NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS NE 185
Revised
and Updated Edition of F. Bruce
Sanford's
1957 "Planning
Your Scientific
Research Paper"
by Jon A. Gibson
National Marine Fisheries Serv., 166 Water St., Woods Hole, MA 02543
Print
publication date August 2004 ;
web version posted February 23, 2005
Citation: Gibson JA. 2004. Revised and updated edition of F. Bruce Sanford's 1957 "Planning your scientific research paper." NOAA Tech Memo NMFS NE 185; 36 p.
Download
complete PDF/print version
ABSTRACT
This manual presents numerous suggestions on how to plan your scientific
research paper. The first part deals with preliminary steps in planning
such as outlining, choosing headings, and making up tables. The last
part deals with the following: title, abstract, introduction, methods,
results and discussion, conclusions, summary, and literature cited or
bibliography. Much stress is laid on the importance of keeping your paper
in mind from the moment your research is conceived, of making adequate
use of tables and making them clear, of using outlines, and of using
headings. Particular attention is focused on the introduction and on
the need for stating your specific problem and for orienting your readers
to it. Suggestions are given on how to deal with problems in the writing
of the methods, results and discussion, and the conclusion. The differences
between the conclusions and the summary are made clear. Relationships
between the title and the abstract and between the title and the specific
objectives stated in the introduction are pointed out. Finally a reminder
is given of the importance of following the format of your journal when
you are citing the literature.
Preface to the Revised
Edition
In my 28 years as a technical writer-editor for the Northeast Fisheries
Science Center (NEFSC), I have been asked on several occasions by different
Center Directors and division chiefs to go beyond editing research papers,
to training specific individuals in order for them to write better papers.
In general, those individuals were young scientists who had been identified
as having strong research potential, but weak writing skills. In each
case, I worked one-on-one with the young scientist, evaluating his/her
previous papers, pointing out the relative strengths and weaknesses of
the writing, suggesting methods for correcting the weaknesses, and providing
reference materials for further self-training. The results for the young
scientists were mixed: some individuals showed improved writing, adopting
the lessons from the training; others showed little or no improvement,
reverting more or less to their pre-training weaknesses. Because I am
trained and experienced in technical writing and editing, but not as
an instructor per se of those activities, it is unclear to what
extent the mixed results were a consequence of the failures of the instructor
or of several of the instructees.
The results for me personally, though, were not mixed.
Every individualized training exercise took a lot of time and effort.
From an efficiency standpoint, I found it more and more difficult to
justify that time and effort with each new exercise. Consequently, I
began to look around for an existing training tool -- a manual, a videotape,
a course, anything -- which would let me effectively train individual
scientists without taking a lot of time, or, let me effectively train
many scientists concurrently regardless of the time taken. Dozens of
training tools, from a Society for Technical Communication training manual
to a U.S. Air Force training videotape to a U.S. Department of Agriculture
Graduate School training course, were evaluated, but nothing seemed to
address adequately the typical weaknesses in the writings of these young
scientists. I was resigned to having to design and deliver my own training
course.
Then I accidentally came across an old, faded report on "Planning Your
Scientific Research Paper," authored by F. Bruce Sanford, a chemist with
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's (USFWS's) Branch of Commercial Fisheries
in Seattle, Washington. The report was issued as U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service Commercial Fishery Leaflet 10 (February 1957, 95 pages).
The title caught my attention, so I scanned the report. Although some
of the information in the report is outdated, and some of the information
I personally would not follow nor recommend that others follow, it nonetheless
-- as a whole and at the conceptual level -- comes the closest
to an effective and efficient training tool to address the predominant
weaknesses in the writings of the NEFSC's young scientists.
Soon after I came across the Sanford report, I attended a November
2002 meeting for scientific and technical editors of the National Marine
Fisheries Service (NMFS) in Seattle, Washington. A major thrust of that
meeting was to identify the needs of NMFS for improving its scientific
publishing program. Identified as a key need was the training of our
young scientists to write better research papers. I mentioned the Sanford
report; several at the meeting felt that it might be a useful training
tool, so I committed the NEFSC and myself to updating and revising the
report and re-issuing it in the NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS-NE series
for use throughout NMFS as my counterparts might see fit.
This report is an updated and revised edition of Sanford's 1957 report.
Much of the new information which is conceptually different from the
original information has been kept separate from the original information.
In the paper version of this report, this new information is contained
in an "Endnotes" section; in the online version, this new information
is accessed through internal links. This separation of new and original
information has been done to achieve two objectives: 1) to recognize
properly the contributions of Sanford in his original work, and 2) to
identify the contributions of myself should there be any disagreements
by readers over the recommendations inherent in the new information.
Very limited editing of Sanford's original work has been performed where
there were some obvious errors, outdatedness, and awkwardness -- after
all, Sanford was a chemist, not an editor.
The original report had 23 figures: 18 which used cartoon-like caricatures
and provided humorous emphasis of the points made in the text, and 5
which provided substantive examples of the points made in the text. The
five substantive figures have been redrafted and appear in this updated
and revised edition of the report.
The separation of the original and new information also means that
the core of the report reflects the views of society and the manner of
language of almost a half-century ago. In one of Sanford's examples,
he describes how to cut up a whale for market. Throughout the report,
only masculine pronouns are used. There are other examples as well. If
anyone finds Sanford's original report to be politically incorrect and
thus offensive, then there is an antidote: grow older by about -- oh,
let's say -- 50 years, then look back; many of the views that are politically
correct today will not necessarily be politically correct then.
For NEFSC researchers, this report should not be read alone, but also
in combination with the NEFSC's official position on such matters: "Manuscript/Abstract/Webpage
Preparation, Review, and Dissemination: NEFSC Author's Guide to Policy,
Process, and Procedure" (Gibson et al. 2003). The NEFSC author's
guide contains important information which complements and supplements
the information in this updated and revised edition of Sanford's 1957
report.
Finally, I take this opportunity to thank Laura Garner, an editor with
the NEFSC's Research Communications Branch in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.
In my 24 years before Laura joined the NEFSC, I handled a host of time-consuming
technical and administrative tasks associated with the NEFSC's scientific
publishing program. In the five years since, Laura has handled a number
of those tasks, freeing me to undertake several special projects such
as this updating and revising of Sanford's 1957 report. She also retyped
the original report in order to have it available in an electronic format.
JON A. GIBSON
WOODS HOLE, MASSACHUSETTS
JUNE 14, 2004
"Your paper is both good and original.
Unfortunately, the good part is not original,
and
the original part is not good."
Ben Johnson (1702-1784)
PREFACE
TO THE ORIGINAL EDITION
(Note: This manual is not a scientific research paper; hence
it does not follow the style of such papers,
particularly in the use of
personal pronouns.)
DEFINITION
For the purposes of this manual, a scientific research paper is considered
to be a report in which you: 1) state what specific problem (or set of
closely related specific problems) you were trying to solve; 2) explain
the significance of your problem (if you think that your intended audience
may need this explanation for a full understanding of your work); 3)
tell what method you used to solve the problem; 4) give the results you
obtained; and 5) list the conclusions or the recommendations you arrived
at after considering these results. [See Endnote
#1.]
IMPORTANCE OF PLANNING
Giving careful thought to the plan of your paper is important to you
in three ways: 1) your research will be aided; 2) your papers will be
less difficult to write; and 3) your papers will be easier to understand.
AID TO RESEARCH
Carefully considering the organization of your research paper will
aid you in planning the research itself and will catalyze your flow of
ideas on the research. Furthermore, it will help to insure that your
research will be carried out soundly and that your findings will be published.
AID TO WRITING
If your paper is written poorly, it may be subject to major revision
-- which means, in addition to spending time in writing the original
paper, you must spend significantly further time in revising it.
The time spent in the revision of your work can be longer than the
time spent in the original writing; and if your paper is reviewed by
several critics, the number of pages of criticism can be more than the
number of pages of writing in your original paper. You then wearily must
read, evaluate, and act upon all of this tiresome criticism. If your
paper has been criticized and revised greatly, you hardly will be able
to recognize the final publication as being your own, and it still may
not be good. After a few experiences of this kind, you are likely to
lose much of your enthusiasm for research.
Experience has shown that a principal cause of poor writing in scientific
papers is poor planning. Experience has also shown that the poorly planned
papers require the greatest amount of revision. Your errors in grammar,
for example, can be corrected with relatively little difficulty; whereas
those in planning often require you to rewrite your entire paper. A knowledge
of planning therefore will make your paper much easier to write.
AID TO COMPREHENSION
The number of research papers now being published is so large you are
faced with the bitter choice of trying to keep abreast with the advancements
in your field or of doing research of your own. Your fellow scientists
have the same problem. They therefore read your published research papers
in the same way you read theirs -- hastily. Thus, if one of your papers
is poorly written, it is not likely to be given sufficient attention
for full appreciation and comprehension of your work. To the extent then
to which you fail to write your papers clearly, the time spent on your
research is likely to have been ineffectual; and the funds spent, to
have been wasted.
The seriousness of this problem seems not generally to be realized;
at least there does not seem to be a general awareness that anything
much can be done about it. Somehow, the impression prevalent among laymen
that scientific papers are hard to comprehend is believed by scientists
themselves. Thus if you publish a paper that is unclear, no one censures
you particularly, since the majority of your fellow scientists apparently
themselves believe that scientific papers are inherently difficult to
understand. Can you visualize, however, what the effect on science would
be if all papers were clear and easy to read -- if all you had to do
was to read rapidly through a paper once and you would comprehend it
completely?
You can see that such an improvement in the clarity of scientific papers
would effect almost a revolution in scientific progress.
Can all scientific papers be written in this manner? Experience in
writing, in abstracting, and in editing has led me to believe that they
can be. Without underestimating the great importance of the other elements
of composition, I also have been led by this experience to believe that
poor planning is one of the basic causes of unclarity in scientific papers.
My purpose therefore in presenting this manual to you is to enliven your
interest in planning and to offer you some suggestions that have proved
helpful to others.
PLAN OF THE MANUAL
The plan of this manual is simple, for it might be considered as having
only two main parts. In the first of these, you are given general suggestions
on the planning of your paper; and in the second, some rather specific
suggestions related to the title, the abstract, the introduction, the
methods, the results and discussion, the conclusions, the summary, and
the literature cited or bibliography.
PRELIMINARY
CONSIDERATIONS
GIVE THOUGHT TO IMPORTANCE
The quality of your research paper will depend in no small part upon
your attitude toward the writing. If you are not convinced that the paper
is an important part of your research and that the time taken to make
the paper easily readable and clear is well spent, you obviously will
not give the writing of the paper the attention that it requires.
During your period of university training, you probably spent only
5 percent of your time in learning how to write and some 95 percent in
learning how to do research. [See Endnote #2.] You
therefore unconsciously may feel that the writing is only about one nineteenth
as important as is the research work itself.
Yet, depending upon the use to which your research findings are to
be put, the effectiveness of your research may depend entirely upon your
paper. If, for example, the users of your results will not be able to
query you directly, your entire research effort may be wasted if you
write any of the essential parts of the paper in an ambiguous manner
or if you leave any important questions unanswered. Furthermore, if the
paper is too hard to read, the potential users of the results of your
research may never find the time to decipher what you have written. [See Endnote
#3.] Therefore, if you are not content to pass your
time in a scientific squirrel cage and really want to have your work
count for something, take the care in planning and in writing that is
required to make your paper unambiguous, complete, and easy to read.
PLAN FROM INCEPTION
OF RESEARCH
Writing your paper can be made much easier if you will start to plan
it from the moment that your research is conceived. Think back to whatever
papers you already have published and you undoubtedly will remember some
that would have been far less difficult to write if you had carried out
the research in a better manner.
You cannot write a logical paper if the research itself was not logically
organized, for your paper can never be any better than the research it
reports. By keeping your paper in mind while you still are able to modify
the direction of the research, you can make whatever changes are necessary
to enable you not only to do your research in the best way but also to
report it in a logically developed paper.
Keeping your paper constantly in mind is particularly helpful to you
in the following five ways:
- You save yourself from doing useless work by deciding, before you
start the research, whether the finding will be publishable. Incidentally,
in starting your research and in carrying it through to completion,
keep in mind that you eventually will have to write an introduction
to your paper in which you must show, directly or indirectly, the need
for the data you have obtained. Unless you carefully have determined
prior to undertaking the work and while completing it that your problem
is one that definitely needed solving by your particular organization,
you will find that the introduction will be exceedingly difficult to
write.
- You prevent yourself from wandering aimlessly. In each of your research
papers, you should make a concrete and specific statement of the problems
you were trying to solve. Obviously, if your research had no clearly
defined objectives, you cannot state them in the paper. By keeping
your paper in mind, you recognize the need for defining the objectives
of your research as soon as is possible, and you thus avoid wandering.
- You protect yourself from being sidetracked. One of the pleasures
of research is that of making an unexpected discovery. After such a
finding, you naturally are tempted to learn more about it unless you
clearly realize that the data you obtain in this new investigation
will not fit into the paper on the original problem. The correct procedure
is to keep on with your original objectives and to set up the new discovery
as a project for later investigation.
Often the only immediately tangible result of your research is your
research paper. After you have spent a reasonable time on your investigation,
you therefore are expected to write a paper reporting your results.
If you have followed the will-o'-the-wisp of new discoveries and have
not held to your original problem, you may be hard pressed to find
enough data on a single subject. You then may decide to throw into
one paper all of the data you have obtained on your series of more-or-less
unrelated experiments. Since the subject matter of the resulting paper
has no obvious unity, you are now faced with the tortuous experience
of trying to supply verbally the unity that was not inherent in the
investigation. After a paper of this kind has gone through the mill
of criticism, you well may have spent as much time on the work of writing
and of revising as you did in carrying out the original research. All
of this effort then may terminate in nothing worthwhile accomplished
because often such papers finally are rejected for publication.
Thus, it is not sufficient to have clearly defined goals; you must
stick to them.
- You help to insure yourself against overlooking or neglecting some
factor on which data must be given when you publish. Ordinarily, if
you fail to make some of the required observations, you will not discover
this fact until you start to write your paper -- which may not be until
after your project has been terminated and the data are impossible
to obtain. On the other hand, by keeping your paper constantly in mind,
you are not apt to overlook anything that you will require when the
paper is being written.
