The "question outline" method: How I stop falling down research rabbit holes.

[JaneCops]

I have a problem: I start researching a paper, find an interesting tangent, follow it, find another tangent, and three hours later I've read 20 articles and haven't written a word. My research question is a distant memory.

So I invented the "question outline" method.

Before I open a single source, I write down every question I need to answer for my paper.

For a paper on renewable energy policy, my questions might be:

• What policies currently exist at the federal level?
• What policies exist at the state level?
• Which states have been most successful?
• Why were they successful?
• What are the barriers to adoption?
• What do critics say?

Then, when I find a source, I ask: Which question does this answer? If it doesn't answer any of my questions, I don't read it. (Or I save it for later if it seems really important.)

This keeps me focused. I'm not reading randomly. I'm hunting for answers to specific questions. When I've answered all my questions, I have all the information I need to write.

The outline also becomes my paper structure. Each question becomes a section.

Anyone else have a system for focused research? How do you avoid the rabbit holes?