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| Preface | |
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| An Introduction to Writing in the Life Sciences | |
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| Intended Audiences | |
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| The Culture of Science and Scientific Communication | |
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| Our Approaches to Successful Scientific Writing | |
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| A Critical Thinking Approach | |
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| A Process-based Approach | |
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| A Problem Solving Approach | |
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| A Goal-directed Approach | |
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| An Audience-centered Approach | |
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| A Discipline-specific and Content-rich Approach | |
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| Defining Your Writing Project | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| About the Process | |
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| Analyzing Your Writing Task | |
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| Attending to Instructions, Guidelines, and Evaluation Criteria | |
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| Seeking Clarification of Problematic Assignments and Directions | |
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| Selecting a Topic and Refining a Research Issue | |
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| Brainstorm topics that inspire your interest and enthusiasm | |
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| Ask knowledgeable experts for advice on hot research issues | |
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| Learn about hot research issues from the scientific literature | |
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| Learn about hot research issues on the Internet | |
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| Use your task analysis to refine your research issue | |
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| Add a novel twist to your selected research issue Check ahead for the availability of scientific literature on selected research issues | |
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| Make sure that you have sufficient time and resources to learn the science on your research issue | |
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| Learning about Scientific Discourse Conventions | |
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| Research Papers | |
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| Review Papers | |
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| Research Proposals | |
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| Analyzing Your Audiences | |
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| Key Questions for Audience Analysis | |
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| Taking Notes on Your Audience Analysis | |
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| Searching for Scientific Literature | |
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| Evaluating the Credibility of Published Scientific Literature | |
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| Searching for Peer-reviewed Journal Articles: Research Papers and Review Papers | |
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| Searching for Scientific Books | |
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| Searching for Scientific Literature on Web Sites | |
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| Reading to Learn Science | |
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| Solving Comprehension Problems | |
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| Reading and Taking Notes on Published Research Papers | |
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| Summing Up and Stepping Ahead | |
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| Developing a Goal-based Plan | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| About the Process | |
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| Setting the Framework for Your Goal-based Plan | |
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| Distinguishing between Just-Okay Goals and Powerful Rhetorical Goals | |
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| Devising Strategies for Accomplishing Rhetorical Goals | |
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| The Structure of a Goal-based Plan | |
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| Taking Goal-based Planning to Heart | |
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| Relying Your Experience in Scientific Writing | |
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| Adopting and Adapting Conventional Guidelines | |
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| Using Model Papers | |
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| Applying Your Task and Audience Analyses | |
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| Using the Helicopter Thinking Method | |
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| Starting to Draft | |
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| Revising Your Goal-based Plan | |
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| Check for whether your rhetorical goals are appropriate for the major sections in which you have placed them | |
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| Check your rhetorical goals for their content-generating potential | |
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| Check your rhetorical goals for their audience-affecting potential | |
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| Check your strategies for their detail and depth | |
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| Check your strategies for whether they are logically related to their rhetorical goals Summing Up and Stepping Ahead | |
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| Generating Content | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| About the Process | |
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| Solo and Collaborative Brainstorming | |
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| Solo Brainstorming | |
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| Collaborative Brainstorming | |
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| Reading for Relevance | |
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| Interpreting Study Data | |
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| Interpreting the Statistical Significance of Study Data | |
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| Interpreting the Practical Significance of Study Data | |
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| Synthesizing Study Outcomes | |
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| Focusing on Rhetorical Goals that Require Synthesis | |
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| Creating a Summary Chart to Guide Synthesis | |
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| Synthesizing Studies with Similar Conclusions | |
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| Synthesizing Studies with Contrasting Conclusions | |
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| Constructing Convincing Scientific Arguments | |
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| Setting up the Structure of a Scientific Argument | |
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| Evaluating Published Scientific Arguments | |
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| Evaluating Research Methods | |
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| Summing up and Stepping Ahead | |
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| Organizing Content and Writing a Draft | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| About the Process: Organizing Content | |
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| Choosing a Design for Your Organizing Plan | |
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| Taking a Principled Approach to Organizing Content | |
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| Organizing Your Paper's Major Sections | |
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| Organizing Your Paper's Subsections | |
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| Deciding Which Parts of Your Plan to Emphasize | |
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| About the Process: Writing a Draft: | |
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| Drafting Titles | |
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| Drafting Abstracts | |
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| Drafting Section Headings | |
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| Drafting Paragraphs | |
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| Drafting Sentences | |
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| Drafting Graphics | |
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| Citing References | |
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| Avoiding Plagiarism | |
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| Summing up and Stepping Ahead | |
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| Revising Document Design, Global Structure, and Content | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| About the Process: Revising for Matters of Document Design | |
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| About the Process: Revising for Matters of Global Structure | |
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| Disordered Sections | |
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| Weak Global Unity | |
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| Mismatched Organizing Themes | |
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| Redundancy of Content across Sections | |
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| About the Process: Revising for Matters of Content | |
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| Missing Content | |
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| Ambiguous Content | |
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| Inaccurate Content | |
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| Content that Misses the Target on Key Rhetorical Goals | |
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| Content that Fails to Adequately Address Concerns of Audience | |
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| Saying Too Little or Too Much | |
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| Logical Fallacies in Scientific Arguments | |
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| Revising Graphics | |
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| Excelling at Collegial Peer Review | |
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| Apply key methods of independent revision to guide your peer review | |
