University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

"Most common issues I see in scientific writing:
- Doesn’t explain why the problem is important.
- No clear takeaway message. (How would the reader explain it to a colleague?)
- Sentences too long/complex.
- Doesn’t offer intuition for results.
- Over-stated conclusions." 

-@nataliexdean

Natalie E. Dean tweets about the challenges she's encountered while reading through scientific papers

Solutions: Using unnecessarily complex/abstract structure and/or jargon helps no-one

Twitter

Journalists interpreting preprints effect on scicomm according to Jessica Rivera MS (reply to nataliexdean)

Heather Lander PhD responds to nataliexdeans tweet reaffirming her message

Tim Plante MD MHS responds to nataliexdean with his solution to help first time writers

Tweet is about common issues scientists see in other scientist’s papers due to vague or unnecessarily complex writing. Conclusions are also made without necessary evidence to back it up. Results lack intuitive explanation on how to read it. 


Analysis of Natalie E. Dean tweet


Research papers will be more useful and more easily understood and appreciated by scientists if they clearly state a problem, why the problem is important, and what the main takeaway is of the paper. 


Hypothesis 1 of Natalie E. Dean tweet


A research paper will be more easily understood and appreciated if the paper clearly states a problem and explains why the problem is important, as well as what the main takeaway is

Hypothesis 2 of Natalie E. Dean tweet


Papers can be made more comprehensible if results were written in such a way that if a reader looked exclusively at the results without having read the full paper, they could still understand what the results are and what they mean.

Hypothesis 3 of Natalie E. Dean tweet

Researchers are often eager to share the insights from their study, which can lead them to forget to qualify their conclusions (explaining the limitations of the study, possible biases, need for further studies, etc.) 

Hypothesis 4 of Natalie E. Dean tweet

Researchers can address common pitfalls with scientific writing if they have a tool that facilitates peer feedback on research papers. Preprint papers often forego much of the peer review process which would normally catch common writing pitfalls, so rapid peer review mechanisms should be provided for preprint papers. Possible mechanisms for feedback: discussion board / forum, peer comments and annotations.    

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