position statement in research

Position statement

A Position statement denotes an article with the form of a guideline (usually society-endorsed), expert consensus document, position paper, scientific statement, standards paper, or white paper. A Position statement should present a balanced review put together by a taskforce of people from various institutes, rather than from one group, and can be evidence-based or eminence-based. It represents a consensus recommendation.

Preparing your manuscript

The title page should:

• present a title that includes, if appropriate, the research design or for non-research studies: a description of what the article reports
• if a collaboration group should be listed as an author, please list the group name as an author  and include the names of the individual members of the group in the “Acknowledgements” section in accordance with the instructions below
• indicate the corresponding author

The abstract should briefly summarize the aim, findings or purpose of the article. Please minimize the use of abbreviations and do not cite references in the abstract.

Beginning January 2022, we welcome submissions that include a graphical abstract (GA). This image should be a summary of the findings from the presented research allowing readers to quickly deduce the content in a visual format. The purpose is to highlight your work – draw the readers in quickly so they want to read more.

This graphical abstract figure (drawing, structure, or reaction scheme), preferably in color (free), will be used in the Table of Contents and in the abstract section on the title page of the article. Cover art is often chosen from graphical abstract figures.

For the GA, include a short title and description (about 50 words).The figure should be in one of the following file types: .tiff, .eps, .jpg, .bmp, .doc, or .pdf. It should be 8 cm (3.15 inches) wide x 4 cm (1.57 inches) high when printed at full scale (100%), and should have high quality image and text. Please insure that the illustration maintains this aspect ratio and is still informative upon reduction.

Please supply the GA figure at 100% using the following specifications/sizes:

• 300 dpi – halftone
• 600 dpi - with text
• 600 dpi - combine halftone and text (embedded text)
• 1200 dpi - bitmap (pure text and lines (b/w))
• 300/600/1200 dpi - combine embedded images and vector objects
• For "rastered" images (.pdf, .doc, .bmp, .jpg), the resolution should be at least 300 dpi.

​​​​​​​ Keywords

Three to ten keywords representing the main content of the article.

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

List of abbreviations

If abbreviations are used in the text they should be defined in the text at first use, and a list of abbreviations should be provided.

Declarations

All manuscripts must contain the following sections under the heading 'Declarations':

Availability of data and materials

Competing interests, authors' contributions, acknowledgements.

• Authors' information (optional)

Please see below for details on the information to be included in these sections.

If any of the sections are not relevant to your manuscript, please include the heading and write 'Not applicable' for that section.

All manuscripts must include an ‘Availability of data and materials’ statement. Data availability statements should include information on where data supporting the results reported in the article can be found including, where applicable, hyperlinks to publicly archived datasets analysed or generated during the study. By data we mean the minimal dataset that would be necessary to interpret, replicate and build upon the findings reported in the article. We recognise it is not always possible to share research data publicly, for instance when individual privacy could be compromised, and in such instances data availability should still be stated in the manuscript along with any conditions for access.

Data availability statements can take one of the following forms (or a combination of more than one if required for multiple datasets):

• The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are available in the [NAME] repository, [PERSISTENT WEB LINK TO DATASETS]
• The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
• All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article [and its supplementary information files].
• The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are not publicly available due [REASON WHY DATA ARE NOT PUBLIC] but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
• Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.
• The data that support the findings of this study are available from [third party name] but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study, and so are not publicly available. Data are however available from the authors upon reasonable request and with permission of [third party name].
• Not applicable. If your manuscript does not contain any data, please state 'Not applicable' in this section.

More examples of template data availability statements, which include examples of openly available and restricted access datasets, are available  here .

SpringerOpen  also requires that authors cite any publicly available data on which the conclusions of the paper rely in the manuscript. Data citations should include a persistent identifier (such as a DOI) and should ideally be included in the reference list. Citations of datasets, when they appear in the reference list, should include the minimum information recommended by DataCite and follow journal style. Dataset identifiers including DOIs should be expressed as full URLs. For example:

Hao Z, AghaKouchak A, Nakhjiri N, Farahmand A. Global integrated drought monitoring and prediction system (GIDMaPS) data sets. figshare. 2014.  http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.853801

With the corresponding text in the Availability of data and materials statement:

The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available in the [NAME] repository, [PERSISTENT WEB LINK TO DATASETS]. [Reference number]

If you wish to co-submit a data note describing your data to be published in BMC Research Notes , you can do so by visiting our submission portal . Data notes support open data and help authors to comply with funder policies on data sharing. Co-published data notes will be linked to the research article the data support ( example ).

All financial and non-financial competing interests must be declared in this section.

See our  editorial policies  for a full explanation of competing interests. If you are unsure whether you or any of your co-authors have a competing interest please contact the editorial office.

Please use the authors’ initials to refer to each authors' competing interests in this section.

If you do not have any competing interests, please state "The authors declare that they have no competing interests" in this section.

All sources of funding for the research reported should be declared. If the funder has a specific role in the conceptualization, design, data collection, analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript, this should be declared.

The individual contributions of authors to the manuscript should be specified in this section. Guidance and criteria for authorship can be found in our  editorial policies .

Please use initials to refer to each author's contribution in this section, for example: "FC analyzed and interpreted the patient data regarding the hematological disease and the transplant. RH performed the histological examination of the kidney, and was a major contributor in writing the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript."

Please acknowledge anyone who contributed towards the article who does not meet the criteria for authorship including anyone who provided professional writing services or materials.

Authors should obtain permission to acknowledge from all those mentioned in the Acknowledgements section.

See our  editorial policies  for a full explanation of acknowledgements and authorship criteria.

If you do not have anyone to acknowledge, please write "Not applicable" in this section.

Group authorship (for manuscripts involving a collaboration group): if you would like the names of the individual members of a collaboration Group to be searchable through their individual PubMed records, please ensure that the title of the collaboration Group is included on the title page and in the submission system and also include collaborating author names as the last paragraph of the “Acknowledgements” section. Please add authors in the format First Name, Middle initial(s) (optional), Last Name. You can add institution or country information for each author if you wish, but this should be consistent across all authors.

Authors' information

This section is optional.

You may choose to use this section to include any relevant information about the author(s) that may aid the reader's interpretation of the article, and understand the standpoint of the author(s). This may include details about the authors' qualifications, current positions they hold at institutions or societies, or any other relevant background information. Please refer to authors using their initials. Note this section should not be used to describe any competing interests.

Footnotes should be designated within the text using a superscript number. It is not allowed to use footnotes for references/citations.

Examples of the Basic Springer reference style are shown below. 

See our editorial policies for author guidance on good citation practice.

Web links and URLs: All web links and URLs, including links to the authors' own websites, should be given a reference number and included in the reference list rather than within the text of the manuscript. They should be provided in full, including both the title of the site and the URL, as well as the date the site was accessed, in the following format: The Mouse Tumor Biology Database. http://tumor.informatics.jax.org/mtbwi/index.do . Accessed 20 May 2013. If an author or group of authors can clearly be associated with a web link, such as for weblogs, then they should be included in the reference.

Example reference style:

Article within a journal

Smith J, Jones M Jr, Houghton L (1999) Future of health insurance. N Engl J Med 965:325-329.

Article by DOI (with page numbers)

Slifka MK, Whitton JL (2000) Clinical implications of dysregulated cytokine production. J Mol Med 78:74-80. doi:10.1007/s001090000086.

Article by DOI (before issue publication and with page numbers)

Slifka MK, Whitton JL (2000) Clinical implications of dysregulated cytokine production. J Mol Med. doi:10.1007/s001090000086.

Article in electronic journal by DOI (no paginated version)

Slifka MK, Whitton JL (2000) Clinical implications of dysregulated cytokine production. Dig J Mol Med. doi:10.1007/s801090000086.

Journal issue with issue editor

Smith J (ed) (1998) Rodent genes. Mod Genomics J 14(6):126-233.

Journal issue with no issue editor

Mod Genomics J (1998) Rodent genes. Mod Genomics J 14(6):126-233.

Book chapter, or an article within a book

Brown B, Aaron M (2001) The politics of nature. In: Smith J (ed) The rise of modern genomics, 3rd edn. Wiley, New York.

Complete book, authored

South J, Blass B (2001) The future of modern genomics. Blackwell, London.

Complete book, edited

Smith J, Brown B (eds) (2001) The demise of modern genomics. Blackwell, London.

Complete book, also showing a translated edition [Either edition may be listed first.]

Adorno TW (1966) Negative Dialektik. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt. English edition: Adorno TW (1973) Negative Dialectics (trans: Ashton EB). Routledge, London.

Chapter in a book in a series without volume titles

Schmidt H (1989) Testing results. In: Hutzinger O (ed) Handbook of environmental chemistry, vol 2E. Springer, Heidelberg, p 111.

Chapter in a book in a series with volume titles

Smith SE (1976) Neuromuscular blocking drugs in man. In: Zaimis E (ed) Neuromuscular junction. Handbook of experimental pharmacology, vol 42. Springer, Heidelberg, pp 593-660.

OnlineFirst chapter in a series (without a volume designation but with a DOI)

Saito, Yukio, and Hyuga, Hiroyuki. (2007) Rate equation approaches to amplification of enantiomeric excess and chiral symmetry breaking. Topics in Current Chemistry. doi:10.1007/128_2006_108.

Proceedings as a book (in a series and subseries)

Zowghi D (1996) A framework for reasoning about requirements in evolution. In: Foo N, Goebel R (eds) PRICAI'96: topics in artificial intelligence. 4th Pacific Rim conference on artificial intelligence, Cairns, August 1996. Lecture notes in computer science (Lecture notes in artificial intelligence), vol 1114. Springer, Heidelberg, p 157.

Article within conference proceedings with an editor (without a publisher)

Aaron M (1999) The future of genomics. In: Williams H (ed) Proceedings of the genomic researchers, Boston, 1999.

Article within conference proceedings without an editor (without a publisher)

Chung S-T, Morris RL (1978) Isolation and characterization of plasmid deoxyribonucleic acid from Streptomyces fradiae. In: Abstracts of the 3rd international symposium on the genetics of industrial microorganisms, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 4-9 June 1978.

Article presented at a conference

Chung S-T, Morris RL (1978) Isolation and characterization of plasmid deoxyribonucleic acid from Streptomyces fradiae. Paper presented at the 3rd international symposium on the genetics of industrial microorganisms, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 4-9 June 1978.

Norman LO (1998) Lightning rods. US Patent 4,379,752, 9 Sept 1998.

Dissertation

Trent JW (1975) Experimental acute renal failure. Dissertation, University of California.

Book with institutional author

International Anatomical Nomenclature Committee (1966) Nomina anatomica. Excerpta Medica, Amsterdam.

In press article

Major M (2007) Recent developments. In: Jones W (ed) Surgery today. Springer, Dordrecht (in press).  

Online document

Doe J (1999) Title of subordinate document. In: The dictionary of substances and their effects. Royal Society of Chemistry. Available via DIALOG. http://www.rsc.org/dose/title of subordinate document. Accessed 15 Jan 1999.

Online database

Healthwise Knowledgebase (1998) US Pharmacopeia, Rockville. http://www.healthwise.org. Accessed 21 Sept 1998.

Supplementary material/private homepage

Doe J (2000) Title of supplementary material. http://www.privatehomepage.com. Accessed 22 Feb 2000.

University site

Doe J (1999) Title of preprint. http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/mydata.html. Accessed 25 Dec 1999.

Doe J (1999) Trivial HTTP, RFC2169. ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2169.txt. Accessed 12 Nov 1999.

Organization site

ISSN International Centre (2006) The ISSN register. http://www.issn.org. Accessed 20 Feb 2007.

General formatting information

Manuscripts must be written in concise English. For help on scientific writing, or preparing your manuscript in English, please see Springer's  Author Academy .

Quick points:

• Use double line spacing
• Include line and page numbering
• Use SI units: Please ensure that all special characters used are embedded in the text, otherwise they will be lost during conversion to PDF
• Do not use page breaks in your manuscript

File formats

The following word processor file formats are acceptable for the main manuscript document:

• Microsoft word (DOC, DOCX)
• Rich text format (RTF)
• TeX/LaTeX 

Please note: editable files are required for processing in production. If your manuscript contains any non-editable files (such as PDFs) you will be required to re-submit an editable file if your manuscript is accepted.

For more information, see ' Preparing figures ' below.

Additional information for TeX/LaTeX users

You are encouraged to use the Springer Nature LaTeX template when preparing a submission. A PDF of your manuscript files will be compiled during submission using pdfLaTeX and TexLive 2021. All relevant editable source files must be uploaded during the submission process. Failing to submit these source files will cause unnecessary delays in the production process.  

Style and language

For editors and reviewers to accurately assess the work presented in your manuscript you need to ensure the English language is of sufficient quality to be understood. If you need help with writing in English you should consider:

• Getting a fast, free online grammar check .
• Visiting the English language tutorial which covers the common mistakes when writing in English.
• Asking a colleague who is proficient in English to review your manuscript for clarity.
• Using a professional language editing service where editors will improve the English to ensure that your meaning is clear and identify problems that require your review. Two such services are provided by our affiliates Nature Research Editing Service and American Journal Experts . SpringerOpen authors are entitled to a 10% discount on their first submission to either of these services. To claim 10% off English editing from Nature Research Editing Service, click here . To claim 10% off American Journal Experts, click here .

