In this instructional video, Dr. Steve Tippins, an experienced dissertation committee member, presents a concise three‑step process for identifying a defensible research gap for a dissertation. He begins by defining a literature gap as an unstudied yet meaningful area that adds incremental knowledge to the existing “knowledge pile.” He then outlines where to look for gaps: future‑research sections, discussion sections, contradictory findings, and repeated calls for further work, while warning against self‑serving or outdated suggestions. Tippins emphasizes that gaps often emerge organically when readers encounter “I wonder…” moments while reading strategically. He advises validating potential gaps with advisors, committee members, peers, and research librarians, and cautions against pursuing topics in overly saturated, “hot” fields. Finally, he explains how to articulate a gap clearly—citing existing work, specifying the missing element (e.g., different sample, method, context), and justifying its importance—before encouraging persistence and offering a free Dissertation Help community for further support.
Chapters
The fastest way to find your research gap it is not to just go out and read 400 articles. It's to know where to look when you're reading articles and know what to look for. I'm Dr. Steve Tippins and I've served on over 300 dissertation committees. And in this video we're going to talk about a simple three step process to help you find a defensible gap in the literature. And if you're looking for support and help along this journey, click the link below and join our free dissertation help community. Okay, first, what is a gap in the literature? A gap is something that has been unstudied or hasn't been done in your field. But just because it's unstudied doesn't mean it needs to be done. Your role in this process is to add knowledge. I like to think of knowledge as a pile. And every piece of research adds a little bit more to the pile. But we don't take huge leaps away from the pile, we just add a little bit more. So if your research is in theory sounding very good, but no one has ever gotten anywhere near it, no one's ever thought of anything like that. That's prob too far away from our knowledge base for the gap to be meaningful. So where do I go to find gaps? Well, first and the easiest way is where other researchers tell you there's a gap. And if you look at the end of articles that have been written, there may be a section called future research. Future research needs to be done on. That's the researchers telling you there is a gap. Now, a caveat on that I have seen researchers suggest, hey, here's some more research that should be done without saying, oh, and I'm 90% completed on that research, they're trying to pave the way for their next article. Also, here's something that should be done. If that article was written in 1947, that's a long time ago. So yes, if they tell you that's a great place to look, but you want to continue to looking to say, is it reasonable, is it timely, things like that. You can also find future research options in discussion sections where they're discussing what has been done and maybe they'll talk about future research. Also, if there are contradictory results. Jones found this, however, Smith found this, which means there's not agreement. And if there's a strong body of literature on both sides, there still needs to be more work done. There's still a gap in our knowledge. And if you find that seven people have said, and not one article of seven authors, but seven different studies have said certain things need to be done. That's most likely a gap, and there's justification for doing it. And that's another important thing about a gap. Your committee is going to want to see that there's justification for doing this. What if I've looked at the literature and it doesn't expressly hit me in the head saying, hey, here's your gap. What do I do now? I like to think that research gaps are going to arise naturally as you do reading. Where does your mind go when they start talking about doing something? When you start saying, huh, I wonder why no one's looked at it this way, Or I wonder if this could be done. Those become gaps in the literature, or at least paths to gaps in literature. Now, if you're following the I wonder why or I wonder if approach, if you see it once, that's a trigger. Yeah, maybe. And if you start looking at more literature, you start keeping track of this when you realize, wow, no one's ever done this. I can see that there have been seven or eight people who've approached it this way, but no one's ever done this way. I wonder why not. That could be the beginning of a gap in literature. So you've looked at literature, you think, yeah, there's something here. Ask other people, ask your committee, ask your chair, ask scholars in the field, fellow doctoral students, hey, here's my gap. What do you think of it? And they may be able to come back, especially seasoned research, and say, oh, yeah, that was a line of thinking that we followed in the 1990s. And, you know, such and such as research of 2002 showed something, and they can stop you from following a path that's already been done, but they can also confirm, you know, that's a really interesting point. No one's that I know of has ever looked at it this way. So that validation can be very helpful in finding a gap. One area that seem is seemingly untapped is, look, you're paying tuition to go to school and you've got librarians. Ask the research librarian, has there ever been any research done like this? And give them parameters that they can search. They're wizards at doing these searches and, and they might be able to help you find the yes or no answer much quicker than you can. And it's always nice to call on a wizard to help in the process. Another thing that experts can tell you is this is a really popular field. Yeah, that hasn't been done, but when you hear popular field or a hot field or something like that, you want to be aware that maybe a lot of other people are doing it too. And you don't want to get into a project that's going to take you a considerable amount of time and find out that seven publications have come out in the last month, all doing exactly what you're doing or variations of what you're doing. Your gap can go away. So yes, you want something that needs to be done, but also that not so many people know it needs to be done, that everybody's doing it. Once I found a gap, now I got to be able to explain it, put it in words that people can understand. Things like this research has been done, Smith has said this, Jones has said this. They've used these results or these tests. However, this has not been done. And now, either using a different test, a different sample, a different location in the world, or it's been done on police officers, but not on firefighters, we expand the knowledge base again by little teeny pieces that we're going to add to the pile. If you can also have a reason why important because it may help, it may do this, it may do that. Meaning it's not just a gap for a gap's sake. There is a reason to look at this gap that I found. So going back through, gaps in the literature are there. You want to read and read strategically. Look at your documents you're reading and see are they telling me or showing me where there's a gap? Where does curiosity pop up? Hmm. Or I wonder, wow, what if? When those types of questions start coming to you, as you get comfortable in the literature, gaps will begin to show themselves. And then test these results on your faculty members, your committee members, and trusted others within academia. And once you've done that, write up your gap. See if it becomes a logical write up of what the gap is. Doesn't take a genius to find a gap, but it does take persistence and dedication to what you're doing. If you're struggling with finding a gap or just having difficulties in fine tuning it, join our free Dissertation Help community. You'll get our five step dissertation acceptance program, access to veteran committee members, Q and A sessions, and one on one help to help you move forward. This is a long journey, but you don't have to do it alone. Like thousands of students before you, join up to get help and support. I'll see you there.
