Research Prompts & Guides¶

🎯 Comprehensive Research Prompts

Practical prompts and guides for all research activities

📖 Paper Reading Prompts¶

First Pass Reading (Quick Scan)¶

🔍 First Pass Questions

Use these questions when doing first pass (5-10 minutes):

Relevance Check: - What problem does this paper solve? - Is this relevant to my research area? - What is the main contribution? - Should I read this paper in detail?

Quick Understanding: - What is the proposed method? - What are the key results? - What datasets were used? - Is code available?

Decision Making: - Is this paper worth reading in detail? - Should I save it for later? - Does it relate to my current work?

First Pass

Answer these questions quickly. If not relevant, move on. If relevant, proceed to second pass.

Second Pass Reading (Detailed)¶

📚 Second Pass Questions

Use these when doing detailed reading (30-60 minutes):

Problem Understanding: - What is the specific problem addressed? - Why is this problem important? - What are the limitations of existing methods? - What gap does this work fill?

Method Understanding: - What is the proposed approach? - How does it work? (high-level) - What are the key innovations? - What are the assumptions?

Results Analysis: - What datasets were used? - What metrics were reported? - How does it compare to baselines? - Are the results convincing?

Critical Evaluation: - Are experiments fair? - Are baselines appropriate? - Are there missing comparisons? - What are potential limitations?

Second Pass

Take detailed notes during second pass. This is where you understand the paper.

Third Pass Reading (Deep Dive)¶

🔬 Third Pass Questions

Use these for deep understanding (1-2 hours):

Technical Details: - How exactly does the algorithm work? - What are the mathematical formulations? - What are the implementation details? - Can I reproduce this?

Experimental Deep Dive: - What is the experimental setup? - What are the hyperparameters? - How were results obtained? - Are there ablation studies?

Critical Analysis: - What are the strengths? - What are the weaknesses? - What could be improved? - What questions remain?

Connection to Other Work: - How does this relate to other papers? - What papers should I read next? - What are the key citations? - What future work is suggested?

Third Pass

Only do third pass for highly relevant papers. This is time-intensive.

🧠 Understanding & Exploration Prompts¶

Understanding Concepts¶

💡 Concept Understanding Prompts

Use these to understand new concepts:

Definition: - What is [concept] in simple terms? - How is [concept] different from [related concept]? - What are the key components of [concept]? - Can I explain [concept] to someone else?

Intuition: - Why does [concept] work? - What is the intuition behind [concept]? - What problem does [concept] solve? - When would I use [concept]?

Examples: - Can I think of a simple example of [concept]? - What is a real-world application? - How is [concept] used in practice?

Connections: - How does [concept] relate to [other concept]? - What are similar concepts? - What builds on [concept]?

Understanding

If you can explain a concept simply, you understand it well.

Exploring Research Areas¶

🗺️ Exploration Prompts

Use these to explore new research areas:

Area Overview: - What is the current state of [research area]? - What are the main problems in [area]? - What are the key methods? - Who are the leading researchers?

Key Papers: - What are the foundational papers? - What are the most cited papers? - What are recent important papers? - What are survey papers?

Trends: - What are current trends in [area]? - What are emerging directions? - What are open problems? - What are future directions?

Resources: - What are good resources for [area]? - What courses cover [area]? - What tools/libraries exist? - What datasets are used?

Exploration

Start with survey papers, then read foundational papers, then recent work.

Method Understanding¶

⚙️ Method Understanding Prompts

Use these to understand methods:

How It Works: - What is the input to [method]? - What is the output? - What are the steps? - What is the algorithm?

Why It Works: - What is the theoretical justification? - What are the key insights? - Why is this better than alternatives? - What are the assumptions?

Implementation: - How would I implement [method]? - What are the key components? - What are the hyperparameters? - What are implementation challenges?

Evaluation: - How is [method] evaluated? - What metrics are used? - What are the limitations? - When does it fail?

📝 Note-Taking Prompts¶

Paper Notes Template¶

📄 Paper Notes Template

Use this template for each paper:

# [Paper Title]

**Authors**: [Author names]
**Venue**: [Conference/Journal, Year]
**Link**: [URL]
**Code**: [Code link if available]

## Summary
[2-3 sentence summary]

## Problem
- What problem does this solve?
- Why is it important?
- What are limitations of existing methods?

## Method
- What is the proposed approach?
- Key idea: [one sentence]
- How does it work? [high-level]
- Key innovations: [list]

## Key Contributions
1. [Contribution 1]
2. [Contribution 2]
3. [Contribution 3]

## Results
- Datasets: [list]
- Metrics: [list]
- Main results: [key findings]
- Comparison: [vs. baselines]

## Strengths
- [Strength 1]
- [Strength 2]
- [Strength 3]

## Weaknesses
- [Weakness 1]
- [Weakness 2]
- [Weakness 3]

## Questions/Unclear Points
- [Question 1]
- [Question 2]
- [Question 3]

## Related Papers
- [Paper 1] - [why related]
- [Paper 2] - [why related]

## Implementation Notes
- [Implementation detail 1]
- [Implementation detail 2]

## Key Takeaways
- [Takeaway 1]
- [Takeaway 2]

Note-Taking

Fill this template for each paper. It helps with recall and writing.

