types of research titles

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How To Find A Research Topic

If you’re struggling to get started, this step-by-step video tutorial will help you find the perfect research topic.

Research Topic FAQs

What (exactly) is a research topic.

A research topic is the subject of a research project or study – for example, a dissertation or thesis. A research topic typically takes the form of a problem to be solved, or a question to be answered.

A good research topic should be specific enough to allow for focused research and analysis. For example, if you are interested in studying the effects of climate change on agriculture, your research topic could focus on how rising temperatures have impacted crop yields in certain regions over time.

To learn more about the basics of developing a research topic, consider our free research topic ideation webinar.

What constitutes a good research topic?

A strong research topic comprises three important qualities : originality, value and feasibility.

• Originality – a good topic explores an original area or takes a novel angle on an existing area of study.
• Value – a strong research topic provides value and makes a contribution, either academically or practically.
• Feasibility – a good research topic needs to be practical and manageable, given the resource constraints you face.

To learn more about what makes for a high-quality research topic, check out this post .

What's the difference between a research topic and research problem?

A research topic and a research problem are two distinct concepts that are often confused. A research topic is a broader label that indicates the focus of the study , while a research problem is an issue or gap in knowledge within the broader field that needs to be addressed.

To illustrate this distinction, consider a student who has chosen “teenage pregnancy in the United Kingdom” as their research topic. This research topic could encompass any number of issues related to teenage pregnancy such as causes, prevention strategies, health outcomes for mothers and babies, etc.

Within this broad category (the research topic) lies potential areas of inquiry that can be explored further – these become the research problems . For example:

• What factors contribute to higher rates of teenage pregnancy in certain communities?
• How do different types of parenting styles affect teen pregnancy rates?
• What interventions have been successful in reducing teenage pregnancies?

Simply put, a key difference between a research topic and a research problem is scope ; the research topic provides an umbrella under which multiple questions can be asked, while the research problem focuses on one specific question or set of questions within that larger context.

How can I find potential research topics for my project?

There are many steps involved in the process of finding and choosing a high-quality research topic for a dissertation or thesis. We cover these steps in detail in this video (also accessible below).

How can I find quality sources for my research topic?

Finding quality sources is an essential step in the topic ideation process. To do this, you should start by researching scholarly journals, books, and other academic publications related to your topic. These sources can provide reliable information on a wide range of topics. Additionally, they may contain data or statistics that can help support your argument or conclusions.

Identifying Relevant Sources

When searching for relevant sources, it’s important to look beyond just published material; try using online databases such as Google Scholar or JSTOR to find articles from reputable journals that have been peer-reviewed by experts in the field.

You can also use search engines like Google or Bing to locate websites with useful information about your topic. However, be sure to evaluate any website before citing it as a source—look for evidence of authorship (such as an “About Us” page) and make sure the content is up-to-date and accurate before relying on it.

Evaluating Sources

Once you’ve identified potential sources for your research project, take some time to evaluate them thoroughly before deciding which ones will best serve your purpose. Consider factors such as author credibility (are they an expert in their field?), publication date (is the source current?), objectivity (does the author present both sides of an issue?) and relevance (how closely does this source relate to my specific topic?).

By researching the current literature on your topic, you can identify potential sources that will help to provide quality information. Once you’ve identified these sources, it’s time to look for a gap in the research and determine what new knowledge could be gained from further study.

How can I find a good research gap?

Finding a strong gap in the literature is an essential step when looking for potential research topics. We explain what research gaps are and how to find them in this post.

How should I evaluate potential research topics/ideas?

When evaluating potential research topics, it is important to consider the factors that make for a strong topic (we discussed these earlier). Specifically:

• Originality
• Feasibility

So, when you have a list of potential topics or ideas, assess each of them in terms of these three criteria. A good topic should take a unique angle, provide value (either to academia or practitioners), and be practical enough for you to pull off, given your limited resources.

Finally, you should also assess whether this project could lead to potential career opportunities such as internships or job offers down the line. Make sure that you are researching something that is relevant enough so that it can benefit your professional development in some way. Additionally, consider how each research topic aligns with your career goals and interests; researching something that you are passionate about can help keep motivation high throughout the process.

How can I assess the feasibility of a research topic?

When evaluating the feasibility and practicality of a research topic, it is important to consider several factors.

First, you should assess whether or not the research topic is within your area of competence. Of course, when you start out, you are not expected to be the world’s leading expert, but do should at least have some foundational knowledge.

Time commitment

When considering a research topic, you should think about how much time will be required for completion. Depending on your field of study, some topics may require more time than others due to their complexity or scope.

Additionally, if you plan on collaborating with other researchers or institutions in order to complete your project, additional considerations must be taken into account such as coordinating schedules and ensuring that all parties involved have adequate resources available.

Resources needed

It’s also critically important to consider what type of resources are necessary in order to conduct the research successfully. This includes physical materials such as lab equipment and chemicals but can also include intangible items like access to certain databases or software programs which may be necessary depending on the nature of your work. Additionally, if there are costs associated with obtaining these materials then this must also be factored into your evaluation process.

Potential risks

It’s important to consider the inherent potential risks for each potential research topic. These can include ethical risks (challenges getting ethical approval), data risks (not being able to access the data you’ll need), technical risks relating to the equipment you’ll use and funding risks (not securing the necessary financial back to undertake the research).

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• USC Libraries
• Research Guides

Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper

• Choosing a Title
• Purpose of Guide
• Design Flaws to Avoid
• Independent and Dependent Variables
• Glossary of Research Terms
• Reading Research Effectively
• Narrowing a Topic Idea
• Broadening a Topic Idea
• Extending the Timeliness of a Topic Idea
• Academic Writing Style
• Applying Critical Thinking
• Making an Outline
• Paragraph Development
• Research Process Video Series
• Executive Summary
• The C.A.R.S. Model
• Background Information
• The Research Problem/Question
• Theoretical Framework
• Citation Tracking
• Content Alert Services
• Evaluating Sources
• Primary Sources
• Secondary Sources
• Tiertiary Sources
• Scholarly vs. Popular Publications
• Qualitative Methods
• Quantitative Methods
• Insiderness
• Using Non-Textual Elements
• Limitations of the Study
• Common Grammar Mistakes
• Writing Concisely
• Avoiding Plagiarism
• Footnotes or Endnotes?
• Further Readings
• Generative AI and Writing
• USC Libraries Tutorials and Other Guides
• Bibliography

The title summarizes the main idea or ideas of your study. A good title contains the fewest possible words needed to adequately describe the content and/or purpose of your research paper.

Importance of Choosing a Good Title

The title is the part of a paper that is read the most, and it is usually read first . It is, therefore, the most important element that defines the research study. With this in mind, avoid the following when creating a title:

• If the title is too long, this usually indicates there are too many unnecessary words. Avoid language, such as, "A Study to Investigate the...," or "An Examination of the...." These phrases are obvious and generally superfluous unless they are necessary to covey the scope, intent, or type of a study.
• On the other hand, a title which is too short often uses words which are too broad and, thus, does not tell the reader what is being studied. For example, a paper with the title, "African Politics" is so non-specific the title could be the title of a book and so ambiguous that it could refer to anything associated with politics in Africa. A good title should provide information about the focus and/or scope of your research study.
• In academic writing, catchy phrases or non-specific language may be used, but only if it's within the context of the study [e.g., "Fair and Impartial Jury--Catch as Catch Can"]. However, in most cases, you should avoid including words or phrases that do not help the reader understand the purpose of your paper.
• Academic writing is a serious and deliberate endeavor. Avoid using humorous or clever journalistic styles of phrasing when creating the title to your paper. Journalistic headlines often use emotional adjectives [e.g., incredible, amazing, effortless] to highlight a problem experienced by the reader or use "trigger words" or interrogative words like how, what, when, or why to persuade people to read the article or click on a link. These approaches are viewed as counter-productive in academic writing. A reader does not need clever or humorous titles to catch their attention because the act of reading research is assumed to be deliberate based on a desire to learn and improve understanding of the problem. In addition, a humorous title can merely detract from the seriousness and authority of your research. 
• Unlike everywhere else in a college-level social sciences research paper [except when using direct quotes in the text], titles do not have to adhere to rigid grammatical or stylistic standards. For example, it could be appropriate to begin a title with a coordinating conjunction [i.e., and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet] if it makes sense to do so and does not detract from the purpose of the study [e.g., "Yet Another Look at Mutual Fund Tournaments"] or beginning the title with an inflected form of a verb such as those ending in -ing [e.g., "Assessing the Political Landscape: Structure, Cognition, and Power in Organizations"].

Appiah, Kingsley Richard et al. “Structural Organisation of Research Article Titles: A Comparative Study of Titles of Business, Gynaecology and Law.” Advances in Language and Literary Studies 10 (2019); Hartley James. “To Attract or to Inform: What are Titles for?” Journal of Technical Writing and Communication 35 (2005): 203-213; Jaakkola, Maarit. “Journalistic Writing and Style.” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Communication . Jon F. Nussbaum, editor. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018): https://oxfordre.com/communication.

Structure and Writing Style

The following parameters can be used to help you formulate a suitable research paper title:

• The purpose of the research
• The scope of the research
• The narrative tone of the paper [typically defined by the type of the research]
• The methods used to study the problem

The initial aim of a title is to capture the reader’s attention and to highlight the research problem under investigation.

Create a Working Title Typically, the final title you submit to your professor is created after the research is complete so that the title accurately captures what has been done . The working title should be developed early in the research process because it can help anchor the focus of the study in much the same way the research problem does. Referring back to the working title can help you reorient yourself back to the main purpose of the study if you find yourself drifting off on a tangent while writing. The Final Title Effective titles in research papers have several characteristics that reflect general principles of academic writing.

• Indicate accurately the subject and scope of the study,
• Rarely use abbreviations or acronyms unless they are commonly known,
• Use words that create a positive impression and stimulate reader interest,
• Use current nomenclature from the field of study,
• Identify key variables, both dependent and independent,
• Reveal how the paper will be organized,
• Suggest a relationship between variables which supports the major hypothesis,
• Is limited to 5 to 15 substantive words,
• Does not include redundant phrasing, such as, "A Study of," "An Analysis of" or similar constructions,
• Takes the form of a question or declarative statement,
• If you use a quote as part of the title, the source of the quote is cited [usually using an asterisk and footnote],
• Use correct grammar and capitalization with all first words and last words capitalized, including the first word of a subtitle. All nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs that appear between the first and last words of the title are also capitalized, and
• Rarely uses an exclamation mark at the end of the title.

The Subtitle Subtitles are frequently used in social sciences research papers because it helps the reader understand the scope of the study in relation to how it was designed to address the research problem. Think about what type of subtitle listed below reflects the overall approach to your study and whether you believe a subtitle is needed to emphasize the investigative parameters of your research.

