Research Skills Support
Good research underpins every good grade — but most students are never actually taught how to search, filter and evaluate academic literature. Our research skills support gives you practical, discipline-specific help with finding, judging and using sources, and with designing research that stands up to scrutiny.
Literature searching that finds the right sources
We help you build effective search strategies for Google Scholar, Scopus, Web of Science, PubMed and your library databases — keyword combinations, Boolean logic, date and citation filters — so you stop drowning in irrelevant papers and start finding the studies your argument needs.
Evaluating and using sources critically
Not all sources are equal. We show you how to weigh methodology, sample size, recency and journal quality, and how to position sources against each other in your writing — the difference between a descriptive summary and the critical synthesis markers reward.
Research design and analysis guidance
Choosing between surveys, interviews, experiments or secondary data; sampling and ethics; and analysing results in SPSS, R, Excel or NVivo. We explain the reasoning behind each choice so you can justify your design in your methodology chapter and in person.
What's included
- Database search strategy for your topic
- Curated starting reading lists with rationale
- Source evaluation and critical synthesis techniques
- Research design and methods guidance
- Statistics and qualitative analysis support
- One-to-one Q&A through the enquiry chat
Research Skills Support — FAQs
Is this a tutoring service or do you do the research for me?
Both options exist. Research skills support is guidance-focused — we teach the method and review your work. If you need the research and writing done as a service, see our dissertation support and academic writing support pages.
Can you help me find sources for a specific essay?
Yes — send the essay question through the enquiry chat and we will return a targeted search strategy and a starting list of relevant, credible academic sources.
Do you support systematic literature reviews?
Yes, including PRISMA-style search documentation, inclusion and exclusion criteria and quality-appraisal frameworks.
I don't understand my statistics output — can you explain it?
Yes. Send your output (SPSS tables, R results, Excel charts) as attachments in the chat and we will explain what it means and how to report it correctly.
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