Finding Evidence

Learning Objectives

  • Describe strategies for preliminary research on a topic

A critical step in the writing process is to find evidence that supports and explains the claim you make in your thesis statement. Often, this means doing research and finding information, facts, stories, data, and reports related to your topic, but sometimes, especially in narrative writing, it means adding support through your own experiences and examples.

Support and Elaboration

When we talk about support and elaboration in writing, we are discussing specific details and information writers use to develop their topic. The key to developing support and focusing on elaboration is to focus on being specific. Good writers use concrete, specific details, and relevant information to create mental images for their readers.

Two important concepts in support and elaboration are sufficiency and relatedness.

Key Takeaway: Sufficiency

Sufficiency refers to the amount of detail — is there enough detail to support the topic? Good writers supply their readers with sufficient details to comprehend what they have written.

  • In narrative writing, this means providing enough descriptive details for the reader to construct a picture of the story in their mind.
  • In expository writing, this means not only finding enough information to support your purpose, whether it is to inform or persuade your audience, but also finding information that is credible and accurate.

Sufficiency, however, is not enough. The power of your information is determined less by the quantity of details than by their quality. Look for evidence that is accurate and comes from credible sources.

Key Takeaway: RElatedness

Relatedness refers to the quality of the details and their relevance to the topic. Good writers select only the details that will support their focus, deleting irrelevant information.

  • In narrative writing, details should be included only if they are concrete, specific details that contribute to, rather than detract from, the picture provided by the narrative.
  • In expository writing, information should be included only if it is relevant to the writer’s goal and strengthens rather than weakens the writer’s ability to meet that goal.

Guiding Questions for Support and Elaboration

FOR NARRATIVE WRITING:

  • Is your story developed with specific details that are related to the main event?
  • Do all of the details move the story along?
  • Does your story have enough elaboration so that your reader can see and feel what is happening? Can you show me an example where your reader can see or feel what is happening?

FOR INFORMATIONAL WRITING:

  • Is your essay developed with specific information (facts, statistics, etc.) that is related to the main topic?
  • Does all of the information support the main topic?
  • Does your essay have enough information to fulfill your reader’s needs?

FOR ARGUMENTATIVE WRITING:

  • Is your essay developed with specific details that are related to the main topic?
  • Does all of the information support the main argument?
  • Does your essay have enough supporting evidence to persuade your reader?

Finding Evidence

Your research strategy should align with your professor’s requirements. Some assignments require only peer-reviewed journal articles, while others allow a mix of sources, including credible websites. If unsure, always ask for clarification.

Key Takeaway: Types of sources

Some assignments require you to find primary sources only, while others allow you to rely on secondary sources.

Primary vs. Secondary Sources

  • Primary sources are firsthand accounts or original documents, such as letters, autobiographies, research studies, or historical artifacts. A Civil War soldier’s journal or a scientist’s published experiment results are examples of primary sources.
  • Secondary sources are secondhand accounts of primary sources and involve generalization, analysis, interpretation, or evaluation of the original information. These include sources like biographies, news articles about research findings, or scholarly essays evaluating historical events.

Popular vs. Scholarly Sources

  • Popular sources (news articles, blogs, magazines) are written for a general audience and sometimes may lack in-depth analysis or rigorous fact-checking (though there are plenty that are well-researched and provide references).
  • Scholarly sources are written by experts in a field, often peer-reviewed, and found in academic journals. University libraries provide free access to many of these journals, while Google Scholar can help locate them online.

Tips for Choosing Sources

  • Consider the Author’s Credibility: Does the author have expertise in the subject? Oftentimes, an author’s credentials will be listed as a footnote within the source, but if not, an Internet search may reveal whether the writer can be determined to be a scholarly author or one who has done a vast amount of research on the topic.
  • Use University and Library Resources: Many academic fields have journals and periodicals that publish scholarly articles. Universities often provide free access to these through library databases and print collections. By discovering and accessing these journals, you can be sure that the piece from which you are quoting is a scholarly source.
  • Use Google Scholar for Research: Search engines such as Google offer the option of searching “Google Scholar” in order to access scholarly articles. Some online access journals require a fee to access articles–if you encounter a paywall, check your university library’s database, as they often provide free access to the same materials.
  • Ask Your Professor About Research Requirements: If no specific guidelines are given, clarify whether certain types of sources (e.g., only peer-reviewed journals) are required. You can start with a general search using Google or Wikipedia to understand the basics about your topic, but you’ll want to do specific research to find the type of evidence needed to give credibility to your argument. 

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