1.  Explains or provides additional context , e.g., "Linguistic Ethnography and the Study of Welfare Institutions as a Flow of Social Practices: The Case of Residential Child Care Institutions as Paradoxical Institutions." [Palomares, Manuel and David Poveda.  Text & Talk: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Language, Discourse and Communication Studies 30 (January 2010): 193-212]

2.  Adds substance to a literary, provocative, or imaginative title or quote , e.g., "Listen to What I Say, Not How I Vote": Congressional Support for the President in Washington and at Home." [Grose, Christian R. and Keesha M. Middlemass. Social Science Quarterly 91 (March 2010): 143-167]

3.  Qualifies the geographic scope of the research , e.g., "The Geopolitics of the Eastern Border of the European Union: The Case of Romania-Moldova-Ukraine." [Marcu, Silvia. Geopolitics 14 (August 2009): 409-432]

4.  Qualifies the temporal scope of the research , e.g., "A Comparison of the Progressive Era and the Depression Years: Societal Influences on Predictions of the Future of the Library, 1895-1940." [Grossman, Hal B. Libraries & the Cultural Record 46 (2011): 102-128]

5.  Focuses on investigating the ideas, theories, or work of a particular individual , e.g., "A Deliberative Conception of Politics: How Francesco Saverio Merlino Related Anarchy and Democracy." [La Torre, Massimo. Sociologia del Diritto 28 (January 2001): 75 - 98]

6.  Identifies the methodology used , e.g. "Student Activism of the 1960s Revisited: A Multivariate Analysis Research Note." [Aron, William S. Social Forces 52 (March 1974): 408-414]

7.  Defines the overarching technique for analyzing the research problem , e.g., "Explaining Territorial Change in Federal Democracies: A Comparative Historical Institutionalist Approach." [ Tillin, Louise. Political Studies 63 (August 2015): 626-641.

With these examples in mind, think about what type of subtitle reflects the overall approach to your study. This will help the reader understand the scope of the study in relation to how it was designed to address the research problem.

Anstey, A. “Writing Style: What's in a Title?” British Journal of Dermatology 170 (May 2014): 1003-1004; Balch, Tucker. How to Compose a Title for Your Research Paper. Augmented Trader blog. School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Tech University; Bavdekar, Sandeep B. “Formulating the Right Title for a Research Article.” Journal of Association of Physicians of India 64 (February 2016); Choosing the Proper Research Paper Titles. AplusReports.com, 2007-2012; Eva, Kevin W. “Titles, Abstracts, and Authors.” In How to Write a Paper . George M. Hall, editor. 5th edition. (Oxford: John Wiley and Sons, 2013), pp. 33-41; Hartley James. “To Attract or to Inform: What are Titles for?” Journal of Technical Writing and Communication 35 (2005): 203-213; General Format. The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Kerkut G.A. “Choosing a Title for a Paper.” Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology Part A: Physiology 74 (1983): 1; “Tempting Titles.” In Stylish Academic Writing . Helen Sword, editor. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012), pp. 63-75; Nundy, Samiran, et al. “How to Choose a Title?” In How to Practice Academic Medicine and Publish from Developing Countries? A Practical Guide . Edited by Samiran Nundy, Atul Kakar, and Zulfiqar A. Bhutta. (Springer Singapore, 2022), pp. 185-192.

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Types of Research – Explained with Examples

• By DiscoverPhDs
• October 2, 2020

Types of Research

Research is about using established methods to investigate a problem or question in detail with the aim of generating new knowledge about it.

It is a vital tool for scientific advancement because it allows researchers to prove or refute hypotheses based on clearly defined parameters, environments and assumptions. Due to this, it enables us to confidently contribute to knowledge as it allows research to be verified and replicated.

Knowing the types of research and what each of them focuses on will allow you to better plan your project, utilises the most appropriate methodologies and techniques and better communicate your findings to other researchers and supervisors.

Classification of Types of Research

There are various types of research that are classified according to their objective, depth of study, analysed data, time required to study the phenomenon and other factors. It’s important to note that a research project will not be limited to one type of research, but will likely use several.

According to its Purpose

Theoretical research.

Theoretical research, also referred to as pure or basic research, focuses on generating knowledge , regardless of its practical application. Here, data collection is used to generate new general concepts for a better understanding of a particular field or to answer a theoretical research question.

Results of this kind are usually oriented towards the formulation of theories and are usually based on documentary analysis, the development of mathematical formulas and the reflection of high-level researchers.

Applied Research

Here, the goal is to find strategies that can be used to address a specific research problem. Applied research draws on theory to generate practical scientific knowledge, and its use is very common in STEM fields such as engineering, computer science and medicine.

This type of research is subdivided into two types:

• Technological applied research : looks towards improving efficiency in a particular productive sector through the improvement of processes or machinery related to said productive processes.
• Scientific applied research : has predictive purposes. Through this type of research design, we can measure certain variables to predict behaviours useful to the goods and services sector, such as consumption patterns and viability of commercial projects.

According to your Depth of Scope

Exploratory research.

Exploratory research is used for the preliminary investigation of a subject that is not yet well understood or sufficiently researched. It serves to establish a frame of reference and a hypothesis from which an in-depth study can be developed that will enable conclusive results to be generated.

Because exploratory research is based on the study of little-studied phenomena, it relies less on theory and more on the collection of data to identify patterns that explain these phenomena.

Descriptive Research

The primary objective of descriptive research is to define the characteristics of a particular phenomenon without necessarily investigating the causes that produce it.

In this type of research, the researcher must take particular care not to intervene in the observed object or phenomenon, as its behaviour may change if an external factor is involved.

Explanatory Research

Explanatory research is the most common type of research method and is responsible for establishing cause-and-effect relationships that allow generalisations to be extended to similar realities. It is closely related to descriptive research, although it provides additional information about the observed object and its interactions with the environment.

Correlational Research

The purpose of this type of scientific research is to identify the relationship between two or more variables. A correlational study aims to determine whether a variable changes, how much the other elements of the observed system change.

According to the Type of Data Used

Qualitative research.

Qualitative methods are often used in the social sciences to collect, compare and interpret information, has a linguistic-semiotic basis and is used in techniques such as discourse analysis, interviews, surveys, records and participant observations.

In order to use statistical methods to validate their results, the observations collected must be evaluated numerically. Qualitative research, however, tends to be subjective, since not all data can be fully controlled. Therefore, this type of research design is better suited to extracting meaning from an event or phenomenon (the ‘why’) than its cause (the ‘how’).

Quantitative Research

Quantitative research study delves into a phenomena through quantitative data collection and using mathematical, statistical and computer-aided tools to measure them . This allows generalised conclusions to be projected over time.

According to the Degree of Manipulation of Variables

Experimental research.

It is about designing or replicating a phenomenon whose variables are manipulated under strictly controlled conditions in order to identify or discover its effect on another independent variable or object. The phenomenon to be studied is measured through study and control groups, and according to the guidelines of the scientific method.

Non-Experimental Research

Also known as an observational study, it focuses on the analysis of a phenomenon in its natural context. As such, the researcher does not intervene directly, but limits their involvement to measuring the variables required for the study. Due to its observational nature, it is often used in descriptive research.

Quasi-Experimental Research

It controls only some variables of the phenomenon under investigation and is therefore not entirely experimental. In this case, the study and the focus group cannot be randomly selected, but are chosen from existing groups or populations . This is to ensure the collected data is relevant and that the knowledge, perspectives and opinions of the population can be incorporated into the study.

According to the Type of Inference

Deductive investigation.

In this type of research, reality is explained by general laws that point to certain conclusions; conclusions are expected to be part of the premise of the research problem and considered correct if the premise is valid and the inductive method is applied correctly.

Inductive Research

In this type of research, knowledge is generated from an observation to achieve a generalisation. It is based on the collection of specific data to develop new theories.

Hypothetical-Deductive Investigation

It is based on observing reality to make a hypothesis, then use deduction to obtain a conclusion and finally verify or reject it through experience.

According to the Time in Which it is Carried Out

Longitudinal study (also referred to as diachronic research).

It is the monitoring of the same event, individual or group over a defined period of time. It aims to track changes in a number of variables and see how they evolve over time. It is often used in medical, psychological and social areas .

Cross-Sectional Study (also referred to as Synchronous Research)

Cross-sectional research design is used to observe phenomena, an individual or a group of research subjects at a given time.

According to The Sources of Information

Primary research.

This fundamental research type is defined by the fact that the data is collected directly from the source, that is, it consists of primary, first-hand information.

Secondary research

Unlike primary research, secondary research is developed with information from secondary sources, which are generally based on scientific literature and other documents compiled by another researcher.

According to How the Data is Obtained

Documentary (cabinet).

Documentary research, or secondary sources, is based on a systematic review of existing sources of information on a particular subject. This type of scientific research is commonly used when undertaking literature reviews or producing a case study.

Field research study involves the direct collection of information at the location where the observed phenomenon occurs.

From Laboratory

Laboratory research is carried out in a controlled environment in order to isolate a dependent variable and establish its relationship with other variables through scientific methods.

Mixed-Method: Documentary, Field and/or Laboratory

Mixed research methodologies combine results from both secondary (documentary) sources and primary sources through field or laboratory research.

In the UK, a dissertation, usually around 20,000 words is written by undergraduate and Master’s students, whilst a thesis, around 80,000 words, is written as part of a PhD.

How should you spend your first week as a PhD student? Here’s are 7 steps to help you get started on your journey.

This post gives you the best questions to ask at a PhD interview, to help you work out if your potential supervisor and lab is a good fit for you.

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Self-plagiarism is when you try and pass off work that you’ve previously done as something that is completely new.

In this post you’ll learn what the significance of the study means, why it’s important, where and how to write one in your paper or thesis with an example.

Aaron’s now writing up his PhD thesis at the University of Birmingham. His research has investigated the Impact and Mitigation of Wavefront Distortions in Precision Interferometry.

Nick is a first year PhD student at Queen Mary University of London. The long-term goal of his research is to help game designers make games that support healthy engagement and well-being.

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Writing Clear Science

Learn to write clearly and succinctly, without sacrificing the accuracy of your topic..

How to write good research paper titles

Your title is the first and most important step in engaging your reader. It should be concise, interesting and summarise the essential content of the document. Any title that is lengthy, overly complex, ambiguous or misleading can turn away prospective readers. This writing guide gives an overview of the different types of titles and explains the essential steps in designing your title.

Title structure

Titles can be sentence fragments, complete sentences or compound sentences with the second sentence typically following a colon.

To help the paper appear in search results, it is common practice to place keywords in the title. Keywords used in the title should be placed in the beginning in case only a fragment of the title appears in the search results. 

Terms used to describe types of titles

Common terms used to describe different types of research paper titles are Descriptive, declarative, interrogative, suggestive, humorous and combination titles.

Descriptive titles or indicative titles

Descriptive titles state the subject, topic, design, purpose or methods of the project. For example:

• ‘Effects of natural forest and tree plantations on leaf-litter frog assemblages in Southern Brazil.’ ( Cicheleiro et al. 2021 ).
• ‘An efficient incremental learning mechanism for tracking concept drift in spam filtering.’ ( Jyh-Jian et al. 2017 ).

Declarative or Informative titles

These titles give the main findings or result of the study. For example:

• ‘Novel flight style and light wings boost flight performance of tiny beetles.’ ( Farisenkov et al 2022 ).
• ‘Cause of hypereosinophilia shows itself after 6 years: Loa loa.’ ( Hicks et al. 2022 ).

There is some concern that presenting the results or conclusions in the title of a paper will appear presumptive: that titles containing a definitive statement or final conclusion of a study, might prove problematic if that finding is later disproved.

