Write in English, not in “Science Speak”

Woman scientist writing on her laptop in the laboratory with male colleague in the background

Scientific research is hard; writing a scientific paper in good English style can be even harder.

Pick up almost any paper in a scientific journal, and you’ll encounter sentences like the following:

  1. The radially symmetric solution of the three-dimensional foundation-soil interaction is obtained.
  2. Further, it was also captured from the velocity-time history curves that there was a large negative wave crest after the first positive peak.
  3. Finally, the most relevant details of its construction process carried out to ensure the exact position of the timber laths are presented.
  4. A systematic literature review is performed to assess to what extent the current evidence addresses the effects of the sound environment on cognition and learned helplessness measured by motivation in children and young adults until the age of 21.

Each of these sentences reflects a tremendous amount of scientific research and effort but is equally incomprehensible to lay readers—and probably to many scientists as well.

In this article, we’re going to look at some of the pitfalls of scientific writing and how you can make your writing clearer and more effective without sacrificing any of its scientific quality.

The Passive Voice Isn’t More Formal

The first sentence above (The radially symmetric solution of the three-dimensional foundation-soil interaction is obtained) is a very frequently encountered type of sentence in scientific writing. The sentence uses a passive construction to describe the obtainment of a particular result: The solution … is obtained. Such sentences are a challenge to readers because one often has to wait until the very end of the sentence to find out what happened.

There are a couple of reasons why scientists write like this. The first is that doing so sounds more formal than the standard word order. Second, it sounds more formal because it leaves the scientist out of it; it doesn’t sound as personal as saying, “We obtained” or “I found.”

However, plenty of good scientific writing references the researcher directly. Some very fine papers use constructions like we have shown, we investigated, or we found that. Formality isn’t necessarily established by word order, and, in some cases, the word order can interfere with the comprehensibility of the writing.

As I have noted elsewhere, a simple method for improving the clarity and comprehensibility of writing is to ensure that each sentence of a given paragraph has the same subject. The problem with using the passive voice is that when the performer of each action is the researcher, using the passive voice requires changing the subject in every sentence. For example, compare these two versions of someone’s morning routine:

The alarm clock was first turned off after having been placed on snooze three times. Subsequently, teeth were brushed and clothing from the dresser were donned. Breakfast was prepared and consumed in under 10 min. Using keys previously collected, the car door was opened and the ignition turned on. The vehicle was driven down the road at a velocity of 60kph.

Lina hit snooze on her alarm clock three times before turning it off and getting up. She brushed her teeth and got dressed with clothes from her dresser. She ate breakfast in only ten minutes, grabbed her keys, opened the car door, and started the ignition. She drove down the road at 60 kilometers an hour.

Now, these two paragraphs are in markedly different styles, but it is not style alone that differentiates them. The second one is much easier to understand and feels much less like a disjointed series of actions than the first. The first paragraph, because it uses the passive voice throughout, creates a series of actions that do not feel otherwise connected.

Thus, Sentence 1 above can be rewritten as We obtained the radially symmetric solution for the three-dimensional foundation-soil interaction or The researchers obtained the radially symmetric solution for the three-dimensional foundation-soil interaction without any loss of quality and with a great improvement in the comprehensibility of the writing.

The Curse of Knowledge

One of the hardest things for a writer to remember is that not everyone knows what you know. When we write, we know what we mean to say, so it doesn’t occur to us that no one else might understand what we’ve written.

There are a couple of ways to avoid this very common pitfall.

Background

Even the most seasoned professional needs the occasional reminder about developments in the field. Brief explanations of phenomena or processes can provide much-needed clarity.

Now, given that most of the people reading your paper will be familiar with the subject matter, you don’t need to go into great depth—you don’t need to do what legal writers often do. As one colleague noted: “Before they can talk about this year’s car models, they have to go through the whole invention of the wheel.” Having said that, if you wish to be understood by a broader audience or the media, providing a little background can help.

