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Research Mapping
Research Mapping
When my LA class was told that we were going to do a research paper, I got scared, but I also expected for this to come.
It's high school, of course there's going to be a research paper.
We were also told that we could choose our own topics to research about, which was a good thing.
But I'm also an indecisive person, so I was worried that I would spend a lot of time choosing a topic--luckily that wasn't the case.
Here's a more thorough documentation of my thought process and research map:
For those who can't watch the video:
I started off trying to think like an inventor, searching for everyday problems that have an impact on many people, so that my research topic will be highly applicable to whomever may be reading my paper. I've come up with a few interesting topics, such as "Why are people afraid of bugs?" and "How does the American education system not appear effective among today's students?" I chose this question because it made it so that I would be more motivated in my research; I would be finding out the truth about what I was going through and about what other people must be going through in this technologically secluded society.
After deciding on the question, "How does loneliness affect mental and social health?", I started to create my research map, which was easy, for I'm a lonely person myself. I asked, is loneliness a part of a "culture"? and what specific aspect of one's health e.g. mental health would be affected by loneliness and social isolation, and how?
After "slicing" my research map based on thoughts and possible assertions that I thought I could research more easily than others, I began my research.
The Research Process 💯💯💯
The Research Process 💯💯💯
I started with defining my assertions by simply just "breaking up" or "simplifying" my topic. My initial topic was about "How loneliness affects health", so all I did was just make the three assertions aboutÂ
mental health ðŸ§
social health (social status) 🌎
financial health 💵
More specifically, how loneliness negatively affects each of those factors.
And just like that, I was done with my assertions! (kind of...)
When my LA teacher, Mrs. Johnston, finally announced that the research process for us began, she told us about how Gwinnett County Public Schools, the school district that I went to for my high school years, was kind enough to buy us students access to hundreds of academic databases, i.e. the "Online Research Library", so I used that as a starting point to "fish" for evidence. At first, finding the sources that I needed, along with making my annotated bibliography, was pretty easy: especially because of the COVID-19 pandemic had forced most of the world's population to quarantine in their homes, finding sources that were relevant to my topic about loneliness and social isolation was a breeze...
Until I had to start finding another assertion to support.
See, most of the recent and creditable research articles and studies I picked out mainly discussed about the COVID-19 pandemic and how loneliness affects mental health, while they didn't really talk about any other aspect of health.
Top: This is a part of my research organizer; the source that's pictured didn't really say much about the COVID-19 pandemic...
Left: This article that's shown in my annotated bibliography, though, does (as seen in the article's title).
So for the other assertions, I had to find more articles and studies that could support them. Luckily, I had just barely enough evidence to back up my assertion for how loneliness negatively affects physical health (btw, did you know that "loneliness and social isolation can be as damaging to an individual's health as smoking 15 cigarettes per day"?), but not enough sources to support my claim that loneliness burdens one's financial health--this is where I had to redo my third assertion and...
improvise.
I remember spending two full periods in LA just trying to find some stable reasons that my sources could support.
And even after deciding on what my last reason would be, I would end up having to search for and find an additional source "last-minute" to strengthen it, just in case.
What was my last assertion?
"Loneliness negatively affects one's suicidal ideation."
And as similar as it may seem to my previous assertion that "loneliness negatively affects mental health", suicide, I realized, is more than just the result of poor mental health: it's the result of both poor mental health that leads to physical pain, suicide. In a way, I realized that my last assertion would tie a lot of aspects of one's health together to make one "web" of connections about how loneliness, when it affects one aspect of one's health, can affect all the rest through a "chain reaction". It was like a "summary" and "applications", if you will.
And yes, if you're wondering, I did procrastinate on this paper...but not by a lot.
But I got it in on time!
And I didn't stay up until 11:59pm on the last day writing it unlike some people I know...
But all in all, I think I did fairly well, despite how my teacher, Mrs. Johnston gave me a 70% "sample grade" on one of my paragraphs I turned in for feedback. *yikes*
If you're curious, here are links to my completed research paper!
"Epilogue"
"Epilogue"
Ok why is there an epilog-
After all of the papers were due, (it was on a Sunday, 11:59pm) it turns out the whole class turned their papers in on time!
This, supposedly, wasn't normal for Mrs. Johnston, for she was used to all of her classes turning in only 70% of their papers in on time (at best), so the whole class got donuts the next day :)
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