Some journals prefer informative titles. For example, the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology has “… an editorial policy of “more informative titles” (MITs) that crisply and concisely tell our readers what our authors found in their research. A MIT states the study type and summarizes its key findings, using the past tense for individual studies and the present tense for systematic reviews .” The idea is that titles for small individual studies should be written in past tense to allow future studies to overrule or disagree with their findings, while titles should be written in present tense for studies that are unlikely to be over-ruled by later studies: i.e. literature reviews. Some research has also demonstrated that “articles with short titles describing the results are cited more often.” ( Paiva et al. 2012 ).

Interrogative titles

Interrogative titles or titles phrased as a question. The use of questions in titles can create interest by making the reader immediately wonder what the answer might be. It is also a concise way of presenting the research topic.

For example:  

• ‘Does adding video and subtitles to an audio lesson facilitate its comprehension?’ ( Zheng et al. 2022 ).
• ‘Microbial defenses against mobile genetic elements and viruses: Who defends whom from what?’ ( Eduardo et al. 2022 ).

Suggestive titles

These are titles that are slightly ambiguous or overly brief to hint or suggest what the findings might be, presumably to create suspense to entice the reader to find out what the answer is. For example:

• ‘Drawing to improve metacomprehension accuracy’. ( Thiede et al. 2022 ).
• ‘The puzzle of high temperature superconductivity in layered iron pnictides and chalcogenides.’ ( Johnston 2010 ).

Humorous or colloquial title

These are titles that hope to attract interest through humour or common-use sayings, colloquialism or metaphors. These types of titles can be used to good effect. However, be mindful that colloquialisms might not make sense to readers from different language or cultural backgrounds.

For example:

• ‘miR miR on the wall, who's the most malignant medulloblastoma miR of them all?’ ( Wang et al 2018 ).
• ‘One ring to multiplex them all’ ( Torres-Company 2017 ).
• ‘Sauropod farts warmed the planet.’ ( Marshall 2012 ).

Combination titles

Combination titles are those that include a combination of different types listed above.

The following example uses a colloquialism in the key title with the findings mentioned in the sub-title:

• ‘Standing out in a crowd: Intraspecific variability in dorsal patterning allows for photo-identification of a threatened anuran.’ ( Gould et al. 2021 ).

The following example has the following structure: ‘Topic: results of study’

• Plastic Pollution in the World's Oceans: More than 5 Trillion Plastic Pieces Weighing over 250,000 Tons Afloat at Sea ( Eriksen et al. 2014 ).

Which type is better?

There are conflicting views which type of title is better. There are arguments for and against different types, with research findings presenting the pros and cons of different types of title. Before you decide which is best, first look at how titles are commonly structured in recently published journals within your discipline.

Essential steps in designing your title

The following steps will help you design your document title.

1. Read the Instructions to Authors

Once you have selected a journal, review the types of titles recently published and read the Instructions to Authors to learn what the journal requires for paper titles. Instructions regarding titles are often brief. For example:

- Elsevier’s Guide for Authors “Title - Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations and formulae where possible.”

- Plos One Submission Guidelines state that titles should be “…Specific, descriptive, concise, and comprehensible to readers outside the field.” and “…written in sentence case (only the first word of the text, proper nouns, and genus names are capitalized). Avoid specialist abbreviations if possible. For clinical trials, systematic reviews, or meta-analyses, the subtitle should include the study design.”

2. Consider your audience

Although the expected audience is broadly set by the scope of the journal, you still need to identify who will be interested in your paper. Who is your target audience? Are they scientists who mostly work in your field or will they include researchers from other disciplines? Consider what aspects of your project would attract your target audience and whether or not you can include these in your title.

3. Decide what aspects of your study to include in your title

As outlined above (Types of titles) decide whether you want to describe the process (descriptive) the result (informative) the research question or problem (integrative) or a combination of these factors.

Description of methods and study design

Titles of research papers, reports and conference proceedings often contain standard research methods. For example:  

• ‘Plant-based diets and incident cardiovascular disease and all-cause mortality in African Americans: A cohort study.’ ( Weston et al. 2022 ).
• ‘Using scale modelling to assess the prehistoric acoustics of Stonehenge.’ ( Cox et al. 2020 ).
• ‘The use of chronosequences in studies of ecological succession and soil development.’ ( Walker et al 2010 ).

Description of study subjects and location

Titles often just describe the key study subject, and also often including habitat or location. For example: 

• ‘Making (remote) sense of lianas.’ ( van der Heijden 2022 ).
• ‘The vulnerability of native rangeland plant species to global climate change in the West Asia and North African regions’ ( Ouled Belgacem & Louhaichi 2013 ).

How specific or general should your title be?

Your title should be unique to your project. Hopefully, no one else is writing a paper exactly the same as you, and your title should reflect this. If your title is too broad or general, then you may give the impression that the study is larger than it is or that it is a literature review.  This is when it is important to make a distinction between ‘topic’ (general) and ‘title’ (specific). Unless you are writing a literature review or presenting a large-scale study, don’t give your research topic as your title.

Including information on the scope of the study will also help the reader understand the magnitude of your study and from this, the importance and implications of the findings. In the following example, “in highway bridges” gives the scope of the study:

• ‘Finite element based fatigue assessment of corrugated steel web beams in highway bridges.’ ( Wang & Wang 2015 ).

Avoid making your title too long with too much specific detail. For example, perhaps this title is too long:

• ‘Use of open-text responses to recode categorical survey data on postpartum contraception use among women in the United States: A mixed-methods inquiry of Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System data.’ ( Richards et al, 2022 ).

4. Consider your reader’s behaviour

Assume your reader only has a short time to decide if your title is relevant and that they will only review the abstract if the title interests them. Titles that include standard procedures, common cause-effect scenarios or well-known research topics, might be overlooked in preference for titles describing unique approaches or interesting findings.

5. Check that your title is clear and easy to read 

Your main message must be clear. Your titles don’t have to be grammatically-complete sentences, but make sure they make sense, especially if you have tried to shorten them by cutting out words. Don’t sacrifice clarity for brevity by making your title obscure.

Beware of using adjectival-noun strings in your titles. This is when authors try and be more concise by placing too many adjectives in front a single noun making it difficult to decipher whether each adjective is actually modifying the root noun or another word in the adjectival-noun string. Take an example from a student report: ‘ Australian insecticide control failure .’ (Anon.) This might be interpreted as:

• The failure of insecticide to control something in Australia.
• The failure of Australian insecticide to control something somewhere else.
• The failure to control [the use of] Australian insecticide.

Another unclear example: ‘Post head emergence spring radiative frost damage of winter cereals.’ (Anon.) It could be made even longer: ‘Winter cereal post head emergence spring radiative frost damage.’ 

6. Check your title length  

The shorter the title, the easier it will be to read but only to a certain point. Too short and you risk sacrificing your meaning. Also, If you leave out too much detail, the title may appear too general and mislead the reader. If the reader has to guess what the meaning, you increase the chance of losing them. Check that your title is not too ambiguous, cryptic or inadvertently misleading. An ambiguous media release example:

• ‘Lupins show healthy potential for increased human consumption.’ ( Australian Food News 2008 ).

7. Check that your title is concise

Titles can be made more concise by removing unnecessary repetition and detail. Common research phrases can be removed without affecting the meaning or structure of the title. Examples of these research phrases include ‘The influence of...’, ‘The role of..’, ‘Effects of..’, ‘Observations of..,’ ‘Studies on...’

For example: ‘Annual variation in the distribution of summer snowdrifts in the Kosciuszko alpine area, Australia, and its effect on the composition and structure of alpine vegetation.’  ( Edmonds et al. 2006 ) [25 words] could be reduced to: “Distribution of summer snowdrifts influences composition and structure of Kosciuszko alpine vegetation, Australia” [13 words].  

8. Ways to make your title more interesting

Ask a question

By writing a title in the form of a question you are immediately inviting the reader to think. For example:

• ‘Whose shoulders is health research standing on? Determining the key actors and contents of the prevailing biomedical research agenda.’ ( Testoni et al. 2021 ).

Be humorous or focus on the unusual or unexpected

Mildly humorous titles immediately engage the reader while unusual or unexpected tiles create curiosity.

• ‘On human odour, malaria mosquitoes, and Limburger cheese.’ ( Knols 1996 ).

Final considerations

My key advice is, ensure your title is concise, easy to read (for your target audience), not too long and adequately reflects your study’s design or purpose (not too general or too specific).

• Is it hard to read?
• If it is a question, does it make your reader wonder what the answer is?
• If it is a summary of your methods, are these methods unique or reveal a fresh approach or are they just standard and well-known and therefore unlikely to stand-out?
• If it is the answer or conclusion to your problem, are you risking letting the reader think they now don’t need to read the paper? Or might your conclusion-title be a way to hook your reader into finding out more about your study?
• Does it create interest or curiosity?

© Dr Marina Hurley 2022 www.writingclearscience.com.au

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Writing Effective Research Paper Titles: Advice and Examples

Are you ready to submit your research paper for publication but haven't settled on a title yet? Do you have a title but aren't sure if it will be the right one for the journal editor or research database search engines? This article will help you fine tune or create an effective research paper title for your work.

Now that you have finished your research and analysis, and you're ready to take the final step before sending your work to journal editors and reviewers. The first thing journal editors and search engine results will see and show is your research paper title. Creating an effective research paper title is highly important to getting your paper in front of the right people. It is also going to be the only part of your paper that is available to everyone for free, and it will be what search engines use to index and show your work in search results. You therefore must design a clear and persuasive title that accurately represents your work.

When writing an effective research paper title, you want to ensure that the title includes all the relevant aspects of your work. Showcase those aspects in a way that entices the audience to read more. Be sure to use the nomenclature common in your field of study, because that will help your work show up in more search results and it will grab the attention of journal editors looking for articles that clearly represent the industry. If you are studying landslides, for example, you will want to include keywords relating to soil composition or grain size; if you are working on a study about organ transplants, then include the specific feature or procedure that affected successful transplants. Identify what parts of your research are going to interest your intended audience.

There are two key pieces of information that people will need to see in your paper title: the subject and the objective. Because you are already familiar with your study and its purpose, creating an effective research paper title is simply a matter of whittling down the words that describe the important aspects of your paper. The advice below will help you take steps to identify key areas of your research, organize the information, and trim it down to the right size for a title.

Develop a topic statement

To get started, consider a topic statement of your paper that includes the subject and scope of the study. The first step in building a topic statement is to ask yourself the following questions:

• What is your research paper about? "My paper is about gene therapy and how it can improve cognitive function in dementia patients."
• What was the subject of your study? "I used data from 40 dementia patients from 10 states in the US."
• What method did you use to perform your research? "I performed a randomized trial."
• What were the results? "My study showed that gene therapy improved cognitive function in those who received the treatment."

Once you have answered those questions (such as in the example answers above), make a list of the keywords you used. For this example, those keywords would include the following:

• gene therapy
• cognitive function
• 40 dementia patients
• improved cognitive function
• 10 states in the US
• randomized trial

Then, create your topic statement using those keywords. It might read something like this:

"This study is a randomized trial that investigates whether gene therapy improved cognitive function in 40 dementia patients from 10 states in the US. The results show improved cognitive function in those who received the treatment."

This statement has 36 words — too long for a title. However, it does contain the main required elements: the subject and the objective. It also includes a summary of the results, which can be used to increase the persuasive nature of the title. If you are writing this down on paper, it may be helpful to underline or circle the keywords you used in the statement, as this will help you visually see how the keywords work together in your statement.