Concept Notes Template¶

💭 Concept Notes Template

Use this for understanding concepts:

# [Concept Name]

## Definition
[Simple definition]

## Intuition
[Why it works, intuition]

## Key Components
1. [Component 1]
2. [Component 2]
3. [Component 3]

## How It Works
[Step-by-step explanation]

## Example
[Simple example]

## When to Use
- [Use case 1]
- [Use case 2]

## Related Concepts
- [Related concept 1]
- [Related concept 2]

## Papers
- [Paper 1] - [how it uses concept]
- [Paper 2] - [how it uses concept]

## Questions
- [Question 1]
- [Question 2]

Concept Notes

Understanding concepts deeply helps with research.

Research Log Template¶

📊 Research Log Template

Use this for tracking your research:

# Research Log - [Date]

## Papers Read Today
1. [Paper 1] - [Brief note]
2. [Paper 2] - [Brief note]

## Concepts Learned
- [Concept 1] - [Brief explanation]
- [Concept 2] - [Brief explanation]

## Ideas/Insights
- [Idea 1]
- [Idea 2]

## Questions
- [Question 1]
- [Question 2]

## Next Steps
- [ ] Read [paper]
- [ ] Implement [method]
- [ ] Explore [topic]

## Time Spent
- Reading: [X hours]
- Coding: [X hours]
- Thinking: [X hours]

Research Log

Keep a daily research log. Helps track progress and ideas.

Citation-Based Search¶

📚 Citation Search Prompts

Use these to find related papers:

Backward Citations (Foundations): - What papers does [this paper] cite? - What are the foundational papers? - What methods does [this paper] build on? - What are the key references?

Forward Citations (Extensions): - What papers cite [this paper]? - What are recent extensions? - How has [this paper] been used? - What are follow-up works?

Related Work Section: - What papers are in related work? - How do they compare? - What are similar approaches? - What are alternative methods?

Same Authors: - What other papers by [author]? - What is [author]'s research line? - What are recent papers by [author]?

Citation Chains

Follow citation chains (backward and forward) to find related work.

Topic-Based Search¶

🔍 Topic Search Prompts

Use these for topic-based search:

Keyword Variations: - What are synonyms for [keyword]? - What are related terms? - What are alternative names? - What are acronyms?

Broader/Narrower: - What is the broader area? - What are sub-areas? - What are related fields? - What are applications?

Search Queries: - "[method] AND [application]" - "[problem] AND [approach]" - "[dataset] AND [method]" - "[concept] OR [related concept]"

Venue Search: - What papers in [venue] on [topic]? - What are recent [venue] papers? - What are best papers on [topic]?

Search Strategy

Use multiple search strategies. Different approaches find different papers.

Platform-Specific Search¶

🌐 Platform Search Prompts

Use these for different platforms:

Google Scholar: - Search: "[keyword]" AND "[year]" - Use: "Cited by" for forward citations - Use: "Related articles" for similar papers - Use: Author profiles for researcher papers

Semantic Scholar: - Use: AI-powered recommendations - Use: Citation graphs - Use: Author networks - Use: Research trends

Connected Papers: - Start with: Key paper - Explore: Visual graph - Find: Related papers - Discover: Research tree

Papers With Code: - Search: Task or method - Filter: By code availability - Check: Leaderboards - Find: Implementations

Multiple Platforms

Use multiple platforms. Each has different strengths.

🎯 Research Planning Prompts¶

Topic Selection¶

🎯 Topic Selection Prompts

Use these to select research topics:

Interest Assessment: - What topics am I interested in? - What problems excite me? - What would I work on for years? - What aligns with my skills?

Feasibility: - Do I have required resources? - Is data available? - Do I have required skills? - Is it achievable in time?

Novelty: - Has this been done before? - What is new about this? - What gap does this fill? - What is the contribution?

Significance: - Why does this matter? - Who will benefit? - What is the impact? - Is it publishable?

Topic Selection

Choose topics you're genuinely interested in. Research is hard - interest sustains you.

