A research paper intends to discover more things out of seemingly ordinary topic interests. It is like looking for answers for questions that cannot simply be answered with a Yes or No. So in this case, you must know what the components of a research paper are to have a document that is truly worth reading.
The first part of a research paper is the thesis statement. This is the main idea of your researching plan. You are like making a problem out of a sentence that is assertive enough to tell you that an idea is valid. This is then integrated to the Introduction paragraph. This part is the introductory stage of what the research paper is all about. Also, you may provide some details of background why you are planning to start a research about the topic to make it clear to your audiences.
Another component of a research paper is the body paragraph block. If you are simply writing a narrative type research paper, you can write the block in an informative format. But if you need to present discussions, arguments and proofs of your analysis, then you can divide the body paragraph into smaller parts that will include the methodology, data, analysis and preliminary results. This may be necessary especially for highly technical subjects like a cancer research paper.
You may also need to use a citation style for your research paper, if you are going to use other references to prove that your details and information are credible, then provide your readers some details where you have acquired your information. An APA research paper outline may be needed.
The last component of a research paper is the conclusion. This is the summary of the entire paper. Also, you are going to provide the overall results of your research in this paragraph. Sometimes, you may even involve your discovered answer to the question posed by the thesis statement.