example

Let’s imagine I am interested in “gender quotas and political rhetoric”

Finding the Topic

Example

Let’s imagine I am interested in “gender quotas and political rhetoric”

Finding the Topic

Example

Choose based on:

  • relevance (how close it is to what interests you)
  • citations (indicator for how popular the scholar’s work is)
  • source type (favor peer-reviewed publications like “Journal of …”)