Use Verbs, Not Nouns

Consider the following sentence:

(1) Morale in the department has improved ever since the reorganization.

It is good to know that morale has improved, but the reader doesn’t have any sense of why it has because reorganization is opaque. The reorganization of what? How?

Consider this sentence:

(2) Morale in the department has improved ever since we reorganized the supervisory structures for our employees.

Here, the nature of the reorganization and its likely reasons for having improved department morale are much clearer. The remainder of the text can refer to “the reorganization” and be much more understandable.

Putting the Lessons into Practice

With these guidelines, let’s see how the example sentences from above can be reworked to be clearer and in a more natural English style.

Original VersionEdited Version
The radially symmetric solution of the three-dimensional foundation-soil interaction is obtained.We obtained the radially symmetric solution to the three-dimensional foundation-soil interaction.
Further, it was also captured from the velocity-time history curves that there was a large negative wave crest after the first positive peak.Further, the velocity–time history curves allowed us to capture a large negative wave crest after the first positive peak.
Finally, the most relevant details of its construction process carried out to ensure the exact position of the timber laths are presented.Finally, we present the most relevant details of the construction process used to ensure the exact position of the timber laths.
A systematic literature review is performed to assess to what extent the current evidence addresses the effects of the sound environment on cognition and learned helplessness measured by motivation in children and young adults until the age of 21.We perform a systemic literature review, examining the extent to which the current evidence addresses the effects of the sound environment on cognition and learned helplessness in children and young adults up to 21 years old, using the children’s motivation to measure their cognition and learned helplessness.

Some of these edited sentences are shorter, and some are longer; all of them are clearer.

Conclusion

The primary function of writing is to communicate effectively. Writing that is difficult to follow or that does not express its ideas clearly undermines effective communication.

Writing in clear and accessible language is essential for effective scientific communication. Avoiding excessive use of the passive voice, providing background information, and using specific verbs can significantly improve the clarity and comprehensibility of scientific writing.

When we narrow the gap between scientific knowledge and reader understanding, we not only make our writing clearer and more enjoyable, we enhance the impact and accessibility of scientific research to the wider world.


Let Schaefer Wordsmithing help you with your scientific writing. We are experienced in editing academic and scientific papers, articles, and other publications. Communicate your ideas more clearly and effectively and improve your chances for publication and greater impact.

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One Weird Trick for Better Writing

A trebuchet before a castle. Illustration of the weird trick for better writing

Okay, I promise it’s not that weird; it’s just fun to appropriate click-bait headlines. And I won’t make you sit through a 25-minute video or scroll through pages of text before I share this trick with you.

As I’ve noted before, writing is easy, but good writing is hard. However, there are a few simple things that you can do to improve your writing, including many of the tips that are on this blog.

One of my favorite tips is something simple but really effective at making your writing clearer and easier to follow. Let’s see if you can figure out what this trick is by seeing it in action.

Continue reading “One Weird Trick for Better Writing”

On Being Original

dictionary entries for original and originality

For centuries old was better. Old meant tried-and-true, reliable, dependable.

This was especially true in the ancient world. The Romans gave a pass to Jewish religious observances because they were ancient and venerable; the Christians, on the other hand, were some kind of crazy newfangled cult that needed to be suppressed.

But today, no one wants to be a rehash of what has long been; everyone wants to be an original, to say something new and fresh. Now, part of that is because manufacturers and advertisers figured out that they could get more money from you by hyping the “new and improved” version of the thing that worked just fine as it was.

But another part of that is the understandable desire to leave a mark, to make a unique difference—to say I was here. And for that, unoriginality won’t do.

Continue reading “On Being Original”

The Hardest Part of Writing: Starting

Man with his head in his hands, looking at a blank notebook

So, it’s National Novel Writing Month, and you’ve decided that you’re going to give it a shot.

