Momina

Research Assistant

Upwork • Freiberufler

Dec 2024 - Jul 2025 • 7 mos

This was a research assistant role for a nonfiction book about the human senses, covering 18 senses total. The book was written for parents, meant to give them a real, practical understanding of how their children's senses develop, with the tone meant to feel like a conversation rather than a textbook. My initial job was research: gathering and verifying scientific information on each of the 18 senses, finding real-life case studies and examples that would make the science land for a parent reading at home, and helping build out interactive elements — role-play exercises and games meant to help kids actually engage with their senses rather than just read about them. The project was ambitious in scope, aiming for 250+ pages across all 18 senses, so a lot of the early work was making sure each sense had enough substance, sourcing, and real examples to hold its own chapter. The role grew from there. Once the research was in place, I moved into editing the actual content, tightening the writing, making sure the conversational tone stayed consistent across chapters instead of drifting into something drier, and checking that the science stayed accurate as it got simplified for a general audience. From there I also handled the structural side: taking what had been a research document and shaping it into an actual book, organizing it into chapters, giving it a consistent internal logic and flow, and making decisions about pacing and structure that a reader moving front to back would actually follow. So the work ended up spanning three distinct stages on one project: research and fact-finding, developmental-level content editing, and full manuscript formatting into book form. It's the kind of project that started as one job description and turned into something closer to being a research assistant, editor, and structural