Please note that the use of a language editing service is not a requirement for publication in AAPS Open and does not imply or guarantee that the article will be selected for peer review or accepted.  为便于编辑和评审专家准确评估您稿件中陈述的研究工作，您需要确保文稿英语语言质量足以令人理解。如果您需要英文写作方面的帮助，您可以考虑：

• 获取快速、免费的在线  语法检查 。
• 查看一些有关英语写作中常见语言错误的 教程 。
• 请一位以英语为母语的同事审阅您的稿件是否表意清晰。
• 使用专业语言编辑服务，编辑人员会对英语进行润色，以确保您的意思表达清晰，并提出需要您复核的问题。例如我们的附属机构 Nature Research Editing Service 以及合作伙伴 American Journal Experts 都可以提供此类专业服务。SpringerOpen作者享受首次订单10%优惠，该优惠同时适用于两家公司。您只需点击以下链接即可开始。使用 Nature Research Editing Service的编辑润色10%的优惠服务，请点击 这里 。使用 American Journal Experts的10%优惠服务，请点击 这里 。

请注意，使用语言编辑服务并非在期刊上发表文章的必要条件，这也并不意味或保证文章将被选中进行同行评议或被接受。 エディターと査読者があなたの論文を正しく評価するには、使用されている英語の質が十分であることが必要とされます。英語での論文執筆に際してサポートが必要な場合には、次のオプションがあります：

• 高速なオンライン  文法チェック  を無料で受ける。
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• 英語を母国語とする同僚に、原稿内の英語が明確であるかをチェックしてもらう。
• プロの英文校正サービスを利用する。校正者が原稿の意味を明確にしたり、問題点を指摘し、英語を向上させます。 Nature Research Editing Service と American Journal Experts の2つは弊社と提携しているサービスです。SpringerOpenのジャーナルの著者は、いずれかのサービスを初めて利用する際に、10%の割引を受けることができます。Nature Research Editing Serviceの10%割引を受けるには、 こちらをクリックしてください 。. American Journal Expertsの10%割引を受けるには、 こちらをクリックしてください 。

英文校正サービスの利用は、このジャーナルに掲載されるための条件ではないこと、また論文審査や受理を保証するものではないことに留意してください。 영어 원고의 경우, 에디터 및 리뷰어들이 귀하의 원고에 실린 결과물을 정확하게 평가할 수 있도록, 그들이 충분히 이해할 수 있을 만한 수준으로 작성되어야 합니다. 만약 영작문과 관련하여 도움을 받기를 원하신다면 다음의 사항들을 고려하여 주십시오:

• 영어 튜토리얼 페이지 에 방문하여 영어로 글을 쓸 때 자주하는 실수들을 확인합니다.
• 귀하의 원고의 표현을 명확히 해줄 영어 원어민 동료를 찾아서 리뷰를 의뢰합니다
• 리뷰에 대비하여, 원고의 의미를 명확하게 해주고 리뷰에서 요구하는 문제점들을 식별해서 영문 수준을 향상시켜주는 전문 영문 교정 서비스를 이용합니다. Nature Research Editing Service 와 American Journal Experts 에서 저희와 협약을 통해 서비스를 제공하고 있습니다. SpringerOpen에서는 위의 두 가지의 서비스를 첫 논문 투고를 위해 사용하시는 경우, 10%의 할인을 제공하고 있습니다. Nature Research Editing Service이용시 10% 할인을 요청하기 위해서는 여기 를 클릭해 주시고, American Journal Experts 이용시 10% 할인을 요청하기 위해서는 여기 를 클릭해 주십시오.

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Data and materials

For all journals, SpringerOpen strongly encourages all datasets on which the conclusions of the manuscript rely to be either deposited in publicly available repositories (where available and appropriate) or presented in the main paper or additional supporting files, in machine-readable format (such as spread sheets rather than PDFs) whenever possible. Please see the list of recommended repositories in our editorial policies.

For some journals, deposition of the data on which the conclusions of the manuscript rely is an absolute requirement. Please check the Instructions for Authors for the relevant journal and article type for journal specific policies.

For all manuscripts, information about data availability should be detailed in an ‘Availability of data and materials’ section. For more information on the content of this section, please see the Declarations section of the relevant journal’s Instruction for Authors. For more information on SpringerOpen's policies on data availability, please see our editorial policies .

Formatting the 'Availability of data and materials' section of your manuscript

The following format for the 'Availability of data and materials section of your manuscript should be used:

"The dataset(s) supporting the conclusions of this article is(are) available in the [repository name] repository, [unique persistent identifier and hyperlink to dataset(s) in http:// format]."

The following format is required when data are included as additional files:

"The dataset(s) supporting the conclusions of this article is(are) included within the article (and its additional file(s))."

For databases, this section should state the web/ftp address at which the database is available and any restrictions to its use by non-academics.

For software, this section should include:

• Project name: e.g. My bioinformatics project
• Project home page: e.g. http://sourceforge.net/projects/mged
• Archived version: DOI or unique identifier of archived software or code in repository (e.g. enodo)
• Operating system(s): e.g. Platform independent
• Programming language: e.g. Java
• Other requirements: e.g. Java 1.3.1 or higher, Tomcat 4.0 or higher
• License: e.g. GNU GPL, FreeBSD etc.
• Any restrictions to use by non-academics: e.g. licence needed

Information on available repositories for other types of scientific data, including clinical data, can be found in our editorial policies .

What should be cited?

Only articles, clinical trial registration records and abstracts that have been published or are in press, or are available through public e-print/preprint servers, may be cited.

Unpublished abstracts, unpublished data and personal communications should not be included in the reference list, but may be included in the text and referred to as "unpublished observations" or "personal communications" giving the names of the involved researchers. Obtaining permission to quote personal communications and unpublished data from the cited colleagues is the responsibility of the author. Either footnotes or endnotes are permitted. Journal abbreviations follow Index Medicus/MEDLINE.

Any in press articles cited within the references and necessary for the reviewers' assessment of the manuscript should be made available if requested by the editorial office.

Preparing figures

When preparing figures, please follow the formatting instructions below.

• Figure titles (max 15 words) and legends (max 300 words) should be provided in the main manuscript, not in the graphic file.
• Tables should NOT be submitted as figures but should be included in the main manuscript file.
• Multi-panel figures (those with parts a, b, c, d etc.) should be submitted as a single composite file that contains all parts of the figure.
• Figures should be numbered in the order they are first mentioned in the text, and uploaded in this order.
• Figures should be uploaded in the correct orientation.
• Figure keys should be incorporated into the graphic, not into the legend of the figure.
• Each figure should be closely cropped to minimize the amount of white space surrounding the illustration. Cropping figures improves accuracy when placing the figure in combination with other elements when the accepted manuscript is prepared for publication on our site. For more information on individual figure file formats, see our detailed instructions.
• Individual figure files should not exceed 10 MB. If a suitable format is chosen, this file size is adequate for extremely high quality figures.
• Please note that it is the responsibility of the author(s) to obtain permission from the copyright holder to reproduce figures (or tables) that have previously been published elsewhere. In order for all figures to be open access, authors must have permission from the rights holder if they wish to include images that have been published elsewhere in non open access journals. Permission should be indicated in the figure legend, and the original source included in the reference list.

Figure file types

We accept the following file formats for figures:

• EPS (suitable for diagrams and/or images)
• PDF (suitable for diagrams and/or images)
• Microsoft Word (suitable for diagrams and/or images, figures must be a single page)
• PowerPoint (suitable for diagrams and/or images, figures must be a single page)
• TIFF (suitable for images)
• JPEG (suitable for photographic images, less suitable for graphical images)
• PNG (suitable for images)
• BMP (suitable for images)
• CDX (ChemDraw - suitable for molecular structures)

Figure size and resolution

Figures are resized during publication of the final full text and PDF versions to conform to the SpringerOpen standard dimensions, which are detailed below.

Figures on the web:

• width of 600 pixels (standard), 1200 pixels (high resolution).

Figures in the final PDF version:

• width of 85 mm for half page width figure
• width of 170 mm for full page width figure
• maximum height of 225 mm for figure and legend
• image resolution of approximately 300 dpi (dots per inch) at the final size

Figures should be designed such that all information, including text, is legible at these dimensions. All lines should be wider than 0.25 pt when constrained to standard figure widths. All fonts must be embedded.

Figure file compression

Vector figures should if possible be submitted as PDF files, which are usually more compact than EPS files.

• TIFF files should be saved with LZW compression, which is lossless (decreases file size without decreasing quality) in order to minimize upload time.
• JPEG files should be saved at maximum quality.
• Conversion of images between file types (especially lossy formats such as JPEG) should be kept to a minimum to avoid degradation of quality.

If you have any questions or are experiencing a problem with figures, please contact the customer service team at [email protected] .

Preparing tables

When preparing tables, please follow the formatting instructions below.

• Tables should be numbered and cited in the text in sequence using Arabic numerals (i.e. Table 1, Table 2 etc.).
• Tables less than one A4 or Letter page in length can be placed in the appropriate location within the manuscript.
• Tables larger than one A4 or Letter page in length can be placed at the end of the document text file. Please cite and indicate where the table should appear at the relevant location in the text file so that the table can be added in the correct place during production.
• Larger datasets, or tables too wide for A4 or Letter landscape page can be uploaded as additional files. Please see [below] for more information.
• Tabular data provided as additional files can be uploaded as an Excel spreadsheet (.xls ) or comma separated values (.csv). Please use the standard file extensions.
• Table titles (max 15 words) should be included above the table, and legends (max 300 words) should be included underneath the table.
• Tables should not be embedded as figures or spreadsheet files, but should be formatted using ‘Table object’ function in your word processing program.
• Color and shading may not be used. Parts of the table can be highlighted using superscript, numbering, lettering, symbols or bold text, the meaning of which should be explained in a table legend.
• Commas should not be used to indicate numerical values.

If you have any questions or are experiencing a problem with tables, please contact the customer service team at [email protected] .

Preparing additional files

As the length and quantity of data is not restricted for many article types, authors can provide datasets, tables, movies, or other information as additional files.

All Additional files will be published along with the accepted article. Do not include files such as patient consent forms, certificates of language editing, or revised versions of the main manuscript document with tracked changes. Such files, if requested, should be sent by email to the journal’s editorial email address, quoting the manuscript reference number.

Results that would otherwise be indicated as "data not shown" should be included as additional files. Since many web links and URLs rapidly become broken, SpringerOpen requires that supporting data are included as additional files, or deposited in a recognized repository. Please do not link to data on a personal/departmental website. Do not include any individual participant details. The maximum file size for additional files is 20 MB each, and files will be virus-scanned on submission. Each additional file should be cited in sequence within the main body of text.

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/images/cornell/logo35pt_cornell_white.svg" alt="position statement in research"> Cornell University --> Graduate School

Research statement, what is a research statement.

The research statement (or statement of research interests) is a common component of academic job applications. It is a summary of your research accomplishments, current work, and future direction and potential of your work.

The statement can discuss specific issues such as:

• funding history and potential
• requirements for laboratory equipment and space and other resources
• potential research and industrial collaborations
• how your research contributes to your field
• future direction of your research

The research statement should be technical, but should be intelligible to all members of the department, including those outside your subdiscipline. So keep the “big picture” in mind. The strongest research statements present a readable, compelling, and realistic research agenda that fits well with the needs, facilities, and goals of the department.

Research statements can be weakened by:

• overly ambitious proposals
• lack of clear direction
• lack of big-picture focus
• inadequate attention to the needs and facilities of the department or position

Why a Research Statement?

• It conveys to search committees the pieces of your professional identity and charts the course of your scholarly journey.
• It communicates a sense that your research will follow logically from what you have done and that it will be different, important, and innovative.
• It gives a context for your research interests—Why does your research matter? The so what?
• It combines your achievements and current work with the proposal for upcoming research.
• areas of specialty and expertise
• potential to get funding
• academic strengths and abilities
• compatibility with the department or school
• ability to think and communicate like a serious scholar and/or scientist

Formatting of Research Statements

The goal of the research statement is to introduce yourself to a search committee, which will probably contain scientists both in and outside your field, and get them excited about your research. To encourage people to read it:

• make it one or two pages, three at most
• use informative section headings and subheadings
• use bullets
• use an easily readable font size
• make the margins a reasonable size

Organization of Research Statements

Think of the overarching theme guiding your main research subject area. Write an essay that lays out:

• The main theme(s) and why it is important and what specific skills you use to attack the problem.
• A few specific examples of problems you have already solved with success to build credibility and inform people outside your field about what you do.
• A discussion of the future direction of your research. This section should be really exciting to people both in and outside your field. Don’t sell yourself short; if you think your research could lead to answers for big important questions, say so!
• A final paragraph that gives a good overall impression of your research.

