The Three Cycles of My Research

I've noticed over the past year or so that my work on research projects goes in cycles.  There are three basic cycles: Research, Background Reading and Output.  These aren't the only areas of a research project but when I get deep into research I tend to lose myself in these phases for quite a while.


Here's how I would describe what the mean:

Research

This is the chase.  I've got my mind on a specific goal.  Usually I'm chasing after a gravestone carver, an 18th century African American in New England or a specific historic house.  I do wide surveys of documents and record groups in my attempt to locate something, anything on my target.  This often involves creating a research plan so that my chase is focused and efficient.  All the while I still get lost in the effort and can spend days or weeks on end chasing after my goal.

Background Reading

Often referred to as the literature search.  I typically circle around a topic, reading what seems to be relevant, and then later expanding my circle.  This summer has been an intensive background reading phase for me.  In the past I have read many genealogical works on New England as they related to my research.  This summer I decided I needed to read everything related to New England.  This has been a serious literature search.  I realized I couldn't move forward until I really understood everything that has already been published and what the gaps are in published works.  I started on this to achieve two things: 1) to fill in the gaps of my own knowledge and 2) to provide direction for my own research so I wouldn't waste time researching something that has already been done.  Clearly trying to read *everything* will take me a very long time but I've made great progress in the last few months.

Output

There is where I take everything that I have learned from the research and background reading phases and turn it into something that can be shared.  Most of my efforts to-date have involved preparing presentations or articles.  I'd like to shift that in the future to include books, newsletters, webinars and maybe even a podcast.  Output takes just as much, if not more focused effort than the other two phases.  Often this is when I need my "alone" time, particularly for writing.  Output also takes the most discipline.  I need to give myself deadlines and try to stick to them.  Planning for the output stage typically starts in September, which for me, is a time of renewal and re-energizing.  But  it can also be strongly influenced, not surprisingly, by conference proposal deadlines.

Yes, the three phases do overlap.  It's not realistic to think that I can do one activity exclusive of another.  But each phase seems to take a predominance over the others for awhile.

I'm sure that my research phases are directly related to the cycles of my family life.  I imagine most researchers do all three things on a more daily basis.  Perhaps some researchers have other influences that are impacting the way their cycles work.

Let me know how it works for you.

Photo Credit: Photo by sonictk used under the Creative Commons license.