- You help to insure yourself against carrying out the work in an unscientific
manner: that is, the more thought that is given to the research, the
more likely it is to be sound. Also, by keeping your paper in mind,
you are more likely to watch for those points on which you might be
criticized when you submit your paper for publication.
From the discussion of the preceding five points, it is clear that
by giving thought to your paper while you are planning and carrying out
the research work, not only will you write a better paper, but you also
will do a better job of research.
MAKE EARLY DECISION
AS TO WHO WILL WRITE
Since most research projects are cooperative ventures involving several
workers, there may be a problem as to who will write the paper; that
is, the senior author is not necessary the one who does the actual writing
of it. Hence, a decision should be made as to which one of the research
workers is to have the primary responsibility for writing the paper and
for seeing it through to publication. This decision should be made early
so that the paper can be kept in mind from the very start of the research.
(Other aspects of authorship have been discussed by Young and Crowell
(1956).)
ALLOW SUFFICIENT TIME
FOR WRITING AND PUBLISHING
A common error in scientific writing is the failure of research workers,
in planning their project, to allow sufficient time for writing and publishing
the paper. This process of writing and publishing is complex and time-consuming,
particularly if several workers are involved. As a result, estimates
of the time needed are almost invariably too short. The writing and related
tasks required in the publishing of the paper then must be sandwiched
in between other projects or must be done outside of working hours.
Any delay in the publication of the paper can add greatly to the other
complications. Other rush projects may take every moment of available
time, or key workers may become ill or transfer to other jobs. Thus your
paper may never be published if sufficient time is not assigned for the
work that will be required in the writing and publishing of it.
ALLOW SUFFICIENT TIME
FOR SEARCH OF LITERATURE
As has been pointed out by Piskur (1956), the scientific literature
represents a tremendous amount of man-years of work that is available
to research, development, and production. Thus, in a search of the literature,
you obtain "experimental results, history of experiences, and data at
a cost in effort and supplies comparable to as little as a p.p.m. or
even a millimicro of the
supplies and labors expended to produce this information." Obviously,
the failure to make a proper search of the literature is a colossal blunder.
Furthermore, when you write the
introduction to
your paper, you will look foolish if you have not searched the literature
well.
In many lines of research, the old idea of changing one variable at
a time is inefficient. You therefore should consider your statistical
requirements or possibly consult a statistician when planning your research.
At the termination of your project, however, you cannot expect the statistician
to wave his magic wand of mathematics over a hatful of unreliable data
and pull out a sound research rabbit for you. That is, statistics is
not a substitute for careful planning, sound experimental techniques,
and old-fashioned common sense.
TAILOR PAPER TO AUDIENCE
Write your paper in such a way that your intended audience will understand
it completely after rapidly reading it through once. [See Endnote
#4.]
To accomplish this, you will have to visualize your audience. In particular,
you will have to visualize the least informed individual who you wish
your paper to be read by, because you will have to write the paper at
a level he will understand. Otherwise, in effect, you will have eliminated
him from your audience and will have narrowed your readers accordingly.
The more specifically you can visualize this least informed individual,
the more successful you are likely to be in reaching the entire audience
you have in mind. By writing for a well characterized individual, you
will be able to determine better: 1) what he already knows, and 2) what
he needs to be told.
Remember that the better informed you assume this individual to be,
the narrower will be your circle of understanding readers. If you lose
sight of this fact, you unwittingly may exclude from this circle, by
your method of presentation, the very people you most would like to have
read and act upon your paper.
Unless you have a good reason for doing otherwise, I would suggest
that you visualize as your least informed reader, a recent graduate with
a bachelor of science or engineering degree in the field in which you
are writing. This practice will give you about the widest audience possible
without making your paper into a popular one or involving you in vast
amounts of explanation.
Whatever audience you choose, you should keep your presentation consistent,
for any shift in your point of view will alienate some of your readers.
If you start your discussion after introducing it on a more difficult
level, you will give your better informed readers the impression that
you are starting to talk down to them. By keeping one fairly well characterized
individual in mind while you are planning and writing your paper, you
are less likely to fall into these errors.
LIMIT SCOPE
Complexity of Ideas
To express an idea, you must use a certain minimum number of words.
Unless you use this required number, you are obviously doomed to failure. [See Endnote
#5.]
The number of words required depends upon two factors: 1) the complexity
of the idea, and 2) the background of knowledge of the least-informed
member of your audience. Owing to the limitation in space in the scientific
journals, you are restricted as to the type of subjects you can present
to certain audiences. If you do not keep this fact in mind, you may attempt
to present too complex an idea for the audience in the particular journal
in which you intend to publish. For this reason, you should carefully
consider whether the limitations in space in your contemplated journal
will preclude a successful presentation of the idea that you had in mind.
Number of Subjects
The more different subjects you present to your readers at one time,
the greater the difficulty they will have in understanding you, and the
harder you will find the paper to write. In planning your paper, make
certain you are dealing with only one problem or with only one set of
closely related problems. You are not justified in reporting two or more
separate research projects in the same paper -- even though you may have
studied all of them at the same time. Unity is just as important in scientific
papers as in any other type of publication. [See Endnote
#6.]
If you limit your paper to reporting only one problem or one set of
closely related problems, you may find that some of your papers are relatively
short. If you are not reporting upon a fragment of your research, do
not let this fact disturb you because there is nothing less "scientific" about
a short paper than about a long one. (This topic is treated by Young
and Crowell (1956).) The value of your paper lies not in its length but
in its contents.
CONSIDER THE TABLES [See Endnote
#7]
It does not appear generally to be realized that many subjects can
be presented better in tables than in words alone. Almost any subject
that is difficult to write because of its repetitive nature can be given
better in tabular form; that is, the use of tables is not limited necessarily
to the presentation of numerical data, as can be seen from Table 1. (Note:
This illustration shows you the value of using a table for repetitive
material. If you are skeptical, try presenting the contents of this table
in writing. Also, to conserve space, I have abridged the table, as I
have most of the others in this manual. The longer tables would have
illustrated the various points more impressively.) In fact, almost every
subject that can be presented in a table will take less writing time,
will require less space in a journal, and will be much easier for your
readers to comprehend if it is given in a table rather than in a written
discussion.
The names of the various parts of the formal table are shown in Table 2 (Jenkinson 1949). Table 3 gives a specific example corresponding to
Table 2. Compare these two tables. [See Endnote
#8.]
The following are suggestions on the preparation of tables:
- Present all of your tabular material in formal tables. There are
two reasons for this suggestion: a) the formal table, being able to
stand independently of the text, is the clearest of all tables; and
b) since the formal table does stand independently, the printer can
place it on the pages wherever it will fit best.
- Type each table on a separate sheet of paper. If you follow this
practice, you will not have to retype your table every time you revise
the text -- or vice versa. [See Endnote #9.]
- Give special thought to the title. Keep it short, if you can, but
make it adequate, and make it logical. The title preferably should
give the intent of the table rather than merely catalogue its contents,
which the reader readily can determine for himself by reading the various
headings. The title of Table 4, for example, might have been given
as: "Composition of press cake and of the corresponding meal produced
in different types of dryers." Such a title, however, would not show
exactly the relationships that the author had in mind. The title "Effect
of the type of dryer upon the vitamin content of the meal as compared
with that in the press cake" reveals more the intent of the author
because the information wanted was the following: a) is there a loss
of vitamins when the press cake is dried to meal?; and b) if the vitamins
are decomposed, which type of dryer contributes to the greater loss?
You can see that the title I suggested as a possibility does no more
than hint at these relationships and therefore is not nearly as good
as was the one chosen by the author.
- Try to place the units at the head of columns (Table 4), if at all
possible, rather than bury them in line captions (Table 5). (If your
head is nodding at this point, wake up because this suggestion is tremendously
important to you. Placing the units at the head of columns not only
greatly aids clarity but also makes your tables far easier to design.)
- Draw vertical guidelines between all columns. (Here is another simple
but highly important suggestion. Compare Table 6 with Table 7.)
- Draw the appropriate horizontal guidelines (Table 4 and Table 7.)
- If room permits, space each line of data (Table 8 and Table 9). To
learn whether horizontal guidelines and spacings between lines of data
in tables contribute to the clarity of the tables, I polled 53 readers
and asked them to compare Table 7 with Table 8, Table 8 with Table 9, and Table 9 with Table 10. The results of this poll, which are given
in Table 11 , indicate the following: a) most of the readers preferred
the use of horizontal guidelines; b) most of the readers preferred
relatively wide spacing between the lines of data; and c) when the
spacing between the lines of data was decreased, more of the readers
felt the need for horizontal guidelines than when the spacing was wider.
On the basis of this limited poll, I recommend that you take Table
4 and Table 8 as your standard format, without forgetting suggestion
No. 9 below.
- Make your tables stand independently of the text.
- Regardless of any of the preceding suggestions, follow the format
of the journal to which you intend to submit your paper.
- Test your table by asking someone who is not familiar with it to
explain it to you.
Your tables should be devised, of course, prior to the time that you
first start to gather your data. These data then can be entered in the
appropriate table as they are obtained. This practice will enable you
to follow the trend of your research more closely than if you wait until
you start to write your paper before devising your tables and entering
your data. By following this practice, you are not likely to miss taking
any of the essential observations.
CONSIDER THE GRAPHS [See Endnote
#10]
If the same information can be given in either a table or a graph,
the graphical presentation is likely to be comprehended more readily
by your readers. Tables, however, have certain advantages that should
not be overlooked. Exact values, for example, can be taken directly from
the table, whereas they are somewhat more difficult to determine from
a graph. If the policy of your journal permits, you therefore may wish
to present both the table and graph.
In constructing your graph, keep in mind that it probably will be photographically
reduced in size for publication. Therefore, make all of the lettering
and the figures large enough to be read easily in the published paper. [See Endnote
#11.] Do not forget to label your ordinate and abscissa
and to state the units, if any (Figure 1). [See Endnote
#12.]
The title of the graph should reflect your intent rather than merely
repeat the variables that can be read from your labeled ordinate and
abscissa. Figure 1, for example, might have been given the title: "Concentrations
of Potassium Nitrate Versus Temperature." This title lists the variables
but does not reveal much of the intent of the author. Note how much more
informative is the title: "Influence of Temperature on the Solubility
of Potassium Nitrate in Water." This second title supplies information
that otherwise might not be apparent to the reader.
The value of an informative title is illustrated further
by Figure 2. Could you have guessed the
intent of this table from a mere listing of the ordinate and the abscissa?
Follow, of course, the format of the journal in which you intend to
publish. You will save yourself much effort if you will check on the
format before you make the graphs.
CONSIDER THE PHOTOGRAPHS
AND OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS
Many subjects are impossible to present adequately by words alone,
and almost all others can be made clearer and more interesting if they
are illustrated. If your journal permits the use of illustrations, you
show a lack of perception if you do not make adequate use of them. [See Endnote
#13.]
Including illustrations in your paper often requires forethought. If
photographs are to be used, you may not be able to take them after your
project is completed. Try to schedule your photographs ahead of time
or at least to keep the need for them in mind while you are doing the
research.
MAKE OUTLINE
One of the really great labor-saving devices in the writing of scientific
papers is the use of an outline. Unfortunately, many beginning writers
in science are not convinced of this fact. The result is much unnecessary
work not only for the authors, but also for typists, critics, and editors.
It therefore follows that the least expensive way to write a scientific
paper is first to make an outline. The mere fact that you may have published
papers without an outline proves only that: 1) some of the published
scientific papers are vastly in need of improvement, and 2) many workers
who may be expert at research do not know how to plan and to write scientific
papers properly.
A word of warning: the use of an outline is not foolproof. The outline
simply enables you to organize your thoughts, but it does not guarantee
that you will do so. In short, the perfunctory use of an outline will
get you nowhere. Only by careful thinking can you be sure that your outline
will enable you to present your material to the best advantage.
Many writers have trouble getting started on their outline. If you
have this difficulty, you might try first to divide your subject into
its principal divisions:
I. |
_____________ |
II. |
_____________ |
III. |
_____________, etc. |
Next, divide each of these divisions into its principal subdivisions:
I. |
_____________ |
|
A. |
_____________ |
|
B. |
_____________ |
|
C. |
_____________, etc. |
II. |
_____________ |
|
A. |
_____________ |
|
B. |
_____________ |
|
C. |
_____________, etc. |
III. |
_____________ |
|
A. |
_____________ |
|
B. |
_____________ |
|
C. |
_____________, etc. |
Continue this approach until you have completed your outline down to
the paragraph level. If you follow this process, you will find that you
have made several short outlines, with each succeeding one increasing
in complexity. You thus will have to reconsider your paper in its entirety
several times, but this is a small price to pay for a logically organized
paper.
In practice, you probably will find that it will be easier to develop
an outline for certain divisions of the paper than for others. Once your
ideas start to flow readily on a given division, go ahead and finish
it without worrying about the other ones. The point is not how you make
the outline but that you make a good one.
While you are reflecting on how best to write the paper, you may think
of a good idea concerning some subsection of it before you have thought
the paper through completely. As has been pointed out by Prince (1955),
a practice that you may find useful is to write down your ideas on the
subject, taking care to use a separate sheet of paper every time your
thoughts take a new direction. When you come to writing your final article,
you then can shuffle these papers until the various subjects discussed
fit into your outline. As long as you do not write on more than one subject
to a single piece of paper, you will have no trouble in fitting these
subjects into whatever logical outline you finally devise.
In developing your outline, do not be satisfied too easily. Check it
and recheck it, and then discuss it with your colleagues. If you have
a supervisor, you should give it to him for a final check. Remember that
only if your outline is logical and complete, will your problem of writing
be relatively easy.
Often times you can think of several different ways to write the paper.
If so, make an outline to correspond to each of them before arriving
at your final decision as to which way to write the paper. Making the
additional outlines will be far less work for you than will be the work
of revising the paper if you decide later that your first way was
not the best. Furthermore, the additional time spent in considering the
various outlines will clarify and help to firm up your ideas and will
greatly facilitate the later process of getting them down on paper. [See Endnote
#14.]
USE HEADINGS
A monumental discovery in the history of writing was the invention
of headings, for they serve two very important functions: 1) they act
as sign posts pointing out to the reader changes in your direction of
thought; and 2) they serve as filing guides showing where certain information
is given in the paper.
