WRITING AND REVISING

Writing Tips

• What do you want to say?  Think before you write.  Outline ideas or your argument before starting.
   
• Who is your reader?  Even if you are writing for an expert in the field, imagine that you are explaining your ideas to an intelligent stranger.  Make your sentences specific, clear, concise.
   
• Avoid process comments, such as “I will now discuss x, then critique y, and summarize, closing with z.”  Scientific writing, where the emphasis is on logical argument and results, often uses an impersonal third-person approach.  First-person recounting can be distracting, at best.
   
• Use simple words, cut out jargon, and trim excess wherever possible.  In other words,

Omit needless words.  Vigorous writing is concise.  A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.  This requires not that the writer make all sentences short, or avoid all detail and treat subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.  (Strunk & White, 2000, p. 23)

• Use strong verbs in the active voice; by translating the passive into active, your writing will be livelier.
  

  Wrong: The investigation was conducted by researchers who found that…
  Right: Researchers investigated …and found that….

Grammatical Guidelines

• Your subject and verb should agree in person and in number.
  

  Wrong: The subjects each has his or her own identification code..
  Right: The participants each have their own identification code.
   

• Parallel construction of words, phrases and clauses will improve the flow of your writing and heighten clarity, thus enhance reader comprehension.
  

  Wrong: …government of, by and for the people
  Right: …government of the people, by the people and for the people
   

• Use parallel construction not only in sentences but in lists, outlines, or headings, in order to provide impact and to simplify your writing.  
   
• Use commas, colons, semicolons, and dashes to vary your sentence structure, but know which is appropriate when.  Consult a good style book, as well as a dictionary and thesaurus.

Revising Checklist

	Give yourself 24 hours to get some distance from your writing before revising.
	Read it aloud, to yourself or a colleague. If it doesn’t make sense to you, or the other person, it certainly won’t make sense to your reader. The sentences or paragraphs that are hard to read or comprehend are those to rewrite, perhaps even rethink what you mean to say.
	If a sentence sounds awkward, even though it makes sense to you, rewrite it. Don’t make your reader suffer through clumsy prose to find your ideas, as in: In a broader sense, one might view much of the history of psychology in terms of the tension generated by these two seemingly contradictory components of the human organism, a history that has involved an oscillation between periods in which the field has focused primarily on motivational issues and periods in which it has focused principally on cognitive issues. [The same sentence revised:] The history of psychology reflects a tension between these two components.  It has oscillated between a focus on motivation and a focus on cognition. (Clark, 1988, p. 1)
	Outline what you have written, if you didn’t start with an outline, paragraph by paragraph, idea by idea.
	Be on the lookout for new ideas that can arise from your revisions.
	Edit for bias. Avoid stereotypes and labels, or find substitutes for words that could be seen as insensitive, such as ethnic references or masculine pronouns.
	Run Spell Check! It often catches typographical and grammatical errors. But remember, Spell Check misses homophones, words that sound alike (e.g., ‘affect’ or to influence, and ‘effect’ meaning a result or to bring about, to accomplish). Therefore, before you hand your paper in…
	Proofread once again. A good tip is to read the paper one line at a time, covering the remainder with a sheet of paper so you can focus. Otherwise you can schedule an appointment with a Writing Center tutor to help with this stage