Writing Research Statements

• Avoid jargon. Make sure that you describe your research in language that many people outside your specific subject area can understand. Ask people both in and outside your field to read it before you send your application. A search committee won’t get excited about something they can’t understand.
• Write as clearly, concisely, and concretely as you can.
• Keep it at a summary level; give more detail in the job talk.
• Ask others to proofread it. Be sure there are no spelling errors.
• Convince the search committee not only that you are knowledgeable, but that you are the right person to carry out the research.
• Include information that sets you apart (e.g., publication in  Science, Nature,  or a prestigious journal in your field).
• What excites you about your research? Sound fresh.
• Include preliminary results and how to build on results.
• Point out how current faculty may become future partners.
• Acknowledge the work of others.
• Use language that shows you are an independent researcher.
• BUT focus on your research work, not yourself.
• Include potential funding partners and industrial collaborations. Be creative!
• Provide a summary of your research.
• Put in background material to give the context/relevance/significance of your research.
• List major findings, outcomes, and implications.
• Describe both current and planned (future) research.
• Communicate a sense that your research will follow logically from what you have done and that it will be unique, significant, and innovative (and easy to fund).

Describe Your Future Goals or Research Plans

• Major problem(s) you want to focus on in your research.
• The problem’s relevance and significance to the field.
• Your specific goals for the next three to five years, including potential impact and outcomes.
• If you know what a particular agency funds, you can name the agency and briefly outline a proposal.
• Give broad enough goals so that if one area doesn’t get funded, you can pursue other research goals and funding.

Identify Potential Funding Sources

• Almost every institution wants to know whether you’ll be able to get external funding for research.
• Try to provide some possible sources of funding for the research, such as NIH, NSF, foundations, private agencies.
• Mention past funding, if appropriate.

Be Realistic

There is a delicate balance between a realistic research statement where you promise to work on problems you really think you can solve and over-reaching or dabbling in too many subject areas. Select an over-arching theme for your research statement and leave miscellaneous ideas or projects out. Everyone knows that you will work on more than what you mention in this statement.

Consider Also Preparing a Longer Version

• A longer version (five–15 pages) can be brought to your interview. (Check with your advisor to see if this is necessary.)
• You may be asked to describe research plans and budget in detail at the campus interview. Be prepared.
• Include laboratory needs (how much budget you need for equipment, how many grad assistants, etc.) to start up the research.

Samples of Research Statements

To find sample research statements with content specific to your discipline, search on the internet for your discipline + “Research Statement.”

• University of Pennsylvania Sample Research Statement
• Advice on writing a Research Statement (Plan) from the journal  Science

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Research Statements

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A research statement is used when applying for some academic faculty positions and research-intensive positions. A research statement is usually a single-spaced 1-2 page document that describes your research trajectory as a scholar, highlighting growth: from where you began to where you envision going in the next few years. Ultimately, research productivity, focus and future are the most highly scrutinized in academic faculty appointments, particularly at research-intensive universities. Tailor your research statement to the institution to which you are applying – if a university has a strong research focus, emphasize publications; if a university values teaching and research equally, consider ending with a paragraph about how your research complements your teaching and vice versa. Structures of these documents also varies by discipline. See two common structures below.

Structure One:

Introduction: The first paragraph should introduce your research interests in the context of your field, tying the research you have done so far to a distinct trajectory that will take you well into the future.

Summary Of Dissertation: This paragraph should summarize your doctoral research project. Try not to have too much language repetition across documents, such as your abstract or cover letter.

Contribution To Field And Publications: Describe the significance of your projects for your field. Detail any publications initiated from your independent doctoral or postdoctoral research. Additionally, include plans for future publications based on your thesis. Be specific about journals to which you should submit or university presses that might be interested in the book you could develop from your dissertation (if your field expects that). If you are writing a two-page research statement, this section would likely be more than one paragraph and cover your future publication plans in greater detail.

Second Project: If you are submitting a cover letter along with your research statement, then the committee may already have a paragraph describing your second project. In that case, use this space to discuss your second project in greater depth and the publication plans you envision for this project. Make sure you transition from your dissertation to your second large project smoothly – you want to give a sense of your cohesion as a scholar, but also to demonstrate your capacity to conceptualize innovative research that goes well beyond your dissertation project.

Wider Impact Of Research Agenda: Describe the broader significance of your work. What ties your research projects together? What impact do you want to make on your field? If you’re applying for a teaching-oriented institution, how would you connect your research with your teaching?

Structure Two:

25% Previous Research Experience: Describe your early work and how it solidified your interest in your field. How did these formative experiences influence your research interests and approach to research? Explain how this earlier work led to your current project(s).

25% Current Projects: Describe your dissertation/thesis project – this paragraph could be modeled on the first paragraph of your dissertation abstract since it covers all your bases: context, methodology, findings, significance. You could also mention grants/fellowships that funded the project, publications derived from this research, and publications that are currently being developed.

50% Future Work: Transition to how your current work informs your future research. Describe your next major project or projects and a realistic plan for accomplishing this work. What publications do you expect to come out of this research? The last part of the research statement should be customized to demonstrate the fit of your research agenda with the institution.

Positionality Statements in Research

Introduction

What is positionality in qualitative research, what are examples of researcher positionality, how does my positionality affect the research process, how do you write a positionality statement for a research project, further reading.

In the qualitative research process, the researcher is the main instrument of data collection , making positionality an important aspect to acknowledge in research. When you conduct research in the social sciences, it is essential for you and your research team to account for researcher identities such as gender, social class, sexual orientation, and other factors, especially if they are relevant to the research topic .

In this article, we'll look at the importance of the researcher's identity in qualitative research, then we'll discuss how a researcher can write about their positionality for an international journal or conference.

Quantitative research is typically straightforward; two plus two always equals four and the speed of light is always constant. The knowledge generated from this sort of research is seen as objective and universal.

Qualitative research , on the other hand, is more subjective in the interpretation of data . Every individual, whether they are the researcher or the participant, looks at the social world in entirely different ways.

When it comes to a researcher's own study, this degree of subjectivity can inform their research methods , research questions , and existing assumptions about the concept or phenomenon they are looking to study.

As a result, the researcher needs to acknowledge their own positionality to contextualize their data collection and data analysis .

Positionality refers to a number of self-identifications ranging from the researcher's background, personal experiences, gender identity, national origin, and other factors that the researcher brings to the research process.

It can also be an acknowledgment of their outsider status relative to the study participants, personal stories about interactions or power dynamics with the study population, or life experiences that bring the researcher to the research question they are addressing.

Positionality is also related to the concept of reflexivity . Both concepts rely on an acknowledgment of the researcher's own background and identity and how these may influence the researcher's interpretations.

While a positionality statement benefits the research audience, the act of reflexivity compels the researcher to become aware of their own influence on the field they are observing. This is an important principle not only for collecting rich data but also for conducting research in an ethical manner.

Fields such as psychological research, sociological research, and education research employ a range of methods , including interviews , focus groups , observations , and ethnographies . When using these methods, the researcher is the most important instrument of data collection .

Take a research study that employs semi-structured interviews , for example. When follow-up questions are generated in the moment as the interviewer responds to answers given by participants, it's important to know a little about the interviewer.

How well does the interviewer know about the expertise and knowledge that their respondents have? Are they close colleagues or are they meeting for the first time? Does the interviewer belong to the same social groups as the interviewee? Answering such questions in a positionality statement helps the research audience understand how the data was generated.

Ethnographies benefit from a more complex statement of positionality. Sociocultural and critical research relies on, among other things, the concept of emic and etic positioning. This concept says that cultures and communities treat people differently depending on whether they are considered insiders or outsiders. Such judgments may be made based on age, race, gender, or cultural background.

As a result, an ethnographer's status as an insider or outsider has potentially significant implications in terms of gaining access to the context, interacting with participants, and analyzing data generated from the ethnography.

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Imagine you are an ethnographer who wants to examine any of the following groups:

• indigenous peoples
• people with religious beliefs
• sex workers
• refugees in war zones

Would these groups welcome you or treat you with suspicion? In turn, what kind of bias would you have when observing or interacting with these groups? How might the difference in perspectives affect your methodology and findings?

Positionality can also affect the more mechanical aspects of a study. Informed consent , for example, is critical to gathering data from participants, making the discussion of power dynamics in a positionality statement essential to explaining to the audience how consent was obtained for data collection.

In general, there is no specific form that positionality statements should take in a research paper or presentation . The main objective of expressing positionality is to provide the audience with the sufficient contextualization of your background and identity to allow them to understand how data was collected and analyzed.

That said, scholarly research has two main conventions for writing a positionality statement in a research paper. Positionality statements are often written as part of the research methodology , where the research context, data collection , and data analysis are discussed. Writing positionality statements make the research methodology more transparent .

In this sense, a positionality statement looks like a brief biography of the researcher(s). A few short sentences are usually sufficient, for example:

"The main researcher in this study has significant experience working with patients in hospice care. As a result, she has a familiarity with the issues facing teminally ill patients that informs her reflections of her observations while in the field."

Alternatively, positionality need not be a formal or separate statement. In fields such as anthropology and sociology, and particularly fields where ethnography is commonly employed, research papers tend to resist a clinical structure (i.e., a paper with a strict background section, methodology section, etc.) in favor of a more literary narrative form. This means that positionality often accompanies the narrative developments when there is a relevant connection, for example:

"I observed how the students in class separated into groups according to whom they considered friends outside of formal activities. As a former classroom practitioner, I found this to be quite a natural development. I felt sympathetic toward the teacher, who tried to assign groups to establish more connections among classmates, as I would have done the same during my teaching days."

In the example above, the researcher is explaining what they observed in the field. They are drawn to a particular development (i.e., the grouping of students), which they note because of their previous experience as a teacher.

In this case, their positionality informs how they collected the data, particularly in a dynamic social enviroment where countless developments can occur and the researcher can only document so much at a time. The description of positionality here points out what the researcher did focus on during their research.

Ultimately, the best way to write about positionality depends on the field of research you are in. It is important for you to conduct a literature review of studies relevant to your topic, not only to gain a sense of the current theoretical developments, but also to understand and emulate the writing practices of other researchers.

Keep in mind how positionality statements are written in studies that connect to your research so you can determine the writing style that journals and their peer reviewers find compelling.

There are numerous articles engaging in meta-discussion of positionality and its role in the research process. Here are a few additional references:

• Holmes, A. G. D. (2020). Researcher Positionality--A Consideration of Its Influence and Place in Qualitative Research--A New Researcher Guide. Shanlax International Journal of Education , 8 (4), 1-10.
• Martin, J. P., Desing, R., & Borrego, M. (2022). Positionality statements are just the tip of the iceberg: Moving towards a reflexive process. Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering , 28 (4).
• Wilson, C., Janes, G., & Williams, J. (2022). Identity, positionality and reflexivity: Relevance and application to research paramedics. British Paramedic Journal , 7 (2), 43-49.

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How to Write a Positionality Statement: A Step-by-Step Guide

Developing a positionality statement is a critical aspect of research, particularly in social sciences and humanities. In this article, we will provide you with a comprehensive step-by-step guide to help you write an effective positionality statement. We will explore what positionality statements are, why they are important, and how to craft them using HTML formatting.

Understanding Positionality Statements

Before we dive into the process of writing a positionality statement, let's first establish what it is and explore its significance.

A positionality statement is a written document that outlines an individual's social, cultural, political, and personal locations. It provides a clear understanding of the researcher's background, also specifying their biases, assumptions, and values.

Positionality statements are essential because they provide readers with insight into how researchers' backgrounds and experiences shape the research they conduct. It also helps researchers acknowledge implicit biases and assists readers in understanding the contexts of the research.

For instance, if a researcher is conducting research on the experiences of African American women, their positionality statement may include information about their own experiences as a woman of color. This information can help readers understand the researcher's perspective and how it may influence the research findings.

Furthermore, positionality statements can also help researchers reflect on their own biases and assumptions. By acknowledging their own positionality, researchers can strive to conduct research that is more objective and inclusive.

It is also important to note that positionality is not just limited to the individual researcher. The positionality of the research participants should also be taken into account. For example, if a researcher is conducting research on the experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals, they should consider their own positionality as well as the positionality of the participants. This can help ensure that the research is conducted in a respectful and ethical manner.

In conclusion, positionality statements are crucial in research because they provide readers with insight into the researcher's background, biases, and assumptions. They also help researchers reflect on their own positionality and strive for more objective and inclusive research. By acknowledging positionality, researchers can conduct research that is respectful and ethical to all involved.

Preparing to Write Your Positionality Statement

Now that we have established the importance of positionality statements, let's dive into how to prepare to write one.

A positionality statement is a statement that explains your personal and cultural background and how it may impact your research. It is important to write a positionality statement to acknowledge any biases or assumptions you may have and to ensure that your research is conducted in an ethical and transparent manner.

Reflecting on Your Personal Background

The first step in preparing to write your positionality statement is reflecting on your background. Start by thinking about your race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, religion, social class, and any other identities that might impact your research.

Reflect on your experiences and how they have shaped your perception. Think about how your personal and cultural background may inform your research questions and methods. For example, if you are a person of color researching racism, your personal experiences with racism may influence your research questions and methods.

It is important to note that your personal background is not the only factor that may impact your research. Your professional background and educational experiences may also play a role in shaping your research questions and methods.