By the aid of headings, the reader is able to follow -- without confusion
-- intricate changes in your line of thinking, since the headings serve
as sign posts to guide him. The headings also enable the reader to: 1)
skip large sections of the paper, if he is so inclined, and to read only
those parts in which he has a particular interest; or 2) go back to these
parts, time and time again if need be, for data and other information.
Important though headings are as filing guides, the use of them as
indicators of changes in your direction of thought is vastly the more
important function. The mind of the reader has a certain amount of inertia.
It therefore will continue to follow along the same line of thoughts,
unless you supply a force sufficient to start it to think in whatever
new direction you desire. Headings are forceful enough to enable you
to accomplish these shifts in the thinking of the reader.
Theoretically, you could omit headings by substituting transitional
sentences and paragraphs. But why weary your readers unnecessarily by
forcing them to read a paragraph for which a short heading will suffice?
This question is not meant to imply that transitional sentences and paragraphs
are not useful in scientific writing, for they are. Rather, it is intended
to impress you with the fact that headings help greatly to reduce reader
fatigue. Furthermore, a short heading often will arrest the attention
of the reader far better than will a tiresome transitional paragraph.
Your readers therefore are less likely to get lost in your discussion
if you employ an adequate number of headings. In fact, unless you do
make adequate use of headings, your readers will seldom be able to understand
your paper completely on one rapid reading of it.
The editor of your paper, recognizing the great importance of headings,
often will supply them for you if you have omitted them. As you already
may have discovered, the headings supplied by the editor are not always
worded logically nor are they always placed at logical divisions. The
explanation for this apparent mental aberration on the part of your editor
is simple. Not having the benefit of proper headings when he reads your
paper, he may misinterpret what you mean, particularly if you also have
failed otherwise to write the paper well; and without the aid of an outline,
he often can only guess at the direction your thinking has taken. Do
not depend therefore upon the editor to supply your paper with headings.
Ordinarily, you can devise them better than he can.
As already has been indicated, the use of headings makes the writing
of your paper easier, since often they spare you the need for composing
transitional sentences and paragraphs, which can be hard to write. Headings
are also an indirect aid to you, in that they help to insure that your
paper will be logically organized; that is, it usually is difficult to
find suitable headings for an illogically planned paper, and you yourself
will become convinced that your paper needs reorganization. Furthermore,
the use of headings makes your paper much easier to comprehend. Critics
and editors therefore are more likely to find errors if any are in it.
In this use, headings admittedly do not save you any work, but they may
help to save your reputation.
Relationship between
Outline and Headings
Your outline and the headings of your paper are closely related in
two ways: 1) the headings in your written paper reveal the various divisions
in your outline; and 2) if you employ care in the wording of the outline,
the wording of the headings can be taken directly from the outline. In
a paper by Brown, Venolia, Tappel, Olcott, and Stansby (Submitted), for
example, the outline of the paper was as follows:
OXIDATIVE DETERIORATION IN FISH
AND FISHERY PRODUCTS.
II. PROGRESS ON STUDIES CONCERNING MECHANISM
OF OXIDATION IN FISH
TISSUE
|
I. |
Introduction |
II. |
Hematin catalysis |
|
A. |
Hematin-compound content of fish |
|
B. |
Catalytic effect of hematin compounds |
|
C. |
Catalytic effect of proteins |
|
D. |
Hematin-compound changes during oxidation |
|
E. |
Rate of oxidation in fish flesh |
III. |
Role of antioxidants |
|
A. |
Naturally occurring antioxidants |
|
B. |
Commercial antioxidants |
IV. |
Oxidation of oil in fish meals |
|
A. |
Rate of oxidation in meals |
|
B. |
Effect of commercial antioxidants |
V. |
Summary |
The corresponding headings in the paper were:
OXIDATIVE DETERIORATION IN FISH AND FISHERY PRODUCTS.
II. PROGRESS ON STUDIES CONCERNING MECHANISM
OF OXIDATION
IN FISH TISSUE
|
INTRODUCTION |
HEMATIN CATALYSIS |
Hematin-compound content of fish |
Catalytic effect of hematin compounds |
Catalytic effect of proteins |
Hematin-compound changes during oxidation |
Rate of oxidation in fish flesh |
ROLE OF ANTIOXIDANTS |
Naturally occurring antioxidants |
Commercial antioxidants |
OXIDATION OF OIL IN FISH MEALS |
Rate of oxidation in meals |
Effect of commercial antioxidants |
SUMMARY |
You thus can see that the headings in the paper by Brown
and his coworkers were the same as those in their outline.
Types of Headings
Available
In the paper just cited, the degree of subdivision of the outline was
revealed by the types of headings used in the paper. There were, for
example, only two degrees of subdivision (Table 12). The first degree
of subdivision was shown by capitalizing all of the words in the heading
and by putting it in the center of the page:
HEMATIN CATALYSIS
The second degree of subdivision was shown by capitalizing only the
principal words in the heading, by putting it at the left-hand side of
the page, and by underlining it:
Hematin-Compound Content of Fish
With only two degrees of subdivision, you have no difficulty in devising
suitable types of headings -- even with the limited facilities of a typewriter
-- but you may require as many as six different types of headings with
an outline of the following degree of subdivision:
I. |
___________ |
|
A. |
___________ |
|
|
1. |
___________ |
|
|
|
a. |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
(1) |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
|
(a) |
___________ |
After you have given this problem some thought, you may wish to adopt
the system of headings widely used by those writing in publications of
the federal government. [See Endnote
#15.] In this system,
for convenience of reference, each type of heading is given a number
as follows:
THIS IS AN EXAMPLE OF A TYPE-ONE
HEADING |
This
Is an Example of a Type-Two Heading |
This is an example of a type-three
heading |
This Is an Example of a Type-Four Heading |
This
is an example of a type-five heading. -- The type-five heading
is indented and made part of a paragraph as shown here. |
1. This
is an example of a type-six heading: The type-six heading is similar
to the type-five heading in that it is indented and made a part of
the paragraph, but it differs in: a) being numbered, b) not being
underlined, and c) having a colon rather than a period and a dash
following the last word. |
Perhaps you have not thought of the title of the paper as requiring
a separate type of heading. Nevertheless it does, and this type has been
designated by the number zero, as follows:
THIS IS AN EXAMPLE
OF A TYPE-ZERO HEADING:
TYPE-ZERO HEADINGS ARE
USED ONLY
IN THE TITLE OF THE PAPER
In the paper by Brown and co-workers, the title was a type-zero heading,
the principal subdivisions of the paper were type-one headings, and the
other subdivisions were type-four headings. (The reason why the last
was not a type-two heading, as would seem more logical, is discussed
in a later section of the manual.)
Capitalization of
Type-Two and Type-Four Headings
In the type-two and type-four headings, the articles a, an,
and the; the prepositions at, by, for, in, of, on, to,
and up; the conjunctions and, but, if, or,
and nor; and the second element of a compound numeral are not
capitalized as is shown by the following examples, which are taken from
the United States Government Printing Office Style Manual (Anonymous
1953).
Built-up Stockpiles Are Necessary
Men Hit with 2-Inch Pipe
No-Par-Value Stock for Sale
Price-Cutting War
Yankees May Be Winners
No Ex-Senator Admitted
Notice of Filing and Order on Exemption from Requirements
but
Building on Twenty-first Street (if spelled)
One Hundred and Twenty-three Years (if spelled)
Only One-tenth of Shipping Was Idle
Many 35-mm. Films in Production
Recommended Headings
If you will compare the preceding seven types of headings (types 0,
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6), one with another, you will see that unfortunately
many of them are very similar in appearance, and that for that reason,
your readers may have difficulty in distinguishing one type from another
one. Remember that the only way your readers can keep your outline readily
in mind is by the type of heading you use. Thus if he fails to distinguish
one type from another, he will become confused (Figure 3).
The ideal arrangement would be to use only those types of headings
that are as dissimilar in appearance as is possible. If, however, your
outline is as complex as the one illustrated in Figure 3, you would have
no choice as to the types you could use because you would require a type-zero
heading for the title to your paper and you would need to use all of
the remaining six types to distinguish between your various subdivisions.
Fortunately, it so happens that most scientific research papers do not
require such a high degree of subdivision. You therefore ordinarily have
a choice among the types of headings you can use.
The problem now becomes, which types are the most dissimilar and how
should they be chosen? The following method of choosing the best types
of headings to use has been tested and has been found to work well. In
this method, you first classify your paper into one of six categories,
which are determined by the complexity of the outline of your paper as
follows:
Outline of category-A papers (one subheading):
I. |
___________ |
II. |
___________ |
III. |
Etc. |
Outline of category-B papers (two subheadings):
I. |
___________ |
|
A. |
___________ |
|
B. |
___________ |
|
C. |
Etc. |
Outline of category-C papers (three subheadings):
I. |
___________ |
|
A. |
___________ |
|
|
1. |
___________ |
|
|
2. |
___________ |
|
|
3. |
Etc. |
Outline of category-D papers (four subheadings):
I. |
___________ |
|
A. |
___________ |
|
|
1. |
___________ |
|
|
|
a. |
___________ |
|
|
|
b. |
___________ |
|
|
|
c. |
Etc. |
Outline of category-E papers (five subheadings):
I. |
___________ |
|
A. |
___________ |
|
|
1. |
___________ |
|
|
|
a. |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
(1) |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
(2) |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
(3) |
Etc. |
Outline of category-F papers (six subheadings):
II. |
___________ |
|
A. |
___________ |
|
|
1. |
___________ |
|
|
|
a. |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
(1) |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
|
(a) |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
|
(b) |
___________ |
|
|
|
|
|
(c) |
Etc. |
After deciding which category your paper falls into, you then choose
the proper headings as follows:
Headings for category-A papers (those with one subheading):
I. |
Type-1 heading |
II. |
Type-1 heading |
III. |
Etc. |
Headings for category-B papers (those with two subheadings):
I. |
Type-1 heading |
|
A. |
Type-4 heading |
|
B. |
Type-4 heading |
|
C. |
Etc. |
Headings for category-C papers (those with three subheadings):
I. |
Type-1 heading |
|
A. |
Type-4 heading |
|
|
1. |
Type-5 heading |
|
|
2. |
Type-5 heading |
|
|
3. |
Etc. |
Headings for category-D papers (those with four subheadings):
I. |
Type-1 heading |
|
A. |
Type-2 heading |
|
|
1. |
Type-4 heading |
|
|
|
a. |
Type-5 heading |
|
|
|
b. |
Type-5 heading |
|
|
|
c. |
Etc. |
Headings for category-E papers (those with five subheadings):
I. |
Type-1 heading |
|
A. |
Type-2 heading |
|
|
1. |
Type-3 heading |
|
|
|
a. |
Type-4 heading |
|
|
|
|
(1) |
Type-5
heading |
|
|
|
|
(2) |
Type-5 heading |
|
|
|
|
(3) |
Etc. |
Headings for category-F papers (those with six subheadings):
I. |
Type-1 heading |
|
A. |
Type-2 heading |
|
|
1. |
Type-3 heading |
|
|
|
a. |
Type-4
heading |
|
|
|
|
(1) |
Type-5 heading |
|
|
|
|
|
(a) |
Type-6 heading |
|
|
|
|
|
(b) |
Type-6 headin
g |
|
|
|
|
|
(c) |
Etc. |
You will note from the foregoing that the type-three and type-six headings,
being the least distinctive ones, are used only in those papers that
require so many different types that all the others need also be used.
If you examine the scientific literature, you will find that most papers
fall into categories B, C, or D.
The paper by Brown and co-workers, for example, falls into category
B, and this is the reason why the type-four heading was used in that
paper instead of the type-two heading, as might have seemed logical.
(The present manual falls into category C.)
Use of Headings with
Individual Paragraphs
Ordinarily, you will not set off each individual paragraph by a heading.
The factor determining whether you should use a heading for an individual
paragraph depends upon how abruptly you shift your line of thought. Remember
that one of the principal purposes of headings is to indicate to your
readers that your direction of thought has changed. Therefore where the
subject matter of your paper varies markedly from one paragraph to another,
do not hesitate to use headings to signal this fact to your readers.
In this manual, for example, you will find numerous places, in addition
to the present paragraph, where I have set off individual paragraphs
by headings.
Logical Use of Headings
One error often made by scientific authors is to use headings illogically.
Suppose that the following is the outline of a paper:
I. |
_________ |
|
A. |
_________ |
|
B. |
_________ |
II. |
_________ |
This is a category-B paper, and the correct headings therefore are:
I. |
Type-1 |
|
A. |
Type-4 |
|
B. |
Type-4 |
II. |
Type-1 |
Quite often, however, an author chooses the correct types of headings,
but mixes them up illogically as follows:
I. |
Type-1 |
|
A. |
Type-4 |
|
B. |
Type-1 |
II. |
Type-4 |
If you will make an outline and follow it, you easily can avoid this
kind of error.
As has been pointed out earlier, you also will find that if in devising
your outline you use care in the wording of it, you can take the titles
for the headings directly from the outline. This practice has the great
advantage of helping to insure that your headings will be logical and
parallel in form.
Importance of Headings
Of all the devices that you can use to make your paper easy to read
and to comprehend, headings must be ranked among the most important.
Unless you make adequate use of them, you never can achieve your maximum
potential as a writer of clear scientific papers. In concluding this
section, I therefore strongly urge that you always give careful thought
to the headings when you write your future papers.
GIVE THOUGHT TO THE
PARAGRAPHING
The use of paragraphs has much the same function as the use of headings;
that is, the paragraph alerts the reader to the fact that you have finished
discussing one topic and now are ready to discuss another. There also
is a further parallel between headings and paragraphs in that the heading
signals to the reader that the group of paragraphs being considered is
related, and the paragraph signals that the group of sentences is related.
In the same way also that you should not have long sections in your
paper without organizing them into shorter subsections, you should not
have long paragraphs without trying to break them into shorter groupings;
that is, long paragraphs, like long sections, are mentally tiring for
the reader. If it is at all logically possible, the long paragraphs therefore
should be broken into shorter ones. View with suspicion any paragraph
that is longer than a typewritten page because it usually can be separated
logically into smaller divisions.
Pay particular attention to the opening paragraph. A long opening one
looks formidable, promises much dull reading, and tends to repel prospective
readers.
