ENGLISH RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
TRUONG VAN ANH
tvanh@sgu.edu.vn
Chapter 10: Writing up
Twenty forms of procrastination
1 I just can’t get started.
2 There are too many words to write.
3 There are too few words to play with.
4 I’ve never written an academic thesis before.
5 I’ve never written a work report before.
6 I’ll do it tomorrow.
7 I’m not in the mood.
8 I’d rather be surfing.
9 It’s too noisy to concentrate.
10 I can’t type.
11 My computer has broken down.
12 It’s all been done already.
13 What’s the point?
14 The oven needs cleaning.
15 It’s too difficult.
16 I’m no good at writing.
17 I’ve only got half an hour.
18 I wish I’d never started.
19 I don’t feel very well.
20 The children will be home soon.
Twenty suggestions for overcoming procrastination
1 Make notes on what you have read.
2 Make notes on interviews you have conducted.
3 Make notes on your last discussion with your supervisor or manager.
4 Draft your contents page.
5 Type out your references or bibliography.
6 Draft the structure for a section or chapter.
7 Type out the quotations you think you may use.
8 Note down the points you think you will refer to.
9 Set yourself a target for writing a given number of words each day, week
or month.
10 Speak your ideas out aloud, tape record and then transcribe them.
11 Write anything so that you dirty your page or screen.
12 Work out how many words you will devote to each chapter, section or
subsection.
13 Write up to your word limit, and then edit what you have written.
14 Give yourself a treat, but then come straig

15 Think about all the other times you procrastinated, and what you did about it then.
16 Don’t allow yourself to do anything else until you have written something.
17 Give someone else the responsibility to oversee your writing.
18 Talk it through with somebody else.
19 Try writing at a different time of day, or time of the week.
20 Just write anything.
Editing and reworking your writing
Once you have written something – anything – the writing-up process becomes
in part a process of rewriting what you have already written. You will need to rewrite in order to:
• bring in new material, ideas and thinking;
• reduce the length of what you have written;
• revise old sections to refer to newly drafted material;
• alter the structure of what you have written;
• respond to the suggestions made by your readers;
• remove any inadvertent repetitions.

Writing to the appropriate length
+ June - August: Conducting the proposal
Writing the outline on a paper/article
Writing the abstract and send to a conference
+ September – October: Completing the paper/article
Submitting the paper/article
+ November – December: Completing the procedures to attend the conference.
+ January – February: Completing the first draft
+ March – April: Completing the work
Submitting the work
+ May – June: Defending the work
How to contract your writing
1 Remove unnecessary, qualifying or repetitive words, and perhaps clauses,
from sentences.
2 Summarize one or more sentences, perhaps whole paragraphs, in one
sentence.
3 Delete references and quotations which are not essential to your
discussion.
4 Replace lengthy descriptions by tables or charts where possible.
5 Remove whole sections, or perhaps even chapters, where these are not
central to your argument.
The need to expand what you have written is a less obvious skill in writing
up, but all researchers have to face it when they first begin to turn their outline
into the finished report or thesis. It may also be necessary at a later stage when
you, your supervisor or manager, detect imbalances or omissions in your work.
You can’t assume that your readers know all that you know, so there may be a
need to put in more explanatory material. To expand your writing, you might
use the five methods listed in Box 10.5.

How to expand your writing
1 Look for more references and quotations on the subjects or issues which
you are writing about.
2 Build individual sentences up into paragraphs by developing your
argument.
3 Add new sections, or even chapters, of relevant material.
4 Integrate appendices within the main text.
5 Take more space to discuss your methodology, and how well it worked.
Coping with interruptions
[W]hen I came to write, there were very few material obstacles in my way.
Writing was a reputable and harmless occupation. The family peace was
not broken by the scratching of a pen. No demand was made upon the
family purse . . . You have only got to figure to yourselves a girl in a
bedroom with a pen in her hand. She had only to move that pen from left
to right – from ten o’clock to one.
(Woolf 1995: 1–2)

Ordering a paper/article
Put the writing materials in order.
1. Abstract
2. Introduction
3. Literature review and Method
4. Result
5. Discussion
6. Conclusion
References
Appendix


The ‘classic’ dissertation structure is:
• contents
• abstract
• introduction (10% of words or space)
• review of the background literature (20%)
• design and methodology of the research (10%)
• implementation of the research (15%)
• presentation and analysis of data (15%)
• comment and critique of the outcomes or findings (20%)
• summary and conclusion (10%)
• references
• bibliography
• appendices

Possible forms for a work report
Short report
• Title page
• Abstract/executive summary
• Introduction (what you did and why)
• Materials and methods (how you did it)
• Results (what you found out)
• Discussion (what the results mean)
• References

Long report
• Title page
• Abstract/executive summary
• Acknowledgements
• Table of contents
• Introduction
• Materials and methods
• Results
• Discussion
• Recommendations
• References
• Appendices


Who am I writing for?
the researcher is also a narrator and an active producer of ‘knowledge’ in research . . . the researcher is also involved in writing his or her life, reflecting on experiences both within and outside the research context – both are also related. Here, there is the ‘intellectual biography’ of the researcher who not only ‘translates’ the experience of others but also writes and interprets their own life.
(Roberts 2002: 85–6)
Voice and style
When you start to write up your research, there are two related issues which you will need to address, whether explicitly or implicitly, early on. These are the issues of voice and style.
• Style relates to how you write up your research, which may be determined by the requirements of your audience, by your own predilections, or by a mixture of the two.
• Voice has to do with how you express yourself and tell the story of your research, and is something you are likely to develop further as you write and research.
Being consistent
Above all, whatever audience you are writing for, it is important to be consistent in terms of style and organization. Switching between styles is usually confusing for all concerned, and hence inadvisable, except in exceptional or carefully handled circumstances. Thus, if you have written your thesis or
report in the third person, and in a measured style, it is unwise suddenly to begin using the first person. The main exception to this is what you write in prefatory sections, such as a preface or acknowledgements, which lie outside of the main content of your thesis or report.
Grammar, referencing and plagiarism
Two of the most common failings of written-up research – even of books like this one! – are errors in grammar, punctuation and spelling, and mistakes in referencing or in the bibliography. Hence, one of the easiest ways of making a good initial impression on your readers is to ensure, as far as possible, that your presentation is error free.