Identifying Your Biases and Assumptions

The next step in preparing to write your positionality statement is identifying your biases and assumptions.

Consider any assumptions you may have about your research topic and anything that may influence your take on the subject. If you are aware of your biases, you can be sure to address them in your research. For example, if you are researching a controversial topic, such as abortion, it is important to acknowledge any personal biases you may have on the subject.

It is also important to consider any power dynamics that may exist between you and your research participants. For example, if you are a white researcher studying a marginalized community, you may hold more power in the research relationship, which may impact your research findings.

Considering Your Research Context

Lastly, think about your research context and how it may affect your positionality statement. Consider the environment in which you will conduct your research, such as the type of participants, location, and how long your research will last.

It is important to consider any potential ethical concerns that may arise during your research, such as confidentiality and informed consent. Additionally, it is important to consider how your research may impact the participants and the community in which you are conducting your research.

By reflecting on your personal background, identifying your biases and assumptions, and considering your research context, you can prepare to write a thoughtful and transparent positionality statement that will enhance the quality of your research.

Crafting Your Positionality Statement

With your preparation completed, you can now start to craft your positionality statement. We will break this down into four basic steps.

Step 1: Introduce Yourself and Your Background

The first step is to provide a brief introduction of yourself and your background to the reader. Include information about your personal and cultural identities, background, and experiences. Also, give insight into your academic and professional background, which could include your degree qualifications and research interests.

Step 2: Discuss Your Research Interests and Goals

Next, you should describe your research interests and goals. In this section, be specific about the research questions you are seeking to answer and the methodologies you plan to use.

You can also discuss how your research interests connect to your personal and cultural background. Be honest and transparent about the reasons why you are interested in this research.

Step 3: Address Your Biases and Assumptions

It's important to acknowledge any biases and assumptions you may have in your research. Whether they are positive or negative, address them in this section.

Use clear and concise language to outline your assumptions and be honest. Doing so will help others see how your experiences and perspectives shape your research.

Step 4: Explain How Your Positionality Influences Your Research

Finally, explain how your positionality influences your research. In this section, discuss how your background, values, experiences, and biases shape your research. If possible, give examples of how your positionality has affected the research process or outcomes.

Tips for Writing an Effective Positionality Statement

Now that you have learned how to craft your positionality statement, let's go over some tips that will help you craft a powerful and effective one.

Be Honest and Transparent

Honesty and transparency are key when writing a positionality statement. Be upfront about your background, values, experiences, and biases. Don't try to hide or sugarcoat anything.

Use Clear and Concise Language

Remember, your goal is to communicate clearly with your audience. Use clear and concise language, avoid jargon, and explain any difficult concepts.

Provide Examples to Illustrate Your Points

Examples can be extremely helpful in illustrating your points. Adding examples would make your positionality statement easier to understand for your audience.

Final Thoughts

By following the steps mentioned in this article, you can write a comprehensive and effective positionality statement. Remember that your objective is to be reflective and transparent about your research, communicating your perspective to others.

Writing your statement can be daunting, but with a little guidance, it should be easier to accomplish. You now have a clear understanding of what positionality statements are, why they are important, and a detailed guide on how to write one. Good luck!

ChatGPT Prompt for Writing a Positionality Statement

Chatgpt prompt.

Compose a thorough and detailed statement that outlines your positionality, including your background, experiences, beliefs, and values, in order to provide insight into the lens through which you view and approach various issues and topics.

[ADD ADDITIONAL CONTEXT. CAN USE BULLET POINTS.]

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How to Construct a Compelling Research Statement

A research statement is a critical document for prospective faculty applicants. This document allows applicants to convey to their future colleagues the importance and impact of their past and, most importantly, future research. You as an applicant should use this document to lay out your planned research for the next few years, making sure to outline how your planned research contributes to your field.

Some general guidelines

(from Carleton University )

An effective research statement accomplishes three key goals:

• It clearly presents your scholarship in nonspecialist terms;
• It places your research in a broader context, scientifically and societally; and
• It lays out a clear road map for future accomplishments in the new setting (the institution to which you’re applying).

Another way to think about the success of your research statement is to consider whether, after reading it, a reader is able to answer these questions:

• What do you do (what are your major accomplishments; what techniques do you use; how have you added to your field)?
• Why is your work important (why should both other scientists and nonscientists care)?
• Where is it going in the future (what are the next steps; how will you carry them out in your new job; does your research plan meet the requirements for tenure at this institution)?

1. Make your statement reader-friendly

A typical faculty application call can easily receive 200+ applicants. As such, you need to make all your application documents reader-friendly. Use headings and subheadings to organize your ideas and leave white space between sections.

In addition, you may want to include figures and diagrams in your research statement that capture key findings or concepts so a reader can quickly determine what you are studying and why it is important. A wall of text in your research statement should be avoided at all costs. Rather, a research statement that is concise and thoughtfully laid out demonstrates to hiring committees that you can organize ideas in a coherent and easy-to-understand manner.

Also, this presentation demonstrates your ability to develop competitive funding applications (see more in next section), which is critical for success in a research-intensive faculty position.

2. Be sure to touch on the fundability of your planned research work

Another goal of your research statement is to make the case for why your planned research is fundable. You may get different opinions here, but I would recommend citing open or planned funding opportunities at federal agencies or other funders that you plan to submit to. You might also use open funding calls as a way to demonstrate that your planned research is in an area receiving funding prioritization by various agencies.

If you are looking for funding, check out this list of funding resources on my personal website. Another great way to look for funding is to use NIH Reporter and NSF award search .

3. Draft the statement and get feedback early and often

I can tell you from personal experience that it takes time to refine a strong research statement. I went on the faculty job market two years in a row and found my second year materials to be much stronger. You need time to read, review and reflect on your statements and documents to really make them stand out.

It is important to have your supervisor and other faculty read and give feedback on your critical application documents and especially your research statement. Also, finding peers to provide feedback and in return giving them feedback on their documents is very helpful. Seek out communities of support such as Future PI Slack to find peer reviewers (and get a lot of great application advice) if needed.

4. Share with nonexperts to assess your writing’s clarity

Additionally, you may want to consider sharing your job materials, including your research statement, with non-experts to assess clarity. For example, NC State’s Professional Development Team offers an Academic Packways: Gearing Up for Faculty program each year where you can get feedback on your application documents from individuals working in a variety of areas. You can also ask classmates and colleagues working in different areas to review your research statement. The more feedback you can receive on your materials through formal or informal means, the better.

5. Tailor your statement to the institution

It is critical in your research statement to mention how you will make use of core facilities or resources at the institution you are applying to. If you need particular research infrastructure to do your work and the institution has it, you should mention that in your statement. Something to the effect of: “The presence of the XXX core facility at YYY University will greatly facilitate my lab’s ability to investigate this important process.”

Mentioning core facilities and resources at the target institution shows you have done your research, which is critical in demonstrating your interest in that institution.

Finally, think about the resources available at the institution you are applying to. If you are applying to a primarily undergraduate-serving institution, you will want to be sure you propose a research program that could reasonably take place with undergraduate students, working mostly in the summer and utilizing core facilities that may be limited or require external collaborations.

Undergraduate-serving institutions will value research projects that meaningfully involve students. Proposing overly ambitious research at a primarily undergraduate institution is a recipe for rejection as the institution will read your application as out of touch … that either you didn’t do the work to research them or that you are applying to them as a “backup” to research-intensive positions.

You should carefully think about how to restructure your research statements if you are applying to both primarily undergraduate-serving and research-intensive institutions. For examples of how I framed my research statement for faculty applications at each type of institution, see my personal website ( undergraduate-serving ; research-intensive research statements).

6. Be yourself, not who you think the search committee wants

In the end, a research statement allows you to think critically about where you see your research going in the future. What are you excited about studying based on your previous work? How will you go about answering the unanswered questions in your field? What agencies and initiatives are funding your type of research? If you develop your research statement from these core questions, your passion and commitment to the work will surely shine through.

A closing thought: Be yourself, not who you think the search committee wants. If you try to frame yourself as someone you really aren’t, you are setting the hiring institution and you up for disappointment. You want a university to hire you because they like you, the work you have done, and the work you want to do, not some filtered or idealized version of you.

So, put your true self out there, and realize you want to find the right institutional fit for you and your research. This all takes time and effort. The earlier you start and the more reflection and feedback you get on your research statement and remaining application documents, the better you can present the true you to potential employers.

More Advice on Faculty Job Application Documents on ImPACKful

How to write a better academic cover letter

Tips on writing an effective teaching statement

More Resources

See here for samples of a variety of application materials from UCSF.

• Rules of the (Social Sciences & Humanities) Research Statement
• CMU’s Writing a Research Statement
• UW’s Academic Careers: Research Statements
• Developing a Winning Research Statement (UCSF)
• Academic Packways
• ImPACKful Tips

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Writing a Research Statement

What is a research statement.

A research statement is a short document that provides a brief history of your past research experience, the current state of your research, and the future work you intend to complete.

The research statement is a common component of a potential student's application for post-undergraduate study. The research statement is often the primary way for departments and faculty to determine if a student's interests and past experience make them a good fit for their program/institution.

Although many programs ask for ‘personal statements,' these are not really meant to be biographies or life stories. What we, at Tufts Psychology, hope to find out is how well your abilities, interests, experiences and goals would fit within our program.

We encourage you to illustrate how your lived experience demonstrates qualities that are critical to success in pursuing a PhD in our program. Earning a PhD in any program is hard! Thus, as you are relaying your past, present, and future research interests, we are interested in learning how your lived experiences showcase the following:

• Perseverance
• Resilience in the face of difficulty
• Motivation to undertake intensive research training
• Involvement in efforts to promote equity and inclusion in your professional and/or personal life
• Unique perspectives that enrich the research questions you ask, the methods you use, and the communities to whom your research applies

How Do I Even Start Writing One?

Before you begin your statement, read as much as possible about our program so you can tailor your statement and convince the admissions committee that you will be a good fit.

Prepare an outline of the topics you want to cover (e.g., professional objectives and personal background) and list supporting material under each main topic. Write a rough draft in which you transform your outline into prose. Set it aside and read it a week later. If it still sounds good, go to the next stage. If not, rewrite it until it sounds right.

Do not feel bad if you do not have a great deal of experience in psychology to write about; no one who is about to graduate from college does. Do explain your relevant experiences (e.g., internships or research projects), but do not try to turn them into events of cosmic proportion. Be honest, sincere, and objective.

What Information Should It Include?

Your research statement should describe your previous experience, how that experience will facilitate your graduate education in our department, and why you are choosing to pursue graduate education in our department. Your goal should be to demonstrate how well you will fit in our program and in a specific laboratory.

Make sure to link your research interests to the expertise and research programs of faculty here. Identify at least one faculty member with whom you would like to work. Make sure that person is accepting graduate students when you apply. Read some of their papers and describe how you think the research could be extended in one or more novel directions. Again, specificity is a good idea.

Make sure to describe your relevant experience (e.g., honors thesis, research assistantship) in specific detail. If you have worked on a research project, discuss that project in detail. Your research statement should describe what you did on the project and how your role impacted your understanding of the research question.

Describe the concrete skills you have acquired prior to graduate school and the skills you hope to acquire.

Articulate why you want to pursue a graduate degree at our institution and with specific faculty in our department.

Make sure to clearly state your core research interests and explain why you think they are scientifically and/or practically important. Again, be specific.

What Should It Look Like?

Your final statement should be succinct. You should be sure to thoroughly read and follow the length and content requirements for each individual application. Finally, stick to the points requested by each program, and avoid lengthy personal or philosophical discussions.

How Do I Know if It is Ready?

Ask for feedback from at least one professor, preferably in the area you are interested in. Feedback from friends and family may also be useful. Many colleges and universities also have writing centers that are able to provide general feedback.

Of course, read and proofread the document multiple times. It is not always easy to be a thoughtful editor of your own work, so don't be afraid to ask for help.

Lastly, consider signing up to take part in the Application Statement Feedback Program . The program provides constructive feedback and editing support for the research statements of applicants to Psychology PhD programs in the United States.

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Graduate School Applications: Writing a Research Statement

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What is a Research Statement?

A research statement is a short document that provides a brief history of your past research experience, the current state of your research, and the future work you intend to complete.

The research statement is a common component of a potential candidate’s application for post-undergraduate study. This may include applications for graduate programs, post-doctoral fellowships, or faculty positions. The research statement is often the primary way that a committee determines if a candidate’s interests and past experience make them a good fit for their program/institution.

What Should It Look Like?

Research statements are generally one to two single-spaced pages. You should be sure to thoroughly read and follow the length and content requirements for each individual application.

Your research statement should situate your work within the larger context of your field and show how your works contributes to, complicates, or counters other work being done. It should be written for an audience of other professionals in your field.

What Should It Include?

Your statement should start by articulating the broader field that you are working within and the larger question or questions that you are interested in answering. It should then move to articulate your specific interest.

The body of your statement should include a brief history of your past research . What questions did you initially set out to answer in your research project? What did you find? How did it contribute to your field? (i.e. did it lead to academic publications, conferences, or collaborations?). How did your past research propel you forward?