It is very important that your paragraphs be logical units of thought.
An example of a type of paragraphing that gives scientific authors much
difficulty in this respect is the following:
The
analysis was carried out in two steps.
In
the first step, so and so, and so and so, and so and so was done…
In
the second step, such and such, such and such, and such and such
was done…
As you can see, this is logical paragraphing, and it is clear. You
know how many steps there are, and you know where the description of
each one starts. You may feel, however, that you are breaking some rule
of composition by using a one-sentence paragraph such as:
The
analysis was carried out in two steps.
There is no objecting to the use of the one-sentence paragraph -- if
such use aids reader comprehension. Naturally it should not be overdone
because it would defeat its purpose of arresting the attention of the
reader. If all of the above paragraphs are short, for example, all three
should be combined into one paragraph:
The
analysis was carried out in two steps. In the first step, so and so,
and so and so, and so and so was done… In the second step, such and
such, such and such, and such and such was done…
The introductory sentence, in this example, belongs just as much to
the second step as it does to the first one. I grant that combining the
introductory sentence with the paragraph explaining the first step is
only slightly illogical, but this practice is far more serious than you
might think because in scientific writing, you need be only slightly
confusing to cause your readers much mental fatigue.
You complicate matters further if you forget about parallel construction
and start your description of the second step with different wording
from that used with the first step:
The
analysis was carried out in two steps. In the first step, so and
so, so and so, and so and so was done…
The
second step consisted in such and such, such and such, and such and
such…
Your attention has been focused on these slight changes, and you know
what they are, but you will be surprised at how fast you can lose an
inattentive reader by this confused method of breaking up your paragraphs
and of presenting your thoughts. This confusion will be greatly compounded
if you use several paragraphs to describe the first step and several
to describe the second.
Let me hasten to add that these faults are minor in comparison to leaving
out the introductory statement:
In
the first step, so and so, so and so, and so and so was done…
The
second step consisted in doing such and such, such and such, and
such and such…
Now visualize the confusion if you also neglect to mention that you
are describing the first step:
So
and so, so and so, and so and so was done…
The
second step consisted in doing such and such, such and such, and
such and such…
If your reader has been half asleep, the statement about the second
step may wake him up, and he will go back to discover what your first
step was. If your discussion is short, he may have no difficulty in finding
the first step, but if your discussion is long, he may waste much time
before he discovers where in your paper your discussion of the first
step begins.
The last example is not the worst. You also might omit mentioning that
you are describing the second step:
So
and so, so and so, and so and so was done…
Such
and such, such and such, and such and such…
In addition, you might run the paragraphs together:
So
and so, so and so, and so and so was done…Such and such, such and
such, and such and such was done…
Do all these things, and you leave your readers with a nice little
puzzle to solve -- if they ever get around to it.
THE
TITLE
In searching the literature, have you ever been misled by the titles
of certain papers into believing these papers would furnish you with
the information you needed? On the other hand, because of poorly worded
titles, have you ever rejected certain other papers only to discover
later, through different sources, that these particular ones really were
important? If so, you already are aware of the need for carefully wording
your title.
TOO GENERAL
One of the pitfalls to avoid in wording the title is to make it too
general. Although such a title may inform the reader that your paper
treats subjects in his field of interest, it will not tell him whether
your paper contains the particular information he needs. After a worker
fruitlessly has looked up a large number of papers because of titles
that are overly general, he tends to become highly critical and to reject
all those general titles. Unless your title is specific, your paper may
be among those eliminated -- possibly incorrectly.
INCOMPLETE OR MISLEADING
Another common error in titles is that of incompleteness. Thus, your
paper may treat certain subjects, but your title may give no clue to
this fact. Still another difficulty is that your title may be misleading
in that it indicates your paper is about one subject, whereas it actually
is about another.
SHORT VERSUS SPECIFIC
TITLES
In planning and writing your paper, you may fall into errors such as
making your title too general, incomplete, or misleading, owing to your
desire to keep the title from becoming overly long. Now, although it
is important to have a short title, it is even more important to have
one that correctly reveals the main contents of your paper.
You have only to go through the tiresome act, however, of writing out
the titles to half a dozen papers to discover the great virtue of brevity.
It therefore is unfortunate that brevity and specificity usually are
not compatible. With many of your papers, the title will be a compromise
between what you think should be mentioned and what space you think can
be spared for it. The following examples illustrate how the length of
the title increases as the title becomes more specific:
Measurements
Fish Measurements
Determining Fish Measurements
Accurately Determining Fish Measurements
Device for Accurately Determining Fish Measurements
Photographic Device for Accurately Determining Fish Measurements
Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining Fish Measurements
Fully Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining Measurements
of King Salmon
Fully Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining Measurements
of King Salmon (Oncorhynchus tsawystcha)
Fully Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining Measurements
of Live King Salmon (Oncorhynchus tsawystcha)
Fully Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining, Aboard
Ship, Axial Measurements of Live King Salmon (Oncorhynchus tsawystcha)
Fully Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining, Aboard
Ship at Near-Freezing Temperatures, Axial Measurements of Live King Salmon
(Oncorhynchus tsawystcha)
Fully Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining, Aboard
Ship at Near-Freezing Temperatures Under All Conditions of Lighting,
Axial Measurements of Live King Salmon (Oncorhynchus tsawystcha)
To arrive at the proper balance between specificity and brevity, you
will have to give much thought to the subject. A good plan is to assign
a temporary title when you first start to consider your paper and then
to improve upon the title as time goes by. The first one you think of
usually is not the best.
IMPRACTICAL SOUNDING
Another unfortunate aspect of scientific titles is that some of them
sound impractical. In fact, often the better and more specific the title
-- from the scientific point of view -- the less sensible it may sound,
especially to the layman who might not be sufficiently acquainted with
your project to see the need for it. Take for example, the title: "Fully
Automatic Photographic Device for Accurately Determining, Aboard Ship
at Near-Freezing Temperatures Under All Conditions of Lighting, Axial
Measurements of Live King Salmon (Oncorhynchus tsawystcha)." You
can see that this title sounds pedantic. To make it actually ridiculous,
all you now need to add is something like: "Caught at the Mouth of Hunter
Creek" or "Caught at the Mouth of Hunter Creek by Frogmen."
You should keep this aspect of titles in mind because often it is a
layman who must approve of the bill for your investigation, and you cannot
expect him to be enthusiastic about a project that does not seem to be
of value. If your title is unavoidably pedantic sounding, make sure that
you show the significance of your work when you write the introduction
to your paper.
THE
ABSTRACT
Your abstract has two principal functions: 1) to supplement your title,
and 2) to give the reader an overall view of your paper.
In the function of supplementing the title, the abstract supplies further
information on what the paper is about. As we have seen, owing to the
need for brevity, the title does not always reveal completely the contents
of your paper. The abstract, not being quite so limited in length, makes
up for this deficiency. Thus a principal function of it is to supplement
the title and thereby help the reader to decide whether your paper will
be of sufficient value to him to warrant his time spent in reading it.
One of the main requirements of the abstract is that it be short and
to the point. If it is wordy, the prospective reader may reject both
your abstract and your paper.
In the function of giving the reader an overall view of the paper,
the abstract helps him to keep from getting lost in the maze of details
most scientific papers contain. After having read the abstract, he can
see better where these details fit into the overall picture. For this
reason, the small amount of space taken by your abstract more than pays
for itself in aiding your readers to a quick comprehension of your paper.
A well-known technique in writing and in public speaking is the following:
1) tell your readers what you are going to tell them, 2) tell them, 3)
tell them what you told them.
In the writing of scientific papers, the abstract is step 1 of this
technique, the body of the paper is step 2, and the summary is step 3.
The use of this technique helps to insure that your readers will understand
your paper completely the first time they read it.
A problem arises if
you have both an abstract and a summary in that you may repeat in the
summary what you said in the abstract. You can
solve this problem by making the abstract qualitative (descriptive) and
the summary, where you are less restricted as to wordage, quantitative.
(An example of how to do this is given later in the manual under the
heading "Summary.") If you omit the summary, you should make the abstract
as quantitative as your limitations of space will allow. [See Endnote #16.]
Omitting the summary, however, gives your readers a feeling of incompleteness
and an impression that you have left your paper to dangle. If you think
that you must omit either the abstract or the summary, your paper will
be stronger if you retain the summary instead of the abstract.
I strongly recommend that you retain both.
THE
PRINCIPAL DIVISIONS
The principal divisions of the scientific paper that have become more-or-less
traditional are: 1) introduction, 2) methods, 3) results and discussion,
and 4) conclusions. These divisions have resulted from the desire of
the readers to obtain answers to the following five questions: 1) what
were you, the author, trying to accomplish?; 2) why were you trying to
do this?; 3) how did you carry out the work?; 4) what did you find out?;
and 5) what did you conclude from your findings? Questions 1 and 2 are
answered in the introduction; question 3 is answered in the methods;
question 4, in the results and discussion, and question 5, in the conclusions. [Also,
see the embedded table in Endnote #2.]
The subsections of this manual immediately following will discuss these
principal divisions.
THE INTRODUCTION
As was just stated, the primary function of the introduction is to
answer two questions: 1) what were you trying to do?, and 2) why were
you trying to do it?
Your failure to answer adequately these questions may very greatly
reduce the effectiveness of your research. If you fail to answer the
first of them, you force your readers to turn detective in that they
must infer your objectives from the data and from the discussion in the
latter part of your paper. The odds are that they will be unsuccessful,
and as a result, badly confused. The omission, therefore, of a specific
statement of objectives in the introduction is one of the most serious
errors in scientific writing, and in my opinion, is the principal cause
of unclearness in many scientific papers. If you fail to answer the second
question, your paper may join the myriad of others that have lain long
in disuse because their authors did not make clear the significance and
usefulness of their findings. A thought you might keep in mind in this
regard is that numerous examples exist of worthwhile research projects
that have been terminated because those who have had to pay the bills
for the research were not shown it was worth the cost.In answering these two questions, you may find it helpful to consider
the general nature of research, which is illustrated in Figure 4 and Figure 5. These figures are intended to show two points:
- Your paper ordinarily reports on the solution to some closely related
set of problems of relatively very narrow scope, which for convenience,
can be grouped together and called the specific problem.
- Your specific
problem is never an isolated one, for your findings always contribute
to the solution to some problem of greater scope, which
can be called the broad problem. The solution to the broad problem,
in turn, contributes to the solution to a problem of even greater scope,
which can be called the general problem. This process can be continued
to the widest field of knowledge. It however seldom is profitable to
consider relationships beyond the general problem -- or one of a scope
that is even wider, since there are not many limitations to the extent
of the inquiries of science and since few problems ever are solved
completely.
The subjects treated in scientific papers are so widely different that
no one outline will suffice for all introductions. The following is offered,
however, as being suggestive of the general approach:
I. |
Introduction |
|
A. |
Orientation
of your readers to your specific problem |
|
|
1. |
Transitional
sentence or paragraph to relate the title of your paper to your
general problem. |
|
|
2. |
General problem |
|
|
|
a. |
What it is |
|
|
|
b. |
Why it needs solution |
|
|
|
c. |
What has been
done on it |
|
|
3. |
Broad problem |
|
|
|
a. |
What it is |
|
|
|
b. |
Why it needs solution |
|
|
|
c. |
What has been
done about it |
|
|
4. |
Specific problem |
|
|
|
a. |
What it is |
|
|
|
b. |
Why it needs solution |
|
B. |
Statement of objectives of specific problem |
|
|
1. |
Objective of subproblem 1 |
|
|
2. |
Objective of subproblem 2 |
|
|
3. |
Etc. |
Orienting Your Readers
to Your Specific Problem
We now see from the outline that orienting your readers to your specific
problem (answering question 2 given in the first paragraph
of this section, "The
Introduction") may be somewhat involved -- depending upon their background
of knowledge. With a poorly informed audience, you may have to tell them
something of the general problem -- what it is, why it needs solution,
and what has been done about it -- and then go on to discuss the broad
and the specific problems. With a better informed audience, no mention
need be made of the general problem. Only with the most specialized audiences,
however, can you omit mention of the broad problem -- and even then you
are taking a chance that some of your readers may not see the significance
of your work. In planning and writing your paper, keep in mind that you
cannot possibly visualize all the many uses for your findings. You therefore
should be careful not to restrict the size of your audience unnecessarily
by your failure properly to orient your readers to your specific problem.
Your title should reveal your specific problem. If therefore you start
your paper directly with a discussion of your general problem, your readers
may get the impression that you have already strayed from your subject.
The opening transitional sentence or paragraph is to assure them that
your discussion of the general problem is pertinent to the subject indicated
in your title. Take, for example, the paper entitled: "Photographic Device
for Accurately Determining Fish Measurements" (Long and Arzylowicz, In
preparation). The opening paragraph begins as follows: "The photographic
measuring device described in this paper was developed to aid the work
of the International North Pacific Fisheries Commission. As a result
of a treaty between Canada, Japan, and the United States, this Commission
was formed…" You can see that if the paper had not included the opening
transitional sentence, the readers would have wondered what the statements
about the Commission had to do with a photographic device.
Some papers do not require this transitional statement, whereas others,
such as the one just cited, definitely do. You therefore always should
give thought to whether a transitional statement will be helpful to your
paper.
You may feel that you can eliminate any need for this transitional
statement by starting with the specific problem and then discussing the
broad and general problems, in that order. This technique leaves your
readers thinking about your general problem. You then will need a transitional
statement to bring them back to the problem at hand. Ordinarily, you
will find the better technique is to start with the general problem and
end up with the specific problem rather than the reverse.
In telling what has been done on the broad and general problems, you
will be citing the literature. Keep in mind that often a citation of
only one or two papers that have good bibliographies will give references
to all the important papers that have been written in your particular
field. Because of this fact, you may wish to call special attention to
these papers in your citation.
Another point you should keep in mind is that your readers should always
be able to distinguish between your work and that of others. Owing to
the custom in scientific writing of omitting personal pronouns, the readers
often are left in doubt as to whether the author or someone else did
the work being cited. This is not to suggest that you start to use personal
pronouns but simply that you make clear, in your discussion, what you
and your coworkers did and what the other authors did.
