Scientific writing in practice

Graphs

• Software for making artwork for figures: PowerPoint (simple), Inkscape (advanced functionality, especially relevant for article manuscripts)
• Graphs: R and python packages (especially seaborn)
• Pasting graphs into the text
  • as graphics (bitmap, png, jpeg, eps), not as an Microsoft graphical object
  • with “In line with text” option (to prevent figures/graphs from moving around when text is being edited)

Text

Software

Microsoft word or similar. Please do not use latex or quarto pdf rendering. These are nice tools, but unfortunately they lack track-changes option which we need.

Introduction

Introduction is structured as an ice cream cone: <3 It goes form more general to more specific. The cone should be “pointing” exactly at your research question. Typically the introduction covers the following topics (in this order):

• General relevance of the topic

• Previous research research on the topic and its findings

• Gaps in knowledge, methodological problems or any reasons to study this topic further

• Your specific research question/approach

Discussion

Discussion has the following sections.

• It starts with a single-paragraph brief summary of the main (not all!) results without interpretation.

• The main part consists of the discussion of individual results, starting from more important and going to less important. For each result, one can compare the findings with the previous studies and speculate on the reasons if the results diverge. One can also speculate on the reasons for particularly interesting/unexpected results

• An outlook for future studies is not always feasible as a separate section. The outlook on what future studies should study or improve can be provided separately for each aspect of the results that is being discussed.

• A conclusion at the end should again briefly state the results and main implications.

General notes on text

• Throughout the text: use “working” headings for each paragraph that will be deleted later. They are useful for structuring the thoughts and the text. The heading should answer the question “what is this paragraph about?”

• Text structure resembles a computer program

  • There are specific building blocks that repeat. Within the paragraph, it may be “first, second, third”. Across the paragraphs it may be “The first/second/third phase of the experiment consisted of…”.

  • Listings of different things should have identical and parallel grammatical structure.

    Original

    Improved

    “The location of the illusory surface was increased when the inducers formed an illusory shape, compared to when the inducers did not form an illusory shape.  The brain activity at the location of inducers partaking in the illusory shape perception was inhibited compared to the same inducers not forming the illusory shape. The background region was not modulated by the presence of the illusory shape”

    “Brain activity at the location of the illusory surface was increased when the inducers formed an illusory shape compared to when the inducers did not form an illusory shape.Brain activity at the location of the inducers forming an illusory shape was inhibited compared to when the inducers did not form an illusory shape. Finally, brain activity at the location of the background was not modulated by the presence of an illusory shape”.

Text layout checklist

• Use headings and subheadings function in MS Word

  • Useful for navigation

  • Simplifies formatting

• Add page numbers!!!

• Make sure graphics are pasted “In line with text” to make sure they do not jump around when text is being edited.

• For article manuscripts: also add line numbers

Reading recommendation

to avoid complex and bulky text:

https://stevenpinker.com/files/pinker/files/descioli_pinker_2021_piled_modifiers.pdf