Trim the statement

The next step is to remove all unnecessary words to create a working title. Unnecessary words include elements that make the sentences complete sentences. Also remove words that are not central to your study or that would not be used in a research database search.

" This study is a randomized trial that investigates whether gene therapy improved cognitive function in 40 dementia patients from 10 states in the US. The results show improved cognitive function in those who received the treatment ."

Next, take those words and move them around to form a new phrase. This may take a few tries to get it right, but it is worth the time.

"A randomized trial investigating whether gene therapy improved cognitive function in 40 dementia patients from 10 states in the US showed improved cognitive function."

This sample now has 24 words. We still need to get it down to the ideal 15 or fewer total words, with just the exact information journal editors will want. One way to do this is to use the keywords at the beginning and end of your title. Remove any irrelevant facts that other researchers will not be searching for. For example, the method you used is not usually the most searched-for keyword.

" A randomized trial investigating whether gene therapy improved cognitive function in 40 dementia patients from 10 states in the US showed improved cognitive function. "

The final result may be something like this:

"Investigating the impact of gene therapy on cognitive function in dementia patients"

The resulting title has 13 words, had the main action at the beginning, and the main subject of the study at the end. This is a good example of how to create an effective research paper title that will increase journal editors' and reviewers' interest, and it may even help your paper receive more citations down the road.

Main tips to remember

If you are working on your first research paper title, the process can seem intimidating. Even with the process outlined above, creating the best research paper title possible for your work can be difficult and time consuming. Be sure to set aside a good amount of time to developing your title so that you don't feel rushed. Some writers go through 20 or more iterations before they arrive at a title that achieves effectiveness, persuasiveness, and clarity of purpose all in one.

In addition to the above process, keep the following main tips in mind when writing an effective research paper title:

• Write your paper and abstract first, then work on your title. This will make the process much easier than trying to nail a title down without a full, finished paper to start from.
• Keep your title short! Do not include more than 15 words.
• Do not use a period at the end of your title.
• Be sure that the keywords you use truly represent the content of your paper.
• Do not use abbreviations in your title.
• Include all essential key terms from your paper. This ensures your paper will be indexed properly in research databases and search engines. If you are unsure of the best keywords to use, talk to an academic librarian at your institution. They can help you identify keyword and search trends in your research field.

Examples of research paper titles

The lists below illustrate what effective and ineffective research paper titles look like. Use these examples to help guide your research paper title.

Effective titles

• Nurses on the Move: A Quantitative Report on How Meditation Can Improve Nurse Performance
• Correction of the ion transport defect in cystic fibrosis transgenic mice by gene therapy
• Landslide mapping techniques and their use in the assessment of the landslide hazard
• HLA compatibility and organ transplant survival: Collaborative Transplant Study

Ineffective titles

• Meditation Gurus
• The landslide story
• Landslide hazard and risk assessment
• Pharmacodynamics of oral ganciclovir and valganciclovir in solid organ transplant recipients

No matter what kind of field you are doing research in, you have the opportunity to create an amazing and effective research paper title that will engage your readers and get your paper in front of the journal editors and reviewers you want. By taking the time to go through the title development process, you will finish your work with a title that matches the work outlined in your research paper.

Header photo by Stokkete .

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How to write a good research paper title

“Unread science is lost science .”

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“Unread science is lost science.”

28 July 2020

Mykyta Dolmatov/Getty

With the influx of publications brought on by the pandemic, it’s become more challenging than ever for researchers to attract attention to their work.

Understanding which elements of a title will attract readers – or turn them away – has been proven to increase a paper’s citations and Altmetric score .

“In the era of information overload, most students and researchers do not have time to browse the entire text of a paper,” says Patrick Pu , a librarian at the National University of Singapore.

“The title of a paper, together with its abstract, become very important to capture and sustain the attention of readers.”

1. A good title avoids technical language

Since the primary audience of a paper is likely to be researchers working in the same field, using technical language in the title seems to make sense.

But this alienates the wider lay audience, which can bring valuable attention to your work . It can also alienate inexperienced researchers, or those who have recently entered the field.

“A good title does not use unnecessary jargon,” says Elisa De Ranieri , editor-in-chief at the Nature Communications journal (published by Springer Nature, which also publishes Nature Index.) “It communicates the main results in the study in a way that is clear and accessible, ideally to non-specialists or researchers new to the field.”

How-to: When crafting a title, says De Ranieri, write down the main result of the manuscript in a short paragraph. Shorten the text to make it more concise, while still remaining descriptive. Repeat this process until you have a title of fewer than 15 words.

2. A good title is easily searchable

Most readers today are accessing e-journals, which are indexed in scholarly databases such as Scopus and Google Scholar.

“Although these databases usually index the full text of papers, retrieval weightage for ‘Title’ is usually higher than other fields, such as ‘Results’,” Pu explains.

At the National University of Singapore, Pu and his colleagues run information literacy programmes for editors and authors. They give advice for publishing best practice, such as how to identify the most commonly used keywords in literature searches in a given field.

“A professor once told us how he discovered that industry experts were using a different term or keyword to describe his research area,” says Pu.

“He had written a seminal paper that did not include this ‘industry keyword’. He believes his paper, which was highly cited by academics, would have a higher citation count if he had included this keyword in the title. As librarians, we try to highlight this example to our students so that they will consider all possible keywords to use in their searches and paper titles.”

How-to: Authors should speak to an academic librarian at their institution to gain an understanding of keyword and search trends in their field of research. This should inform how the paper title is written.

3. A good title is substantiated by data

Authors should be cautious to not make any claims in the title that can’t be backed up by evidence.

“For instance, if you make a discovery with potential therapeutic relevance, the title should specify whether it was tested or studied in animals or humans/human samples,” says Irene Jarchum , senior editor at the journal Nature Biotechnology (also published by Springer Nature, which publishes the Nature Index.)

Jarchum adds that titles can be contentious because different authors have different views on the use of specific words, such as acronyms, or more fundamentally, what the main message of the title should be.

Some authors may over-interpret the significance of their preliminary findings, and want to reflect this in the title.

How-to: If you know your paper will be contentious within the scientific community, have the data ready to defend your decisions .

4. A good title sparks curiosity

A one-liner that sparks a reader’s interest can be very effective.

“A title has to pique the interest of the person searching for literature in a split-second – enough that they click on the title to read the abstract. Unread science is lost science,” says Christine Mayer , editor-in-chief of the journal Advanced Therapeutics .

Paper titles such as, "White and wonderful? Microplastics prevail in snow from the Alps to the Arctic" ( 2019 Science ), and “Kids these days: Why the youth of today seem lacking” ( 2019 Science Advances ) are good examples of this principle. Both papers have high Altmetric Attention scores, indicating that they have been widely read and discussed online.

How-to: Take note of the characteristics of paper titles that spark your own interest. Keep a record of these and apply the same principles to your own paper titles.

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Titles in research articles and doctoral dissertations: cross-disciplinary and cross-generic perspectives

• Published: 29 February 2024
• Volume 129 , pages 2285–2307, ( 2024 )

Cite this article

• Jialiang Hao   ORCID: orcid.org/0009-0006-5980-4451 1 , 2  

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Although titles are often regarded as a minimal aspect of academic discourse, they play a crucial role in knowledge construction across various disciplines and genres. This study examined four features of titles, namely, title length, punctuation usage, structure, and content information, with a corpus comprising 1600 titles of research articles (RAs) from top journals and doctoral dissertations (DDs) from prestigious universities across four soft and hard science disciplines. The results confirm disciplinary and generic variations within the titles of these two critical academic genres. Titles in linguistics and medicine are generally longer than those in economics and computer science (CS). Slightly more titles in hard disciplines contain punctuation than do those in soft disciplines. The average title length of RAs is longer than that of DDs, and more RA titles than DD titles have punctuation in all four disciplines, with no apparent difference in the punctuation variety across the two genres, except for CS titles. Nominal group titles and compound titles are the two most common types, and prepositional phrase titles are the least common in all four disciplines and genres. The content information in titles is different in each discipline and genre. These findings are partially congruent with those of previous studies, indicating the significance of further investigating titles across disciplines and genres.

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Acknowledgements

The researcher thanks the handling editor and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments, which significantly contributed to enhancing the quality of the manuscript.

This research was supported and funded by the Scientific Research Program Funded by Shaanxi Provincial Education Department (Program No. 23JK0100).

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Hao, J. Titles in research articles and doctoral dissertations: cross-disciplinary and cross-generic perspectives. Scientometrics 129 , 2285–2307 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-024-04941-4

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Title, Abstract and Keywords

The importance of titles.

The title of your manuscript is usually the first introduction readers (and reviewers) have to your work. Therefore, you must select a title that grabs attention, accurately describes the contents of your manuscript, and makes people want to read further.

An effective title should:

• Convey the  main topics  of the study
• Highlight the  importance  of the research
• Be  concise
• Attract  readers

Writing a good title for your manuscript can be challenging. First, list the topics covered by the manuscript. Try to put all of the topics together in the title using as few words as possible. A title that is too long will seem clumsy, annoy readers, and probably not meet journal requirements.

Does Vaccinating Children and Adolescents with Inactivated Influenza Virus Inhibit the Spread of Influenza in Unimmunized Residents of Rural Communities?

This title has too many unnecessary words.

Influenza Vaccination of Children: A Randomized Trial

This title doesn’t give enough information about what makes the manuscript interesting.

Effect of Child Influenza Vaccination on Infection Rates in Rural Communities: A Randomized Trial This is an effective title. It is short, easy to understand, and conveys the important aspects of the research.

Think about why your research will be of interest to other scientists. This should be related to the reason you decided to study the topic. If your title makes this clear, it will likely attract more readers to your manuscript. TIP: Write down a few possible titles, and then select the best to refine further. Ask your colleagues their opinion. Spending the time needed to do this will result in a better title.

Abstract and Keywords

The Abstract is:

• A  summary  of the content of the journal manuscript
• A time-saving  shortcut  for busy researchers
• A guide to the most important parts of your manuscript’s written content

Many readers will only read the Abstract of your manuscript. Therefore, it has to be able to  stand alone . In most cases the abstract is the only part of your article that appears in indexing databases such as Web of Science or PubMed and so will be the most accessed part of your article; making a good impression will encourage researchers to read your full paper.

A well written abstract can also help speed up the peer-review process. During peer review, referees are usually only sent the abstract when invited to review the paper. Therefore, the abstract needs to contain enough information about the paper to allow referees to make a judgement as to whether they have enough expertise to review the paper and be engaging enough for them to want to review it.

Your Abstract should answer these questions about your manuscript:

• What was done?
• Why did you do it?
• What did you find?
• Why are these findings useful and important?

Answering these questions lets readers know the most important points about your study, and helps them decide whether they want to read the rest of the paper. Make sure you follow the proper journal manuscript formatting guidelines when preparing your abstract.

TIP: Journals often set a maximum word count for Abstracts, often 250 words, and no citations. This is to ensure that the full Abstract appears in indexing services.

Keywords  are a tool to help indexers and search engines find relevant papers. If database search engines can find your journal manuscript, readers will be able to find it too. This will increase the number of people reading your manuscript, and likely lead to more citations.

