ECON7360: Research Proposal The University of Queensland
Instructor: Rigissa Megalokonomou Due: 16:00, 30 Oct 2020
The empirical project should be a maximum of 4 pages (not including the title page). The project must be word processed using 11 point font or larger.
1 Writing an Empirical Project
This HW exercise offers general guidelines on writing an empirical research proposal. Note that, in your writing, you do not have to include every section I describe below (in many occasions, even in published papers, the ”economic theory” section is omitted).
2 Description of a Typical Empirical Project
I will discuss the ingredients of a successful empirical analysis, with emphasis on completing a term proposal. The main purpose of a research proposal is to show that the problem/question you propose to investigate is (i) significant enough to warrant the investigation, (ii) the method you plan to use is suitable and feasible, (iii) you have access to a dataset that could execute an empirical analysis and (iv) the results are likely to prove fruitful and (iv) will make an original contribution.
Identifying a Research Question In this stage, you need to find an interesting economic question to yourself. This idea may come from attending lectures, reading newspaper articles, or some others. It might also be related to papers that you read in this course (discussed in lectures or tutorials) or related to the article review that you have already done. You will need to identify (i) feasibility of your proposed research, (ii) data sources, and (iii) suitable methodologies.
You might use this research proposal for further research or for a future thesis. You have to think why you would like to work on this topic, or why anyone would want to do so. Ask yourself, ”Why is it important? What is interesting about this? Suppose I solve it, or find it, or pull it all together, what use is it? What is its significance?” Then, with some questions such as these in mind, go and read more about it to see what is there and find out what aspects of it have been exhausted, what is neglected, what are the main ideas, issues and controversies in the area.
0. The Scope of the Research Question From a writer’s point of view, it is important to pose a very specific question that, in principle, can be answered with some datasets that exists or you are planning to collect or generate.
1. Introduction. (a) First, state the problem to be solved.
(b) Discuss briefly why is the problem important? Suppose you solve the problem, discuss briefly how would a policy marker use there results and what is their significance?
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(c) Identify the methodologies to use and justify why they are suitable (e.g. better in accounting for unob- served confounding factors) as well as feasible (e.g. you have IVs to control for OVB).
(d) Briefly discuss about the main variables of interests (e.g dependent variable, main explanatory variables, treatment, and IVs).
(e) Briefly state the essence of your potential contribution when the investigation is completed and the policy implications.
Q) Please state (a), (b), (c), (d), and (e).
2. Literature Review. (a) Briefly summarize a few papers that are most closely related to your research questions.
(b) Discuss the state of the art (i.e., previous work) and explain why, despite/because of this literature, there remains: (i) confusion; (ii) misunderstanding; (iii) errors; or (iv) some unresolved problem.
You can I do a google search (google or google scholar) for ”the specific research topic” in major journal articles. You can also try to get the main idea of these papers and also look carefully at their literature review for a summary of the research frontiers. Read the literature review in these related papers to see what has been done.
Q) Please state (a) and (b).
3. Economic Theory. (a) Please provide the basic logic of the approach that the paper takes, if there is any. (b) If you have any testable hypotheses, please explain them here. Briefly state the hypotheses (e.g. relationship between variables) you want to empirically tests to give insights to your research question.
Q) If you decide to have an economic theory section, please state (a) and (b). In several papers there is no economic theory part. You will not be deducted marks if you don’t have an economic theory section.
4. Data. (a) Describe the dataset that you would like to use.
Your plan for data collection –(i) source contact (e.g. available to public or apply for an access) (ii) time- frame of collection and data cleaning (e.g. how many hours to complete data collection and cleaning ) (iii) labor inputs (e.g. 5 hrs per week feasible to complete in 2 months).
Hint: The dataset might already exist. You don’t have to download the data or perform any analysis for this proposal. In case you are thinking about an RCT or some other design/experiment that will generate the data on its own, you can briefly describe what kind of data you want to collect though your experiment. Q) Please state (a).
5. Econometric Analysis. (a) Identify the estimable equations and econometric techniques. (b) Also briefly justify the econometric techniques that you are planning to use in your paper. (c) Also discuss po- tential econometric issues – sample selection, omitted variables, simultaneity, or measurement errors? What is your plan to handle these problems?
Q) Please state (a), (b), and (c).
6. Results (a) Briefly discuss potential results you expect to obtain. (b) Also argue that these results are important, what is the policy implication and recommendation, and your original contribution.
Q) Please state (a) and (b).
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