SPG 502 Master’s Thesis Proposal
PUT THE TITLE HERE ALL CAPITAL LETTERS
NO MORE THAN 12 WORDS
By
Put your name here
Submitted to the Division of Sport Management
College of Professional Studies
St. John’s University
In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Master of Professional Studies
 Approved
 Conditionally Approved
 Rejected
_________________________________________________________ Date: ______________
Put your thesis advisor’s name here
Thesis Advisor
Introduction
In the introduction, you should creatively discuss the background of the issue. The
purpose is to build the reader’s interest and stress why the topic is significant. You can (and
should) use citations from the popular press and journals (if appropriate). This section should be
approximately 2-3 pages in length.
Note the levels of headings in this document. Major headings are bold and centered,
minor headings are left-flush and bold. This corresponds to the APA 6th Edition guidelines, and
if you need more levels of headings, see the table on page 62 of the Manual. Most of you will be
able to write your paper with only two levels of headings, three at the most.
The Research Problem
State in one or two sentences the problem that you have identified.
Preliminary Hypotheses and/or Research Questions
Develop several research questions and/or hypotheses, these are not meant to be final,
and they may be edited, added to, or deleted as your future research progresses. These should
follow naturally from the research problem.
If your study is quantitative, you will propose hypotheses using this format, the null first:
Hypothesis #1
H10: Fog is not a contributing factor to traffic accidents in London.
H11: Fog is a contributing factor to traffic accidents in London.
Hypothesis #2
H20: Rain is not ……. Etc.
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If your study is qualitative, you will propose research questions:
Q1: Does fog contribute to traffic accidents in London?
Q2: Does rain ……..?
If you are doing a mixed-methods study, you will have both hypotheses and research
questions. Have a separate section for each.
Brief Literature Review
The key word is brief, you should identify three or four of the most important articles on
your topic and summarize them here. Since this is a proposal, you should first discuss the types
of articles you expect to include in your literature review. For tips on writing an effective
literature review, see Creswell (2003).
Note that in the literature review, ONLY PEER-REVIEWED ARTICLES SHOULD BE
USED. It is possible that other articles may be appropriate (working papers from academic
researchers, papers presented at academic conferences, or the results of corporate research) but
you should check with your advisor before including them here.
Methodology
Identify if the study is to be quantitative, qualitative, or mixed methods and in a few
sentences justify why the methodology you propose is most appropriate to your study (again, see
Creswell for tips on how to do this).
Identify the population, the sampling technique, and the estimated sample size. If you are
doing primary research, you will need approval from the St. John’s Institutional Review Board
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before you begin collecting your data. Discuss this with your advisor since approval can take
anywhere from two weeks to two months depending on the nature of your study.
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References
Format this section as follows: (single space, Paragraph > Special > Hanging > 0.5”)
American Psychological Association. (2010). Publication manual of the American Psychological
Association (6th ed.). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Creswell, J. W. (2003). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods
approaches (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
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