However, to be effective, Keywords must be chosen carefully. They should:

• Represent  the content of your manuscript
• Be  specific  to your field or sub-field

Manuscript title:  Direct observation of nonlinear optics in an isolated carbon nanotube

Poor keywords:  molecule, optics, lasers, energy lifetime

Better keywords:  single-molecule interaction, Kerr effect, carbon nanotubes, energy level structure

Manuscript title:  Region-specific neuronal degeneration after okadaic acid administration Poor keywords:  neuron, brain, OA (an abbreviation), regional-specific neuronal degeneration, signaling

Better keywords:  neurodegenerative diseases; CA1 region, hippocampal; okadaic acid; neurotoxins; MAP kinase signaling system; cell death

Manuscript title:  Increases in levels of sediment transport at former glacial-interglacial transitions

Poor keywords:  climate change, erosion, plant effects Better keywords:  quaternary climate change, soil erosion, bioturbation

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Creating effective titles for your scientific publications

Associated data.

You work for months, maybe years, to plan and conduct your study. You write it up carefully, reporting every piece of data accurately. You get the approval of your co-authors and double-check everyone’s conflicts of interest for the disclosure form. You are ready to submit it when you remember that your work needs a title. “No problem,” you say. “I’ll just throw something together.”

Hold on—that’s not a good idea. The title of a scholarly article really does matter, for several reasons ( Video 1 , available online at www.VideoGIE.org ). It is the first thing a reader will see, so it helps him or her decide whether to read the rest of the article ( Fig. 1 ). 1 If you are publishing in a subscription model, it helps the reader decide whether to buy the whole article. Later, when the reader is writing his own article and wants to cite yours, he can find it more easily if you have given it an effective title. If the article is cited more, it will help your H-Index and G-Index, building your reputation and credibility. Furthermore, if your article is highly cited, it helps the publishing journal’s Impact Factor. Journal editors know which authors’ articles are highly cited and will react with interest when they see another article submitted by that author in the future.

Example of a poor title. It has a problem with grammar (“Are” instead of “Is”), it attempts to be funny, it is in the form of a question, uses abbreviations, does not have clear keywords, and does not make the point of the article clear.

Several elements make up an effective title ( Table 1 ). Studies have shown that shorter titles receive more citations; most recommend 10 to 15 words or between 31 and 40 characters. 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 Punctuation is important: commas and colons have been shown to increase citations, but articles with question marks or exclamation points are cited less frequently. 7 Keywords that help researchers find your article when they use search algorithms are critical, so make sure that your title accurately reflects the key concepts of your article. 4 , 8 , 9

Table 1

Elements of a good title for a scholarly publication

Avoid abbreviations or jargon in your title. 3 , 4 , 9 People from other fields whose research intersects with yours might cite you if they can find your article, but if you use abbreviations or jargon specific to your field, their searches won’t uncover your article.

Some authors think attracting attention with humor or puns is a good idea, but that practice is actually counterproductive. 3 , 4 , 5 , 9 Your title should reflect the tone of the article and of the journal, and because we are dealing with scholarly publications, that means the title should be formal as well. If you are writing an editorial or opinion piece, you might get away with a less-formal title, but for the most part, making your readers laugh should not be a priority.

Poor grammar and incorrect spelling are jarring and irritating to many readers as well as to editors and reviewers, so check and double check that the title is grammatical and everything is spelled and punctuated correctly. If you are using an editing or translation service to assist you with the composition of your article, be sure to include the title in the content submitted for review to catch errors you may have overlooked.

Above all, remember that your title is a reader’s first impression of your article, so make sure that impression is effective. Do all you can to create a title that is professional and does justice to the article you have worked so hard to create.

All authors disclosed no financial relationships relevant to this publication.

Supplementary data

Creating effective titles for scientific articles takes planning and knowledge. In this video, we discuss the elements of a good title.

Organizing Academic Research Papers: Choosing a Title

• Purpose of Guide
• Design Flaws to Avoid
• Glossary of Research Terms
• Narrowing a Topic Idea
• Broadening a Topic Idea
• Extending the Timeliness of a Topic Idea
• Academic Writing Style
• Choosing a Title
• Making an Outline
• Paragraph Development
• Executive Summary
• Background Information
• The Research Problem/Question
• Theoretical Framework
• Citation Tracking
• Content Alert Services
• Evaluating Sources
• Primary Sources
• Secondary Sources
• Tertiary Sources
• What Is Scholarly vs. Popular?
• Qualitative Methods
• Quantitative Methods
• Using Non-Textual Elements
• Limitations of the Study
• Common Grammar Mistakes
• Avoiding Plagiarism
• Footnotes or Endnotes?
• Further Readings
• Annotated Bibliography
• Dealing with Nervousness
• Using Visual Aids
• Grading Someone Else's Paper
• How to Manage Group Projects
• Multiple Book Review Essay
• Reviewing Collected Essays
• About Informed Consent
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• Writing a Policy Memo
• Writing a Research Proposal
• Acknowledgements

The title summarizes the main idea or ideas of your study. A good title contains the fewest possible words that adequately describe the contents and/or purpose of your research paper.

The title is without doubt the part of a paper that is read the most, and it is usually read first . If the title is too long it usually contains too many unnecessary words, e.g., "A Study to Investigate the...." On the other hand, a title which is too short often uses words which are too general. For example, "African Politics" could be the title of a book, but it does not provide any information on the focus of a research paper.

Structure and Writing Style

The following parameters can be used to help you formulate a suitable research paper title:

• The purpose of the research
• The narrative tone of the paper [typically defined by the type of the research]
• The methods used

The initial aim of a title is to capture the reader’s attention and to draw his or her attention to the research problem being investigated.

Create a Working Title Typically, the final title you submit to your professor is created after the research is complete so that the title accurately captures what was done . The working title should be developed early in the research process because it can help anchor the focus of the study in much the same way the research problem does. Referring back to the working title can help you reorient yourself back to the main purpose of the study if you feel yourself drifting off on a tangent while writing. The Final Title Effective titles in academic research papers have several characteristics.

• Indicate accurately the subject and scope of the study.
• Avoid using abbreviations.
• Use words that create a positive impression and stimulate reader interest.
• Use current nomenclature from the field of study.
• Identify key variables, both dependent and independent.
• May reveal how the paper will be organized.
• Suggest a relationship between variables which supports the major hypothesis.
• Is limited to 10 to 15 substantive words.
• Do not include "study of," "analysis of" or similar constructions.
• Titles are usually in the form of a phrase, but can also be in the form of a question.
• Use correct grammar and capitalization with all first words and last words capitalized, including the first word of a subtitle. All nouns,  pronouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs that appear between the first and last words of the title are also capitalized.
• In academic papers, rarely is a title followed by an exclamation mark. However, a title or subtitle can be in the form of a question.

The Subtitle Subtitles are quite common in social science research papers. Examples of why you may include a subtitle:

• Explains or provides additional context , e.g., "Linguistic Ethnography and the Study of Welfare Institutions as a Flow of Social Practices: The Case of Residential Child Care Institutions as Paradoxical Institutions."
• Adds substance to a literary, provocative, or imaginative title , e.g., "Listen to What I Say, Not How I Vote: Congressional Support for the President in Washington and at Home."
• Qualifies the geographic scope of the research , e.g., "The Geopolitics of the Eastern Border of the European Union: The Case of Romania-Moldova-Ukraine."
• Qualifies the temporal scope of the research , e.g., "A Comparison of the Progressive Era and the Depression Years: Societal Influences on Predictions of the Future of the Library, 1895-1940."
• Focuses on investigating the ideas, theories, or work of a particular individual , e.g., "A Deliberative Conception of Politics: How Francesco Saverio Merlino Related Anarchy and Democracy."

Balch, Tucker. How to Compose a Title for Your Research Paper . Augmented Trader blog. School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Tech University;  Choosing the Proper Research Paper Titles . AplusReports.com, 2007-2012; General Format. The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University.

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80+ Great Research Titles Examples in Various Academic Fields

Coming up with a research title for an academic paper is one of the most challenging parts of the writing process. Even though there is an unlimited quantity of research titles to write about, knowing which one is best for you can be hard. We have done the research for you and compiled eighty examples of research titles to write on. Additionally, we have divided the research titles examples into sections to make them easier to choose.

Research Study Examples of Current Events

Examples of research topics on ethics, title of research study examples on health, research paper title examples on social concerns, examples of research title on art and culture, example of research interest in religion, samples of research study topics on technology, research examples of environmental studies, good research title examples on history, specific topic examples regarding education, research title examples for students on family, food, and nutrition, research problems examples computer science, samples of research title about business marketing and communications, sample of research study topics in women’s studies, research problem example on politics, what are some examples of research paper topics on law, final words about research titles.

When it comes to choosing a good sample research title, research is one of the best tips you can get. By reading widely, including your school notes and scholarly articles, you will have a problem/line of interest examples in research. Then, you can derive any question from areas that appear to have a knowledge gap and proceed with researching the answer. As promised, below are eighty research title examples categorized into different areas, including social media research topics .

• Discuss the peculiar policies of a named country – for example, discuss the impacts of the one-child policy of China.
• Research on the influence of a named political leader, say a president, on the country they governed and other countries around. For instance, you can talk about how Trump’s presidency has changed international relations.
• Conduct an analysis of a particular aspect of two named countries – for example, the history of the relationship between the U.S. and North Korea.
• Compare the immigration laws in two or more named countries – for example, discuss how the immigration laws in the U.S. compares with other countries.
• Discuss how the Black Lives Matter movement has affected the view and discussions about racism in the United States.
• Enumerate the different ways the government of the United States can reduce deaths arising from the unregulated use of guns.
• Analyze the place of ethics in medicine or of medical practitioners. For instance, you can discuss the prevalence of physician-assisted suicides in a named country. You may also talk about the ethicality of such a practice and whether it should be legal.
• Explain how recent research breakthroughs have affected that particular field – for instance, how stem cell research has impacted the medical field.
• Explain if and why people should be able to donate organs in exchange for money.
• Discuss ethical behaviors in the workplace and (or) the educational sector. For example, talk about whether or not affirmative action is still important or necessary in education or the workplace.
• Weigh the benefits and risks of vaccinating children and decide which one outweighs the other. Here, you might want to consider the different types of vaccinations and the nature and frequency of associated complications.
• Investigate at least one of the health issues that currently pose a threat to humanity and which are under investigation. These issues can include Alzheimer’s, cancer, depression, autism, and HIV/AIDS. Research how these issues affect individuals and society and recommend solutions to alleviate cost and suffering.
• Study some individuals suffering from and under treatment for depression. Then, investigate the common predictors of the disease and how this information can help prevent the issue.

Tip : To make this example of a research title more comprehensive, you can focus on a certain age range – say, teenagers.

• Discuss whether or not free healthcare and medication should be available to people and the likely implications.
• Identify and elucidate different methods or programs that have been most effective in preventing or reducing teen pregnancy.
• Analyze different reasons and circumstances for genetic manipulation and the different perspectives of people on this matter. Then, discuss whether or not parents should be allowed to engineer designer babies.
• Identify the types of immigration benefits, including financial, medical, and education, your country provides for refugees and immigrants. Then, discuss how these benefits have helped them in settling down and whether more or less should be provided.
• Discuss the acceptance rate of the gay community in your country or a specific community. For example, consider whether or not gay marriage is permitted if they can adopt children, and if they are welcome in religious gatherings.
• Explore and discuss if terrorism truly creates a fear culture that can become a society’s unintended terrorist.
• Consider and discuss the different techniques one can use to identify pedophiles on social media.

