I have put together these ideas about writing research papers because I often see that students do not cover all the territory in their papers, and I would like students to make the best use of their time (and my time) and get the structure down early in the game. Remember that we are talking here both about form and content. If the paper has good form, it can convey its ideas (content) better than if it is poorly organized.
In later sections of this document I indicate some sources that can be
used to help the beginning (or even the advanced) researcher. One that
has just recently appeared, and will be available in the University
Bookstore, is a handbook entitled The Craft of Research
by Wayne Booth, Gregory Colomb, and Joseph Williams, published by U. of
Chicago Press, 1995. ISBN: 0-226-06584-7 (paper), card catalogue no.
Q180.55.M4B66 1995. This is an extremely useful book that goes beyond
just the style of a paper to deal with structure, argumentation, goals of
research, the basic ideas of what we are trying to do when we do research
and present it to our readers.