Every time I have completed my experimental and/or numerical work, I always face the same problem (effective writing) once it becomes ready to be published.
Should the researcher start writing once he has got the idea? Or just after applying it and getting good results?
We can open this discussion to get much more experience regarding this issue.
The most effective way to me is to write down notes during the research process including ideas, methods, references, results, people who contributed, etc. These notes do not need to be written out like in a paper for publication, key points are sufficient. You will find these notes very useful when you will start writing the paper after you have finished the research project.
The guidance as per the following publications may further help, namely: "Capture ideas in a notebook, a file folder or your personal digital assistant, or by sending e-mails to yourself. Review and refine the answers. Regularly review this ideas file. Once your ideas are focused, you are ready to write…." see: MacDonald et al, (2006).
- Cetin, S. and Hackam, D. J. (2005) An approach to the writing of a scientific Manuscript, Journal of Surgical Research, 128, 2, pp. 165-167.
- Daft, R. L. (1985) Why I Recommended That Your Manuscript Be Rejected and What You Can Do about It, in L, C.L. and Frost, P.J. (eds.) Publishing in the Organizational Sciences. California: SAGE Publications, Inc., pp. 164-182.
- MacDonald, N. E., Ford-Jones, L., Friedman, J. N. and Hall, J. (2006) Commentary: Preparing a manuscript for publication: A user-friendly guide, Paediatrics and Child Health, 11, 6, pp. 339-342.
- Ortinau, D. J. (2011) Writing and publishing important scientific articles: A reviewer's perspective, Journal of Business Research, 64, 2, pp. 150-156.
- Pierson, D. J. (2004) The Top 10 Reasons Why Manuscripts Are Not Accepted for Publication, Respiratory Care, 49, 10, pp. 1246-1252.
Mohammed Rabie Follow these procedures, and remember that organization is essential. To be organized when writing a research paper, do the following significant steps:
1. Conduct thorough research.
2. Select your study subject with caution.
3. Take appropriate notes.
4. Create an outline.
5. Create a rough draft.
6. Write and proofread your final paper.
A lot depends on the discipline, language (rhetorical style of the language), and your own personal preferences. I usually begin with a research question based on my research (a subquestion). This means you may have multiple articles based on the same overall research but addressing different research questions/goals.
It is important to start off with some general theoretical grounding (so writing a literature review always helps me at the beginning of my research project). Using this as a basis, I begin my research design and write out preliminary questions (which always changes as I get further into my research) and start taking notes on my reasoning for research design choices, preliminary results, changes and reasons for changes in research design, limitations, and relationships between components of my study/research. I also will continue to look for relevant research, especially as my questions change (often more focused) and questions come out of my preliminary findings (including relevant research instruments/statistical formulas and tests). I use these notes to justify my research questions and analysis.
I'm not a linear thinker so I usually draw a concept map to help me organize my paper. This will also help if you are writing in a second language to allow you to organize sections depending on the rhetorical style needed for your discipline and your first and second language.
Depending on the study, I may start with writing the study design AS I am doing the study or I may start with the literature review. I always write the introduction and abstract last. I read through what I have written and then determine what the purpose of the article really is (letting the study determine the direction of the paper). I then reread the entire paper for consistency based on the introduction, making changes to each section so it meets the objectives laid out in the introduction (and cutting anything that does not meet those objectives, it can always be used in a later article). Finally, I write the abstract.
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