different forms of abstracts — simple abstracts and structured
abstracts— are usually used in academic journal articles, thesis
and dissertations. A simple abstract is an undifferentiated
paragraph of less than 200 words; while the structured abstracts
are typically written with sub-sections in about 200-300 words. The
traditional journals usually use simple abstracts, while some other
journals use the structured abstracts (Katz 119)
[2].
Simple abstracts
A simple abstract, although is often one paragraph and is economic
in words, it has four easily identifiable parts. Each of the four
parts answers key questions that the reader has: What is the
problem? How is the problem solved? What are the specific results?
And how useful is this to science or to the reader? (Lebrun
120)
[3]
Therefore, a simple abstract should (1) state the principle
objectives and scope of the investigation, (2) describe the methods
employed, (3) summarize the results, and (4) state the principal
conclusions. This type of abstract is often referred to as an
informative abstract, and it is designed to condense the
paper. Often, the abstract supplants the need for reading the full
paper (Day 30)
[4]. The following abstract, for example,
commence directly with this method.
Abstract
The titles of scientific articles have a special
significance. We examined nearly 20 million scientific articles and
recorded the development of articles with a question mark at the
end of their titles over the last 40 years. Our study was confined
to the disciplines of physics, life sciences and medicine, where we
found a significant increase from 50% to more than 200% in the
number of articles with question-mark titles. We looked at the
principle functions and structure of the titles of scientific
papers, and we assume that marketing aspects are one of the
decisive factors behind the growing usage of question-mark titles
in scientific articles.
|
Figure 5.2: A simple abstract from a report on using question marks
in the titles of scientific articles in medicine, life sciences and
physics 1966–2005 (Ball 667)
[5].
In the above abstract, four-parts are clearly identified. The parts
that cover the research scope correspond to the first sentence. The
second sentence introduces the research methodology, followed by
the third sentence presenting the key results. The abstract covers
the contribution in the last sentence but you need to read the
whole paper to know the details of findings and conclusion. In many
abstracts, it is very common to find that some elements are missing
– the background, the method or the results. Nowadays, although
most journals conventionally use such simple abstracts in reporting
empirical and laboratory studies, case reports and brief
communications, many other journals use structured abstracts for
full-length papers (Gustavii 58)
[6].
Structured abstracts
The form of structured abstract was introduced into medical
research journals in the 1980s and has been widely used in other
areas of research (Hartley 31)
[7]. Structured abstracts are typically written
using sub-headings:
·
BACKGROUND: One or Two
Sentence
·
AIM (purpose,
objectives): One or two sentence.
·
METHODS: Two or Three
Sentence
·
RESULTS: Less Than Ten
Sentence
·
CONCLUSION (original
contribution, implications): One Sentence or more sentences.
The Abstract is a mini-version of your article. It presents the
essence of your Methods, your Results, and your Conclusion. In the
structured abstract, you write simply “we did, we found, and we
concluded”. Specifically, you state the background of or the reason
for your study, tell what methods you used, list your main
findings, and end with your conclusion.
The wording of these sections may vary in different disciplines.
The following example in Figure 5.3 is a typical structured
abstract from an article in
Journal of Business and Industrial
Marketing. Obviously, this abstract slightly differs from the
“five sub-sections” structure, but it shows a clear structure of
the article.
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to establish the
importance and approaches in securing an organization’s legitimacy
from the network community of customers, suppliers and
manufacturers, including private investors and state-owned
institutions when marketing their products.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper presents an
inductive interpretative approach complimented by action-based
research founded on inquiry and testing.
Findings – The paper finds that the key to legitimacy
success involves using legitimacy orientations to demonstrate
commitment to the interests of constituents, acquiring legitimacy
from them, but concurrently considering the central government’s
influence on a firm’s legitimacy performance.
Research limitations/implications – The multiple
interactions proposed in this paper remain untested and might have
to be modified pending further empirical testing and
analysis.
Practical implications – In China’s telecommunication
market, a company’s legitimacy emanates first and foremost from the
development and commercialization of innovative and creative
technological solutions. This requires good, creative management of
technological resource and activity links, connecting the company’s
technology to network constituents which include local
manufacturers, carriers, software developers, investors.
Originality/value – This is the first published paper that
examines the proposed interactions among legitimacy orientations,
alignments, and performances from a “market-as-network” perspective
in a dynamic, transitional Chinese telecommunication
market.
|
Figure 5.3: A structured abstract from a report examining the
network legitimacy in China telecommunication market (Low,
Johnston, and Wang 97).
[8]
The above example illustrates that a structured abstract is a
mini-version of your paper. Written with sub-sections that parallel
the article, a structure abstract often contains more information
and is usually longer (200-350 words) than a simple abstract.
Therefore, writing abstract in structured format can ensure that it
is informative and complete.
Using the sub-headings and the appropriately spaced typographical
layout makes the content clear. It is easier for readers to scan
and can facilitate peer review. Generally, the structured abstract
is welcomed by readers and authors.
Structured abstracts are adopted by a variety of papers in health
science and social science. These include qualitative studies,
narrative reviews, systematic reviews, meta-analyses and randomized
controlled trials. However, many people believe that structured
abstracts are only suitable for empirical papers, particularly
those with ‘methods’ and ‘results’.