You will note in the outline immediately preceding
this subsection, "Orienting
Your Readers to Your Specific Problem," that under 4, "Specific problem," no
mention is made of what has been done on it. The reason for this omission
is that ordinarily, unless you simply are repeating the work of others,
you will be the only one who ever has studied your specific problem.
Thus there will be no work to report other than your own. The reporting
of the work that you have done on the specific problem is what forms
the body of your paper.
You can see from the outline that most of the introduction is devoted
to orienting your readers to your specific problem. In summary, the basic
technique for doing this is first to point out the importance of your
general problem and then to show that: 1) your broad problem is necessary
to the solution of the general problem; and 2) your specific problem,
in turn, is necessary to the solution of the broad problem. How detailed
you make these explanations will depend upon the background of information
of your intended audience.
Stating the Objectives
of Your Specific Problem
As is indicated in Figure 4, your specific problem ordinarily is composed
of a number of closely related subproblems. The objectives of your specific
problem are to solve these subproblems. In stating your specific problem,
you should list these objectives by number and state them explicitly
so that your readers will know exactly what you were trying to do. Let
me strongly emphasize that from the standpoint of clarity, numbering
your objectives and stating them explicitly are two of the most important
things you can do in planning and writing your paper.
The more objectives you have, the more important it becomes that you
state them explicitly. If you have only one objective, a careful reader
may be able to infer what it is even if you do not state it. If, however,
you have several objectives and do not state them, you can see that it
will be almost impossible not to confuse your readers. Why chance puzzling
them when the simple technique of listing your objectives will make your
paper so much easier to understand?
If you have done an adequate job of showing the need for your research,
you ordinarily can include the word "therefore" in your statement of
objectives, as in the following example:
The objectives of the research reported in this paper therefore were
as follows:
1. ________
2. ________
3. ________
You will find that usually the listing of your objectives will determine
the logical structure of the rest of the paper. This fact seems not to
be well known, for many authors use only the following outline 1 for
all of their papers:
OUTLINE 1 |
I. |
Introduction |
II. |
Methods |
III. |
Results and discussion |
IV. |
Conclusions |
The following outline 2, however, generally will be more appropriate.
OUTLINE
2 |
I. |
Introduction |
|
A. |
Orientation of readers to specific problem |
|
B. |
Statement of objectives of specific problem |
|
|
1. |
Objective of subproblem 1 |
|
|
2. |
Objective of subproblem 2 |
|
|
3. |
Etc. |
II. |
Subproblem
1 |
|
A. |
Introduction |
|
B. |
Methods |
|
C. |
Results and discussion |
|
D. |
Conclusions |
III. |
Subproblem
2 |
|
A. |
Introduction |
|
B. |
Methods |
|
C. |
Results and discussion |
|
D. |
Conclusions |
IV. |
Subproblem
3, etc. |
V. |
Overall discussion |
VI. |
Overall conclusions |
From an examination of outline 2, you can see that outline 1 normally
will be suitable only if your specific problem has but one objective.
You thus can see one reason why so many scientific papers are hard to
understand: the authors of them use only one outline, regardless of how
unsuitable it may be.
Let me state that outline 2 is not the ultimate for all papers. It
is presented simply to stimulate your thinking. Each of your papers should
be considered individually, and you should develop whatever logical outline
will enable you to present your paper to best advantage. My point in
this discussion is not to recommend that you use any one particular outline.
Rather it is to impress you with two facts: 1) the statement of the objective
of your specific problem ordinarily determines the structure of your
paper, and 2) neglecting to state your objectives usually will make your
paper hard to organize and even harder to understand.
You probably have noticed that in discussing the subproblems of your
specific problem, I always have been careful to point out that they must
be closely related. If this relationship is not close, you will have
two or more papers instead of one, as otherwise unity will be violated.
With each of your papers, you therefore should determine whether your
specific subproblems are closely enough related to justify reporting
of them in one paper.
An Example of an Introduction
To see how these suggestions work in practice, let us consider a paper
by Thurston (Submitted). The following is a slightly altered and abridged
version of the introduction to it:
DYE-BINDING
CHARACTERISTICS OF FISH-MEAL PROTEIN,
PART I --SOME PRELIMINARY
FINDINGS AS TO SUITABLE DYES
By Claude Thurston
INTRODUCTION |
Statement of general problem and why it needs solution |
Owing to the time required in animal tests for determining the
quality of proteins in foods, chemists long have been interested
in developing quicker methods. One promising approach has been to
correlate the quality of the protein with its dye-binding properties.
Such a method has many practical advantages because of the simplicity
with which the concentration of dyes can be measure by spectrophotometric
techniques. |
What has been done on general problem |
Several of the investigations reported in the scientific literature
indicate that the quality of a vegetable protein can be determined
by its dye-binding characteristics. Chapman, Greenberg, and Schmidt
(1927) showed by reactions of several acid dyes with various protein
solutions, that the amount of dye bound was proportional to the number
of basic groups in the protein. Fraenkel-Conrat and Cooper (1944)
found that dyes could be used to determine the number of acidic and
basic groups present. Udy (1954) -- working with vegetable proteins,
chiefly wheat -- found that the quality of the protein could be determined
from its dye-binding characteristics. |
Statement of broad problem and why it needs solution
Statement
of specific problem and why it needs solution |
If a similar relationship
exists between dyes and the proteins in fish meal, the nutritive
value of these proteins might be determined
by a chemical index, in hours, rather than in 1-3 wk as is now required
when a feeding test is used.
An investigation of the
dye-binding characteristics of the protein in fish meal accordingly
has been started at the Seattle Technological Laboratory in order
to learn if there is any correlation between the nutritive value
of the meal, as determined by chick-feeding tests, and the extent
of binding of the dye. Since no previous research has been reported
on the use of dyes with fish meals, one of the preliminary steps
necessary in undertaking this investigation was to determine what
dyes are suitable and how they best can be employed. |
Statement of objectives of specific problem |
The specific objectives of the study reported in the present paper
therefore were to determine: 1) what dyes will bind the proteins
of fish meal, and 2) what are the optimum conditions in the use of
these dyes. |
If you analyze this introduction, you see that the general, broad,
and specific problems are as follows:
General problem: |
To determine the quality of proteins by the use of dyes. |
Broad problem: |
To determine the quality of proteins in fish meals by the use of
dyes. |
Specific problem: |
To determine what dyes will be bound by the proteins in fish meals
and what are the optimum conditions in the use of these dyes. |
Note that: 1) the first part of the title, "Dye-Binding Characteristics
of Fish-Meal Protein," points to the broad problem, since this part of
the title refers to the series of papers that yet are to be written;
and 2) the second part, "Some Preliminary Findings as to Suitable Dyes," points
to the specific problem, since it is the part of the title referring
to Dr. Thurston's paper itself. Note also there is no transitional statement
to relate the title of the paper to the general problem, since the discussion
of the general problem seems to be related closely enough to the title.
The opening paragraph of Dr. Thurston's paper gives an indirect statement
of the general problem and tells why it needs solution. The second paragraph
tells what has been done on the general problem. The opening part of
the third paragraph gives an indirect statement of the broad problem
and tells why it needs solution. No other information is given on the
broad problem because no work has been reported on it in the literature.
The last part of the third paragraph states the specific problem and
tells why it needs solution. Since the statement of the specific objectives
is so very important, it is set apart in the fourth paragraph, for emphasis,
and the specific objectives are listed by number.
As was pointed out earlier, the statement of the specific objectives
of the research determines the structure of the paper. Dr. Thurston's
paper, for example, falls into two main divisions: 1) the determination
of suitable dyes, and 2) the determination of optimum conditions in the
use of them.
You thus can see the tremendous importance of clearly stating your
specific problem. If, however, you have not thought your research through,
and do not have a clear idea of what your specific problem is, you hardly
can state it when you come to reporting your data. This is one of the
principal reasons why you were advised earlier in the manual to give
very careful thought to the planning of your research and to the writing
of your paper at the time you start your research project.
THE METHODS [See Endnote
#17]
Statement of Strategy
and Motives
If you study the scientific literature, you find that many customs
have developed that do not contribute to the clarity of the writing.
It is the custom, for example, to give a step-by-step statement of the
methods without telling the readers where these steps are leading or
why this particular approach to solving the problem was used. The readers
are then forced to infer what the methods are supposed to accomplish
and why they were the best available ones.
In presenting your methods, you therefore should give thought to whether
they need an introductory statement as to their overall scope. Ordinarily,
you will find that only a short paragraph or two will be all that is
needed to make a vast difference of the ease of comprehension of your
work by your readers. Incidentally, the more difficulty you have in composing
this paragraph, the greater will be the need for it.
This short introductory statement will be helpful particularly to those
of your readers who want to find out what you did in a general way but
who do no have the time to read the details or who actually lack the
ability to synthesize them into a meaningful picture. These readers deserve
more consideration than most scientific papers give them. You might keep
in mind that this group often includes abstracters and that the niche
in scientific history your paper will occupy actually may depend on how
well some abstracter understands it. You will not be exhibiting wisdom
if you lose him and your other readers in a maze of details.
Description by Reference
to Authors
If your methods already have been published, you should not describe
them in detail in your own paper. You, however, should include a brief
general statement of them for the benefit of those of your readers who
are not familiar with the methods and who may not have the time to look
up the reference to them. A key word that often aids the general description
of the methods, in this case, is the word "essentially."
Description of Methods
Involving a Number of Consecutive Steps
A problem frequently encountered is how to describe methods involving
a number of consecutive steps. In such a description, you have two difficulties:
1) the structure of your sentences becomes monotonously the same as does
also your choice of words; and 2) your readers find it difficult to follow
you, especially if you intersperse explanations with directives, as often
you should.
This problem of describing a number of consecutive steps can be solved
by the use of the following technique: 1) number each step, and 2) give
the directions in imperative sentences and the explanations in declarative
ones.
An example of this technique is given in the earlier section "Consider
the Tables." A second example is shown in the following directions on
how to cut up a whale:
- Strip off the blubber from
both sides of the whale with the aid of a winch.
- Remove
the jawbone.
- Remove,
from one side, the long loin that runs from the shoulder to the
tail.
- Etc.
If you number each step, your readers will have no difficulty in determining
where you finish one step and start the next one. If your directives
are given in imperative sentences and your explanations in declarative
ones, your readers also will have no difficulty in distinguishing between
a directive and an explanation. Enclosing the explanatory material in
parentheses also may be helpful.
The use of the imperative sentence for stating the directive ordinarily
will enable you to start each sentence with a different verb instead
of monotonously starting it with the article "the" as usually will be
the case if declarative sentences are used, as for example:
- The blubber is stripped off from both sides of the whale with the
aid of a winch.
- The jawbone is removed.
- The long loin that runs from the shoulder
to the tail is removed from one side.
- The etc.
You may find, however, that even with imperative sentences, you will
need to start many sentences with the same verb, since that particular
verb may be the best one to use. If so, repeat it as many times as necessary,
as for example:
- Strip etc.
- Remove etc.
- Remove etc.
Scientific writing, like any other kind, is more pleasing if it is
euphonious; but logic, clarity, and faithful reporting of the facts should
never be sacrificed to euphony.
Description of a Series
of Similar Experiments
If your work involved a series of experiments all of which were quite
similar to one another, you may find it difficult to describe the methods.
The following technique provides a good solution to this problem: 1)
tell the readers how many experiments there were in the series, 2) describe
the first experiment in detail, and 3) tell how each of the remaining
experiments differed from the first one. If you will give thought to
the numbering of the experiments, you may find that you can simplify
your description of them. In short, unless the chronological sequence
is significant, the experiments should be numbered in whatever order
will best aid in the logical description of them.
In the use of the foregoing technique, you will find that the following
practice will be helpful to your readers: 1) set off, in separate paragraphs,
the introductory statement and the description of each experiment; and
2) use parallel construction so that the reader easily can see any similarities
and differences. The practice of setting off the introduction to the
series and the description of each experiment in a separate paragraph
may result in a number of paragraphs that contain only one sentence.
Although longer paragraphs usually are to be preferred, the function
of paragraphing, as was explained earlier in the manual, is to help the
reader to a quick comprehension of the article. Thus, when clarity is
aided, the use of one-sentence paragraphs not only is permitted but is
recommended.
The following description of methods, adapted from a report by Osterhaug
and Andrews (1955), gives an example of these various points:
Statement of number of series |
Two experiments were made: series I, experimentally handled oysters,
and series II, commercially handled oysters. |
Detailed description of series I |
In series I, shucked Pacific oysters, which had been purchased
in 0.5-gal cans in Seattle and transported to the laboratory, were
sorted into damaged and undamaged groups. The undamaged oysters were
repacked in 0.5-lb cans, hermetically sealed, frozen at -20°F, and
stored for 3 days at 0°F. The frozen oysters were divided into five
groups of six cans each, and each group was thawed under one of the
following conditions: 1) in still air at 34°F, 2) in still air at
48-52°F, 3) in front of a fan at 65-70°F, 4) in water at 45-47°F, and
5) in water at 110°F. |
Description of series II, showing how it differed from series I |
In series II, 10-oz cans of commercially frozen oysters that had
been in storage at 10°F for approximately 9 mo were used. These oysters
were divided into similar groups and thawed under the same conditions
as were those in series I. |
Description of Complex
Methods
The general technique for describing complex methods is the following:
1) analyze the methods into their fundamental components for your own
information; 2) tell your readers how many components there are and what
they are; 3) describe each component, one at a time; and 4) show your
reader how the components fit together.
Illustrations
In describing the methods, do not forget the limitations of words;
that is, always keep in mind the vast importance of illustrations.
There are two possible approaches toward illustrations: 1) that the
illustrations are used simply to support the text, and 2) that the text
is used to support the illustrations. You will find that the second approach
greatly simplifies your problems of description. Thus if you have something
hard to describe, first make whatever pictures and other illustrations
are possible and then build your write-up around these illustrations.
This technique often will save you pages of difficult writing. Furthermore,
it will enable your readers to obtain an almost instantaneous comprehension
of your subject; whereas a written description, in addition to being
tiresome, may leave them with only a foggy notion of what you are trying
to convey. Thus, whenever illustrations are applicable, use them.