Literature Review Planning¶

📖 Literature Review Prompts

Use these for literature review:

Scope Definition: - What is the research question? - What time period to cover? - What types of papers? - What venues to include?

Search Strategy: - What are key terms? - What databases to search? - What search queries? - What filters to use?

Organization: - How to organize papers? - What themes exist? - What chronological order? - What methodological groups?

Analysis: - What are common themes? - What are trends? - What are gaps? - What are contradictions?

Literature Review

Plan your literature review systematically. Saves time later.

Experiment Planning¶

🔬 Experiment Planning Prompts

Use these for planning experiments:

Research Questions: - What questions to answer? - What hypotheses to test? - What comparisons to make? - What to measure?

Design: - What datasets to use? - What baselines to compare? - What metrics to use? - What hyperparameters to tune?

Resources: - What compute needed? - What time required? - What data needed? - What tools needed?

Validation: - How to ensure validity? - What controls needed? - What statistics needed? - How to ensure reproducibility?

Experiment Planning

Plan experiments carefully. Good planning prevents problems later.

💬 Discussion & Analysis Prompts¶

Paper Discussion¶

💬 Discussion Prompts

Use these when discussing papers:

Summary: - Can I summarize this paper in 2 minutes? - What is the main contribution? - What problem does it solve?

Critical Analysis: - What are the strengths? - What are the weaknesses? - Are experiments fair? - Are claims supported?

Connections: - How does this relate to [other paper]? - What are similar approaches? - What are differences?

Questions: - What is unclear? - What questions remain? - What would I do differently? - What are next steps?

Discussion

Discussing papers helps understanding. Join reading groups.

Critical Analysis¶

🔍 Critical Analysis Prompts

Use these for critical evaluation:

Method Evaluation: - Is the method sound? - Are assumptions reasonable? - Are there alternatives? - What are limitations?

Experimental Evaluation: - Are experiments fair? - Are baselines appropriate? - Are datasets suitable? - Are metrics appropriate?

Results Evaluation: - Are results convincing? - Are improvements significant? - Are claims supported? - Are there missing comparisons?

Reproducibility: - Is code available? - Are details sufficient? - Can I reproduce this? - What is missing?

Critical Analysis

Always think critically. Not all papers are perfect.

🎓 Learning & Study Prompts¶

Active Learning¶

📚 Active Learning Prompts

Use these for active learning:

Before Reading: - What do I already know? - What do I want to learn? - What questions do I have?

While Reading: - Can I explain this in my own words? - Do I understand each section? - What questions arise? - How does this connect to what I know?

After Reading: - Can I explain this to someone? - What are key takeaways? - What should I review? - What should I explore next?

Application: - How would I use this? - Can I implement this? - What are applications? - How does this help my research?

Active Learning

Active learning (explaining, implementing) is more effective than passive reading.

Spaced Repetition¶

🔄 Review Prompts

Use these for reviewing:

Daily Review: - What did I read today? - What did I learn? - What should I review?

Weekly Review: - What papers did I read this week? - What concepts did I learn? - What connections did I make? - What should I revisit?

Monthly Review: - What is my progress? - What have I learned? - What are gaps? - What should I focus on next?

Spaced Repetition

Review regularly. Helps retention and understanding.

🔧 Implementation Prompts¶

Code Implementation¶

💻 Implementation Prompts

Use these when implementing:

Understanding: - Do I understand the method? - What are the key components? - What are the steps? - What are the inputs/outputs?

Planning: - How to structure code? - What are the modules? - What are dependencies? - What are test cases?

Implementation: - Start with simplest version? - Add complexity gradually? - Test each component? - Document as I go?

Validation: - Does it match paper? - Are results similar? - What are differences? - What might be wrong?

Implementation

Start simple, test often, document well.

📊 Progress Tracking Prompts¶

Weekly Reflection¶

📈 Weekly Reflection Prompts

Use these weekly:

Progress: - What did I accomplish? - What papers did I read? - What did I implement? - What did I learn?

Challenges: - What was difficult? - What blocked me? - What questions remain?

Next Week: - What are goals? - What papers to read? - What to implement? - What to explore?

Adjustments: - What should I change? - What is working well? - What needs improvement?

Reflection

Regular reflection helps maintain direction and progress.

🔗 Quick Reference¶

Daily Checklist¶

✅ Daily Research Checklist

Weekly Checklist¶

✅ Weekly Research Checklist

Usage Tips: - Copy prompts into your note-taking system - Customize prompts for your needs - Use prompts consistently - Review and refine prompts regularly

Remember: These prompts are tools. Use them to guide your thinking, not replace it.