Tip : Social issues research topics are interesting, but ensure you write formally and professionally.

• Investigate the importance or lack of importance of art in primary or secondary education. You can also recommend whether or not it should be included in the curriculum and why.

Tip : You can write on this possible research title based on your experiences, whether positive or negative.

• Discuss the role of illustration in children’s books and how it facilitates easy understanding in children. You may focus on one particular book or select a few examples and compare and contrast.
• Should the use of art in books for adults be considered, and what are the likely benefits?
• Compare and contrast the differences in art from two named cultural Renaissance – for instance, the Northern Renaissance and the Italian Renaissance.
• Investigate how sexism is portrayed in different types of media, including video games, music, and film. You can also talk about whether or not the amount of sexism portrayed has reduced or increased over the years.
• Explore different perspectives and views on dreams; are they meaningful or simply a game of the sleeping mind? You can also discuss the functions and causes of dreams, like sleeping with anxiety, eating before bed, and prophecies.
• Investigate the main reasons why religious cults are powerful and appealing to the masses, referring to individual cases.
• Investigate the impact of religion on the crime rate in a particular region.

Tip : Narrow down this research title by choosing to focus on a particular age group, say children or teenagers, or family. Alternatively, you can focus on a particular crime in the research to make the paper more extensive.

• Explore reasons why Martin Luther decided to split with the Catholic church.
• Discuss the circumstances in Siddhartha’s life that led to him becoming the Buddha.

Tip : It is important to remove sentiments from your research and base your points instead on clear evidence from a sound study. This ensures your title of research does not lead to unsubstantiated value judgments, which reduces the quality of the paper.

• Discuss how the steel sword, gunpowder, biological warfare, longbow, or atomic bomb has changed the nature of warfare.

Tip : For this example of the research problem, choose only one of these technological developments or compare two or more to have a rich research paper.

• Explore the changes computers, tablets, and smartphones have brought to human behaviors and culture, using published information and personal experience.

Tip : Approach each research study example in a research paper context or buy research paper online , giving a formal but objective view of the subject.

• Are railroads and trains primary forces in the industrialization, exploitation, and settlement of your homeland or continent?
• Discuss how the use of fossil fuels has changed or shaped the world.

Tip : Narrow down this title of the research study to focus on a local or particular area or one effect of fossil fuels, like oil spill pollution.

• Discuss what progress countries have made with artificial intelligence. You can focus on one named country or compare the progress of one country with another.
• Investigate the factual status of global warming – that is, is it a reality or a hoax? If it is a reality, explore the primary causes and how humanity can make a difference.
• Conduct in-depth research on endangered wildlife species in your community and discuss why they have become endangered. You can also enumerate what steps the community can take to prevent these species from going extinct and increase their chances of survival.
• Investigate the environmental soundness of the power sources in your country or community. Then, recommend alternative energy sources that might be best suited for the area and why.
• Consider an area close to wildlife reserves and national parks, and see whether oil and mineral exploration has occurred there. Discuss whether this action should be allowed or not, with fact-backed reasons.
• Investigate how the use and abolishment of DDT have affected the population of birds in your country.

Tip : Each example research title requires that you consult authoritative scientific reports to improve the quality of your paper. Furthermore, specificity and preciseness are required in each example of research title and problem, which only an authority source can provide.

• Discuss the importance of a major historical event and why it was so important in the day. These events can include the assassination of John F. Kennedy or some revolutionary document like the Magna Carta.
• Consider voyagers such as the Vikings, Chinese, as well as native populations and investigate whether Columbus discovered America first.
• Choose a named historical group, family, or individual through their biographies, examining them for reader responses.
• Research people of different cultural orientations and their responses to the acts of others who live around them.
• Investigate natural disasters in a named country and how the government has responded to them. For example, explore how the response of the New Orleans government to natural disasters has changed since Hurricane Katrina.

Tip : Focus this research title sample on one particular country or natural disaster or compare the responses of two countries with each other.

• Explore the educational policy, “no child left behind,” investigating its benefits and drawbacks.
• Investigate the concept of plagiarism in the twenty-first century, its consequences, and its prevalence in modern universities. Take a step further to investigate how and why many students don’t understand the gravity of their errors.
• Do in-depth research on bullying in schools, explaining the seriousness of the problem in your area in particular. Also, recommend actions schools, teachers, and parents can take to improve the situation if anything.
• Explore the place of religion in public schools; if it has a place, explain why, and if it does not, explain why not.
• Does a student’s financial background have any effect on his or her academic performance? In this sample research title, you can compare students from different financial backgrounds, from wealthy to average, and their scores on standardized tests.
• Is spanking one’s child considered child abuse; if so, why? In this research problem example for students, consider whether or not parents should be able to spank their children.
• Investigate the relationship between family health and nutrition, focusing on particular nutrition. This example of the title of the research study, for instance, can focus on the relationship between breastfeeding and baby health.
• Elucidate on, if any, the benefits of having a home-cooked meal and sitting down as a family to eat together.
• Explore the effect of fast-food restaurants on family health and nutrition, and whether or not they should be regulated.
• Research local food producers and farms in your community, pinpointing how much of your diet is acquired from them.

Tip : These are great research titles from which you can coin research topics for STEM students .

• Compare and contrast the two major operating systems: Mac and Windows, and discuss which one is better.

Tip : This title of the research study example can lead to strong uninformed opinions on the matter. However, it is important to investigate and discuss facts about the two operating systems, basing your conclusions on these.

• Explain the effect of spell checkers, autocorrect functions, and grammar checkers on the writing skills of computer users. Have these tools improved users’ writing skills or weakened them?

Tip : For this example of title research, it is better to consider more than one of these tools to write a comprehensive paper.

• Discuss the role(s) artificial intelligence is playing now or will likely play in the future as regards human evolution.
• Identify and investigate the next groundbreaking development in computer science (like the metaverse), explaining why you believe it will be important.
• Discuss a particular trendsetting technological tool, like blockchain technology, and how it has benefited different sectors.

Tip : For this research title example, you may want to focus on the effect of one tool on one particular sector. This way, you can investigate this example of research and thesis statement about social media more thoroughly and give as many details as possible.

• Consider your personal experiences as well as close friends’ and families experiences. Then, determine how marketing has invaded your lives and whether these impersonal communications are more positive than negative or vice versa.
• Investigate the regulations (or lack thereof) that apply to marketing items to children in your region. Do you think these regulations are unfounded, right, or inadequate?
• Investigate the merits and demerits of outsourcing customer services; you can compare the views of businesses with those of their customers.
• How has the communication we do through blog sites, messaging, social media, email, and other online platforms improved interpersonal communications if it has?
• Can understanding culture change the way you do business? Discuss how.

Tip : Ensure you share your reasoning on this title of the research study example and provide evidence-backed information to support your points.

• Learn everything you can about eating disorders like bulimia and anorexia, as well as their causes, and symptoms. Then, investigate and discuss the impact of its significance and recommend actions that might improve the situation.
• Research a major development in women’s history, like the admission of women to higher institutions and the legalization of abortion. Discuss the short-term and (or) long-term implications of the named event or development.
• Discuss gender inequality in the workplace – for instance, the fact that women tend to earn less than men for doing the same job. Provide specific real-life examples as you explain the reasons for this and recommend solutions to the problem.
• How have beauty contests helped women: have they empowered them in society or objectified them?

Tip : You may shift the focus of this topic research example to female strippers or women who act in pornographic movies.

• Investigate exceptional businesswomen in the 21st century; you can focus on one or compare two or more.

Tip : When writing on the title of a research example related to women, avoid using persuasion tactics; instead, be tactful and professional in presenting your points.

• Discuss the unique nature and implications of Donald Trump’s presidency on the United States and the world.
• Investigate the conditions and forces related to the advent and rise of Nazi Germany. Shift the focus of this title research example on major wars like WWI or the American Civil War.
• Is the enormous amount of money spent during election campaigns a legitimate expense?
• Investigate a named major political scandal that recently occurred in your region or country. Discuss how it started, how its news spread, and its impacts on individuals in that area.
• Discuss the impacts British rule had on India.
• Investigate the rate of incarceration in your region and compare it with that of other countries or other regions.
• Is incarcerating criminals an effective solution in promoting the rehabilitation of criminals and controlling crime rates?
• Consider various perspectives on the issue of gun control and coin several argumentative essay topics on the matter.
• Why do drivers continue to text while driving despite legal implications and dire consequences?
• Discuss the legality of people taking their own lives due to suffering from a debilitating terminal disease.

Each example of the research title provided in this article will make for a rich, information-dense research paper. However, you have a part to play in researching thoroughly on the example of the research study. To simplify the entire process for you, hiring our writing services is key as you wouldn’t have to worry about choosing topics. Our team of skilled writers knows the right subject that suits your research and how to readily get materials on them.

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• Knowledge Base
• Starting the research process
• 10 Research Question Examples to Guide Your Research Project

10 Research Question Examples to Guide your Research Project

Published on October 30, 2022 by Shona McCombes . Revised on October 19, 2023.

The research question is one of the most important parts of your research paper , thesis or dissertation . It’s important to spend some time assessing and refining your question before you get started.

The exact form of your question will depend on a few things, such as the length of your project, the type of research you’re conducting, the topic , and the research problem . However, all research questions should be focused, specific, and relevant to a timely social or scholarly issue.

Once you’ve read our guide on how to write a research question , you can use these examples to craft your own.

Note that the design of your research question can depend on what method you are pursuing. Here are a few options for qualitative, quantitative, and statistical research questions.

Other interesting articles

If you want to know more about the research process , methodology , research bias , or statistics , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

Methodology

• Sampling methods
• Simple random sampling
• Stratified sampling
• Cluster sampling
• Likert scales
• Reproducibility

 Statistics

• Null hypothesis
• Statistical power
• Probability distribution
• Effect size
• Poisson distribution

Research bias

• Optimism bias
• Cognitive bias
• Implicit bias
• Hawthorne effect
• Anchoring bias
• Explicit bias

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.

McCombes, S. (2023, October 19). 10 Research Question Examples to Guide your Research Project. Scribbr. Retrieved August 20, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/research-process/research-question-examples/

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Title Case Capitalization

APA Style uses two types of capitalization for titles of works (such as paper titles ) and headings within works : title case and sentence case .

In title case, major words are capitalized, and most minor words are lowercase. In sentence case, most major and minor words are lowercase ( proper nouns are an exception in that they are always capitalized).

• major words: Nouns, verbs (including linking verbs), adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, and all words of four letters or more are considered major words.
• minor words: Short (i.e., three letters or fewer) conjunctions, short prepositions, and all articles are considered minor words.