Pitfalls in the Methods
In writing your methods, keep in mind the need for warning your readers
of any pitfalls; that is, tell them where the methods may go wrong if
they do not take certain precautions. Otherwise they uselessly will have
to rediscover for themselves all your hard-won knowledge of how to avoid
these various difficulties. Those who try to follow your methods are
not likely to revere you for leaving out any of these warnings. In fact
if they have trouble in making your methods work, they may regard you
as being something of a faker instead of being merely an inept author.
Adequacy of the Sample
In describing the materials employed in your experiments, give a full
description of any samples that you may have used. Keep in mind that
no work is ever more reliable than is the sample. This fact, unfortunately,
is not always recognized clearly. Much of the early analytical work in
fishery technology, for example, was almost useless because in experiment
after experiment, the samples were not adequate.
A striking example of the great care needed in sampling has been pointed
out by Karrick, Clegg, and Stansby (1956) in their work with sheepshead,
a common species of freshwater fish:
"If only 16 sheepshead
(a much larger sample than that for most values reported in the literature)
from Clearwater Lake, Minnesota, had
been used as representative of all sheepshead, the oil content would
have
been reported as ranging from 0.72 to 1.67 percent and as averaging
1.04 percent. Sheepshead then would have been considered a non-oily
fish.
If only sheepshead had been used from another small lake, Lake Kegonsa
in Wisconsin, the oil would have been reported as ranging from 2.00
to 8.84 percent and as averaging 4.89 percent. Sheepshead would then
have
been considered as intermediate in oil content. If, however, 16 samples
of sheepshead from the Mississippi River had been taken in June 1954,
values from 3.57 to 14.20 percent and averaging 8.78 percent would
have been found. Sheepshead then would have been classified as an oily
fish.
This is an example of the danger of analyzing one fish, or even one
large lot of fish from the same source, and reporting that the values
obtained
are representative for the species."
THE RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
As was pointed out earlier, if at all possible, present your results
in tables and graphs, for this is the most efficient and satisfactory
way to do so.
Important though your tables and graphs are, however, you should make
your discussion stand independently of them so that any of your readers
who do not have the time to study the details of your report can still
follow the main trends of your findings. This technique of making your
discussion stand independently helps to insure that both your tables
and graphs and your discussion will be clear.
In your discussion, take care not merely to recapitulate the details
of your data; that is, do not make the mistake of repeating in words
the detailed contents of your tables and graphs. This repetition does
not constitute a discussion but merely a waste of time, for the tables
and graphs, as was pointed out earlier, will present the data more clearly
than you can verbally. Furthermore, you will alienate your readers because
after laboriously going through all your verbiage, they will find that
you have told them nothing that was not already more clearly seen from
the tables and graphs themselves. What a reader wants to learn from your
discussion are the trends, correlations, and conclusions that he otherwise
would have to extract from your data himself -- presuming that he would
bring to the task a sufficient background of knowledge to enable him
to do so.
Be sure to point out any apparent or real inconsistencies in your data,
and if you can, explain them. Leaving your readers to wonder about them
will weaken your paper more than if you point them out yourself. Also,
if your conclusions are not obvious, explain the reasoning process by
which you arrived at them. Otherwise, your readers, lacking your insight
into the work, may disagree with you.
If your readers might mistakenly think that certain trends or correlations
exist in your data where none actually do, be sure to make the situation
clear. Also, in your discussion, clearly distinguish between fact and
theory.
THE CONCLUSIONS
The most important part of the scientific paper ordinarily is the conclusions.
The rest of the paper usually is for the primary purpose of showing the
reader: 1) the significance, and 2) the reliability of them. Thus most
scientific papers would need only to present the conclusions were it
not for the readers' lack of information regarding the need for the research
and for the healthy skepticism as to the correctness of the results and
of the conclusions drawn from these results. On the other hand, the willingness
of readers tentatively to accept conclusions that are known to be supported
by a formal publication accounts in no small part for the tremendous
usefulness of such journals as Biological Abstracts and Chemical
Abstracts.
Occasionally you see a paper in which the author has neglected to draw
conclusions from his data. This practice is very poor; for the author,
being the one who is best acquainted with the work, obviously should
be the one who is best able to draw the conclusions. Furthermore, many
of the readers who themselves might not be sufficiently informed on the
subject to draw the correct conclusions, might very well be able to use
these conclusions once they have been drawn.
Because the conclusions are so very important, they rate a subsection
of the paper entirely to themselves. In writing your conclusions, list
each one by number so that each will stand out separately and distinctly
and be easy to read. Do not include any discussions or explanation. If
you find yourself tempted to add an explanation, you have not done a
good job of writing your "Results and Discussion."
After presenting your conclusions, you should check back to your statement
of objectives in the introduction to make sure that your conclusions
are in line with what you started out to do. Experiments have a way of
straying from the intended path. Make certain that yours have not done
this.
THE SUMMARY
Many scientists appear to be confused as to the difference between
the "Summary" and the "Conclusions." The difference, however, is distinct.
Your conclusions give only the inferences that you have drawn from your
data, whereas your summary recapitulates the paper and gives it to the
readers in miniature. Thus in writing the summary, you ordinarily make
some mention of each of the various other sections (introduction, methods,
results and discussion, and conclusions) of the paper. In the summary,
you mentally digest the paper for the readers and present it to them
in its barest essentials. In restricting the summary to the essentials,
however, remember to be informative -- by giving quantitative data --
and not merely descriptive.
Your summary should stand independently. On the other hand, you should
not mention any topic that was not mentioned in the body of the paper.
The summary is not for the purpose of tucking in facts that you forgot
to mention earlier.
Inasmuch as the summary helps the reader to separate the essentials
from the details and to give him a final comprehensive mental grasp of
the article, one should be included with every scientific paper -- even
those that are quite short.
Since your summary and your abstract deal with the same material, the
one will simply be a repetition of the other unless you make the abstract
qualitative (descriptive) and the summary quantitative. [See Endnote
#18.] An example of how to do this is shown in a paper
by Cocca (Submitted):
SOME FACTORS AFFECTING "SAWDUST" LOSSES
DURING THE CUTTING OF FISH STICKS
By F.J. Cocca
ABSTRACT
Much fish is lost as "sawdust" in the cutting of fish sticks (a three-step
operation). As the result of a study to reduce this loss by making the
bandsaw blade more efficient, an "ideal" blade was designed. The loss
of sawdust with this blade was significantly less than that with the
blades that are regularly used. The data obtained in this study show
the great importance of using a slicing operation rather than a sawing
operation in the third step.
SUMMARY
Fish sticks are cut from frozen blocks of fillets
in a three-step operation that results in the loss of 7 to 12 percent
of the weight
of the block
as "sawdust". To help minimize this loss, the Fishery Technological
Laboratory at East Boston carried out a series of tests to determine
the effect
of the type of bandsaw blade on the loss of sawdust in the bandsaw
cutting operations.
Increases in width, in thickness, and in degree of set of the bandsaw
blades caused the amount of fish that was lost as sawdust to increase.
An increase in the number of teeth per inch of blade caused the amount
of fish that was lost to decrease. The type of set -- regular set or
every-tooth set -- had no effect on the amount of fish that was lost.
From these observations, an "ideal" bandsaw blade
was designed to reduce the loss of sawdust to a minimum. The loss
incurred by this
blade was
7.21 percent less than that with the regularly used blade producing
the least loss of sawdust and was 35.4 percent less than that with
the regularly
used blade producing the most loss of sawdust.
In the study of the regularly used bandsaw blades, about 0.6 percent
sawdust was lost in the first step in the cutting operation; about 2
percent, in the second step, and about 6 percent, in the third step.
These data show the great importance of using a slicing or nonsawdust-forming
cutting operation in the third step.
THE LITERATURE CITED
OR BIBLIOGRAPHY
In citing references, follow the format of the journal to which you
intend to submit your paper. Checking the format may seem like an inconsequential
detail, but it will save much labor for you, for your typist, and for
all others involved. Thus if you do not follow the proper format, the
editor of your journal will think unkindly of you. Furthermore, he will
tend to distrust your work, for carelessness in regard to the format
indicates carelessness in regard to other matters, including the technical
content of your paper.
The following examples show you the format used in most of the publications
of the federal government in citing authors [See Endnote
#19]:
Many investigators have studied various methods of preserving fish
and have made recommendations involving: 1) the use of proper icing techniques
(Kuake 1946; Carter and MacCallum 1953; and Castell, MacCallum, and Power
1956); 2) the freezing of fish at sea (Hartshorne and Puncochar 1952);
and 3) the addition of certain substances to the crushed ice in which
the fish is stored, in order to inhibit the growth of bacteria and thereby
reduce fish spoilage (Tarr 1956).
Antibiotics, particularly chlortetracycline
and oxytetracycline added to the ice in which the fish is stored, have
been shown to be effective
in reducing the growth of bacteria in fish (Tarr, Southcott, and Bissett
1952; Farber 1954; and Gillespie, Boyd, Bissett, and Tarr 1955). Tarr
(1956) has found chlortetracycline to be the more effective of these
two compounds.
Certain areas were explored previously by use of the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service fishing vessel, the John E. Cobb (Powell,
Alverson, and Livingstone 1952).
Nitrogen was determined by use of the
standard techniques of the Association
of Official Agricultural Chemists (1950).
Vitamin B12 was determined by a modification of the method
of Hoffman, Stokstad, Hutchins, Dornbush, and Jukes (1949).
If you give only the references that actually have been cited in the
paper, they are listed at the end of the paper in a section called "Literature
Cited." [See Endnote #20.] If, however, you
list references that you did not cite, the heading "Bibliography" is
used. The following examples, which are presented for your convenience,
show the format used in listing the references [See Endnote
#21]:
ASSOCIATION OF OFFICIAL AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTS |
|
1950. |
Official methods of analysis. Seventh edition, pp. 296-297, Association
of Official Agricultural Chemists, P.O. Box 540, Benjamin Franklin
Station, Washington 4, D.C. |
DASSOW,
J.A., and CRAVEN, H.J. |
|
1955. |
Reduction of curd in canned salmon prepared from frozen fish. Part
I -- Use of acid and brine dips. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service,
Department of the Interior, Washington 25, D.C. (In preparation). |
HART, J.L. |
|
1949. |
The lengths of albacore in commercial catch. Circular No. 17, Fisheries
Research Board of Canada, Pacific Biological Station, Nanaimo, B.C.
May. |
JARVIS, NORMAN D. |
|
1943. |
Principles and methods in the canning of fishery products. Research
Report No. 7, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Department of the Interior,
366 pp. (Available from Government Printing Office, Washington 25,
D.C., $1.25.) |
ODAN, RICHARD |
|
1952. |
Effect of temperature and rate of thawing on drip formation in
true cod (Gadus macrocephalus). Manuscript report, University
of Washington, Seattle, Washington, 9 pp. |
SLAVIN, J.W. |
|
1955. |
Technical Note No. 32 -- Freezing rates and energy requirements
for freezing package fish fillets and fish sticks in a multiplate-compression
freezer. Commercial Fisheries Review, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service,
Department of the Interior, Washington 25, D.C., vol. 17, No. 7,
July, pp. 21-26. |
STREET, GUY |
|
1955. |
New approaches in labeling. Modern Packaging Encyclopedia, pp.
568-576, Packaging Catalog Corp., Bristol, Conn. |
TARR, H.L.A.; LANTZ, A.W.; and CARTER, NEAL M. |
|
1950. |
The preparation and application of brines and dipping solutions
for processing certain fish products. Progress Reports of the Pacific
Coast Stations, Fisheries Research Board of Canada, 898 Richards
Street, Vancouver, B.C., No. 84, October, pp. 51-57. |
WIGUTOFF, NORMAN B., and CARLSON, CARL B. |
|
1950. |
S.S. Pacific Explorer. Part V -- 1948 operations in the
North Pacific and Bering Sea. Fishery Leaflet 361, U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, Department of the Interior, Washington 25, D.C.,
January, 161 pp. |
SUMMARY
- This manual is based upon the premises that: a) poor planning is
one of the basic causes of unclarity in scientific papers, b) properly
planned and written scientific papers can be understood completely
after a single rapid reading by the intended audience, and c) a significant
increase in the clarity of scientific papers would effect almost a
revolution in the progress of science.
- Assuming that your research is sound, the quality of your paper will
depend largely upon whether you are willing to take the time and give
the thought required in planning and writing your paper properly.
- Writing your paper can be made easier if you will start to plan it
from the moment that your research is conceived.
- Make an early decision as to which one of the coworkers in your research
team is to have the primary responsibility for writing the paper and
seeing it through to publication.
- Budget sufficient time for the planning, writing, and publishing.
- Allow sufficient time for searching the literature.
- Consider your statistical requirements when planning your research.
- Tailor your paper to your audience. To do this effectively, visualize
the least-informed member in it.
- Limit the scope of your paper. Keep in mind that: a) to express an
idea, you will require a certain minimum number of words and that you
therefore should not attempt too much for the available space in your
journal; and b) unity is just as important in scientific papers as
in any other type of publication.
- Keep in mind that: a) almost every subject that can be presented
in a table will take less writing time, will require less space in
the journal, and will be much easier for your readers to comprehend
if it is presented in a table rather than in a written discussion;
and b) two of the secrets to making clear tables are to: 1) place the
units at the head of columns rather than in line captions, and 2) draw
vertical guidelines between all columns.
- Where suitable, present your data graphically.
- If possible, use illustrations, for there are many subjects that
cannot be presented adequately by words alone, and almost all others
can be made clearer and more interesting if they are illustrated.
- Use an outline.
- Use headings, for they serve two exceedingly important functions:
a) they act as signposts pointing out to the reader changes in the
direction of your thought, and b) they serve as filing guides showing
where certain information is given in the paper.
- Your outline and the headings of your paper are closely related in
two ways: a) the headings reveal the various divisions in your outline;
and b) if you employ care in the wording of the outline, the wording
of the headings can be taken directly from the outline.
- There are about seven types of headings that can be made easily on
a typewriter.
- Choose the most dissimilar types of headings that the complexity
of your outline will allow.
- The factor determining whether you should use headings for an individual
paragraph depends upon how abruptly your line of thought has changed
from the preceding paragraph; the more abrupt the change, the greater
the need for the heading.
- In choosing your headings, follow your outline so that you will not
mix up the types of headings illogically.
- Unless you make adequate use of headings, you cannot achieve your
maximum potential as a writer of clear scientific papers.