It should also address your present research . What questions are you actively trying to solve? What have you found so far? How are you connecting your research to the larger academic conversation? (i.e. do you have any publications under review, upcoming conferences, or other professional engagements?) What are the larger implications of your work?

Finally, it should describe the future trajectory on which you intend to take your research. What further questions do you want to solve? How do you intend to find answers to these questions? How can the institution to which you are applying help you in that process? What are the broader implications of your potential results?

Note: Make sure that the research project that you propose can be completed at the institution to which you are applying.

Other Considerations:

• What is the primary question that you have tried to address over the course of your academic career? Why is this question important to the field? How has each stage of your work related to that question?
• Include a few specific examples that show your success. What tangible solutions have you found to the question that you were trying to answer? How have your solutions impacted the larger field? Examples can include references to published findings, conference presentations, or other professional involvement.
• Be confident about your skills and abilities. The research statement is your opportunity to sell yourself to an institution. Show that you are self-motivated and passionate about your project.

Practice guidelines, standards, consensus statements, position papers: What they are, how they differ

When busy healthcare professionals have questions about which clinical practice is best for a given situation, they commonly turn to practice guidelines, standards, consensus statements, and position papers. Typically, these documents are issued by government and healthcare agencies and by professional healthcare associations or societies. This article defines each type of document and explains how they differ.

Practice guidelines

Ideal for helping both practitioners and patients make healthcare decisions in specific circumstances, practice guidelines are systematically developed statements based on the best evidence and the most current data. They help standardize medical care and improve the quality of care.

Practice guidelines are created by expert panels who evaluate the available data regarding screening, prevention, treatment options, diagnosis, risk/benefit profile, and cost-effectiveness of available treatment options for a particular clinical situation. Before publication, they undergo rigorous review by relevant organizations and practitioners. In some cases, a guideline is endorsed by other organizations.

Examples of practice guidelines include the American Pain Society’s pain management guidelines for patients with cancer pain, fibromyalgia, arthritis, and sickle cell disease (available at www.ampainsoc.org/pub/cp_guidelines.htm ). Other organizations, including the National Comprehensive Cancer Network, American Pediatric Society, American Geriatric Society, and American Society of Anesthesiologists, have developed pain management guidelines for the patient populations they serve.

Practice standards

Usually established by authority or general consent, practice standards are criteria that, when met, result in the best patient outcomes, establish the best practices, or provide the greatest value. They may be used as the basis for accreditation and to establish expectations; for instance, a healthcare organization may issue standards on how to manage pain. Some standards undergo a trial implementation before they’re implemented officially.

Examples of practice standards are those from the Joint Commission and the Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities, which are developed by interdisciplinary groups and adopted by the regulatory body for implementation. Compliance with standards is expected; noncompliance can bring heavy penalties. Each organization the Joint Commission surveys must demonstrate compliance with the standards or face losing accreditation.

(Note: A standard used to establish criteria isn’t the same as the legal standard of care. The latter refers to the care that the average prudent healthcare provider in a given community would provide to a patient in a specific clinical circumstance.)

Consensus statements and position papers

Consensus statements and position papers offer topic-specific opinions or recommendations. Usually drafted by a medical society, they’re derived from expert or prevailing opinion and undergo some degree of peer review by society members.

• A consensus statement represents the collective opinions or suggestions of a society’s expert panel. It’s meant to encourage safe, high-quality patient care, although it doesn’t guarantee a specific outcome.
• A position paper is a detailed policy report, drafted by members of a society, that explains or advocates a certain course of action. It’s commonly derived from research support studies.

Before they’re issued, consensus statements and position papers are distributed to the larger organization, which decides whether to support the consensus or adopt the position advocated.

Who developed the document?

Commonly, all four types of documents are developed by panels—but these panels vary greatly in size and constituency. Some consist of just a few society members; others consist of a large group of experts representing multiple practices (such as nursing, pharmacy, and medicine). Generally, the larger the panel, the wider the references and the less risk that salient evidence will be overlooked.

What level of evidence supports the recommendations?

If you’re considering using a particular recommendation, check the level of support (ranging from poor to high) on which it’s based. Various rating scales for level of support exist. Some use Roman numerals; others use letters. Several medical journals and agencies (such as the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality) have their own grading scales.

• Level II or B denotes that the data derive from studies of less rigorous design, such as a single randomized trial, nonrandomized studies, retrospective studies, outcomes research, or case studies.
• Level III or C typically is assigned when the data derive from case studies or the recommendation is merely an expert opinion.

Delineating the differences

Here’s a quick summary of the differences and similarities in the four types of documents.

• Practice standards are authoritative, whereas practice guidelines are recommendations.
• Consensus statements and position papers serve mainly as information sources; their recommendations aren’t binding.
• Practice guidelines and standards usually have the highest level of evidence-based support; position papers and consensus statements usually have the lowest level.
• Practice guidelines and standards undergo more rigorous peer review than consensus statements and position papers.
• All four types of documents can be used to develop expected performance levels and provide education for clinicians and the healthcare community.
• Compliance with all four types is voluntary. However, a healthcare facility may lose its Joint Commission accreditation if it doesn’t comply with the Commission’s standards.

Basing your practice on the evidence allows you to provide the highest quality of care. If you’re seeking information about a specific clinical practice, start by reviewing the available practice guidelines, standards, consensus statements, and position papers on that topic.

You can find valuable information and recommendations in all of these documents. Do your homework and inspect each one carefully—and you’re likely to find answers to your clinical questions.

Selected references

Beyea S, Slattery J. Evidence-Based Practice in Nursing: A Guide to Successful Implementation. Marblehead, Mass: HCPro, Inc; 2006. D’Arcy Y. Pain Management: Evidence-Based Tools and Techniques for Nursing Professionals. Marblehead, Mass: HCPro, Inc; 2007.

Yvonne D’Arcy, MS, RN, CRNP, CNS, is a Pain Management and Palliative Care Nurse Practitioner at Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, Md.

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ANA Official Position Statements

The American Nurses Association (ANA) develops positions relevant to nursing practice, health policy, and social concerns impacting the health of patients and families. Position statements guide the profession, amplify the views of nursing, and educate consumers and decision makers.

One important process used for the development of a position statement is:

• When a relevant topic has been approved by the ANA Board of Directors, an ANA Professional Issues Panel is appointed to research and come up with a draft position.
• Once the panel has completed its work on the new position statement, a draft of the proposed position statement is then posted on ANA's website for public comment.
• Following public comment, the statement is revised if necessary and approved by the ANA Board of Directors, making it an established ANA position. 

This process allows each and every nurse to voice their views and opinions on the various dimensions of the issue at hand. The current position statements are as follows:

Drug and Alcohol Abuse

• Abuse of Prescription Drugs
• Drug Testing for Health Care Workers
• Emergency Care Psychiatric Clinical Framework
• Promoting Safe Medication Use in the Older Adult
• Substance Use Among Nurses and Nursing Students (Joint Statement by the Emergency Nurses Association and International Nurses Society on Addictions)
• Electronic Health Record
• Electronic Personal Health Record
• Inclusion of Recognized Terminologies Supporting Nursing Practice within Electronic Health Records and Other Health Information Technology Solutions
• Standardization and Interoperability of Health Information Technology: Supporting Nursing and the National Quality Strategy for Better Patient Outcomes

Ethics and Human Rights

• Capital Punishment and Nurses' Participation in Capital Punishment (Approved 2/24)
• Nurses' Roles and Responsibilities in Providing Care and Support at the End of Life (Approved 2/24)
• Privacy and Confidentiality (Revised 2/24)
• The Ethical Use of Artificial Intelligence in Nursing Practice (Approved 12/20/22)
• The Nurse's Role and Responsibility in Unveiling and Dismantling Racism in Nursing (2022)
• Risk and Responsibility in Providing Nursing Care  (Approved 10/6/2022) 
• Therapeutic use of Marijuana and Related Cannabinoids  (Approved 5/4/2021) 

Nurses’ Professional Responsibility to Promote Ethical Practice Environments (Approved 5/4/2021)

• The Ethical Use of Restraints: Balancing Dual Nursing Duties of Patient Safety and Personal Safety  (Approved 11/23/2020)
• Nursing Care and Do-not-resuscitate (DNR) Decisions (Approved 2/19/2020) 
• Nurse’s Role in Providing Ethically and Developmentally Appropriate Care to People With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (Approved 10/10/19)
• Ethical Considerations for Local and Global Volunteerism (Approved 8/2/19) [VIDEO]
• The Nurse’s Role When a Patient Requests Medical Aid in Dying  (Approved 6/22/19)
• The Nurse’s Role in Addressing Discrimination: Protecting and Promoting Inclusive Strategies in Practice Settings, Policy, and Advocacy (Approved 10/3/18) [ VIDEO ]
• The Ethical Responsibility to Manage Pain and the Suffering It Causes (Approved 2/23/2018) [VIDEO]
• Interdisciplinary Guidelines for Care of Women Presenting to the Emergency Department with Pregnancy Loss  (Endorsed 2/23/2018)
• Nursing Advocacy for LGBTQ+ Populations (Approved 4/19/18)
• Non-Punitive Treatment of Pregnant and Breastfeeding Women with Substance Use Disorders (Approved 3/15/17)
• Nutrition and Hydration at the End of Life  (Revised 6/7/17)
• Frequently Asked Questions: ANA Position on Capital Punishment
• The Nurse’s Role in Ethics and Human Rights: Protecting and Promoting Individual Worth, Dignity, and Human Rights in Practice Settings (February 2016)

Retired ANA Position Statements

• Constituent/State Nurses Associations (C/SNAs) as Ethics Resources, Educators, and Advocates (Retired ANA Position Statement - Approved 11/11/11)
• Stem Cell Research  (Retired ANA Position Statement - Approved 1/10/07)

HIV and Viral Hepatitis

• Prevention and Care for HIV and Related Conditions
• HIV Infection and Nursing Students
• Equipment/Safety Procedures to Prevent Transmission of Bloodborne Diseases
• Personnel Policies and HIV in the Workplace
• Post-Exposure Programs in the Event of Occupational Exposure to HIV/HBV

Nursing Practice

• National Provider Identifier (NPI) as the Unique Nurse Identifier
• Academic Progression to Meet the Needs of the Registered Nurse, the Health Care Consumer, and the U.S. Health Care System  (Joint Position Statement by the Organization for Associate Degree Nursing and ANA)
• Retail-Based Nurse Practitioners
• Addressing Nurse Fatigue to Promote Safety and Health: Joint Responsibilities of Registered Nurses and Employers to Reduce Risks
• Assuring Safe, High Quality Health Care in Pre-K Through 12 Educational Setting
• Care Coordination and Registered Nurses’ Essential Role
• Competencies for Nurse Practitioners in Emergency Care
• Credentialing and Privileging of Advanced Practice Registered Nurses
• Criminal Background Checks (CBCs) for Nurse Licensure
• Criteria for the Evaluation of Clinical Nurse Specialist Master’s, Practice Doctorate, and Post-Graduate Certificate Educational Programs
• Determining a Standard Order of Credentials for the Professional Nurse
• The Doctor of Nursing Practice: Advancing the Nursing Profession
• Elimination of Manual Patient Handling to Prevent Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders
• Establishing a Culturally Competent Master's and Doctorally Prepared Nursing Workforce
• Immunizations
• Incivility Bullying and Workplace Violence
• Inclusion of Recognized Terminologies within EHRs and other Health Information Technology Solutions
• Nurse Practitioner Perspective on Education and Post-Graduate Training
• One Perioperative Registered Nurse Circulator Dedicated to Every Patient Undergoing an Operative or Other Invasive Procedure
• Procedural Sedation Consensus Statement
• Professional Role Competence
• The Role of the Registered Nurse in Ambulatory Care
• Safe Practices for Needle and Syringe Use
• Safety Issues Related to Tubing and Catheter Misconnections
• Substance Use Among Nurses and Nursing Students  (Joint statement by the Emergency Nurses Association and International Nurses Society on Addictions)

Patient Safety

• Patient Safety: Rights of Registered Nurses When Considering a Patient Assignment
• Privacy and Confidentiality

Social Causes and Health Care

• Adolescent Health
• ANA and AAN Joint Statement on Family Separation Policy  (February 2019)
• Elimination of Violence in Advertising Directed Toward Children, Adolescents and Families
• Essential Care and Coverage for Those Living with Obesity: Nurses Obesity Network Joint Statement
• Fluoridation of Public Water Drinking Systems
• Lead Poisoning and Screening
• NAPNAP Position Statement on Immunizations
• Nurses’ Role in Addressing Global Climate Change, Climate Justice, and Health
• Nursing Leadership in Global and Domestic Tobacco Control
• Pharmaceutical Waste
• Prevention and Cessation of Tobacco and Other Nicotine Products
• Promoting Tobacco Cessation in Pharmacies
• Promotion and Disease Prevention
• Sexual and Reproductive Health
• Use of Placebos for Pain Management in Patients with Cancer
• Violence Against Women

Role of the Registered Nurse

• Care Coordination and Registered Nurses’ Essential Role
• Registered Nurses Utilization of Nursing Assistive Personnel in All Settings
• Role of the Registered Nurse in Ambulatory Care

Workplace Advocacy

• Just Culture
• Nursing Staffing Requirements to Meet the Demands of Today’s Long Term Care Consumer Recommendations from the Coalition of Geriatric Nursing Organizations (CGNO)
• Promoting Nurses’ Mental Health
• Sexual Harassment
• Work Release During a Disaster - Guidelines for Employers
• Work Release During a Disaster - Registered Nurses' Rights and Responsibilities

ANA Principles

Related resources.

