Results, Implications and Conclusions

Results Summarize the findings. – Explain the results that correspond to the hypotheses. – Present interesting and related interpretations. Verify the accuracy of the findings. – Discuss the test statistics – Explain why better than other – Explain why the results are reasonable (no upward sloping demand curves.) Usually present statistical results in a table with test statistics. It is also often helpful to provide a figure if you can provide a picture of how the results relate to the hypotheses.

Implications Often part of the results section Take the findings and work them into the story of the paper. – Did you find evidence to support your hypothesis? – What does that mean – Do the implications lead to secondary hypotheses?

Purpose of Conclusions Very important; clearly and concisely summarize how you accomplished what you set out to do You should write your conclusions next to last just before writing your introduction. Plan to re-write the conclusions MANY times. If you haven’t convinced the reader of your point by now, you will not do it here – Just state the results very concisely – Be accurate – Send a clear take-home message.

Purpose of conclusions (continued) Do not oversell your results. – Never try to draw conclusions beyond what your model or empirical results imply. – Just because you think something else is true, if you haven’t shown it, don’t claim it. – In the very last paragraph, you can speculate a bit about why certain things are observed and suggest further work to find out. Point out your paper’s weaknesses. Explain who cares about the results and why. Show value in the result not previously realized.

Components of the Conclusion section Start with a strong and concise statement about what has been accomplished in the paper. – Avoid giving too much detail – Present the general principles. Summarize your result briefly (if you can’t do this, you don’t understand what you found). – It should be consistent with what was foreshadowed in the introduction what was found in the analysis

Draw (economic) implications and lead into a discussion of the policy implications – Methodological papers might draw out the implications for future economic practice. – Don’t stretch so far that your implications are not justified. Be truthful. Acknowledge weaknesses – Questionable assumptions – Weak data or empirical results – Weaknesses in the method and econometrics Discuss implications for future research