Assessing the Research Papers

At or near the top of any list of desired qualities for a job or professional program is the ability to communicate effectively. Development of top notch communications skills should be one of your overall goals as an undergraduate. In case you are thinking that your communications skills are already fully developed, consider that we old geezers who have been writing and publishing for years still have a lot to learn. Whatever your prior experience, this program can help to move you to a higher level.

This introductory course places a heavy emphasis on written communication. Oral communication skills will be introduced and/or advanced in upper level labs. The primary writing assignments will be research papers that are based upon the work you accomplish in the laboratory. Papers will be written in parts that correspond to the sections that make up a typical scientific journal article. Introductions, methods sections, results sections, discussions, and abstracts all differ in scope, depth, style, and content even though they are parts of the same article. Learning how to write parts of a journal article will help you become a more effective technical writer.

Perhaps you don't see the relevance of writing research papers to your own future plans. After all, only a minority of you plan to pursue research as a career. Consider that a well written research paper shares the same strengths with most other forms of effective communication. Whether you are writing a letter to the editor or applying for a grant-in-aid, you may have to defend your position or objectives, explain your intentions, and/or defend a strategy. To reproduce any process you must be able to document it clearly and concisely. You must be able to separate facts from interpretation. Outside of science, consider the importance of separating facts from opinion in the fields of law or medicine. Sometimes it is necessary to summarize a complex issue or study because your intended audience simply doesn't have the time to read a full report.

The elements of a typical journal article allow a person to read selectively. Perhaps your reader only wants a quick summary, wants to "borrow" your methodology, is interested in a specific result or interpretation, or perhaps wants to know why this subject is important in the first place. It is much easier to extract the information that one desires from a well organized paper. Here are descriptions of the five written elements of a journal article. Acknowledgements and References have been excluded.

Resources

Please do not ignore any of the guidelines or specific suggestions for writing parts of a paper. If you are not sure how to interpret them, then please ask for clarification, but you mustn't brush them off.

Guidelines for writing parts of a research paper and supporting articles can be found in the Resources section. Suggestions for specific papers are included in the writeups of individual laboratory studies. You are strongly urged to use the required text as a reference and to go through each relevant chapter as you prepare to write specific assignments. The required text is

A portfolio of examples of parts of a research paper will be provided in class.

Expectations and performance criteria

No one expects you to start off as an expert in technical writing. We do expect you to make full use of the available resources, read and understand the feedback on individual assignments, and learn from your mistakes. Recommendations for the first paper are extremely detailed. You are expected to follow instructions, filling in the blanks as needed. You will prepare a figure and table for the first paper, and are expected to remember the form and style required for each element, including use of captions, titles, headings, and numbering.

Read the honor code specifics for writing each research paper for this course. No one is to have access to any other student's paper for any of the current studies in this course, from this semester or from any previous semester. If you find that such papers are posted on the web, kept in college libraries, or available in any other form please inform the instructor.

Overall criteria

• Appropriate form and style for each section
• Good organization
• Clarity of writing
• Effective use of paragraphs (except for abstract)
• Effective use of verb tense
• Effective use of figures and tables (results only)
• Accuracy
• Appropriate content
• Conciseness

Scoring and feedback

Research papers count for a total of 45% of your course grade (45 points out of 100). Each complete research paper will be scored individually on a 100 point scale. Abstracts, introductions, and materials/methods sections count for 10 points (1.5% of the final course grade) each, and results and discussion sections count for 35 points (3.5% of the final course grade) each.

You will submit papers one or two sections at a time. As often as time allows, the instructor will return your papers with printed comments, a score on the assignment, and a cumulative score attached to the back. While labs are in session the papers will be returned in lab. After labs are finished papers can be picked up outside the instructor's office (see Policies for details).

It is critical that you read the instructor's comments and address any issues before writing the next assignment. The instructor will keep a file containing all comments on all assignments for each student in the course. You will be rewarded for learning from your mistakes.

Caveat

You will receive very explicit instructions for the first paper, just to get you started. You will receive less specific guidance for the second paper and will be expected to rely heavily on past experience when you write the third one.