• Oncology Nursing Society: “Ensuring Healthcare Worker Safety When Handling Hazardous Drugs" pdf (0.26MB)
• Retired ANA Position Statements (Members only)
• Archived HOD Resolutions 1999 to 2012 (Members only)

Read about how ANA is leading the health care debate through our Expert policy analysis

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Research statements for faculty job applications

The purpose of a research statement.

The main goal of a research statement is to walk the search committee through the evolution of your research, to highlight your research accomplishments, and to show where your research will be taking you next. To a certain extent, the next steps that you identify within your statement will also need to touch on how your research could benefit the institution to which you are applying. This might be in terms of grant money, faculty collaborations, involving students in your research, or developing new courses. Your CV will usually show a search committee where you have done your research, who your mentors have been, the titles of your various research projects, a list of your papers, and it may provide a very brief summary of what some of this research involves. However, there can be certain points of interest that a CV may not always address in enough detail.

• What got you interested in this research?
• What was the burning question that you set out to answer?
• What challenges did you encounter along the way, and how did you overcome these challenges?
• How can your research be applied?
• Why is your research important within your field?
• What direction will your research take you in next, and what new questions do you have?

While you may not have a good sense of where your research will ultimately lead you, you should have a sense of some of the possible destinations along the way. You want to be able to show a search committee that your research is moving forward and that you are moving forward along with it in terms of developing new skills and knowledge. Ultimately, your research statement should complement your cover letter, CV, and teaching philosophy to illustrate what makes you an ideal candidate for the job. The more clearly you can articulate the path your research has taken, and where it will take you in the future, the more convincing and interesting it will be to read.

Separate research statements are usually requested from researchers in engineering, social, physical, and life sciences, but can also be requested for researchers in the humanities. In many cases, however, the same information that is covered in the research statement is often integrated into the cover letter for many disciplines within the humanities and no separate research statement is requested within the job advertisement. Seek advice from current faculty and new hires about the conventions of your discipline if you are in doubt.

Timeline: Getting Started with Your Research Statement

You can think of a research statement as having three distinct parts. The first part will focus on your past research and can include the reasons you started your research, an explanation as to why the questions you originally asked are important in your field, and a summary some of the work you did to answer some of these early questions.

The middle part of the research statement focuses on your current research. How is this research different from previous work you have done, and what brought you to where you are today? You should still explain the questions you are trying to ask, and it is very important that you focus on some of the findings that you have (and cite some of the publications associated with these findings). In other words, do not talk about your research in abstract terms, make sure that you explain your actual results and findings (even if these may not be entirely complete when you are applying for faculty positions), and mention why these results are significant.

The final part of your research statement should build on the first two parts. Yes, you have asked good questions and used good methods to find some answers, but how will you now use this foundation to take you into your future? Since you are hoping that your future will be at one of the institutions to which you are applying, you should provide some convincing reasons why your future research will be possible at each institution, and why it will be beneficial to that institution and to their students.

While you are focusing on the past, present, and future or your research, and tailoring it to each institution, you should also think about the length of your statement and how detailed or specific you make the descriptions of your research. Think about who will be reading it. Will they all understand the jargon you are using? Are they experts in the subject, or experts in a range of related subjects? Can you go into very specific detail, or do you need to talk about your research in broader terms that make sense to people outside of your research field, focusing on the common ground that might exist? Additionally, you should make sure that your future research plans differ from those of your PI or advisor, as you need to be seen as an independent researcher. Identify 4-5 specific aims that can be divided into short-term and long-term goals. You can give some idea of a 5-year research plan that includes the studies you want to perform, but also mention your long-term plans so that the search committee knows that this is not a finite project.

Another important consideration when writing about your research is realizing that you do not perform research in a vacuum. When doing your research, you may have worked within a team environment at some point or sought out specific collaborations. You may have faced some serious challenges that required some creative problem-solving to overcome. While these aspects are not necessarily as important as your results and your papers or patents, they can help paint a picture of you as a well-rounded researcher who is likely to be successful in the future even if new problems arise, for example.

Follow these general steps to begin developing an effective research statement:

Step 1: Think about how and why you got started with your research. What motivated you to spend so much time on answering the questions you developed? If you can illustrate some of the enthusiasm you have for your subject, the search committee will likely assume that students and other faculty members will see this in you as well. People like to work with passionate and enthusiastic colleagues. Remember to focus on what you found, what questions you answered, and why your findings are significant. The research you completed in the past will have brought you to where you are today; also be sure to show how your research past and research present are connected. Explore some of the techniques and approaches you have successfully used in your research, and describe some of the challenges you overcame. What makes people interested in what you do, and how have you used your research as a tool for teaching or mentoring students? Integrating students into your research may be an important part of your future research at your target institutions. Conclude describing your current research by focusing on your findings, their importance, and what new questions they generate.

Step 2: Think about how you can tailor your research statement for each application. Familiarize yourself with the faculty at each institution, and explore the research that they have been performing. You should think about your future research in terms of the students at the institution. What opportunities can you imagine that would allow students to get involved in what you do to serve as a tool for teaching and training them, and to get them excited about your subject? Do not talk about your desire to work with graduate students if the institution only has undergraduates! You will also need to think about what equipment or resources that you might need to do your future research. Again, mention any resources that specific institutions have that you would be interested in utilizing (e.g., print materials, super electron microscopes, archived artwork). You can also mention what you hope to do with your current and future research in terms of publication (whether in journals or as a book); try to be as specific and honest as possible. Finally, be prepared to talk about how your future research can help bring in grants and other sources of funding, especially if you have a good track record of receiving awards and fellowships. Mention some grants that you know have been awarded to similar research, and state your intention to seek this type of funding.

Step 3: Ask faculty in your department if they are willing to share their own research statements with you. To a certain extent, there will be some subject-specific differences in what is expected from a research statement, and so it is always a good idea to see how others in your field have done it. You should try to draft your own research statement first before you review any statements shared with you. Your goal is to create a unique research statement that clearly highlights your abilities as a researcher.

Step 4: The research statement is typically a few (2-3) pages in length, depending on the number of images, illustrations, or graphs included.  Once you have completed the steps above, schedule an appointment with a career advisor to get feedback on your draft. You should also try to get faculty in your department to review your document if they are willing to do so.

Additional Resources

For further tips, tricks, and strategies for writing a research statement for faculty jobs, see the resources below:

• The PhD Career Training Platform is an eLearning platform with on-demand, self-paced modules that allow PhDs and postdocs to make informed decisions about their career path and learn successful job search strategies from other PhDs. Select the University of Pennsylvania from the drop-down menu, log in using your University ID, and click the “Faculty Careers” tab to learn more about application documents for a faculty job search.
• Writing an Effective Research Statement
• Research Statements for Humanities PhDs
• Tips to Get Started on Your Research Statement (video)

Explore other application documents:

Position statement

Position statements should present a viewpoint on a medical, scientific, ethical, or political issue involving neurology.

Position statements should adhere to the following criteria:

• recommended word limit of 5,000 words (excluding figures, tables, references), if word limit is exceeded please justify in your cover letter

Preparing your manuscript

The information below details the section headings that you should include in your manuscript and what information should be within each section.

Please note that your manuscript must include a 'Declarations' section including all of the subheadings (please see below for more information).

The title page should:

• "A versus B in the treatment of C: a randomized controlled trial", "X is a risk factor for Y: a case control study", "What is the impact of factor X on subject Y: A systematic review"
• or for non-clinical or non-research studies: a description of what the article reports
• if a collaboration group should be listed as an author, please list the Group name as an author. If you would like the names of the individual members of the Group to be searchable through their individual PubMed records, please include this information in the “Acknowledgements” section in accordance with the instructions below
• Large Language Models (LLMs), such as ChatGPT , do not currently satisfy our authorship criteria . Notably an attribution of authorship carries with it accountability for the work, which cannot be effectively applied to LLMs. Use of an LLM should be properly documented in the Methods section (and if a Methods section is not available, in a suitable alternative part) of the manuscript
• indicate the corresponding author

The Abstract should not exceed 350 words and should be structured with a background, main body of the abstract and short conclusion. Please minimize the use of abbreviations and do not cite references in the abstract.

Three to ten keywords representing the main content of the article.

The Background section should explain the background to the article, its aims, a summary of a search of the existing literature and the issue under discussion.

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and include an explanation of their relevance or importance to the field.

List of abbreviations

If abbreviations are used in the text they should be defined in the text at first use, and a list of abbreviations should be provided.

Declarations

All manuscripts must contain the following sections under the heading 'Declarations':

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Consent for publication, availability of data and materials, competing interests, authors' contributions, acknowledgements.

• Authors' information (optional)

Please see below for details on the information to be included in these sections.

If any of the sections are not relevant to your manuscript, please include the heading and write 'Not applicable' for that section. 

Manuscripts reporting studies involving human participants, human data or human tissue must:

• include a statement on ethics approval and consent (even where the need for approval was waived)
• include the name of the ethics committee that approved the study and the committee’s reference number if appropriate

Studies involving animals must include a statement on ethics approval and for experimental studies involving client-owned animals, authors must also include a statement on informed consent from the client or owner.

See our editorial policies for more information.

If your manuscript does not report on or involve the use of any animal or human data or tissue, please state “Not applicable” in this section.

If your manuscript contains any individual person’s data in any form (including any individual details, images or videos), consent for publication must be obtained from that person, or in the case of children, their parent or legal guardian. All presentations of case reports must have consent for publication.

You can use your institutional consent form or our consent form if you prefer. You should not send the form to us on submission, but we may request to see a copy at any stage (including after publication).

See our editorial policies for more information on consent for publication.

If your manuscript does not contain data from any individual person, please state “Not applicable” in this section.

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Hao Z, AghaKouchak A, Nakhjiri N, Farahmand A. Global integrated drought monitoring and prediction system (GIDMaPS) data sets. figshare. 2014. http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.853801

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Article within a journal

Smith JJ. The world of science. Am J Sci. 1999;36:234-5.

Article within a journal (no page numbers)

Rohrmann S, Overvad K, Bueno-de-Mesquita HB, Jakobsen MU, Egeberg R, Tjønneland A, et al. Meat consumption and mortality - results from the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition. BMC Medicine. 2013;11:63.

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Slifka MK, Whitton JL. Clinical implications of dysregulated cytokine production. Dig J Mol Med. 2000; doi:10.1007/s801090000086.

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Frumin AM, Nussbaum J, Esposito M. Functional asplenia: demonstration of splenic activity by bone marrow scan. Blood 1979;59 Suppl 1:26-32.

Book chapter, or an article within a book

Wyllie AH, Kerr JFR, Currie AR. Cell death: the significance of apoptosis. In: Bourne GH, Danielli JF, Jeon KW, editors. International review of cytology. London: Academic; 1980. p. 251-306.

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Saito Y, Hyuga H. Rate equation approaches to amplification of enantiomeric excess and chiral symmetry breaking. Top Curr Chem. 2007. doi:10.1007/128_2006_108.

Complete book, authored

Blenkinsopp A, Paxton P. Symptoms in the pharmacy: a guide to the management of common illness. 3rd ed. Oxford: Blackwell Science; 1998.

Online document

Doe J. Title of subordinate document. In: The dictionary of substances and their effects. Royal Society of Chemistry. 1999. http://www.rsc.org/dose/title of subordinate document. Accessed 15 Jan 1999.

Online database

Healthwise Knowledgebase. US Pharmacopeia, Rockville. 1998. http://www.healthwise.org. Accessed 21 Sept 1998.

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Doe J. Title of supplementary material. 2000. http://www.privatehomepage.com. Accessed 22 Feb 2000.

University site

Doe, J: Title of preprint. http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/mydata.html (1999). Accessed 25 Dec 1999.

Doe, J: Trivial HTTP, RFC2169. ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2169.txt (1999). Accessed 12 Nov 1999.

Organization site

ISSN International Centre: The ISSN register. http://www.issn.org (2006). Accessed 20 Feb 2007.

Dataset with persistent identifier

Zheng L-Y, Guo X-S, He B, Sun L-J, Peng Y, Dong S-S, et al. Genome data from sweet and grain sorghum (Sorghum bicolor). GigaScience Database. 2011. http://dx.doi.org/10.5524/100012 .

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Research Statements

The research statement is a critical document in academic and research applications, such as postdoctoral fellowships or faculty positions. It is a concise summary of your research background, current research activities, and future research goals. It serves as a tool to showcase the independent research you conduct, highlight your research agenda and goals, demonstrate your writing ability, and articulate potential funding opportunities you plan to pursue.