Some traditional
journals insist on the abstract in simple format. In such
circumstance, structured abstract can be written with sub-headings
removed. You can write an abstract in a structured format first,
and then to adjust it to the format as the journal required
(Hartley 33-35)
[9].
In writing the Abstract, use only the present tense of verbs, as an
abstract is about what you do NOW. The present tense is vibrant,
lively, engaging, leading, contemporary, and fresh; while the past
tense is gone, stale, unexciting, and lagging. You are suggested to
avoid the past tense in writing the Abstract since the past tense
can create ambiguity. For example, the phrase
was studied
creates doubt: did the writer publish this before?
To write a quality abstract, you also need to make sure the
abstract is coherent with the title. Remember that the purpose of
abstract is to make the title clear, to help the potential readers
find your article, and to help the reader decide whether the
article is worth reading or not. To achieve this, you need to put
title words (or keywords) in the abstract.
Specifically,
the first sentence of your abstract should contain at least one
third of the words in your title. These words are frequently found
in the second part of your title, i.e. its context. In addition,
you also need to include all the keywords in your abstract to help
readers rapidly gather competitive intelligence and assess the
levels of difficulty of the article (Lebrun 125)
[10].
In summary, two different formats of abstracts — simple abstracts
and structured abstracts —are widely used by researchers in
reporting their studies. Both formats of abstract can clearly and
comprehensively give a brief introduction of your paper, but the
you need to choose the abstract format carefully following the
guideline of the journal or the academic committee you write for. A
quality abstract is complete and informative, includes title words
and keywords of the article, concise and stand-alone.
Keywords
Keywords often stand along after the Abstract. They are often used
by many readers in searching the materials relevant to their
interests. Many editors also use keywords in grouping the articles
to issues of the journal or a set of conference proceedings. If a
published article cannot be found by readers or editors, it will
have little impact. Obviously, choosing effective key words is
vital.
Although there is no formal requirement for keywords, no rules for
formulating them, there are several ways of choosing keywords in
writing academic papers. In practice, the most common method is to
supply key words as many as you can choose within bounds. Sometimes
the journals or the conference proceeding editors require a special
number of keywords (often about six). The next main method is to
choose keywords that fit into categories already prescribed by the
journal’s ‘instruction to authors’. The number of keywords allowed
and the number of categories to choose from often vary in different
disciplines. Finally, keywords are sometimes generated
automatically at proof stage, by the library information system
(Hartley 38)
[11].
In choosing the key words, a wide choice of keywords increases the
probability that a paper will be retrieved and read, thereby
potentially improving citation counts and journal impacts. To
ensure your paper can be found and cited by as many as readers, as
suggested by James Hartley (39)
[12], it might be worth considering selecting
keywords from a series of categories such as Discipline (e.g.
economic, chemistry, biomedical), Methods (e.g. experiment, case
study, questionnaire, grounded theory), Data source (e.g. primary,
secondary, tertiary students, senior citizens), Location (e.g.
country, city, town, institution), Topic (e.g. air pollution,
super-virus, earthquake). Such selection of keywords allows the
search engine such as Google Advanced Scholar list your paper in
the results no matter which of the above keywords the reader typed
in.
The researchers sometimes have to trade-off between the keywords,
particularly when they write for the journals that bound the number
of keywords in the limit of 3~5. In this situation, choose the
keywords from recent or often-cited titles close to your
contribution. If you pick your keywords in this way, the searches
that retrieve these articles will also retrieve yours.
Consequently, the chances of your paper being read will increase.
[1] Beyea, Suzanne C., and Leslie H. Nicoll.
'Writing and Submitting an Abstract.'
AORN 67.1 (1998):
273-74.
[2] Katz, Michael Jay.
From Research to
Manuscript: A Guide to Scientific Writing. The Netherlands:
Dordrecht: Springer, 2006.
[3] Lebrun, Jean-Luc.
Scientific Writing : A
Reader and Writer's Guide. Singapore ; London: World
Scientific, 2007.
[4] Day, Robert A.
How to Write and Publish a
Scientific Paper. 5ed. Arizona Phoenix: ORYX Press, 1998.
[5] Ball, Rafael. 'Scholarly Communication in
Transition: The Use of Question Marks in the Titles of Scientific
Articles in Medicine, Life Sciences and Physics 1966–2005 '
Scientometrics 79.3 (2009): 667-79.
[6] Gustavii, Bjorn.
How to Write and
Illustrate a Scientific Paper. 2ed. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2008.
[7] Hartley, James.
Academic Writing and
Publishing: A Practical Guide. New York: Routledge, 2008.
[8] Low, Brian , Wesley J.
Johnston, and
Jennifer Wang. 'Securing Network Legitimacy in China's
Telecommunication Market.'
Journal of Business & Industrial
Marketing 22.2 (2007): 97-106.
[9] Hartley, James.
Academic Writing and
Publishing: A Practical Guide. New York: Routledge, 2008.
[10] Lebrun, Jean-Luc.
Scientific Writing : A
Reader and Writer's Guide. Singapore ; London: World
Scientific, 2007.
[11] Hartley, James.
Academic Writing and
Publishing: A Practical Guide. New York: Routledge, 2008.
[12] Hartley, James.
Academic Writing and
Publishing: A Practical Guide. New York: Routledge, 2008.
(本文作者：中国农业大学 王志芳）
(待续）