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| Take a goal-directed approach to generating feedback | |
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| Make it constructive criticism | |
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| Take on the role of writing teacher | |
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| Encourage dialogue | |
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| Avoid giving feedback based on personal preferences and pet peeves | |
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| Summing Up and Stepping Ahead | |
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| Revising Paragraphs | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| About the Process | |
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| Revising for Unity | |
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| Fractured Unity | |
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| Faded Unity | |
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| Frazzled Unity | |
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| Revising Topic Sentences | |
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| Missing Topic Sentences (when they're needed) | |
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| Misplaced Topic Sentences | |
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| Topic Sentences as Broken Promises | |
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| Vague Topic Sentences | |
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| Topic Sentences that are Too Specific | |
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| Revising for Coherence | |
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| Disordered Ideas | |
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| Missing Knowledge Links (when they're needed) | |
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| Oversights of Readers' Expectations | |
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| Lack of Parallel Structure (when it's needed) | |
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| Revising for Cohesion | |
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| Missing Cohesion Cues | |
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| Misplaced Cohesion Cues | |
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| Unnecessary Cohesion Cues | |
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| Revising for Sentence Variety | |
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| Lack of Variety in Sentence Length | |
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| Lack of Variety in Sentence Beginnings | |
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| Lack of Variety in Grammatical Structure | |
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| Lack of Variety in Tone | |
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| Revising for Paragraph Design | |
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| Summing Up and Stepping Ahead | |
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| Revising Sentences | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| About the Process | |
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| Revising for Logic and Clarity | |
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| Illogical Expressions and Comparisons | |
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| Anthropomorphism | |
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| Dangling Modifiers | |
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| Vagueness | |
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| Unclear Pronoun Reference | |
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| Illogical Tense Shifts | |
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| Problematic Shifts in Point of View | |
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| Misplaced and Awkward Phrasing | |
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| Inappropriate Emphasis | |
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| Revising for Style and Structure | |
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| Weak Subjects and Verbs | |
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| Misuses of Active Voice and Passive Voice | |
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| Wordiness | |
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| Unnecessary Jargon | |
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| Excessive Separation of Subjects and Verbs | |
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| Long Noun Trains | |
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| Lack of Parallel Structure | |
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| Revising Basic Grammar Errors | |
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| Sentence Fragments | |
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| Subject-Verb Disagreement | |
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| Noun-Pronoun Disagreement | |
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| Revising for Word Choice | |
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| Affect, Effect | |
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| As, Because, Since | |
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| Amount, Number | |
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| Compose, Comprise | |
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| Gender, Sex | |
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| Less, Few, Fewer, | |
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| Study, Experiment | |
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| That, Which | |
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| Than, Then | |
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| Who, Whom | |
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| Revising Punctuation and Mechanics | |
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| Problems Involving Commas | |
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| Problems Involving Semicolons | |
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| Problems Involving Apostrophes | |
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| Problems Involving Colons | |
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| Problems Involving Hyphens | |
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| Problems Involving Quotation Marks | |
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| Problems Involving Capitalization | |
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| Revising for Biased and Inadvertently Offensive Language | |
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| Sexist Language | |
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| Age-Biased Language | |
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| Biased Language Involving Ethnic and Racial Groups | |
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| Summing Up and Stepping Ahead | |
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| Rhetorical Goals for Scientific Papers | |
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| Chapter Introduction | |
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| Rhetorical Goals for Introduction Sections | |
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| Present your research issue and explain its unresolved status. | |
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| Convince readers that your research issue is truly important and therefore worth resolving. | |
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| State your hypotheses and explain their rationale. | |
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| Introduce the novel and unique features of your research and writing project. | |
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| Present the specific purposes of your research and writing project. | |
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| Present your claims. | |
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| Describe the methods that you used, or plan to use, in carrying out your study. | |
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| Justify your use of selected methods. Rhetorical Goals for Results Sections | |
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| Present the results that are essential for reaching and supporting your conclusions. | |
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| Rhetorical Goals for Discussion Sections | |
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| Briefly reintroduce the defining features of your study. | |
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| State your conclusions and support them with your study's results. | |
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| Relate your study's outcomes to those from previous studies on your research issue. | |
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| Discuss the mechanisms that underlie your study's main results, and argue for the most plausible underlying mechanisms (when such an argument is warranted). | |
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| Acknowledge significant methodological shortcomings to your study, and explain how they may have influenced its outcomes. | |
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| Discuss the practical implications and applications of your study's results. | |
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| Propose future studies on your research issue. | |
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| Rhetorical Goals for the Body of Review Papers | |
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| Provide essential background knowledge about the studies, critical evaluations, and arguments that are central to your review paper. | |
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| Summarize the published studies on your topic or research issue. | |
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| Synthesize the published studies on your topic or research issue. | |
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| Explain and argue for the mechanisms underlying the results of the published studies you are reviewing. | |
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| Convince readers to accept your original arguments. | |
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| Rhetorical Goals for the Conclusion Section of Review Papers | |
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| Briefly reiterate the key information, ideas, and arguments that were central to the body of your review paper. | |
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| Suggest future directions and new studies on your paper's topic or research issue. | |
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| Guidelines for Preparing and Delivering Oral Presentations and Poster Presentations | |
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| Glossary of Sentence Grammar Terms | |
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| References | |
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| Index | |