Writing for a Journal Lisa Koonce The University of Texas at Austin

Writing matters If you cannot communicate what you did, nobody will “get” your paper It will get rejected You will get mad and blame the research community at large, reviewers, editors, etc. You’ll turn sour and grumpy You’ll go home and kick the dog and smack your spouse

Moral of the story Do not submit a manuscript that is not well written and polished.  PERIOD!

Writing is hard So what to do? It’s a matter of practicing with ◦ some general guidelines in mind ◦ somebody(ies) to read your paper and give you frank advice ◦ a careful ear to what people are saying  READ BETWEEN THE LINES  Why are they saying what they are saying?  Are they stupid????  Rarely …

Common reasons why people don’t seem to get it You are not communicating clearly

General Guidelines-Academic paper Introduction ◦ What is problem ◦ Why is it important  First one to do it… ◦ What did you do about it? Theory & Results section ◦ Tee-up the issue ◦ Lay out theory and ho’s – clear, to the point ◦ Write persuasively for an outsider ◦ Stick to the point(s)

General Guidelines-Academic paper 25 pages is about average 2 pages of references about average 3-4 tables/figures for experiment about average

Somebody(ies) to read it Hard to get people to really read it (very time consuming) ◦ Maybe just have them read the intro? Present it at workshops (internal as well) Don’t have the first set of real outside eyes be a reviewer  Unlikely to yield good results If you can, let it sit for a while and come back to it…

A careful ear to what people are saying … Often reviewers / outsiders say things that don’t seem to make sense. ◦ Sometimes they do not make sense for good reason … ◦ But more often there’s a reason why they are saying what they are saying.  Try to figure that out.  Example: no incremental contribution complaint  Is it early in the intro or buried on page 10?