Writing in a Scientific Style

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Writing in a Scientific Style

• Dr M. T. Rose

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Types of scientific writing

• Lab reports
• Literature reviews / essays
• Honours dissertation
• Published scientific papers

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Essay Planning
Draft Write something (anything!)
Analyse title
Ruthlessly redraft
Read!
Proof read!!!
Flow diagram
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Speak the Truth!

• Check for Meaning!
• Literature reports state that dairy cows eat too
  little fibre

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Introductions

• Written last of all
• After you know what you are going to say
• Can be a map of the essay
• briefly mentioning the sections following
• Can justify why it is worthy of study
• for essay titles that you choose

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Shaping the argument for an essay

• Up front model
• The evidence for and against a thesis, after it
  has been stated
• That the plays attributed to Shakespeare were
  actually written by Marlowe will be argued in
  this essay
• The thriller model
• Introduce the theme without giving a conclusion
• This essay considers the theory that plays
  attributed to Shakespeare were written by his
  contemporary Marlowe

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The body of the essay

• Keep a focus on the subject at hand
• Represent all (or most points of view)
• Indicate stages in your argument
• However, Therefore, Moreover, Additionally, That
  notwithstanding, etc
• Dont overuse these!

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The body of the essaycont

• Reference (important/ most/ all) facts
• Give a value judgement on the evidence
• Use case studies, specific examples
• These add weight to arguments
• Look out for relations between facts
• Make comparisons, analogies, contrasts, etc

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Conclusions

• Written second to last
• I have told you
• Not suitable for short essays (lt2000 words)
• The answer is
• Giving the answer to a question posed in the
  introduction
• Where this essay could go next
• Identifying further areas of research in to the
  unknown
• Care! Could make you look stupid!

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Past Passive Tense

• Impersonal (almost never I, we, me, our, etc)
• In the past tense for what you found or did for
  an experiment
• In the past tense for what other researchers
  found or did in an experiment
• In the present tense for generally accepted truths

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Past passive tense

• The sample was weighed
• The milk yield was found to increase
• Smith et al. (1999) found numbers of bats to
  fall
• Jolly et al. (2002) reported grain yields
  increased
• The sun rises in the east
• Milk yields decline by 3 per week after peak
  lactation (Jim et al. 2000)
• Cats are the main predators of sparrows (Anon
  et al. 1992 Bob et al. 2003)

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Write in proper sentences

• Do not write in lists
• Construct a proper argument
• A sentence must have a verb
• Not
• Attractive countryside central to the economic
  regeneration of the area.
• Not
• Teaching skills for the new generation of
  University entrants.

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Other stuff

• Avoid contractions
• (e.g. dont, cant, didnt)
• Avoid colloquialisms
• Limit use of abbreviations
• (define on first use, then use throughout)
• Spelling
• (Word spell check is not enough, read your work)
• Random capitals
• (the Importance of being earnest is a very good
  Play)

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Each sentence to convey a single point
Avoid redundancy
Avoid ambiguity
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• Given all these factors arguing against the
  retention of the 365-day calving interval, the
  main case forcing its retention are the extensive
  grazing systems now far more common in the UK
  than in 1979, where cows calve in the early
  spring to produce most of their milk from cheap
  grass.

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• Given all these factors arguing against the
  retention of the 365-day calving interval, the
  main case forcing its retention are the extensive
  grazing systems currently popular. These systems
  are now far more common in the UK than in 1979.
  In these systems cows calve in the early spring
  to produce most of their milk from cheap grass.

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Redundancy

• Very much greater milk yield
• This essay will analyse the effect of the growth
  hormone preparation (under title Growth
  Hormone)
• We conducted an experiment to investigate
  (under the title of the experiment)

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Ambiguity

• Make sure that it is very clear what it is you
  are talking about
• Care with use of words such as
• This (in this report)
• That (in that experiment)
• Which (which was found not to be the case)
• It (it was greater than that)
• etc

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Report facts accurately

• Give a reference (preferably peer reviewed) for
  all scientific statements
• Make clear what is speculation
• Give the good basis for that speculation
• Enable the reader to judge

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Citing references in text

• Just the surname(s) and year of publication
• With the authors name as part of the sentence
• Jones (1999) stated that
• Smith and Western (1990) noted
• Rose et al. (1996) investigated
• With the reference at the end of a statement
• on poor quality diets (Brown et al. 1999)
• was noted (Smith et al. 1903 Jones 1999)

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The Internet as a source of reference

• Is mostly rubbish
• It can change from one day to the next
• There is nothing to vouch that it is true
• Is often opinion rather than fact
• e.g. For an essay on foxhunting
• League Against Cruel Sports
• Countryside Alliance
• Opinion only not facts

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Bibliographies - Harvard Referencing

• Journal
• Bennett, H. Gunter, H. Reid, S. (1996) Through
  a glass darkly images of appraisal. Journal of
  Teacher Development 5 39-46. 
• Journal (where author anonymous)
• How dangerous is obesity? (1977) British Medical
  Journal 6069 1115. 
• Books
• Mohr, L.B. (1996) Impact analysis for program
  evaluation. 2nd ed. London, Sage.
• Chapters in books
• Whitehead, C.C (1991) Nutrition and growth of fat
  and lean broiler genotypes. In Recent Advances in
  Animal Nutrition. Eds. Haresign, W. and Cole,
  D.J.A. London, Butterworths.