Doing Academic Research — UNIT 5

Presenting your Research (Conferences)

A practical guide to conducting research, from structuring ideas to drafting, revising, and preparing for submission.

연구 수행의 전반적인 과정과 구조를 정리한 가이드입니다.

A research paper answers one question using evidence.

Step 1: Start with a Question

  • What problem are you trying to solve?
  • Write it in one sentence

Step 2: Choose Your Contribution

Your paper should do one of these:

  • Test an idea
  • Apply an idea in a new context
  • Propose a new approach

Step 3: Use IMRaD Structure

  • IMRaD stands for Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion. It is a common structure for research papers that helps organize your ideas and findings in a clear and logical way.

Introduction

(~200 words conference / ~400 journal)

  • What is the problem?
  • Why does it matter?
  • What is your research question?
  • What is your contribution?
  • How is it different from previous work?

(~200 words conference / 400–600 journal)

  • What have others already done?
  • What are you building on or changing?
  • How does your work fit into the existing research landscape?
  • This is where you use most of your references (cite 3–6 for conference, 10+ for journal)

Methods

(~200 words conference / 400–800 journal)

  • What exactly did you do?
  • How can someone repeat it?
  • Include:
    • Data
    • Sample size
    • Experimental setup

(Be specific. Write in paragraphs, not bullet points.)

Results

(~200 words conference / 400–600 journal)

  • What did you find?
  • Show:
    • Tables / graphs
  • Do two things:
    • Describe the results (short)
    • Interpret the results (more important)

Discussion / Conclusion

(~200 words conference / 400–600 journal)

  • What do the results mean?
  • What are the limitations?
  • What should be done next (future work)?

Step 4: References

Most conferences and journals we publish in use IEEE style for references. This means:

  • References are numbered in the order they appear in the text (e.g., [1], [2], etc.)
  • The reference list at the end of the paper is ordered by these numbers, not alphabetically
  • Each reference includes specific information such as author names, paper title, conference/journal name, year, etc.
  • For example:
    • [1] J. Doe and A. Smith, “Title of the Paper,” in Proceedings of the Conference Name, Year, pp. 1-10.
    • [2] J. Doe, “Title of the Journal Article,” Journal Name, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 100-110, Year.

Try to include:

  • 3–6 references for a conference paper
  • 10+ references for a journal paper

Step 5: Know Your Target

Two main publication types:

  • Conferences → shorter, faster, early ideas
  • Journals → longer, more detailed, mature work