The Discussion section is where we relate our results back to our research question.
This is where we explain whether our findings were consistent with our predictions or not.
And also how those findings fit in with the broader literature on this topic.
We essentially come back to the issues we identified in the Introduction and talk about
those in the context of our results.
Ultimately, we want to answer some specific questions.
Using the story analogy, we should be asking ourselves:
“How do our results relate back to the main characters of the story?”
“How do our results affect the main characters of the story?”
Specific to our lab report, therefore, the question is:
“How do our results affect the existing research and theories, developed by other
researchers, relating to the research topic that we have just investigated?”
The first paragraph of our discussion should be a summary of our research question and
what we found.
In the next paragraph, we should expand on the first, and relate our findings back to
our research question and predictions.
In the following paragraphs, we relate our findings to the background literature that
we talked about in our Introduction.
This is where we have the opportunity to talk about what our findings actually mean in relation
to the existing literature.
We then talk about the possible strengths and limitations of our research study, our
recommendations for future research, and conclusions from our report.
So, in the Discussion section, we talk about our findings and relate them back to existing literature.
Ultimately, we’re answering the question “What do our results mean in the grand
scheme of things?”
We highlight the strengths of our research study as well as the possible limitations,
and provide our suggestion for future research.