Printable Research Statement Guide

Length and Format

• 1-2 single-spaced pages (unless specified otherwise) • Adheres to the specific length and content requirements of each application

Audience and Context

• Write your research statement for an audience of professionals in your field. • Assume that the readers have a solid foundation in the subject matter.

Introduction

Begin with an introduction that contextualizes your work within your broader field. Discuss the larger questions your research addresses and the significance of those questions within the field.

Research Interests

Describe your specific research interests within the broader context. What questions or problems are you focused on, and why are they important?

Mention any academic publications, conference presentations, or collaborations resulting from your past research.

Incorporating your Research

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Past Research

Provide a concise history of your past research. Discuss the initial questions you aimed to answer, the findings you obtained, and how your work contributed to the field.

Present Research

Discuss your ongoing research. What questions are you currently investigating, and what have you discovered so far? Explain how your current work connects to the broader academic discourse, and mention any forthcoming publications, conferences, or other professional activities. Include specific examples of your successes.

Future Research

Detail plans for future research. What questions do you intend to address next, and how do you plan to answer them? Explain how the institution and program to which you are applying can support your research goals. Discuss the potential implications of your future work.

Tie It All Together

Ensure your statement is logically connected, showing a progression in your research journey. Highlight the primary question or theme that has guided your academic career, its importance to the field, and how each stage of your work has contributed to addressing that question.

Your research statement should convey your motivation and passion for your work. Ultimately, a well-crafted research statement should demonstrate your expertise, potential contributions to the field, and compatibility with the academic institution to which you are applying. It should provide a clear and compelling narrative of your research journey and ambitions.

UW–Madison Privacy Library

Uw-madison policy library, institutional and public position statements, university policy.

This policy specifies when and by whom public position statements may be issued on behalf of the University of Wisconsin—Madison or any of its constituent units. It reflects the University’s enduring conviction that the “continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found” is best advanced by the unimpeded exercise of academic freedom and individual freedom of expression. Unless the core mission or ongoing operations of the university are at stake, the articulation of official institutional positions on matters of public concern and controversy is neither necessary to nor helpful for the lively exchange of ideas. Individuals within the university may take positions on such issues, and indeed, drawing upon scholarly and creative research and expertise for such purposes is one of the functions of a research university like ours. But in order to best support free and open debate, the production of knowledge, and the pursuit of the Wisconsin Idea, it is best for the university itself, as well as any unit within it, to refrain from taking positions on matters of public controversy or concern unless the issue is one that directly and significantly concerns the university’s (or the given unit’s) core functions of education, research, and public service or its operation and mission . 

This policy applies to all units within the University of Wisconsin—Madison, including schools, colleges, departments, divisions, centers, institutes, and programs. It also applies to any UW–Madison faculty or staff member seeking to issue public position statements on behalf of the institution in their capacity as an employee, or who could be reasonably perceived as issuing a public position statement on behalf of the institution or unit under their purview.

It does not apply to UW-Madison faculty, staff, or students making statements as private citizens or as individual scholars, nor does it infringe upon academic freedom with respect to scholarship, teaching, and intellectual debate.  Indeed, one central purpose of this policy of institutional restraint is to ensure that institutional statements do not inadvertently chill the ability of the university to be a site of robust intellectual engagement and debate.

Depending on the nature of an individual’s position on campus, this distinction between personal and institutional role may not always be apparent and university leaders and employees at all levels should therefore endeavor to be clear about when they are speaking personally, when they are speaking as an expert on a particular subject, or when they are speaking in their institutional role.  Most public facing statements made in the course of performing one’s job duties, particularly those that are written and those from administrators (from chairs to chancellors, among others), risk being seen as “official” and thus may be attributed to the university.

UW-Madison's officially recognized shared governance groups are not covered by this policy but as organizations they, too, should be mindful of the policy’s intent. If they choose to publicly opine on a matter of public interest, they should make clear that they are speaking on behalf of their shared governance groups and not on behalf of the institution.

Institutional Public Position Statements

• University leaders (as defined above) will generally refrain from issuing institutional public position statements about matters of public controversy or concern.
• Directly affects UW-Madison’s ability to fulfill its core functions of teaching, research, and public service. For example, an institutional position statement might be considered in response to proposals to limit tenure, restrict specific avenues of research, enhance or reduce federal or state aid to students, affect patient care, or impact academic freedom in the classroom, AND/OR
• Meaningfully disrupts or otherwise significantly impacts campus operations.
• The chancellor may consider issuing an institutional public position statement only when a matter of public controversy or concern relates to the core mission or operations of the university or one or more of its units. In these instances, an institutional public position statement can be issued either directly by the chancellor or by the chancellor’s designee (typically the senior leader whose purview/area of responsibility or constituents are directly impacted). In these instances, other university leaders may amplify and reinforce these chancellor level institutional public position statements.
• When a matter of public controversy or concern relates to the core mission or operations of a particular campus unit (e.g., school, college, department), rather than the university as a whole, then an institutional position statement at the level of that unit (e.g., dean, institute director, department chair) may on rare occasions be considered. In such instances, the university leader of that unit (e.g. dean, department chair) must consult with the Office of Strategic Communication in advance, and such statements are subject to the approval of the chancellor or the chancellor’s designee, given that such statements may well be perceived as representative of or speaking for the entire institution.
• When offered, institutional public position statements may include a reaffirmation of our institutional mission (such as our commitment to the teaching, research, and the Wisconsin Idea), institutional values (such as our commitment to principles of nondiscrimination and equal opportunity), and expectations (such as compliance with rules, laws, or policy).
• Except in cases where the core functions or effective operations of the university are implicated, UW–Madison will not take a position on partisan political issues or directly criticize court decisions, the Universities of Wisconsin, or arms of state or federal government. The university will not promote, endorse, or oppose specific candidates for elected government positions.

Institutional Informational Statements

• University leaders may (and routinely do) issue institutional informational statements unrelated to matters of public controversy or concern. The university shares, for example, a great deal of news about campus research; its faculty, philanthropy, and grants; and data about the institution and its operations, among other areas. This policy is not intended to change those practices. In addition, sharing news-like coverage about faculty research, teaching, or service on areas of controversy is not an institutional public position statement for purposes of this policy.
• Statements that are limited to providing facts about a situation, information about resources and that maintain institutional neutrality regarding events or controversies that affect community members (they do not state or reinforce institutional values) are permitted.
• Statements that are informational in nature, especially about distressing or illegal events that occur on or near our campus, may at times state or reinforce basic institutional values and legal obligations (such as our commitment to principles of nondiscrimination and equal opportunity) without violating this policy. The Office of Strategic Communication should be given advance notice and the opportunity to review such messages to ensure compliance with this overall policy.

Individual Statements

• This policy preserves the academic freedom of faculty, research or instructional staff and students with respect to scholarship, teaching, and intellectual debate. Individuals, and groups of individuals, are encouraged to draw upon their knowledge and expertise to engage in the public sphere, and to share their views as part of the “sifting and winnowing” that lies at the heart of our university.
• Individuals within the university community maintain rights to free expression when making statements as private citizens. This may include critique of UW-Madison, the Universities of Wisconsin, court decisions, state or federal proposals, etc.
• Individual statements must not purport to represent the university or an institutional unit, unless explicitly authorized by the chancellor or designee, regardless of whether such statements reflect academic expertise or individuals’ rights to free expression as private citizens.
• Individuals or groups of individuals should, as practicable, provide clear indication that their statement does not represent the institution but, rather, the related disciplinary or pedagogical expertise, or the personal view, of the individual or group of individuals; especially in instances where there might be confusion on the question.

UW-205 Use of Institutional Names, Logos, Symbols, and other Trademarks

UW-715 Academic Staff Policies and Procedures: Chapter 15 – Academic Freedom

UW-808 Faculty Policies and Procedures Chapter 8 – Faculty Rights and Responsibilities

UW-6013 Expressive Activity

Free Expression at UW-Madison

Political Activity and Public Advocacy on Campus

UW System Administrative Policy 100-Interim 10 Interim: Institutional Statements

Policy Administration

Study at Cambridge

About the university, research at cambridge.

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Open Research Working Group - Position statement on Open Research: Approved by Research Policy Committee at its meeting on 22 November 2018 and by the General Board of the Faculties on 16 January 2019.

Purpose of the Statement

This Statement summarises the University’s approach to Open Research. Informed by external frameworks including the Concordat on Open Research Data , it sets out key principles for the conduct and support of Open Research at the University of Cambridge.

Owned by the Open Access Project Board [1] , it is supported by more detailed Policy Frameworks for Open Access and Research Data Management .

This Statement will be reviewed and refreshed at least every two years or after major policy changes.

1.1 Open Research aims to open access to research outputs (e.g. to protocols, results, publications, data, software and tools) to increase inclusivity and collaboration, unlock access to knowledge, improve transparency and reproducibility of research and underpin research integrity.

1.2 The University promotes and supports Open Research, to improve discoverability and maximise access to knowledge in accordance with our mission to contribute to society through the pursuit of education, learning, and research at the highest international levels of excellence.

1.3 An Open Research culture, based on mutual benefit across research communities, links researchers and the wider community through shared knowledge. By helping to further the global reach of Cambridge’s research and enabling Cambridge based researchers to use open materials from other researchers it accelerates the pursuit of knowledge and fosters truly international collaboration.

2.1 The University recognises contributions from researchers at all career stages, working collaboratively across a wide range of disciplines. Across the disciplinary spectrum there are a wide range of cultural settings that influence both capacity for and appropriateness of fully Open Research. Open publications and open data take different forms, and require different approaches, in each of these settings. The University supports the academic freedom of researchers to pursue new knowledge, and to choose the means of dissemination; but within that free choice, the University encourages outputs of research, and where appropriate the accompanying data, to be ‘as open as possible, as closed as necessary’.

2.2 The University relies on its researchers to uphold principles of scholarly rigour so that open materials are of the highest research quality and, where appropriate, will aid reproducibility. This may include:

• where possible, ensuring all publications are Open Access;
• where appropriate and possible, making openly available the underlying data relating to these publications;
• sharing protocols openly;
• collaborative approaches including blogging, online editions, releasing teaching materials, pre-print deposit.

2.3 The nature of research outputs, and their ownership, varies considerably both by discipline and by the research context. Within this context, the University is committed to supporting authors’ (academics, researchers, staff and students) freedom to choose where to publish. However it is recognised that restrictions may apply, for example when dealing with commercial interests and publisher requirements, third party rights holders, GDPR, patient confidentiality, confidential social data. The University of Cambridge Research Data Management Policy Framework addresses how the University manages these issues while ensuring compliance with funder requirements. Researchers are encouraged to work with the University’s professional services to determine the most appropriate approach in such circumstances, which may mean that outputs or data should remain closed or on limited access.

2.4 At all times, researchers are expected to act in accordance with the expectations of those funding the research, and with the minimum thresholds set by regulatory bodies.

3.1 The University recognises growing enthusiasm for Open Research from amongst its staff and students and acknowledges significant individual efforts to engage with Open Research through a range of collaborative practices. Many researchers expend considerable efforts to practise Open Research, beyond basic compliance thresholds; University support is important to make Open Research simple, effective and appropriate.

3.2 The University will support researchers through:

• Provision of a range of services (including but not limited to the Office of Scholarly Communication, Cambridge University Libraries, Research Office, Cambridge Enterprise and University Information Services), and systems (institutional repository, current research information system, research data management facility and others) to enable researchers to practise Open Research.
• Provision of support, advice and guidance for individual researchers, appropriate to their disciplinary setting.
• Ensuring long-term sustainability of curated open materials and their continued open accessibility.
• Engaging with government and sector organisations, international consortia to ensure policy development and compliance is in keeping with the needs of the University and broader society.

Specific guidance on open activities and policies are available on the University website via the Office for Scholarly Communication.

Guidance and support for Cambridge researchers is available from the Office of Scholarly Communication and the Research Information Office .

[1]  To become Open Research Steering Committee.

Please direct any questions regarding the University's Open Research Position Statement to the Office of Scholarly Communication:

Email:   [email protected]

Policy Version: 2

Date of Policy Review: March 2019

Name of Reviewer: Dr Arthur Smith, Deputy Manager of Scholarly Communication (Open Access)

Policy Notes:

Version 1. Approved by Research Policy Committee at its meeting on 22 November 2018 and by the General Board of the Faculties on 16 January 2019.

Version 2. Corrected some minor typographical errors and updated language around provision of services. 

Original Policy Creation Date: November 2018

Name of Creator: Open Research Working Group

Date for Next Review: November 2020

Frequency of Reviews: At least every two years

Review is the responsibility of: Open Research Steering Committee

Location of Policy: https://osc.cam.ac.uk/open-research/open-research-position-statement

Open Research Newsletter sign-up

Please contact us at  [email protected]   to be added to the mailing list to receive our quarterly e-Newsletter.

The Office of Scholarly Communication sends this Newsletter to its subscribers in order to disseminate information relevant to open access, research data management, scholarly communication and open research topics. For details on how the personal information you enter here is used, please see our  privacy policy . 

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Child Care and Early Education Research Connections

Position statements.

