Los Angeles Valley College Library: English Research Guide: Develop a Topic

Explore & Refine

Explore Your Topic
Refine Your Topic

A hiker cresting a mountain with the word "Explore"

Before you develop your research topic or question, you'll need to do some background research first.

Some good places to find background information:

Your textbook or class readings
Encyclopedias and reference books
Credible websites
Library databases

Try the library databases below to explore your topic. When you're ready, move on to refining your topic.

Find Background Information:

Gale eBooks This link opens in a new window
Cross-searches full text of more than one hundred encyclopedias, almanacs, and specialized reference sources covering arts and humanities, biography and genealogy, business, careers, education, literature, history, philosophy, information industry, law, government, medicine and health, multicultural studies, countries, religion, science, social studies, sports, technology, and women's studies.
Gale Literary Sources This link opens in a new window
Cross-searches Gale's literature databases. Provides full-text literary content with tools to analyze information. Coverage includes authors and their works, literary movements and genres. Full-text of literary works, journal articles, literature criticism, reviews, biographical information and overviews.
Opposing Viewpoints In Context This link opens in a new window
Topic overviews and opinions on hundreds of today's most controversial social issues. Includes pro/con viewpoint essays; full-text magazine, academic journal, and news articles; more than 300 primary source documents; court-case overviews; biographies; statistical tables, charts, and graphs; images, videos; audio files, and links to vetted websites.

a glass beaker with gold liquid inside with the word "Refine" at the top

Now that you've done some background research, it's time to narrow your topic. Remember: the shorter your final paper, the narrower your topic needs to be. Here are some suggestions for narrowing and defining your topic:

Is there a specific subset of the topic you can focus on?
Is there a cause and effect relationship you can explore?
Is there an unanswered question on the subject?
Can you focus on a specific time period or group of people?

Describe and develop your topic in some detail. Try filling in the blanks in the following sentence, as much as you can:

I want to research ____(what/who)____ and ____(what/who)____

in ____(where)____ during ____(when)____ because ____(why)____.

Example: I want to research feminism and gender roles in Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale because I see parallels between the book and today's society.