Muhammad - writing an effective title is part of the overall strategy for successful dissemination. It should not be under-estimated in terms of attracting attention and potential citation. A good title should be informative, concise and, where possible, creative. Using a PICO format can be useful - with the addition of methodology and, sometimes, setting and location.

A title is a summary of the content in a single sentence. I have been doing research on materials processing and authored more than 100 articles. Each article title has the following components embedded into it.

(1) Material Name (Ex: AA6061/SiC composite/316L ASS/HSLA)

(2) Process Name (Ex: Laser Beam Welding/Friction Stir Welding/Stir Casting)

(3) Aspect Dealt (Ex: Microstructure/Wear/Any process parameter focused)

(4) Specialties if any (Ex: Appreciable ductility/High temperature wear/Dissimilar Weld)

Isaac Dinaharan thanks for your valuable contribution

Muhammad - writing an effective title is part of the overall strategy for successful dissemination. It should not be under-estimated in terms of attracting attention and potential citation. A good title should be informative, concise and, where possible, creative. Using a PICO format can be useful - with the addition of methodology and, sometimes, setting and location.

Dean Whitehead can you show me some examples please?

I think if anyone has to write attractive and effective title...he should learn certain tactics and he should have writing skill also...

Intelligently you have to understand first ..the aspect on which you have worked

second make yourself 3-4 titles of your own ..then take 2-3 minutes...to think which one is appropriate ...you will understand then yourself which one is appropriate and catchy and which is not

Muhammad Usman Khalid

Describes the topic and the method of the study but is not particularly catchy.

Dear Muhammad Usman Khalid for more information on how to prepare your paper in general, including the title, please see this highly useful guide entitled "How to publish your research" which was issued by the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) in the UK. About the title it is stated here: "This should be short, straightforward, and emphasise the importance of your work. Think about the key words someone might use to search for this article, and stay general."

Frank T. Edelmann thank you for sharing the publish guide

Tittle should be written in last along with abstract and should give complete idea regarding the components of his/her research study. In review research papers, when author start writing a paper with the some novel idea, his thoughts n knowledge base changes till completion of paper. So, writting tittle in last is more appropriate.

Dear Muhammad Usman Khalid as mentioned earlier by Dean Whitehead the title of your research paper should be "informative, concise and, where possible, creative". I would like to add the the title of a paper should be as short as possible. Thus I strongly suggest to avoid titles running over two or three lines, e.g. "Architecture of New Rare Earth Metal Complexes as Molecular Precursors for the Fabrication of a New Classes of OLEDs with Blue Shift Fluorescence and their Use as Sensors for the Detection of Micromolar Amounts of Nitrogen Dioxide". Such a title is absolutely not appealing to reviewers and editors, even though it might be scientifically correct.

Colleagues have shared excellent advice here. I would like to add a few more things

I am a nurse and I always pay close attention to articles with catchy titles. I love puns so we have used titles like “Stop, Collaborate and Listen: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Patient Care”

Dear Muhammad, you can also find useful guides to writing good research paper titles in the literature. See for example that article cited below which is entitled "Writing the title and abstract for a research paper: Being concise, precise, and meticulous is the key". The paper is available as public full text on RG. Among the most important points mentioned in this article are e.g. "Most readers read only the title and the abstract of a research paper and very few will go on to read the full paper. The title and the abstract are the most important parts of a research paper and should be pleasant to read. The “title” should be descriptive, direct, accurate, appropriate, interesting, concise, precise, unique, and should not be misleading." In any case the title of your research paper should be eye-catching and as short as possible.

Article Writing the title and abstract for a research paper: Being c...

Keisha - I try to do similar where I can - and often for a nursing audience i.e. Before the cradle and beyond the grave: a lifespan/settings-based framework for health promotion

I think Dean's advice is very sound. I would add that some areas of the academic literature require a descriptive title - without puns etc. - that exactly describes the content of the article as part of their writing conventions. You should also think of how your article is indexed in databases. If someone were to search for keyword in the title would they find your article? Make sure all the subject keywords are included. BW Matt

Dear Keisha Marie Oneill and Dean Whitehead that's a good point. Puns like "Stop, Collaborate and Listen" or "Before the cradle and beyond the grave" are certainly eye-catching and attract the attention of reviewers and editors alike. In certain areas of academic literature Matt Holland's advice that all subject keywords should be included in the title is also correct. I would like to add, however, that in our field of research, chemistry, the journals additionally ask for 5 keywords (see attached) to make the work easily searchable in databases such as Scopus or Google Scholar. Thus there is no absolute need to include them all in the title.

By the way, we had an article published in 2010 in the highly renowned Journal of the American Chemical Society (impact factor 14.612) where the title consisted of one word only:

Article Carboranylamidinates

I fully agree with Matt and Frank's points about keywords. 'Creative' titles have to bear in mind that at least part of the title will not include keywords. My example title, for instance, would not include cradle and grave - as keywords - but does have lifespan, health promotion and health-promoting settings - which are the main focus of the article overall.

I definitely take Frank's point that discipline often dictates. One assumes that social sciences/humanities would lean more towards creative titles than the 'hard' sciences - but that doesn't have to be automatic. I'm sure that hard scientists have a creative streak as well - and like to push the barriers of convention!!

Your research title should be concise while it encapsulates the whole idea of your work, usually with a reflection of the main themes of both the outcome and explanatory variables. 2) To be coined in a way to make it easily searchable, i.e., I would not add the keywords to the title; that would be making those redundant. Would use different words for keywords and title!

Hi Ayodele, just need to remember that in STEM subjects at least one strategy for searching on major databases such as MEDLINE is to search in the title field, i.e. title of the article. If your keywords are not present then you risk not being found. BW Matt

Oh, what I meant is that you avoid repeating the keywords you have in the title to avoid redundancy. So I know that every word in the title is a keyword as well, but it'd be neater to have different keywords in the title from the normal keywords list.

ان نلمح الذكاء في تركيبه أو بان يبعث في طياته ما يدعو الى الفضول,

please be in contact with DR. Deepak waikar ([email protected])

hi

It wholly depends upon your research work...its objective and perspective..but still we want catchy ...attractive and easily understandable title

Make 3-4 titles of your own...best will come out of your own efforts which you will never forget..

For titles, if we go for databases...or contact any other person...what is the function of our own brain....

SO BELIEVE IN YOURSELF...BEST WILL COME OUT

Dear Muhammad Usman Khalid personally I would always try to keep the manuscript title as short as possible but still informative. I hate titles that go over three or even four lines. Please also see this potentially useful link entitled "Organizing Academic Research Papers: Choosing a Title"

https://library.sacredheart.edu/c.php?g=29803&p=185911

No matter how the author tries to make the title of his article attractive and informative, it is enough to read 1-2 paragraphs to understand whether it is worth reading the article or not (I also have a category "later..." for articles, like Captain Kopeikin (N.V. Gogol, 10 chapter of first volume of the poem "Dead Souls")). For many (including me) too advertising or artistic character of the title causes rejection. In addition, it should be borne in mind that there are traditions of naming articles, and articles of the early or mid-20th century may seem at least strange, but much more interesting than modern ones, written in full accordance with the mentioned recommendations.

The title should summarize your work and should not be more than 20 words.

Dear Muhammad Usman Khalid for some additional information pülease also see this useful link and video entitled

5 Simple steps to write a good research paper title

https://www.editage.com/insights/5-simple-steps-to-write-a-good-research-paper-title