<aside>
Obligatory disclaimer:
There are few, if any, rules for writing well. These are simply guidelines (tips, tricks, suggestions, recommendations, advice…whatever you want to call a set of specific but highly mutable instructions) for avoiding some of the most common pitfalls for student writers. Practicing using these guidelines will help you develop your unique voice as a writer, where you can decide when and how to bend or break the “rules.”
This document is written with class-based writing in mind. The advice is still generally applicable to research-based writing, but not everything will be equally useful.
</aside>
Academic writing is concise. Filler text and presentational phrasing distract from your point. Eliminating filler language can take some getting used to; sentences may seem oddly blunt or overly simplistic at first. Remember though that your first priority is to ensure your reader can follow your writing. It is better to err on the side of using language that is “too simple” than language that is too complex, confusing, or distracting.
Filler: I noticed that in the Smith et al. (2000) reading they argue that brevity is the soul of wit. Concise: Smith et al. (2000) argue that brevity is the soul of wit.
Filler: I find it interesting that both readings for the week seemed to agree that brevity is the soul of wit. Concise: Both Smith et al. (2000) and Jones (2010) agree that brevity is the soul of wit.
Filler: Studies have shown/[research has shown]/[scientists have proven]/[it has been shown] that brevity is the soul of wit. Concise: Brevity is the soul of wit (Jones, 2010; Smith, 2000).
Filler: I feel that giving concrete examples could help some students learn better than not giving them any. Concise: Giving students concrete examples might help them learn.
Any references you make to publications, lectures, discussions, etc. should be fully grounded in your writing. The text should have enough information for the reference to stand alone without any additional knowledge.
Imagine handing your paper off to a friend who is not in your class or works in a different lab—would they be able to follow along with your references or would you need to contextualize things by telling them what happened in class, which article used which methods, etc.? Even if the concepts are difficult to follow without necessary background, it should be easy for an outside reader to understand where you are getting your information.
You can ground your references by avoiding mentions of your specific class, including relative locations, dates, events, or components of the syllabus. When drawing on source materials, only include precisely what is relevant to your point and precisely what is needed to make your point comprehensible to a naive reader.
Relatedly, a general convention in psychology (and most empirical writing) is to refer to papers, lectures, and other materials by author and year. It is almost never necessary to include the title of a publication in the text of your research. If the reader wants to know the title, they will match your author/year citation to the reference in your bibliography.
An important exception is if you are referencing a complete work (like a book or movie, not a journal article) as a complete work (your point is about the book itself or introduces the book as a whole, not about one specific part of the book). This is exceedingly uncommon in contemporary psychology journal articles.
Dependent: The readings for this week’s class agreed with each other for the most part. Grounded: Smith (2000) and Jones (2010) share similar interpretations.
Dependent: The first paper had a very small sample size. The large sample size in Study 2 of the second paper makes those results more convincing. Grounded: Smith (2000) had a small sample size with just seven participants. Jones et al. (2010) replicated the results of this experiment using identical methods and a sample of 40 participants, making Smith’s original claims more convincing.
Dependent: When Smith (2000) did the bonobos experiment they found that the bonobos performed just as well as the human 3-year-olds in the first study. Grounded: Smith (2000) administered a theory of mind task to both bonobos and 3-year-old humans and found both groups performed similarly.