Title case capitalization is covered in the seventh edition APA Style manuals in the Publication Manual Section 6.17 and the Concise Guide Section 5.7

How to implement title case

In title case, capitalize the following words in a title or heading:

• the first word of the title or heading, even if it is a minor word such as “The” or “A”
• the first word of a subtitle
• the first word after a colon, em dash, or end punctuation in a heading
• major words, including the second part of hyphenated major words (e.g., “Self-Report,” not “Self-report”)
• words of four letters or more (e.g., “With,” “Between,” “From”)

Lowercase only minor words that are three letters or fewer in a title or heading (except the first word in a title or subtitle or the first word after a colon, em dash, or end punctuation in a heading):

• short conjunctions (e.g., “and,” “as,” “but,” “for,” “if,” “nor,” “or,” “so,” “yet”)
• articles (“a,” “an,” “the”)
• short prepositions (e.g., “as,” “at,” “by,” “for,” “in,” “of,” “off,” “on,” “per,” “to,” “up,” “via”)

When to use title case

Use title case for the following:

• titles of articles, books, reports, and other works appearing in text

In the book Train Your Mind for Peak Performance: A Science-Based Approach for Achieving Your Goals

In the article “Turning Frowns (and Smiles) Upside Down: A Multilevel Examination of Surface Acting Positive and Negative Emotions on Well-Being”

• titles of tests or measures, including subscales

Beck Depression Inventory–II

• all headings within a work (Levels 1–5; these are also bold or bold italic)
• the title of your own paper and of named sections and subsections within it

the Results section

• titles of periodicals (these are also italicized)

Journal of Latinx Psychology

Chicago Tribune

• table titles (these are also italicized)
• figure titles (these are also italicized), axis labels, and legends

• News & Insights
• All News & Insights

New USC study sheds light on adolescent mental health crisis in the United States

Results emphasize the interconnectedness of mental health, attendance and school grades—a necessary reality for schools to grapple with.

Key Findings

This study suggests:

• Teen girls and pre-teen boys exhibit distress differently, with pre-teen boys struggling with externalizing behaviors and hyperactivity, while teen girls are experiencing symptoms of anxiety and depression.
• Students who are on track to be chronically absent or who are earning Cs are three or more times as likely to face mental health challenges as those with fewer absences or As and Bs.
• Black and lower-income families report fewer school mental health services, but are more likely to utilize them when available.
• Nearly 20 percent of families without access to mental health services would enroll their children if offered.

The mental health of children in the United States has reached a critical juncture, with rising rates of teen suicides, emergency room visits and anxiety and depression among youth. Contributing factors include the social isolation of the pandemic, academic disruptions, family challenges, economic impacts and social media’s inescapable influence.

Today, researchers with USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and USC Rossier School of Education released a new report titled “A Nation’s Children at Risk: Insights on Children’s Mental Health from the Understanding America Study” that examined the current state of adolescent mental health in the United States.

In a nationally representative sample of U.S. families, this new report examines adolescent mental health through the lens of their school experiences and parental perspectives. The study delved into mental health scores across multiple demographic groups and explored the correlation between scores, school attendance and course grades. Importantly, the study also investigated the availability of mental health resources in schools to support students in need.

Study co-authors Amie Rapaport , Morgan Polikoff , Anna Saavedra and Daniel Silver presented the finding’s implications and offered recommendations in their report.

“Our data supports the interconnected nature of student needs; to improve academic outcomes, schools must need to also prioritize mental health and attendance,” said Rapaport, co-director with the Center for Applied Research in Education (CARE) and research scientist with the Center for Economic and Social Research (CESR) both with USC Dornsife.

The study suggests that when students receive mental health support in school, 75 percent of parents report that these services are beneficial, with 72 percent expressing satisfaction. However, disparities in service availability exist, with service availability more than 20 percentage points greater in schools serving more White and higher-income households. This despite the fact that lower-income families are more than 5 times as likely as higher-income families to take up the services in schools when offered.

“While there is a growing awareness of the mental health struggles faced by adolescents, our study underscores that different student groups are experiencing different struggles–clearly, a one-size-fits-all solution to this problem will not work,” said Polikoff, USC Rossier professor of education and co-faculty director of the USC EdPolicy Hub .

Among the study’s implications:

• While the mental health struggles of our nation’s adolescents often are in the headlines, the report sheds light on the unique challenges faced by different subgroups of children.
• The study recommends a need for targeted allocation of resources to address mental health needs in schools.
• The correlation between mental health struggles and academic outcomes-including the approximately threefold increase in mental health warning flags among students chronically absent or with lower grades - underscores the importance of comprehensive support systems for students.

“The study shows that there is substantial unmet need for mental health services in schools, especially for the most disadvantaged students–states and the federal government need to step in and provide resources and guidance to address this crisis,” said Saavedra, a research scientist with CESR and co-director at CARE.

The study was supported by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation Pandemic Policy Research Fund at the USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics .

Morgan Polikoff

• Professor of Education

USC EdPolicy Hub

Article Type

Article topics.

• K–12 education policy

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Declining senses can impact mental health and loneliness in aging adults

Most people — up to 94% of U.S. adults — experience at least some dulling of their senses with age, finding themselves squinting at screens, craving stronger flavors, and missing snatches of conversations more and more frequently. Researchers at the University of Chicago Medicine are looking into how these changes can go beyond mere inconvenience and actually worsen overall mental health in older adults.

“When your senses decline, you can't experience the world as well,” said Jayant Pinto, MD , a physician and expert in olfactory dysfunction at UChicago Medicine. “You can't hear colleagues or friends at the dinner table; you can't discern what's going on in your environment; you may have a hard time reading or making things out when you’re in your neighborhood. It makes all your cognitive burdens a little harder, and that probably wears you down over time and causes mental health problems.”

Along with Alexander Wang, a medical student at the UChicago Pritzker School of Medicine , Pinto recently led a study examining the prevalence and impact of sensory impairments among older adults. They found that people with sensory disabilities tend to have worse mental health, and that different types of sensory disability were associated with different aspects of mental health.

Revealing associations between perception and emotion

The UChicago researchers analyzed data on sensory function (vision, hearing and sense of smell) and self-reported mental health from nearly 4,000 older adults, collected over 10 years of follow-up as part of the National Social Life, Health & Aging Project . They found that people who had multiple senses impaired experienced more loneliness and had significantly worse self-reported mental health overall, and people with three sensory disabilities were more likely to experience frequent depressive episodes. In analyses that differentiated between the senses, vision impairment was most strongly associated with both loneliness and poor self-rated mental health.

Scientists are still exploring how changes in all five senses can impact people, but the UChicago researchers can already point to many ways sensory decline contributes directly to feelings of loneliness, sadness and boredom.

Older people with vision impairment may have trouble getting out of the house or seeing the faces of their friends and family, and hearing loss can make conversations stilted and frustrating. Even loss of smell can affect someone’s ability to find joy in familiar scents — like a favorite home-cooked meal or a loved one’s signature perfume — and perceive pheromones, which (though not registered consciously) contribute to social dynamics.

“We saw that hearing and vision disability tended to be associated with lower self-rated mental health and feelings of loneliness, but olfactory disability had a weaker association,” Wang said. “This stood out to me because hearing and vision disabilities tend to be much more stigmatized than olfactory disability. This made me reflect on the ways in which social stigma may be driving this worse mental health.”

Caring for one another in an aging society

In the face of that stigma, the researchers say their results highlight the importance of improving access to mental health services and increasing awareness of the connection between sensory loss and mental distress. In particular, understanding how different sensory disabilities impact the long-term mental health of older adults could help healthcare professionals — especially primary care providers, otolaryngologists and ophthalmologists — screen for mental health conditions when they identify sensory loss in their patients, providing opportunities for personalized and timely interventions.

In addition to proactively treating older adults’ mental health, the researchers pointed to steps that can be taken to directly lessen the day-to-day effects of sensory difficulties, which would in turn lessen their negative mental health implications.

“We have an aging society; everybody has a relative who's getting older and having a harder time in life. It’s a burden for us all to share,” Pinto said. “Lessening the burdens of your aging relatives and friends can have a huge impact on people's lives, their productivity and their quality of life.”

On a personal level, family members and friends can help by being patient and finding ways to communicate more effectively, such as speaking clearly or using written notes. On a societal level, public policies and community programs can ensure accessibility in public spaces and provide resources that improve quality of life.

Pinto also highlighted a wide range of technologies and medical interventions are available that can help compensate for sensory impairment. For hearing loss, there are cochlear implants, hearing aids and other hearing-assistive devices — which research has indicated could slow cognitive decline in addition to improving quality of life. For vision loss, there are glasses, contacts, cataract surgery and LASIK surgery, along with accommodations like text-to-speech computer programs. Even for the sense of smell, health experts can sometimes help by reducing sinus inflammation or conducting smell training exercises.

“In many cases, we can mitigate sensory difficulties in ways that might actually improve people's lives, mental health and sense of loneliness — which is a huge epidemic,” Pinto said. “These are simple ways we can intervene to help people and potentially have a huge impact on society.”

Recognizing and destigmatizing sensory disability

The researchers said they intentionally used the word “disability” throughout the paper to underscore the significant impact of sensory impairments on individuals' lives. This terminology also aligns with efforts to destigmatize these conditions and promote a more inclusive approach to healthcare.

“To some extent, our society already considers decreased sensory function to be a disability: think of the blind and d/Deaf communities,” Wang said. “Like many marginalized communities, the disabled community has historically had a very contentious relationship with the medical field, which can cause distress and limit access to mental health services. With better understanding and compassion, we can strive to improve the care we provide to older adults and disabled patients.”

He said that by framing the data this way, he hopes to encourage more healthcare providers to move away from thinking in terms of the Medical Model of Disability and move towards the Social Model of Disability.

“My understanding is that the Medical Model characterizes disability as something that is ‘deficient’ with a person, thus requiring some sort of ‘fixing’ of the individual,” he explained. “The Social Model characterizes disability as more of an identity, so limitations relating to disability stem from a society’s lack of accessibility and accommodation for disabled people.”

Recognizing sensory impairments as disabilities and acknowledging their impact on mental health are important steps toward more comprehensive and compassionate care. By addressing the medical, social and environmental barriers that exacerbate these impairments, clinicians — and society as a whole — can better support older adults in maintaining their independence

Jayant Pinto, MD

Jayant Pinto, MD, is a specialist in sinus and nasal diseases, including chronic sinusitis, allergic rhinitis and olfactory dysfunction. He serves as UChicago Medicine's Director of Rhinology and Allergy and Director of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Research.

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• Qualitative Assessments
• Mpox Rapid Risk Assessment
• 2023-2024 Respiratory Disease Season Outlook
• Respiratory Disease Season Outlook

Related Topics:

• Center for Forecasting & Outbreak Analytics
• About Behind the Model
• Modeling and Forecasting
• Insight Net

What to know

In response to the recent spread of clade I mpox in Sub-Saharan Africa, CDC is working to update our July 8, 2024, risk assessment.

As of July 8, 2024

CDC assessed the overall risk to the United States posed by the clade I mpox outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for two populations.

• The risk to the general population is assessed as VERY LOW. A
• The risk to gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) who have more than one sexual partner and people who have sex with MSM, regardless of gender, is assessed as LOW to MODERATE.

The purpose of this assessment is to provide time-sensitive health information about the ongoing clade I outbreak of mpox in the DRC for public health agencies.

We have moderate confidence in this qualitative assessment. The assessment relies on subject-matter experts evaluating a range of evidence related to risk, including limited epidemiologic data from the DRC outbreak, historical data on clade I mpox epidemiology and clinical severity, and extrapolations based on the ongoing clade IIb mpox outbreak in the United States. We will review available evidence every two weeks, or if the situation changes significantly, and update this assessment as warranted.

This assessment is an update to the previously published risk assessment on May 10, 2024. This update includes new evidence, but there are no changes to the overall risk assessment. We do not anticipate producing additional updates to this risk assessment. We continue to monitor the outbreak of clade I mpox in DRC, and will update this risk assessment if the risk to the United States changes.