Position statements are an important tool that NAEYC uses to build understanding and support for significant, often controversial issues related to early childhood education. They are reflected in our strategic direction as a part of our commitment to leadership and innovation—“NAEYC serves as a catalyst and consensus builder for complex and controversial issues to generate new knowledge and understanding.” Based on current evidence from research, theory, and practice, NAEYC position statements are developed through a consensus-building approach. Typically informed by a workgroup of subject matter experts, the position statement development or revision process includes multiple opportunities for member input and feedback before final approval and adoption by the NAEYC Governing Board. (author abstract) 

Contents:  

Core Statements: Advancing Equity in Early Childhood Education Position Statement; Code of Ethical Conduct and Statement of Commitment; Developmentally Appropriate Practice (DAP) Position Statement; Professional Standards and Competencies for Early Childhood Educators; NAEYC Early Childhood Program Standards

Additional Position Statements: Inclusion; Mathematics; Science; Technology

Historical Archive: Accreditation; Child Abuse Prevention; Curriculum, Assessment, and Program Evaluation; Early Learning Standards, Kindergarten; Licensing and Public Regulation; Linguistic and Cultural Diversity; Literacy; Media Violence; Professional Development; Public Policy; Quality Standards; School Readiness; Teacher Certification; Violence

- Related Resources

Related resources include summaries, versions, measures (instruments), or other resources in which the current document plays a part. Research products funded by the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation are related to their project records.

Advancing equity and embracing diversity in early childhood education: Elevating voices & actions

Professional standards and competencies for early childhood educators: summary [executive summary], professional standards and competencies for early childhood educators, promover la equidad en la educación infantile: declaración de posición [advancing equity in early childhood education: a position statement], advancing equity in early childhood education, learning to read and write: developmentally appropriate practices for young children, naeyc position statement: responding to linguistic and cultural diversity--recommendations for effective early childhood education, - you may also like.

These resources share similarities with the current selection.

Kindergarten position statement: Executive summary

• Career Advice

The Purpose and Value of Positionality Statements

Tracy Peña and Jessica O’Brien suggest five reasons to include them in your writings, as well as some potential pitfalls to consider.

By  Tracy Peña and Jessica O’Brien

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Never heard of positionality statements? Neither had we until our instructor asked us to explore them in the context of educational leadership and instructional technology. Our research revealed that positionality statements can tell us important information about the author because they describe the author’s worldview and how it influences their work. The author writes such a statement in an attempt to provide context and transparency about their specific connections to the research for readers. However, we found that including these statements in the context of research reports is not a common practice, and only a select few scholars bear the burden of publishing their positionalities.

We are two educational leadership doctoral students concentrating on media, technology and learning design. Currently, we hold positions at four-year universities in the southeast region. The following is a merging of our independent research, which includes a review of positionality statements, a list of reasons to use them and some potential concerns.

A researcher’s positionality is their worldview on a research question or topic. It can include declarations of beliefs, methodological preferences and existing or latent biases. What makes a researcher’s positionality so important is that it can shape their epistemology (what can be known), ontology (the nature of reality), methodology (process and procedures), and ultimately the interpretation of their research results by others, as various scholars— such as, Mark Fathi Massoud , Andrew Gary Darwin Holmes , Bryan C. Clift and his coauthors , and Dongxiao Qin —have noted.

One important way to help articulate a researcher’s positionality and the identification of potential biases or subjectivities is through the practice of reflexivity: the ongoing process of a researcher critically examining their own actions, beliefs and motives in an effort to protect the research process. For example, one of us, Jessica, acknowledges that her position as a librarian and instructional technologist, combined with her education and commitment to equitable experiences and opportunities for all, influences her positionality. The other of us, Tracy, recognizes that her roles as a faculty member and instructional designer—in conjunction with her years of advocacy for diversity, equity and inclusion—all impact her positionality.

Positionality statements are often present in qualitative research in the social sciences but not widely included in instructional technology and other disciplines, which is problematic.

We think they can play an essential and integral part in reporting on research within other fields and higher education more broadly. Here are our five reasons why researchers should consider using positionality statements and our suggestions for their use.

No. 1: Positionality statements offer transparency about the background and potential motivation of the researchers. For example, in her article, “When the Music Changes, So Should the Dance,” Cynthia B. Dillard, now dean of the College of Education at Seattle University, proposed an endarkened feminist epistemology, so it makes sense that she would offer her positionality as an African American woman interested in culture and spirituality. She states, “I will suggest that for researchers of color in particular, there are deep and serious implications in choosing to embrace paradigms that resonate with our spirit.” It would almost seem disingenuous for her not to acknowledge her positionality when proposing this new epistemology.

But positionality statements can be useful in a wide variety of research fields. Anisa J.N. Jafar , from the University of Manchester, describes the value of such statements in quantitative as well as qualitative research, as Roehl Sybing at Doshisha University in Japan does in ethnographic research writing.

No. 2: Including positionality statements in research reports is an approach to equity. Marginalized populations tend to include position statements in their works more often than any other population. Furthermore, without these declarations, interpretations will likely skew to a Eurocentric view, as scholars including Massoud, Saran Stewart , and H. Richard Milner IV have noted.

No. 3: Positionality statements can increase the ethics, validity, accessibility and usefulness of the research . They allow for the continuation or replication of research as scholar-practitioners consider what they might do differently in another context. For example, Andrew Gary Darwin Holmes at the University of Hull in England has examined the cultural insider-outsider designation and how a researcher’s status might change over time. As a researcher spends more time with the participants in an ethnographic study, for instance, their status will likely morph from one of cultural outsider to the spectrum of cultural insider. Acknowledging this change is vital to the integrity of the research.

No. 4: Training students and researchers to think about their insider status can improve the rigor of the research. It can be empowering for students to liken positionality to their epistemology. Such training would, in the words of Christina Chavez at California State Polytechnic University, allow researchers to “verify or falsify their assumed interpretations.” Furthermore, Kim Miller of Bridges Academy Los Angeles argues, “... folklorists must clarify their own intentions and consider how their own multifarious roles and identities affect their fieldwork procedures and the way they write about their research.” Additionally, David Takacs of the UC Hastings College of the Law says that training researchers to think reflexively about their insider status would allow them to separate the information that they “know” from the information they “see.” For example, recognizing the knowledge we bring to the research process allows us to see other’s diverse lived experiences.

No. 5: Including one’s personality traits may be more beneficial than positionality statements alone. What could be more helpful to the research process and future readers is the researcher’s personality. Awareness of and documenting one’s personality traits may be more powerful than a list of phenotypic attributes or biases and may be more successful in developing rapport with participants. Indeed, when doing fieldwork in Indonesia, Sarah Moser found that what mattered more was her personality , not her positionality. She argued that individuals in the village judged her more on her social skills, emotional responses, interest in local events and how she “navigated the personalities of others.” What mattered less was her positionality as a white, Canadian, female graduate student, and being middle class, which she describes as “… impersonal externally defined categories.” Researchers should consider including personality traits in their positionality statements to help develop authentic relationships.

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While including positionality statements has these strong benefits, authors should also consider several important factors. For example, while stating one’s positionality is an attempt to be transparent about potential biases when interpreting results, not all researchers participate in this practice. As stated previously, it is the researchers who typically come from marginalized populations who bear the burden of communicating their positionalities. And when women, queer and people of color, for example, express their positionalities or share their experiences in their work, they not only open their research to scrutiny, according to Massoud, a professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz, but they open their personal lives to scrutiny, as well.

Additionally, when publishing their positionalities, authors can share deeply personal and traumatic stories that threaten to retraumatize them. As Massoud states, “These harms do not merely accrue when marginalized scholars speak about their own positionality; they also accrue when scholars from majority populations do not speak about theirs, because that omission renders positionality peripheral to mainstream socio-legal scholarship.” Furthermore, as the University of Cardiff’s Sara Delamont has observed, when stating one’s positionality, the author/researcher cannot regulate how the readers will interpret their stance and how their work is read.

Stating one’s positionality is not common outside the social sciences, perhaps because of the conceptual nature of many of the articles, or maybe positionality statements are viewed as unnecessary in technology research and similar fields. We recommend scholars from all disciplines include positionality statements in their publications to help diminish the burden on marginalized populations. In addition, training future researchers to acknowledge their insider statuses will result in more objective investigations. Even if researchers do not include formal positionality statements in their reports and share their limitations or shortcomings, we hope that, as part of their research journey, they are at least engaging in reflexivity so as to make informed and inclusive scholarly decisions.

Tracy Peña is an instructional designer and lecturer at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington. Jessica O’Brien is associate librarian and coordinator of instructional technology at Lenoir-Rhyne University. They are both concluding a doctoral program in educational leadership at Appalachian State University, with a concentration in media, technology and learning design.

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RESEARCH INVESTIGATOR

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A cover letter is required for consideration for this position and should be attached as the first page of your resume. The cover letter should address your specific interest in the position and outline skills and experience that directly relate to this position. 

Job Summary

Applications are invited to fill a research faculty position in the University of Michigan Department of Chemical Engineering to join a computational engineering-based research group. 

The successful applicant will lead research and development efforts in computational and theoretical modeling of complex colloidal systems, with a focus on geometry-driven active matter and colloidal robotics to create computational models for bio-inspired cellular colloidal robots. This role involves exploring phenomena of collections of self-propelled and/or passive particles interacting with curved interfaces and examining control mechanisms for designing autonomous active vesicles and synthetic cellular tissues. Applicants should possess strong expertise in soft matter physics, excellent programming skills in Python and C++, and experience developing new numerical methods while applying advanced geometrical and topological concepts.   Additionally, the candidate will have experience writing successful proposals for research funding and computational allocations, mentoring graduate and undergraduate students, and publishing research findings in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings. Effective communication skills for presenting and- articulating research at scientific conferences are essential. Ideally, the future investigator also has a proven track record of cultivating collaborative research partnerships to foster the lab's focus on interdisciplinary research and bridge the gap between theory, numerical studies, and experiments.

Michigan Engineers are world-class educators, researchers, students and staff who strive to build a people-first future. As part of a top national public research institution, Michigan Engineering's mission is to provide scientific and technological leadership to the people of the world, develop intellectually curious and socially conscious minds, create collaborative solutions to societal problems, and promote an inclusive and innovative community of service for the common good.

Our vision, mission and values are supported by a people-first engineering framework that guides our work. As Michigan Engineers, we strive to apply excellent engineering fundamentals, integrated expertise and equity-centered values to reimagine what engineering can be, close critical gaps, and elevate all people. Information about our vision, mission and values can be found at:  http://strategicvision.engin.umich.edu/ .

The University of Michigan has a storied legacy of commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI). Michigan Engineering models that commitment in our research, culture and collaborations. We seek to recruit and retain a diverse workforce as a reflection of that commitment. Learn more about DEI at Michigan Engineering:  https://www.engin.umich.edu/culture/diversity-equity-inclusion/

Why Work at Michigan?

In addition to a career filled with purpose and opportunity, The University of Michigan offers a comprehensive benefits package to help you stay well, protect yourself and your family and plan for a secure future. Benefits include:

• Generous time off
• A retirement plan that provides two-for-one matching contributions with immediate vesting
• Many choices for comprehensive health insurance
• Life insurance
• Long-term disability coverage
• Flexible spending accounts for healthcare and dependent care expenses
• Maternity and Parental Leave

Responsibilities*

• Conceiving and articulating research methods for computational and theoretical modeling of geometry-driven active matter and colloidal robotics, to include fostering strong interdisciplinary collaborations with experimentalists and theoreticians.   ( 60%)
• Publishing research findings in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings. ( 15% )
• Mentoring graduate and undergraduate students. (15%)
• Assisting in planning and development of proposals for research funding and computational allocations. (10%)

Required Qualifications*

• PhD in physics with at least 4 years post-doctoral research experience in the computational areas described above.  
• Training and experience in professional software development methods and tools for soft matter simulations.  
• Strong record of peer-reviewed publications in relevant areas.   
• Significant sustained participation in academic and professional meetings.

Desired Qualifications*

• Experience with code management tools, graphics and visualization systems, scripting languages, and database management.
• Experience troubleshooting software issues, submitting pull requests, and working with open source software developers.

Work Locations

Ann Arbor campus

Modes of Work

Positions that are eligible for hybrid or mobile/remote work mode are at the discretion of the hiring department. Work agreements are reviewed annually at a minimum and are subject to change at any time, and for any reason, throughout the course of employment. Learn more about the work modes .

Additional Information

This is a Term-Limited position for 3 years from date of hire.

• May require work during early mornings, nights, and/or weekends.
• The person in the position travels domestically and internationally, as required.

Background Screening

The University of Michigan conducts background checks on all job candidates upon acceptance of a contingent offer and may use a third party administrator to conduct background checks.  Background checks are performed in compliance with the Fair Credit Reporting Act.

Application Deadline

Job openings are posted for a minimum of seven calendar days.   The review and selection process may begin as early as the eighth day after posting. This opening may be removed from posting boards and filled anytime after the minimum posting period has ended.

U-M EEO/AA Statement

The University of Michigan is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer.

Research Coordinator II

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Advertised: 19 Sep 2024 Eastern Daylight Time Applications close: 03 Oct 2024 Eastern Daylight Time

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