- Paragraphing has much the same function as has the use of headings;
that is, the paragraph alerts the reader to the fact that you have
finished discussing one topic and now are ready to discuss another.
- Your title should correctly reveal the main contents of your paper.
- If your title tends to sound impractical, make sure that you show
the significance of your work in the introduction to your paper.
- Include an abstract; make it short and to the point.
- Every scientific paper should answer the following five questions:
a) what were you trying to do?; b) why were you trying to do it?; c)
how did you do it?; d) what did you discover?; and e) what did you
conclude from your findings?
- Your introduction, as a minimum, should answer the two questions:
a) what were you trying to do?; and b) why were you trying to do it?
- Your paper ordinarily reports on the solutions to some closely related
set of problems of relatively very narrow scope, which for convenience
can be grouped together and called the specific problem.
- Your specific problem is never an isolated one, for your findings
always contribute to the solution of some problem of greater scope,
which can be called the broad problem.
- The solution to the broad problem, in turn, contributes to a problem
of even greater scope, which can be called the general problem.
- Your title should reveal your specific problem.
- The basic technique for orienting your readers to your specific problem
is first to point out the importance of your general problem and then
to show that: a) your broad problem is necessary to the solution of
the general problem, and b) your specific problem is necessary to the
solution of the broad problem.
- In stating the objectives of your specific problem, list each one
by number and state it explicitly. From the standpoint of clarity,
numbering your objectives and stating them explicitly are two of the
most important things you can do in planning and writing your paper.
- The statement of the objectives of your specific problem ordinarily
determines the structure of your paper.
- In presenting your methods, give thought to whether they need an
introductory statement as to their overall scope.
- If your methods already have been described in the literature, omit
the details of them in your paper, but include a brief general statement
of them.
- If your methods involved a number of consecutive steps, then: a)
number each step, and b) give the directions in imperative sentences
and the explanations in declarative ones.
- If your work involved a series of experiments, then: a) tell your
readers how many experiments there were in the series, b) describe
the first experiment in detail, and c) tell how each of the remaining
experiments differed from the first one.
- To describe complex methods, analyze them into their fundamental
components; tell your readers how many components there are and what
they are; describe each component, one at a time; and finally show
your readers how the components fit together.
- If your methods are hard to describe, first make whatever pictures
and other illustrations are possible and then build your write-up around
these illustrations.
- In writing your methods, be sure to warn your readers of any pitfalls
in them.
- Give a full description of any samples you may have used so that
your readers can judge as to the adequacy of these samples.
- Make your discussion stand independently of your tables and graphs
in order that any readers who do not have the time to study the details
of your report can still follow the main trends of your findings.
- In your discussion, take particular care not merely to recapitulate
the data in your tables and graphs; instead, point out: a) the trends
and correlations, and b) the conclusions to be drawn from them.
- In writing your conclusions, list each by number so that each one
will stand out separate and distinct and be easy to read.
- Make sure that your conclusions are in line with the objectives given
in your introduction.
- In your summary, recapitulate your paper and give it to your readers
in miniature.
- Make your summary quantitative, not merely descriptive.
- In citing references, be sure that you follow the format of the journal
to which you intend to submit your paper.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anonymous. 1953. United States Government Printing Office style manual.
Rev. ed. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
Brown, W.D.; Venolia, A.W.; Tappel, A.L.; Olcott, H.S.; Stansby, M.E.
(Submitted.) Oxidative deterioration in fish and fishery products. II.
Progress on studies concerning mechanism of oxidation of oil in fish
tissue. Commer. Fish. Rev.
CBE [Council of Biology Editors, Committee on Form and Style]. 1972.
CBE style manual. Third ed. Washington, DC: American Institute of Biological
Sciences; 297 p.
Cocca, F.J. (Submitted.) Some factors affecting "sawdust" losses during
the cutting of fish sticks. Commer. Fish. Rev.
Gibson, J.A.; Frady, T.L.; Kleindinst, E.L.; Garner, L.S. 2003. Manuscript/abstract/webpage
preparation, review, & dissemination. U.S. Dep. Commer., Northeast
Fish. Sci. Cent. Ref. Doc. 03-01; 38 p.
Jenkinson, B.L. 1949. Bureau of the Census manual of tabular presentation.
Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census; 266
p. Available from: Government Printing Office, Washington, DC.
Karrick, N.; Clegg, W.; Stansby, M.E. 1956. Composition of fresh-water
fish -- No. 1. Commer. Fish. Rev. 18(2):13-16.
Long, C.W.; Arzylowicz, R.A. (In preparation.) Photographic device
for accurately determining fish measurements.
Osterhaug, K.L.; Andrews, M. 1955. Cold storage of frozen Pacific oysters
(Crassostrea gigas) -- No. 1. Commer. Fish. Rev. 17(12):11-14.
Piskur, M.M. 1956. The importance of a good technical library for research,
development, and production. J. Am. Oil Chem. Soc. 33(10): 4,18.
Prince, M.V.H. 1955. News item. Chem. Eng. News 33(34):3513.
Thurston, C. (Submitted.) Dye-binding characteristics of fish-meal
protein. Part I. Some preliminary findings as to suitable dyes. Commer.
Fish. Rev.
Weil, B.H., editor. 1954. The technical report: its preparation, processing,
and use in industry and government. New York, NY: Reinhold; 485 p. [Note:
This book contains a number of excellent bibliographies covering all
aspects of technical writing.]
Young, F.N.; Crowell, S. 1956. The application of gamesmanship in science.
Washington, DC: American Institute of Biological Sciences; p. 13-14.
ENDNOTES
(with linked examples) TO THE REVISED EDITION
ENDNOTE
#1
Many papers authored by NMFS employees aren't "scientific research
papers" as defined by Sanford. Those other types of papers cover a wide
spectrum of written products, ranging from descriptive biology articles
to stock assessment reports. Nonetheless, Sanford's report is variously
useful in preparing any type of paper authored by NMFS employees.
ENDNOTE
#2
Different experts recognize different types of writing, but most experts
recognize at least five
major types: expressive, creative, persuasive, expository,
and technical. Some experts lump one or more of these five types together
into a more general type (e.g., lumping expository and technical
writing together as just expository writing); more experts, though, split
one or more of these five types into several specialized types (e.g.,
splitting technical writing into business, high-tech, engineering, and
scientific writing).
Regardless of how many and what types of writing there are, none of
them were designed from the start; rather, each evolved slowly to meet
a different communication need. This evolutionary process has yielded
a unique combination of communication strategy, format, and style for
each type of writing. Our ability to understand the strategy and to master
the format and style of a given type of writing is directly related to
our success in communicating via that type of writing.
It's likely that your high school and college instruction in writing
was in a type, or types, other than technical/scientific. Accordingly,
it's probably worthwhile to introduce or review -- depending on your
background -- the basic communication strategy, format, and style of
scientific writing.
Communication Strategy
in Scientific Writing
We seek to address two fundamental needs in writing papers about our
research for other researchers. First, if the reader of our paper has
little or no background on the subject of our research (e.g.,
the first-year graduate student), then we need to create a structure
within the brain of that reader not only for the storage and recall of
information on our research, but also for the subsequent storage of additional
information from others' research on the same subject, and for the effective
and efficient comparison by the reader of all such information. Second,
if the reader of our paper has a background on the subject of our research
(e.g., the seasoned scientist), and thus has already created
within his/her brain the necessary structure for information storage,
recall, and comparison on that subject, then we need to present our information
so that the reader can effectively and efficiently disassemble it, store
it at the appropriate sites in his/her brain, easily compare it with
existing similar information, and reassemble it so that our research
is now part of his/her knowledge.
Both of the aforementioned needs in communicating about our research,
especially the latter one, operate more -- but not exclusively -- through
the linear-oriented, logical-thinking left side of the brain than through
the spatially-oriented, abstract-thinking right side of the brain. To
deal with such left-brain-dominated needs, a type of writing known as
technical writing, with its unique combination of format and style, has
evolved. Those of us in the sciences use the subset of technical writing
known appropriately as scientific writing.
Format in Scientific
Writing
The basic format of scientific writing follows the progression of the
scientific method. Note the following table:
Scientific
Method Component |
Scientific
Writing
Component |
Observation |
First part of "Introduction" |
Hypothesis |
Second part of "Introduction" |
Experiment |
"Study Area" (if appropriate), "Sampling Gear" (if appropriate), "Experimental
Apparatus" (if appropriate), "Test Specimens" (if appropriate), "Methods," and "Results" |
Theory |
"Conclusions," "Recommendations,"and "Summary" (if
appropriate) |
Law or principle |
Not applicable |
Within each component of scientific writing, the basic format follows
one or more logical orders: chronological, serial, etc.
Style in Scientific
Writing
To facilitate comparisons among the concepts of a research paper, scientific
writing stresses four style principles: 1) definition of technical terms
or phrases, either implicitly in context or explicitly in the text or
in a table of definitions, but always prior to the use of such technical
terms in dealing with concepts; 2) repetition of chosen terms and phrases
(i.e., limited varying of expressions); 3) parallel construction
of clauses, sentences, paragraphs, and sections when dealing with components
of one concept or with a series of related concepts; and 4) example or
analogy for explaining a complex concept.
For researchers, the principle of scientific writing style which they
are typically most reluctant to adopt is the repetition of terms and
phrases. Often, a researcher will say to a technical editor, "I have
a long list of related information, and repeating the same term or phrase
to describe that information would be monotonous." Just about as often,
the technical editor will respond to the researcher, "You have just argued
for taking the information out of the text and placing it in a narrative
table. The principle of scientific writing style which these researchers
are typically next-most reluctant to adopt is the parallel construction
of clauses and sentences.
Conclusion
The above comments do not apply to all of our written communications
about our research. Occasionally, we find ourselves in the position of
communicating in writing about our research to legislators, news reporters,
K-12 students, etc. Depending on whom we are communicating with, we may
need to rely more on expository writing, persuasive writing, etc. For
the bulk of our communications with other researchers, though, technical/scientific
writing is the best choice.
ENDNOTE
#3
We often don't recognize those passages in our own writing which are
difficult for others to comprehend. We typically first learn of those
difficulties when our paper is read by a colleague or a clearing official.
So, what do we do to improve the comprehensibility of difficult passages
in our writing? While there may be several ways to improve our writing,
the one which has overwhelmingly worked the best for me in advising authors
over four decades follows this course: 1) have a face-to-face meeting
with the author; 2) take all paper copies of the writing away from the
author; 3) read out loud the difficult passage to the author; 4) turn
on a tape recorder, and 5) ask the author "What were you trying to say?".
In almost all cases, when we're separated from our original written material
and have to explain our meaning verbally, then our spoken words are more
organized and understandable than our written words. With only minor
editing, the transcribed passage on the tape recorder can usually be
substituted for the previously difficult-to-comprehend written passage.
If you have imagination, then you don't need an editor to engage in
this process -- just a tape recorder. If you have a good imagination
and a good memory, then you don't need the tape recorder either.
ENDNOTE
#4
Readers of our papers are increasingly foreign, often with only rudimentary
skills in English comprehension. Three aspects of English writing that
especially can cause problems for foreign readers are hackneyed phrases
(e.g., "designed from scratch"), acronyms (e.g., "ANOVA"),
and abbreviations (e.g., "vs."). In general, avoid using hackneyed
phrases and abbreviations (except as components of bibliographies and
as units of measure where there are international
standards for such abbreviations), and define all acronyms upon first
mention. It's increasingly common in scientific and technical monographs
to have either a listing of "Acronyms" at
the end of the "Table of Contents," or even a separate "Glossary
of Technical Terms, Acronyms, and Units of Measure" among the report's
preliminary pages.
ENDNOTE
#5
Just as it's important to consider the number of words used to describe
your research, it's also important to consider the size and familiarity
of the words used to describe your research. There is nothing wrong in
using a long word or an unusual word if that word effectively and efficiently
conveys your meaning. Far too often, however, the young researcher will
use a long and/or unusual word to impress his/her colleagues, when that
word is neither the most effective nor efficient at conveying meaning,
and when it's even misleading. By the way, in your most recent study,
did you employ certain "methods" or certain "methodologies"?
ENDNOTE
#6
There is, nevertheless, a role for papers which synthesize results
of several studies in different disciplines, particularly when those
studies collectively bear on resource and/or habitat management issues.
If NMFS's resource and habitat researchers do not perform the
synthesizing, then NMFS's resource and habitat managers must
perform that task. Unfortunately, such synthesizing by managers often
doesn't seem to take place, or if it does, it seems quickly to become
a casualty of the political process (e.g., resource economic
concerns taking precedence over resource status concerns).
Fortunately, there are now several journals which specifically carry
synthesis papers (e.g., Reviews
in Fisheries Science and Conservation
Biology).
ENDNOTE
#7
The increasingly common practices by scientists of reading the works
of their colleagues directly from a computer monitor screen, and of sharing
the components (e.g., an individual table) of their own works
online with their colleagues, have a major effect on how we should prepare
our tables from now on.
Screen Reading Concerns
Virtually all computer monitor screens -- just as virtually all television
viewing screens -- have an "aspect ratio" (i.e., the ratio of
width to height) of 4:3. To the extent practical, you should construct
your tables so that their overall dimensions also have a 4:3 aspect ratio.
If a table has an aspect ratio >4:3 (i.e., a
wide and shallow table), then the horizontal "scrunching" of the
table to get it to fit on the screen can make the size of the table's
letters and numerals so small that they are difficult or impossible to
read. If a table has an aspect ratio <4:3 (i.e., a
narrow and deep table), then the horizontal "stretching" of the table
to get it to fill out the screen can make the bottom of the table disappear,
with the reader needing to scroll down to see the bottom matter, and
then needing to scroll back up again to see the column headings. Aspect
ratios which significantly depart from 4:3 particularly affect readers
using small monitors (e.g., 13-inch monitors, where the 13-inch
measure refers to a single diagonal measure since the aspect ratio is
fixed).
