An Approach to Academic Writing Notes — 1

Wei zen Liu

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7 min readDec 31, 2021

Product of Consideration

Academic Writing Is an Iterative Process

Audience → Purpose → Organization → Style → Flow → Presentation

Adverb Placement

This model was originally developed by …
The morphology of the samples was then analyzed …

Split Infinitives (to + verb)

We need to adequately meet the needs of …
Neural networks have the ability to correctly classify new patterns.
The size of the container could be modified to downwardly adjust the portion size …

Old‐to‐New Information Flow

Punctuation

Conjunction, Subordinator → Use a comma

Birds fly, but fish swim.
Birds fly, while fish swim.

Connection → Use a semicolon or period

Birds fly; however, fish swim.

Non-finite/dependent + Finite/independent → Use a comma

Finite/independent + Non-finite/dependent → Use a comma

Our hypotheses being correct, we produced a good model.
We produced a good mdoel, our hypotheses being correct.

Finite/dependent + Finite/dependent → Use a semicolon or period

Our hypotheses were correct; we produced a good model.

General‐Specific and Specific‐General Texts

General‐Specific (GS) is often used to structure an introduction.

a short or extended definition
a generalization or purpose statement
a statement of fact
some interesting statistics

Starts with a general description and leads to something specific, then follows a convergent pattern until the study aim. Make sure paragraphs are commonly connected either with repetition or linking words and follow the Old-to-new flow logically.

The general statement starts with a statement most people can relate to or a definition. Offer support an explanation with:

Citing previous studies
Specific details

Open with Statistics

In the United States in 2006, 4,784 pedestrians were killed in traffic accidents …
While pedestrians were involved in just over 1 % of all traffic accidents in 2006, these vulnerable road users accounted for over 12% of all traffic fatalities …
Between 1992 and 1995, an international lysine cartel that included five companies illegally colluded on prices around the world …

Verbs in Defining and Naming

This new species was named Ascochyta mycoparasitic
Any rotational velocity is usually denoted by
A book containing lists of word definitions is called a dictionary
Another principal source of heat is the natural increase in temperature as the depth increases. This is known as the geothermal gradient
One important product attribute is perceived product sophistication, which I define here as the degree to which a product exhibits the latest technological advances
DNA microarrays(or gene chips)are an extremely powerful new tool in the field of genomics‐based biotechnology.

Element of Formal Sentence Definitions

Commonly use: technique, method, process, device, and system

Organizational learning is a process through which firms develop …

Notes:

whereby is commonly used in formal writing instead of by which, by means of which, and through which.
Avoid using any form of your term in the definition.
Use when and where in definitions only if necessary.
Extend the Definition.

Former & Latter

However, the former deals only with the creator of an invention or process, while the latter is concerned with authors, playwrights, composers, artists, and publishers.

While debate exists regarding a precise definition of …, the stance adopted in this paper is that ….
For the purposes of this paper,… refers to/is defined as/is considered to be ….
Here we define … as …. In this paper have adopted [author’s] definition of ….

Specific‐to‐General Organization

Specific to general (SG) begin with a specific focus and then progressively becomes more general.

an event
a piece of art
an individual
of organization

Example:

In 2005 a study completed by the Centers for Disease Control found that 5,800 people 65 and older died from injuries related to unintentional falls and another 1.8 million received emergency room care. Of those treated, 433,000 were hospitalized for long-term care.
Seniors who live alone may suffer from an unintentional fall and are often not found for hours or days. Long waits for medical care exacerbate their injuries and increase their risk of death or permanent hospitalization. However, fast emergency response to a fall reduces the risk of hospitalization by 26% and death by 80%. The problem with seniors not receiving immediate attention needs to be addressed.

Problem‐Solution

Problem-to-solution structure is important because much of the academic research activity is aimed at solving problems.

published research articles
research proposals
case reports

Problem-to-solution should be argumentative and evaluative.

Situation: Background information
Problem: reasons for challenging the…; criticisms of …; possible counterevidence
Partial solution: discussion of a way or ways to alleviate the problem
Evaluation: Assessment of the merits and limitations of of the proposed solutions
New solution: discussion of a new way or ways to alleviate the problem
Evaluation: Assessment of the merits of the proposed solutions

Procedures and Processes

Problem-to-solution is commonly structured as a review of the current state of knowledge and offers possible and partial answers.

Cause‐And‐Effect Indication

Using thus+‐ing can be particularly useful as alternatives to traditional logical connectors like therefore and as a result.

Process: Prices rise, thus leading to a drop in demand.
Problem: Prices rise, thus increasing the chance of hyperinflation.
Solution: Prices rise, thus increasing earnings that can then be ….

Passive Voice

by + process or by + a non-human agent

… by calculating …
… by the cancer cells …
… by this new joint …

Flow in Process Description

A good flow of ideas can also be achieved by combining or linking verb phrases.

Each virus strain is grown separately inside the eggs over the course of several days, after which it is harvested, inactivated, and purified.
First, the virus strains most likely to cause disease are identified and three are selected for vaccine development. The virus samples of each selected strain are injected into separate batches of fertilized eggs to amplify the amount of virus. Each virus strain is grown separately inside the eggs over the course of several days, after which it is harvested, inactivated, and purified. The purified virus strains are then combined to create the vaccine, blended with a carrier fluid, and dispensed into vials.

By using selected and purified as adjectives, the writer establishes a strong connection between the sentences

Active Voice

When processes are taking place without direct human intervention, active voice is often used and often a mixture of passive and active voices are used depending on the process.

The Sun rises in the east and sets in the west.
Most metals expand and contract with variations in temperature.
The beam fractures when the load upon it becomes too great.
When demand increases, prices are likely to rise.

Indirect Questions

A way to introduce a problem is to use an adversative sentence connector, such as however or nevertheless.

However, this system/process/idea has its problems.
Nevertheless, few solutions have been found to ….
Despite this, little progress has been made in ….
Nevertheless, the problem remains as to how ….

Introducing the solution

Solution tex usually follows the definition of problems

To address this problem ….
One approach currently under study involves ….
Solutions to this problem are now widely discussed. One remedy is to ….
One method to address this difficulty is to ….
There are two possible ways of handling this problem. The first …. The second ….
Several options are available to address this obstacle. However, the best one seems to be ….
A radically different design/model of … can overcome this limitation.
Recently, researchers have made significant progress in overcoming this difficulty by ….

Data Commentary

Table
Graph
Figure
Non-verbal illustration

Purposes of Date commentary

Highlight the results of research
Use the data to support a point of making an argument
Assesstheory, common beliefs, or general practice in light of the given data
Compare and evaluate different datasets
Assess the reliability of the data in terms of the methodology that produced it
Discuss the implications of the data
Make recommendations

Structure of Data commentary

location elements and/or summary statements
highlighting statements
discussions of Implications, problems, exceptions, recommendations, other interesting aspects of the data

Linking as Clauses

in: As shown in Table 1 ….
by: As predicted by the model ….
on: As described on the previous page ….

Likelihood

Strong → Weak

It is clear that …
It is rather clear that …
It is very probable/highly/ likely that …
It is probable/likely that …
It is possible that …
It is unlikely that …