There are a lot of difficult things about writing, from character development to story continuity to plot development to research, not to mention making sure that your writing is any good! (Psst, that’s what editors are for.)

But it doesn’t take long to discover the hardest part of writing: starting.

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The Sequence of Tenses in Reported Speech

strips of paper with the names of different English verb tenses written on them

In every language, there is a grammatical rule that is so embedded into the language that its native speakers are barely aware of it, even as non-native students of the language struggle to master it.

When I studied abroad in the Soviet Union,1Younger readers, ask your parents; it was a country more or less where Russia is now. I remember having a conversation with some Russian friends about the challenges of learning each other’s languages. “What’s the hardest thing about Russian grammar?” one of my friends asked me. “Oh, that’s easy,” I answered. “Verbs of motion.” (I even said this in Russian.)

“Verbs of what?” came my friend’s confused reply. He had never even heard of this category of verb—a category that bedevils students of Russian to this day. I explained what I was talking about, but it was clear that he was still mystified.

“Your turn,” I said. “What’s the hardest thing about English?”

“Sequence of tenses,” he said. In English.

“Sequence of what?” I replied.

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Write That Novel! But About What?

person holding white ceramci be happy painted mug

November is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo, for short). Every year, aspiring writers commit to writing 50,000 words of a novel in November. As the organizers at nanowrimo.org put it, the project is a “fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to creative writing.”

So, that novel you’ve always wanted to write—November is your chance. You can make a commitment to trying to get your 50,000 words on the page by the end of the month.

But what should you write about? Ah, there’s the rub.

Continue reading “Write That Novel! But About What?”

On the Use of Euphemisms

Letter blocks arranged to spell the word Euphemism

There are plenty of topics that make people uncomfortable. To get around this discomfort, speakers and writers have been employing euphemisms for centuries.

A euphemism is “the substitution of an agreeable or inoffensive expression for one that may offend or suggest something unpleasant.”1“euphemism,” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/euphemism. Accessed 10/10/2022.. The word itself comes from the Greek εὐφημισμος euphēmismós, from the noun εὐφημια euphēmía meaning “good speech” (an antonym of βλᾰσφημιᾱ blasphēmia “deceitful speech”).

Euphemisms are often used to avoid subjects that are usually considered impolite or taboo:

Deathdemisedpassed onis no moreceased to beexpiredgone to meet one’s makerlatebereft of liferests in peacepushing up the daisiesshuffled off this mortal coilrun down the curtain, and joined the choir invisible2From Monty Python’s famous Dead Parrot Sketchkicked the bucket, gone to one’s great reward, crossed over, bought the farm, departed, deceased, lost, no longer with us, gave up the ghost, in a better place, gone home, transitioned, and of course the most common of all: passed away

Losing a Job: let go, between jobs, downsized, taking early retirement, pursuing other opportunities, considering options

Sex: making love, doing it, sleeping with, fooling around, going all the way, hooking up

Bodily functions: powder your nose, break wind, visit the ladies’ room, indisposed, number one, number two, time of the month

It’s easy to see why people use euphemisms; who wants to discuss unpleasant or offensive matters directly? But should a writer employ them in their writing?

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The Importance of Good Writing

One of the great benefits of the internet age is that it is text-driven: emails, text messages, social media, and on and on. People are reading and writing more than ever.

Written text in need of editing to become good writing

But the quality of the writing hasn’t necessarily increased with the quantity. When everyone can publish without restriction, there will be a lot of poorly written content available. Otherwise good ideas can get lost in a sea of jumbled words and phrases.

Good writing and clear communication are essential if you want to stand out and be recognized. Your ideas will draw more attention and earn more respect when they are presented in ways that are easy to understand and remember.

An editor can help you with your writing not only by spotting the obvious grammatical and typographical errors but by helping to improve the flow and the clarity of your writing. An editor can help a writer avoid common writing pitfalls and enable the text to shine.

If you would like to improve your writing, Schaefer Wordsmithing can help you.