Monthly Archives: April 2012

Writing Flow

I’ve been busy reading student papers, and often my most common comment to them is, “work on flow of ideas”. To improve flow I remind people that you are trying to create a complete picture of your research with your words, and how you create that picture will determine if a reviewer sees it the same way you do.

In general, writing a grant should be like doing a connect-the-dots. You should start with the main idea, the central point, the big reveal! I know this sounds weird, but getting the main point out gives your document a FOCAL POINT!  It gives your reader a key stone on which to build their understanding of your research.

This is idea is actually applicable to all areas where you are conveying information.

Example: Think of your best friend calling you when you are half asleep. They start rambling on about how they “had the most amazing night”, you half tune out while ah-ing and hm-ing in the right places. Then at the very end they “spring” on you the big reveal, “We got married!!!!”. Suddenly you are wide awake, wondering how this happened, despite the fact they just told you HOW. Now you are asking questions that will get them to rehash the same story they just told you.

Writing a grant this way is like doing a paint-by-number. You end up jumping around, filling in bits and pieces as you attempt to get the reviewer to see the picture the way you see it. The problem is YOU KNOW what the final picture looks like, but the REVIEWER DOES NOT. So in your mind you might think you created the Mona Lisa, but the reviewer sees something like Picasso’s Femme en pleurs (if you are lucky).

If you connect-the-dots, you start out with the big point, and then build your case one step at a time. You can think of starting with the big point as either point 1 on the connect-the-dots, or  starting with some central part of the picture already provided. Either way it gives you a center to build out from and around. In working through your presentation of ideas you are allowed to come back to an earlier point from time to time, but mainly you are building a very clear outline of your research. In the end, you will come back around to your first central point/idea. If you do this correctly, you and the reviewer will end up with the same clear image of what your research is, why you are doing it, and how you are doing it.

Flow is important not just through the document, but also through a section and even paragraph. A reader shouldn’t have to flip back and forth between pages or scan back and forth through a paragraph to follow jumpy ideas. The more work you make reading your grant, the less the reviewer will want to read it.

Creating flow is a problem for most people, because for most people our brains hardly work in a linear fashion. We tend to jump from idea to idea when working through things in our head. I know I already made the suggestion to free write to get ideas out of your head onto paper, and this tends to lead to topic jumpy stream of consciousness writing. I still suggest free writing, but remember to go back and organize what came out of your head! Start with the big idea, and then build you picture!

Abstract Writing

I’ve been editing some student abstracts for up coming meetings, and thought this was a good time to remind everyone what makes a good abstract.

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The problem most people have is that they want to say EVERYTHING in the abstract. When you are too intimate with you research, you tend to put a little too much detail (e.g., term descriptions, extensive background, statistics…) into the abstract. However, it should be simple and just give the a good idea as to what the research is about and how it contributes to the field.

Therefore, a basic abstract should flow as follows (color after refers to example):

1) Summary of your topic, and why it is important (yellow)

2) Basic theoretical issue / hypothesis (red)

3) Brief description methods (green)

4) Main results (description, NOT stats) <- for conference and empirical. (blue)

5) General conclusion (purple)

Example:

Downing, PE. 2000. Interactions between visual working memory and selective attention. Psychol Sci. 11(6):467-73.

Ok, someone out there is yelling at me saying, “Stats and [some other numerical data such as drug dosage] are important!!”. If you are writing an empirical abstract and have the room, go for it. Giving some numerical detail can really help poor souls with out access to your entire article, but remember if you are word limited, they are probably the first things that should go.

If you are writing a grant abstract this will change a little, because you don’t have results or conclusions. Instead you should state for point 4 what is innovative and/or significant about the research. In a grant point 5 should conclude the abstract with a statement on how the research will advance the field and/or what future research success with this research will support.

*** Writing Block Tip *** IF you are still having problems, enlist the help of a friend. Describe you study to them, have them take notes of what they feel are the key points. You will find that they will write down basically what is outlined above, and you can take these notes – clean them up – and TA DA you have an abstract.

Most conference abstracts had VERY short word restrictions, so following these guidelines should help you. They will also help you write a very direct grant or empirical paper abstract.