Sometimes it's nonetheless impractical to have our tables conform to
the 4:3 aspect ratio. There are two circumstances which typically lead
to such impracticality:
1) There may be so much data in the table (i.e., so many
columns and rows both), that even if the table perfectly fills out
the screen both horizontally and vertically, then the size of the table's
letters and numerals may be so small that they are difficult or impossible
to read. As a general rule, the size of the letters and numbers in
your typed table should be no smaller than 9 points, when the "type
area" has been set up as 9.5 x 7.0 inches (i.e., the correct dimensions
for a 4:3 aspect ratio on a landscape page). Any smaller point size
appearing on a small, low-resolution screen is difficult to read. If
you feel that you need to reduce the point size in a table below 9
points in order for the table to conform to a 4:3 aspect ratio, then
jettison the attempt to make the table conform to the 4:3 aspect ratio,
and try to reconstruct the table to reduce the number of columns (i.e.,
it's easier to comprehend a table via up-and-down scrolling than via
side-to-side scrolling). There are three common editorial "maneuvers" to
reduce the number of columns in a table:
a) "Field Spanners" -- In most tables, the left-most column (i.e.,
stub) and sometimes even the second-left-most column contain "collectivizing" terms.
A collectivizing term applies equally to two or more rows. As an
example, refer to original Table 4; note the two collectivizing terms
under the "Type of Dryer" stub (i.e., "Direct flame dryer" and "Indirect
flame dryer"). Because this stub is composed of only collectivizing
terms, the whole column can be eliminated and the collectivizing
terms can be converted into "field spanners." Refer to the following
modification of original Table 4 to see how such a conversion appears.
The use of field spanners is probably the most useful technique that
an author has for reducing the number of columns in a table.
b) "Subtables" -- Any large table can be broken up into two or
more smaller subtables.
Have no hesitation in breaking up larger tables, but take two steps
to avoid any confusion on the part of the reader: 1) number the subtables
in such a manner as to indicate the relationship among them (e.g.,
Table 1 becoming Tables 1a and 1b); and 2) reword the subtable titles
to reflect the interconnections among them (e.g., "Table
1. Total weight of haddock captured in each of 24 trawl tows in the
special sampling area," becoming "Table 1a. Total weight of haddock
captured in each of the initial 12 (of 24 total) trawl tows in the
special sampling area" and "Table 1b. Total weight of haddock captured
in each of the final 12 (of 24 total) trawl tows in the special sampling
area.")
c) "Rotated Text" -- Often, the part of a table which drives its overall
width is the collective width of its column headings (e.g., see
the preceding modified Table 4). Data entries in the field normally take
up less width than their respective column headings. By rotating the text
of column headings by 90 degrees counterclockwise, the width of column
headings often can be dramatically reduced. However, don't underestimate
the difficulty of trying to read rotated
text on a computer monitor screen. In the old days -- when everything
was printed on paper -- it was easy enough to just rotate the page back
and forth quickly by hand on the surface of your desk. These days, however,
it's not that easy nor that quick to do so with the "rotate tool" provided
by your computer's software. In almost all cases, the use of rotated text
should be the third option behind either field spanners or subtables.
2) The nature of the data may be such that there is no recourse to
having either an extremely wide-and-shallow or an extremely narrow-and-deep
table. In the fisheries science arena, I've seen two kinds of situations
which typically force such tables. First, there can be the need to
sample a large number of stations/specimens for just one or two measurements
per station/specimen (such as quickly determining the concentrations
of oil in the water following a widespread oil spill). Second, the
economic or biological cost of obtaining a sample may be so high that
it makes sense to measure as many aspects of each sample as possible
(such as determining the complete contaminant and bacteriological profile
of just a couple of captured specimens of an endangered species). In
such situations, be prepared to use all three of the aforementioned
editorial maneuvers, but especially subtables.
Online Sharing Concerns
Again, in the old days -- when everything was printed on paper -- it
was acceptable for a monograph of several chapters or sections to have
the tables (and figures) of each chapter or section be numbered
from "1" onward. There was no chance for confusing Table 1 of Chapter
1 with Table 1 of Chapter 8; each table was physically bound within the
correct chapter. Not so today. With the ability to select a given table
(or figure) within a work, and then share just that table (or figure)
with colleagues online, and with the ability to refer colleagues to a
numbered table (or figure) within an online work, the chances for sharing
or referring to the wrong table (or figure) have greatly increased. Consequently,
within any given monograph, you should adopt one of two conventions:
1) number every table (and figure) consecutively over the whole work,
including all appendices (e.g., Table 1 through Table 37); or
2) use "English
notation," where each table (and figure) number is composed of a
unique alphanumeric string (e.g., the first table of Chapter
8 becomes Table 8.1, the twelfth table of Appendix A becomes Table A.12).
To minimize any distortion of your tables as they are converted from
word processing software to a digital markup language, you should use
the "table formatting" function (i.e., row-and-cell architecture)
of your word processing software. To reduce the amount of "cleaning up" of
your tables when they are received by an editor, webmaster, or publisher,
you should place the table title and any table footnotes within cells
which are integral to that single table.
Further, to avoid even momentary confusion by your readers, you should
use letters --
not numbers -- for all superscripts in the table which are both appended
to numerical data and referenced to footnotes.
ENDNOTE
#8
Tables 2 and 3 do not show field spanners. Refer to "Endnote
#7/Screen Reading Concerns/1/a" for a brief discussion of
field spanners.
ENDNOTE
#9
To use the global-search-and-replace tool of your word processing software
for treating all of your tables (and figures) at one time, you may want
to have all of your tables (and figures) in just one large file. However,
when the time comes to forward the manuscript to an editor, webmaster,
or publisher, place a copy of every table (and figure) in a separate
small file, and forward both the one large file of all tables (and figures),
as well as the collection of small files for each table (and figure).
ENDNOTE
#10
Refer to "Endnote #7/Online Sharing Concerns" for
a brief discussion of numbering -- a consideration which applies to figures
just as much as tables.
ENDNOTE
#11
Refer to "Endnote #7/Screen Reading Concerns/1/" for
a brief discussion of aspect ratios and point sizes -- two considerations
which apply to figures as well as tables.
ENDNOTE
#12
Refer to "Endnote #7/Screen Reading Concerns/1/c" for
discussion of rotated text -- something seen more often in figures than
tables, especially in the labels of vertical axes of coordinate-based
graphs. Although unconventional, you should consider "stacking" instead
of rotating the labels of vertical axes. Refer to the modification of
original Figure 1 (left) to see how such a stacked vertical axis
label appears.
Depending on circumstances, a stacked label can also be placed inside
the axis (as intentionally shown in modified Figure 1) to save space.
ENDNOTE
#13
If an illustration does not occupy the whole page, then you may have
the option -- within some limitations -- of where you place the illustration
on the page. Two aspects of brain functioning guide us in choosing this
placement on the page.
First, the right side of the brain processes images, and the left side
of the brain processes language. Since the eye-brain nerve pathways criss-cross
(i.e., the left eye is connected to the right side of the brain,
and the right eye is connected to the left side of the brain), there
is reason to believe that the brain more easily processes information
when the illustrations are on the left side of the page, and the text
is on the right side of the page.) Research in both the neurological
and communication sciences isn't definitive, but is supportive, of this
idea. (Next time you look at a "high-end" magazine with some concordant "high-end" advertisers,
take a close look at the relative left-right placement of the text and
images in the advertisements.)
Second, if the illustration occupies the full width of the page, but
not the full depth of the page, then you may have the option of placing
the illustration either towards the top or the bottom of the page. This
is where that aspect of brain functioning known as "geographic center
of attention" comes into play: our attention is initially drawn to the
upper righthand quadrant of any page. (That's why you always see the
lead story on the front page of every daily newspaper occupying the upper
righthand quadrant.) If you want to draw attention to the illustration,
then place the image towards the top, and the text towards the bottom,
of the page. (Next time you look at an advertisement for a "high-end" automobile,
take a close look at the relative top-bottom placement of the text and
image in the advertisement.)
ENDNOTE
#14
There is an apparent irony in the use of word processing software,
instead of paper and pencil, to compose our writing -- whether that composition
be at the outline stage or the manuscript stage. While it's easier to
create, insert, delete, and move text around with word processing software,
we seem less likely to perform the latter three operations with such
software than with paper and pencil.
Among professional editors, there is consensus on the ubiquitousness
of this behavior, but there is no consensus on the cause of this behavior.
The leading candidate as the cause, though, seems to be what has been
called "showroom syndrome." Text created with word processing software
often looks so relatively finished and polished -- even though it's not
-- that the author is hesitant to change the original creation.
If you're having a hard time bringing yourself to rewrite your work
when using word processing software, even if you know the work needs
to be rewritten, then experiment by printing out a double-spaced paper
copy of the work, grab a colored pencil with a big eraser, and go at
it. In not all cases, but in many cases, this technique has worked for
authors whom I've advised on their writing approach.
ENDNOTE
#15
Sanford worked with a manual typewriter, and his recommendations on
headings are based on the limitations of such. We work with word processing
software, and the following comments are based on the opportunities that
such software offers.
Headings can either be "stand-alones" or "in-lines." Stand-alone headings
are separated from surrounding text typically by two preceding blank
lines and one following blank line. Nested stand-alones (e.g.,
see "Preliminary Considerations/Give Thought
to Importance" in the PDF version
of this document) are separated from each other typically by one blank
line.
There are three factors that convey the level of importance ("Level")
of a stand-alone heading; in order of importance, they are: 1) location
(i.e., centered on the page, centered on the column, flush left
on the column, and increasingly indented from the left); 2) the combination
of type size (i.e., measured in "points," where each point equals
1/72 of an inch) and emphasis (e.g., bold, underline, and italic);
and 3) case (i.e., all letters of each word upper case, or only
the initial letter of each word upper case). Following is a heading level "recipe" --
but certainly not the only one -- which agrees with the ranking factors
for assigning levels of importance to headings. Also, shown after the
recipe is an example which corresponds with this recipe.
Level
of Heading |
Location |
Type
Size & Emphasis |
Case |
I |
Centered on page |
Large & bold |
All capitals |
II |
Centered on column |
Large & bold |
All capitals |
III |
Flush left on column |
Large & bold |
Initial capitals |
IV |
Flush left on column |
Regular & bold |
Initial capitals |
V |
Flush left on column |
Regular & italic |
Initial capitals |
VI |
Single left indent |
Regular & italic |
Initial capitals |
VII |
Double left indent |
Regular & italic |
Initial capitals |
LEVEL I HEADING |
LEVEL II HEADING
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Level III Heading
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Level IV Heading
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx |
Level V Heading
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Level VI Heading
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Level VII Heading
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx |
In-line headings appear on the same line as the first line of the text
with which they are associated. Refer to "Endnote #7/Screen
Reading Concerns/1/a" to note the use of "Field Spanners" as an in-line
heading. In-line headings typically: 1) are flush left on the block of
text with which they are associated; 2) are the same type size as the
associated block of text; and 3) use initial capitals only. Consequently,
in-lines are distinguished from the text by their emphasis (e.g.,
bold, underline, italic, quotation marks) and by their suffixial punctuation
(e.g., colon, em-dash).
ENDNOTE
#16
The contemporary preference of almost all journals in the natural sciences
is for the quantitative, or "informative," abstract. The contemporary
preference of many journals in the social sciences is for the qualitative,
or "indicative," abstract. Following is text, excerpted from CBE (1972),
discussing these two types of abstracts:
Most journals specializing in primary publication of research results
prefer, or even insist on, an informative abstract, a condensed version
of the purpose, methods, results, and conclusions of that research.
Most journals specializing in review articles prefer an indicative
abstract, a kind of expanded table of contents that contains generalized
statements and directs the reader to the full article for any quantitative
or qualitative data.
If you are reporting original research, and you are writing an
informative abstract, identify in the abstract -- as you did in the
title -- the main topic of your paper. Also, state the basic reason
for doing the research being reported, indicate the methods used, list
materials studied, and briefly summarize the results and conclusions.
Do not merely describe or recite the contents of your article, e.g., "Activity
of largemouth bass at various times of the day is discussed." Instead,
tell what you did and what you found: "Largemouth bass were most active
between the hours of 0900 and 1100."
ENDNOTE
#17
Throughout his report, Sanford used the term "procedure" as the heading
of the section of a paper which describes what a researcher did, and
how he/she did it. Contemporary scientific writing almost universally
uses the term "methods" instead of "procedure." That change has been
made throughout the revised and updated report.
ENDNOTE
#18
Since Sanford's time, the practice of placing a summary at the end
of a research paper has largely been abandoned. Contemporary practice
is to place a robust informative abstract at the beginning of the paper,
and dispense with the summary. There is one specialized exception to
this contemporary approach: the technical report with its "executive
summary." Executive summaries largely serve the same purpose as a summary
(i.e., restating in simple language the key results, conclusions,
and recommendations of the report, without introducing any new material),
but are placed either as the last section of the preliminary pages (i.e.,
those using lower case Roman numerals) or as the first section of the
text (i.e., beginning on page "1").
The format of an executive summary differs slightly from the format
of a summary. Often, the summary will include nothing more than numbered
or "bulleted" brief statements on the key results, conclusions, and recommendations.
The executive summary always begins with a narrative section which is
a synoptic version of the report's introduction; then appear the numbered
or "bulleted" brief statements on the key results, conclusions, and recommendations.
ENDNOTE
#19
The record for the number of authors of a single paper is over 900!
(It was a clinical study in the medical sciences; clinics all over world
were involved; and there were numerous people at each clinic who qualified
for authorship.) Clearly, there has to be a rule on how many authors
of a multi-authored paper can be listed in the in-text citation of the
paper. The rule varies from journal to journal, and you need to conform
to rule of your target journal. In the absence of any journal rule, though,
it's recommended that you use the traditional, conservative rule of listing
both authors for a two-author paper, but list only the first author --
followed by "et al." -- for papers authored by three or more
authors.
ENDNOTE
#20
The contemporary practice is to split the category "literature cited" into
two categories: 1) if all of the works in the listing are in
the primary literature (i.e., anonymously peer reviewed), then
the category label remains "literature cited"; and 2) if some or
all of the works in the listing are in the secondary literature
(i.e., transparently peer reviewed) and/or tertiary literature
(i.e., not reviewed), then the category label becomes "references
cited."
ENDNOTE
#21
In the absence of any guidelines on bibliographic style by your target
journal, it's recommended that you follow the guidance of the Council
of Science Editors (CSE,
the former Council of Biology Editors). The "Bibliography" of this report
has been restyled to follow closely, although not exactly, the CSE guidelines.