The result of the narrowing process is a research question that can be tentatively answered by a hypothesis, a statement of what you anticipate your research will show. Like a working thesis (3c, 9d), a hypothesis must be manageable, interesting, and specific. In addition, it must be arguable, a debatable proposition that you can prove or disprove with a reasonable amount of research evidence (9c). For example, a statement like this one is not arguable since it merely states a fact: “Senator Joseph McCarthy attracted great attention with his anti-Communist crusade during the 1950s.” On the other hand, this statement is an arguable hypothesis because evidence for or against it can be found: “Roy Cohn’s biased research while he was an assistant to Senator Joseph McCarthy was partially responsible for McCarthy’s anti-Communist crusade.”

In moving from your general topic of interest, such as Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-Communist crusade of the 1950s, to a useful hypothesis, such as the one in the previous paragraph, you first narrow the topic to a single manageable issue: Roy Cohn’s role in the crusade, for instance. After background reading, you then raise a question about that issue (“To what extent did Cohn’s research contribute to McCarthy’s crusade?”) and devise a possible answer, your hypothesis.

David Craig’s hypothesis

David’s hypothesis, which tentatively answers his research question, is precise enough to be either supported or challenged by a manageable amount of research.