April 10, 2012 edit — Do make sure to look up any particular requirement by a conference, journal, or granting agency. Some do require that you do blatantly stick in words to mark parts (e.g., PURPOSE, METHODS, RESULTS, and CONCLUSION). I think this is kind of silly, but this is one way editors have compensated to get what they want in an abstract.

Writing Classes

Today I am editing a graduate student’s prospectus. This student is in the 3rd year, and I am editing what I know is their 3 or 4th draft. I know that their advisor has already put in a lot of commentary and some editing  in to at least one of those drafts, but I’m wondering how much the graduate student heeded the comments. Doing this is making me think about how I was judged on my writing skill at the stage, how I learned to improve my writing, and what graduate schools do to help their students. . .

Students – very few graduate programs offer a writing classes, and even fewer will require you to take one. My suggestion to you is to find one and take one. If there isn’t one to be found, approach your grad program about starting a class or even an informal seminar on writing. The best classes will have you write something relevant to your research and/or graduate requirements, and then have you trade that paper for several of your classmates to read and discuss. This enables you to get feed back from the instructor(s) and peers, while learning what makes or breaks a document by reading the papers of your peers. It also helps to have various profs rotate through discussing their tips and tricks on writing, and what they think makes a good document. The later will vary, but it will help you develop your own style.

Other options include attending a more generalized writing or grant course. The former will help with clarity, grammar, and probably will give you good tips on style. However, there are few subject specific writing courses available outside grad programs. They are good at helping to teach you how to effectively present a ‘story’.  This can be a huge help in learning to organize and present your grants. Grant courses can often be found generally offered on campus for free or cheap compared to a generalized writing course. If you are at a smaller university, look into what is going on at larger campuses nearby. Often they will let you take advantage of their classes/seminars, and departments can put you on listservs that inform you of upcoming opportunities for classes/seminars. One multi-week grant seminars i took was open to people from 4 different campuses in my area, but it was hard to find information about it if you weren’t on the campus it was taught on.

Get out there and find a class!!! You’ll impress someone!

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Look for a writing center on your campus. This can provide one on one help with writing and editing. Same warning applies – there often isn’t a wide variety of subject specific councilors. Most of them are English majors or similar, but you might luck out. Again, go even if there isn’t  someone subject specific. Grammar is grammar, and they will help you will flow and clarity. HOWEVER, remind them that (non-pop) science writing is supposed to be dry (but hopefully interesting), fluff is not a science writer’s friend.

Finding Grants – Part 1

The first questions I get from most students is, “How do I find grants”?

This is something that is pretty specific to your field, but there are a variety of ideas that should work for most people.

Before we hit the Internet highway and the traditional grants search suggestions, I’m going to discuss a few other resources you can look into first.

First, thing you should do is talk to your senior lab mates and students in your department. See what grants they have applied for in the past. If they have been successful ask for a copy of the grant and any comments they might have gotten. Both are useful to help craft your grant. Some departments ask students to submit a copy of successful grants that they keep on file for other students to look at. If you department doesn’t do this, ASK THEM TO DO IT!!

Second, go the library and talk to a librarian. Ok, this sounds antiquated, I mean when was the last time you actually went to the library? If you are following my other advice, you have been recently to copy out some old articles (that is if your university doesn’t have an online request system that get a work study student to go pull the periodical and scan it as a pdf to you <– BTW, This is AWESOME if it is available to you). Most libraries have subject specific librarians. They can often help you with information related to grants in your field, and can be an amazing resource.

Third, think outside the box. The Internet has opened a lot of opportunities to help funders FIND YOU! (shocking I know). One I suggest is called Rockethub – this is open to any scientist, artist, or entrepreneur. The fun thing about this is you get out of having to write a normal grant proposal. Instead, you get to use your (or a friend’s) AV skills. Make a video that sells your research and then write a little bit about it to back up the video. This is GOOD practice on how to make your research sound exciting and interesting, because lets admit it now; not ALL of us do researching that most of the general populous will find important and exciting (let alone interesting). The nice thing about something like Rockethub, is you can set it up quickly and then go work on finding other funding while money comes in.

I have found some other non-traditional funding sources, but they are more area specific. Let us know if you have found some good non-traditional sources.

Next time I’ll talk about more traditional  routes for finding funding, and keep building on the non-traditional.