Grammar, punctuation and spelling
Many researchers, even experienced ones, have problems with grammar, punctuation and spelling when they are writing up. This is not unusual and should not be a cause for shame. Many of us may not have had a particularly good initial education, or were more interested in other matters at the time.
For others, English is not their first language. However, once you begin to write up your research for consideration and assessment, as a report or as a thesis (and particularly if you are thinking of publishing some or all of it), your use of ‘correct’ grammar, punctuation and spelling becomes very important. Your
readers are likely to be irritated, amused or put off by errors; consequently, errors will detract from your ability to get your ideas across.

Some tips on grammar and punctuation
• Try to avoid long sentences. The sense of what you are saying gets lost, whereas a series of shorter, punchy sentences can advance the argument much better.
• Avoid one-sentence paragraphs. Paragraphs should contain a number of sentences on the same subject, and then lead on to the next paragraph, which will move the discussion on.
• Avoid beginning sentences with ‘joining’ words, such as ‘but’, ‘and’ or ‘because’. These should normally be used to link clauses within sentences.

• Avoid incorporating lengthy lists of material in your text. Your writing should read as a flowing piece of text, not as a summary or precis. If you need lists, they are probably better placed separately from the main text in tables or figures.
• Understand and make use of the full range of standard punctuation forms, including, in particular, the colon (:), semi-colon (;), comma (,) and full stop (.).
• Use double and single quotation marks (“ and ’) consistently.
If you are writing up your research on a computer, you might want to make use of the facilities which much software has for checking your spelling and grammar, and for suggesting alternative words to use. These can be very useful for checking drafts, but remember that they will not recognize many specialist words or names, and, perhaps most importantly, that they will often use American English spelling.
Referencing
Box 10.11 How to reference
Reference to a book
Covington, M. (1992) Making the Grade: A self-worth perspective on motivation and school reform. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Reference to a chapter in an edited book
Weiner, G., Arnot, M. and David, M. (1997) ‘Is the future female? Female
success, male disadvantage and changing gender patterns in education’, in
A. Halsey, H. Lauder, P. Brown and A. Wells (eds) Education, Economy, Culture and Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Reference to an article in a journal
Osler, A. and Morrison, M. (2002) Can race equality be inspected? Challenges for policy and practice raised by the OFSTED school inspection framework.
British Educational Research Journal, 28: 327–38.
Reference to a government report
Department for Education and Employment (1992) Choice and Diversity:
A new framework for schools, Cmnd 2021. London: HMSO.
Reference to material from the internet
Department for Education and Employment (2000) Boys must Improve at the same rate as Girls – Blunkett. Available from: http://www.dfee.gov.uk/pns/ DisplayPN.cgi?pn_id=2000_0368
Reference to a newspaper article
Evans, A. (1996) Perils of ignoring our lost boys. The Times Educational Supplement, 28 June.

Plagiarism
Box 10.12 provides some general guidance.
Box 10.12 Plagiarism and how to avoid it
In plain English, plagiarism is cheating. This occurs when the work of others, either wholly or in part, is presented by you as your own work . . . Naturally, in the course of presenting your own work, you will refer to the ideas, findings and explanations of others. Indeed, this is an expectation on our part which is encouraged as the standard road to academic improvement.
+ Copying any sentence from any work, you have to state it clearly in quotation marks or put the author’s name and year in parentheses.


Using tables, diagrams and other illustrations
It can be a good idea to include tables, diagrams and other illustrations in your research report or thesis, provided that these are both permitted and relevant.
Such illustrations may serve to illuminate, break up, extend and confirm your writing. Their impact and intelligibility can be heightened further if you have
access to a colour printer.


Panics
The process of writing up, like many aspects of doing research, is likely to give rise to a number of common worries, particularly among relatively new researchers. We end this chapter, therefore, by considering four of the most common reasons for panics:
• If it’s new to me, is it original?
• I’ve just discovered someone has written this before.
• It’s all a load of rubbish.
• Conflicting advice.

Summary
Having read this chapter, you should:
• appreciate the need to begin writing as soon as possible, and to revisit and revise what you have drafted;
• understand what is meant by critical writing;
• have a greater awareness of who you are writing for, and the alternative writing styles and voices which may be open to you to use;
• have a clearer idea of the structure and organization of your research thesis or report.


Exercises
10.1 Note down the context and themes for your research report or thesis. Draw a diagram or chart to make the linkages between these clear. What does this suggest for the organization and argument of your writing?
10.2 Draw up a chart of how you propose to organize your argument, giving chapter or section titles and summary contents. How much space (or how many words) might you allocate to each of your chapters or sections?
10.3 What writing styles are you comfortable with, and practised at? How appropriate are they for your intended audience(s). Discuss your preferences with your mentor, supervisor and/or manager.








Good luck!