Risk assessment for general population in the United States

Overall risk.

We assess the overall risk to the general U.S. population as very low , with moderate confidence. Overall risk is assessed by considering the likelihood and impact of infection across the population (see Methods section). This assessment may change as new evidence becomes available.

We assess the likelihood of infection for the general population as extremely low . Factors that informed our assessment of likelihood included the following:

There are no known cases of clade I mpox in the U.S. or any other country outside of endemic areas , although the virus could potentially spread from DRC to the United States or other countries through infected travelers from the DRC.

While the DRC outbreak has resulted in more than 7,000 confirmed or suspected cases so far in 2024, we assess that similar levels of transmission are unlikely in the United States.

• Experts do not believe that a similar scenario of transmission is likely in the United States for several reasons, including smaller average household sizes, increased access to improved sanitation and healthcare, and the lack of zoonotic reservoirs of disease.
• CDC modeling suggests close-contact transmission within and between households is unlikely to result in a large number of mpox clade I cases in the United States.
• The DRC outbreak represents multiple, ongoing provincial-level outbreaks in 25 of 26 provinces. Data suggest that cases have stemmed from many separate zoonotic introductions and subsequent chains of household transmission, with the exception of one outbreak in Kamituga, described below.

Although there is evidence of sexual transmission in some localities in the DRC, widespread sexual transmission in the U.S. general population is unlikely.

• A recent outbreak in the Kamituga mining region in DRC has been associated with sexual transmission, with 29% of confirmed cases identifying as sex workers. One recent cohort study of 371 Kamituga hospital patients with suspected mpox found that 88% of patients reported recent transactional sex.
• There is no current confirmed evidence of widespread heterosexual transmission in other DRC provinces, and it is unclear what proportion of cases elsewhere may be linked to sexual transmission. However, the high number of cases in children ≤ 15 years old is similar to historical trends in DRC and suggests that factors outside of sexual transmission have important roles. In general, epidemiologic data are limited for mpox patients, and we do not know the true number of cases nor how each case acquired infection.
• Modeling work from the United Kingdom related to the 2022 outbreak indicated that lower partnership formation rates among heterosexuals prevented sustained transmission within these networks.
• CDC modeling has shown similar results for heterosexual networks in the U.S. 1
• The likelihood of infection among gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) is assessed separately in the risk assessment for MSM in the United States, reported below.

As of June 2, 2024 , there are 109 reported cases (confirmed, probable, or suspected) in the Republic of Congo, which borders DRC to the west. As of November 2023, WHO indicated it is unknown whether there are links between the Republic of Congo outbreak and DRC’s outbreak. Clade I is endemic in Republic of Congo; these cases may have resulted from zoonotic introductions or spread across the border in a relatively localized area and as such, do not yet suggest wider regional spread.

We assess the impact of infection for the general population as low to moderate . Factors that informed our assessment of impact included the following:

• Acquired immunity from previous infection with the mpox virus is extremely low for the general population (see separate analysis for MSM, who were disproportionately affected by mpox during the 2022 outbreak).
• Vaccine-induced immunity from mpox vaccination during the 2022 outbreak is also very low across the general population. During the 2022 outbreak, vaccination was targeted to those at highest risk of infection, including MSM and their partners.
• Prior smallpox vaccination , which can offer some protection against mpox, has declined substantially in the United States since the 1970s, when population-wide smallpox vaccination ceased.
• DRC health authorities reported the case fatality rate (CFR) from suspected clade I mpox in 2023 was 4.6% and rose to 6.7% throughout early 2024; however, this may be an overestimation because of challenges in completeness of case reporting. In a study of 216 mpox patients from one DRC hospital from 2007-2011, investigators found a CFR of 1.4% among 216 patients who received limited supportive care and no mpox therapeutics.
• In the United States, the CFR would likely be lower, given better access to high-quality supportive medical care and therapeutics.

We have moderate confidence in this assessment.

We note uncertainties around epidemiologic and genomic data in DRC, including transmission dynamics in children and non-MSM sexual networks.

Risk assessment for MSM in the United States

Overall risk for this population.

We assess the overall risk for gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) in the United States, who have more than one sexual partner, and their sexual partners, regardless of gender as low to moderate, with moderate confidence. Overall risk is assessed by considering the likelihood and impact of infection across the population (see Methods section). This assessment may change as new evidence becomes available.

We assess the likelihood of infection for MSM as low to moderate . Factors that informed our assessment of likelihood included the following:

• There are no known cases of clade I mpox in the United States or any other country outside of endemic areas, although the virus could potentially spread from DRC to the United States or from other countries through infected travelers who expose others at their destinations.
• Health authorities have documented sexually transmitted clade I mpox in DRC in MSM in six cases during 2023, indicating the virus could spread among these sexual networks in the United States if cases were imported.
• During the ongoing 2022 global mpox outbreak, most U.S. cases were among MSM and their sexual partners, suggesting this population could be at increased risk for clade I mpox infection if the clade I mpox virus were to spread to the United States. Furthermore, only a minority of MSM who CDC has estimated would benefit from vaccination have been fully vaccinated, though rates vary widely by jurisdiction.
• A 2023 modeling study estimated that depending on population mpox immunity levels, jurisdictions face varying degrees of risk for sustained mpox recurrence, indicating that many jurisdictions may have a high likelihood of sustained transmission.
• More recent CDC modeling found that as population-level immunity increased, the chances of a prolonged or large outbreak decreased. The study also found that if clade I mpox were to be introduced to MSM sexual networks in the United States, counties with greater than 50% population-level immunity would have smaller outbreaks on average (fewer than 100 infections).

We assess the impact of infection for this population as low to moderate . Factors that informed our assessment of impact included the following:

• Like the general population, we expect that the impacts of clade I mpox among MSM are likely lower in the United States, compared to DRC, because of the availability of high-quality supportive care and access to medical countermeasures.
• Population immunity among MSM and their sexual partners is likely to additionally reduce the severity of infection.

Given uncertainties around the level of prior immunity and the extent to which behavior adaptations initiated during the 2022 outbreak have continued or could recur, we have moderate confidence in this assessment.

Factors that could change our assessment

Geographic and population spread.

• Detection of clade I mpox cases in the United States, particularly if there is domestic person-to-person transmission in jurisdictions with low estimated population immunity.
• Clade I mpox spreads outside sub-Saharan Africa, including among people attending mass gatherings or among other highly mobile populations.
• The outbreak in DRC intensifies or spreads to countries where mpox is not endemic, in the region or globally.

Transmission dynamics

• Evidence of person-to-person spread among children in DRC, outside of already recognized high-risk activities , such as exposure to animals or close contact with mpox patients.
• Evidence of widespread, prolonged chains of sexual transmission in DRC.

Natural history and medical countermeasures

• Additional data to suggest an increased or decreased illness severity of clade I mpox infection.
• Increased mpox vaccination coverage among high-risk groups in United States.

Descriptive Epidemiology

There is an ongoing outbreak of mpox in DRC caused by the clade I mpox virus, which is distinct from the clade IIb mpox virus that caused the 2022 global outbreak. As of June 2, 2024, DRC reported 7,281 confirmed or suspected cases of mpox in 2024. In previous outbreaks, clade I has caused more severe disease and has been more transmissible than clade II within close-contact settings, typically in a household. Although clade I mpox is endemic in DRC, in 2023, health authorities reported a higher number of suspect cases and deaths across a wider geographic area that in some provinces affected atypical demographic groups. Approximately 70% of suspected mpox cases in DRC in 2024 were in children under age 15, similar to historical observations. However, adults were disproportionately affected in South Kivu province, where sexual transmission was predominant.

CDC has not detected any cases of clade I mpox in the United States, despite testing a high proportion of presumed mpox specimens—those positive for non-variola orthopoxvirus (NVO)—with tests that can identify mpox by clade. In addition, several commercial and other non-CDC laboratories perform clade II testing in addition to NVO tests, and all specimens tested to date have been clade II. If these laboratories see anything unusual—for example, an NVO positive but clade II negative result—they would alert CDC immediately to ensure additional genotyping is conducted to determine if they are clade I. CDC continues to work, including with other U.S. government agencies, on multiple approaches to expand clade-specific testing domestically. Several public health laboratories (PHLs) have begun or are working to begin clade-specific testing.

Transmission

The DRC outbreak of clade I mpox has likely resulted from transmission through several modes and in different settings. Most cases in 2023 were in children, and in past outbreaks, children have been more likely to acquire infection through contact with infected animals. Transmission caused by close contact within households has occurred in past clade I mpox outbreaks . Household transmission chains have typically been small, although occasionally have involved up to six generations of transmission. Transmission risk is highest among unvaccinated contacts; children and young adults are less likely to have vaccine-induced orthopoxvirus immunity since smallpox vaccination programs ended in 1980 in DRC. Sexual transmission has also been recently reported in Kamituga, South Kivu province in Eastern DRC, primarily among female sex workers , and in a small outbreak affecting MSM and women in Kenge, Kwango Province in March 2023.

Importation risk

In 2023, outbreaks were reported in urban areas of DRC, including Kinshasa and less-populated regions of DRC, such as Équateur and South Kivu Provinces, where cross-border movement elevates the risk of spread of the disease outside of the country. As of June 2, 2024, there are 109 clade I mpox cases (confirmed, probable, and suspected) in the neighboring Republic of Congo, where clade I mpox is endemic, likely representing localized transmission in a region with frequent cross-border movement. There are no direct commercial air passenger flights arriving from DRC and its neighboring countries into the United States.

CDC subject-matter experts specializing in risk assessment methods, infectious disease modeling, global health, and mpox and other orthopoxviruses collaborated to develop this rapid assessment. Experts initially convened in February 2024 to discuss the need for an assessment examining the risks posed by the DRC outbreak to the United States, key evidence related to the DRC outbreak, and specific populations to include in the assessment. To conduct this assessment, experts considered evidence including epidemiologic data from DRC, data from the ongoing mpox outbreak in the United States caused by clade IIb, and historical data on clade I mpox outbreaks in DRC. After the initial assessment was finalized in February, experts subsequently re-reviewed evidence and updated this assessment in early March, mid-March, and mid-April.

Overall risk was estimated by combining the likelihood of infection and the impact of the disease. For example, low likelihood of infection combined with high impact of disease would result in moderate risk. The likelihood of infection refers to the probability that members of the general U.S. population or MSM acquire mpox throughout 2024, which in turn depends on the likelihood of exposure, infectiousness of the disease, and susceptibility of the population. The impact of infection considers several factors affecting the consequences of infection, including the severity of disease, level of population immunity, availability of treatments, and necessary public health response resources. A degree of confidence was assigned to each level of the assessment, taking into account evidence quality, extent, and corroboration of information.

For more details on our methods, please see our rapid risk assessment methods webpage .

Previous Updates

See the previous updates of the Mpox Rapid Risk Assessment.

• We note that the general population includes gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM), but we assess this group in a separate assessment because the clade I mpox outbreak in DRC may pose a higher risk to this population.
• Pollock E, Nakazawa Y, Asher J, Gift T, Spicknall I. Potential mpox transmission among college-attending 18-25-year-olds with opposite-sex contacts in the United States. (2023, July 24-27). The International Society for Sexually Transmitted Diseases Research.
• Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics | CFA | CDC

CFA: Qualitative Assessments

The Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics qualitative assessments - including risk assessments, seasonal outlooks, and more.