Academic writing can seem daunting.

 Academic writing can seem daunting.

Here's a breakdown of the writing process into smaller, manageable steps (and free apps to help you with every step):

1. Brainstorm Research Questions

Use ChatGPT to brainstorm research questions.

Prompt: I am writing a paper on [your topic]. Could you help me brainstorm research questions?

The suggestions ChatGPT will give you will be broad. Ask follow up questions to narrow down.

You can also use Bing (in Creative Mode) to brainstorm research questions.

In my current project, I am exploring two of the research questions Bing has suggested here.

2. Literature Review

Use a combination of the following apps to gather relevant papers for literature review:

Elicit, Inciteful, R Discovery, Research Rabbit

3. Reading and Taking Notes

Download Zotero and create a collection for your project. Then put all your papers in that collection.

Use Zotero to read and annotate papers. You can also take detailed notes in Zotero.

4. Reading Assistant

If you need help while reading papers, use SciSpace.

SciSpace will give you a reading copilot that will simplify complex ideas for you.

5. Outlining Your Paper

Use ChatGPT to create an outline for your paper.

Include the following in your prompt for best results: Topic, Context, Requirement, Tone.

You can also use ask Bing (in Creative Mode) to create an outline for your paper.

6. Drafting

Use the outline generated by ChatGPT/Bing and start drafting your paper in MS Word.

If you have taken notes in Zotero, you can export them to MS Word.

7. Bibliography

Use Zotero for creating citations. That will you will be able to create bibliography for your paper with a single click.