A professor of the Department of Construction Technology and Management at the College of Art and Built Environment, Professor Kofi Agyekum, has launched a book titled Research Methodology and Academic Writing to support students and researchers in producing well-structured academic work.
The publication comes at a time when the volume of academic research continues to grow, placing increasing emphasis on the need for clarity and structure in research output.
Professor Agyekum stated that the book was motivated by challenges he has observed among students and early-career researchers in navigating research processes.
“Per my experience, I’ve come to realise that most people really find research methods quite difficult, not because they lack ideas, but because they don’t have any structured framework or guidelines to assist them to be able to undertake such research,” he said.
According to him, the book translates complex research concepts into practical steps that readers can easily follow.
“So what this book seeks to do is it comes into the system to try to translate complex research concepts into practical step-by-step approaches so that it becomes easier for people to undertake their research works,” he explained.
He added that each section of the book provides detailed guidance for both students and researchers seeking to publish their work.
“Under all these chapters or all these sections we’ve given detailed information so that, for instance, if it’s students who want to use the book, if they go to chapter one, they know what the introduction chapter of their thesis will entail,” he said.
“And then if it is for their research work to be published either in conferences or in journals, the chapters also give them the processes and the procedures they are supposed to follow,” he added.
A key feature of the book is the introduction of the NSMAIC Research Writing System, a six-stage framework developed by the author to guide users from problem formulation to impactful contribution.
“The interesting thing about this book is that it introduces a new framework which I developed myself from my experience and I’ve termed it the NSMAIC framework,” he noted.
“The NSMAIC framework is just supposed to assist the readers to be able to undertake or to be able to write each of the sections without having any difficulties at all,” he added.
Professor Agyekum also pointed to the relevance of the book within the Ghanaian academic context, noting the limited availability of locally grounded research guides.
“Most of the times the books we have are books which we get from outside. So we have some popular names out there but then when it comes to having a book that is within Ghana, which considers the context of Ghana, we don’t really have that,” he explained.
He expressed optimism that the publication will contribute meaningfully to improving research quality.
“I believe that this book has come to assist us here to be able to undertake our research work and then do it very well as well,” he said.
