In writing a scientific paper, it's important to do more than just present your data and
explain it.
To effectively communicate your work to the reader, it's necessary to tell a story.
By story, I mean a narrative that recounts a sequence of events in a manner that captures
and holds the reader's attention and ensures their comprehension of what your study revealed.
If you use a narrative structure in writing a scientific paper, people will enjoy reading
it and may be more likely to recommend your work to others.
The outcome may be greater visibility and more citations.
For example, research shows that papers reporting climate change research with more narrative
abstracts are cited more often.
But there is a better reason for a narrative framework.
And that is it will help you stay on track, avoid confusing digressions, and ultimately
develop a strong, logical argument.
Thinking about your paper as a narrative will also encourage you to thoroughly and clearly
explain each important step in the research and its interpretation.
Let's look at an example so you can see how this works.
As usual, I'll use one of my own papers to illustrate.
In this paper, my colleagues and I used stable isotope methodology to study patterns of nutrient
limitation in a mangrove forest.
In a traditional story, the theme may be a moral lesson, whereas the theme in a scientific
paper is the broader scientific issue that the research addresses.
Our overall theme was how nutrients limit plant growth and how this limitation may be
caused by factors internal and external to the vegetation.
This theme was articulated in the first paragraph.
Now let's consider the story.
A good story begins with a description of an ordinary world, introduces a conflict,
comes to a climax, and ends with a resolution.
This is called the story arc.
We started off in our paper by summarizing what we knew about the ecosystem we were studying.
The conflict was expressed as an unexplained spatial pattern in nutrient limitation that
we had uncovered at our study site.
Some mangrove trees growing on creekbanks were nitrogen limited, other trees that were
shorter and less productive were limited by phosphorus, and still others in a transition
zone were co-limited by both nutrients.
Story-wise, this pattern presented an interesting mystery to be solved.
Why weren't all the trees, a single species, limited by the same nutrient?
In writing the introduction, we described this ordinary world, introduced the conflict
or mystery pattern, and then summarized how isotopes could be used to figure out what
was going on.
Stable isotope methodology provides a means to assess 1, nutrient sources...,
2 biological transformations affecting nutrient availability...,
and 3 effects of environmental conditions on plant metabolism and growth...
These three items foreshadowed the way I would interpret the results in the discussion section.
Articulating such guideposts in the introduction, which will be revisited in the discussion,
is one way to develop a strong narrative structure for a paper.
A good story also creates an indelible picture in the reader's mind of when and where the
story takes place.
In a scientific paper, the author builds a detailed picture of the study site, experimental
setup, and the methods used.
This happens in the methods section where you want to pull the reader into your research
world and help them envision each step taken in the design and conduct of the study.
The next landmark in the story arc is the climax in which the reader learns the outcome
of the conflict.
In a scientific story, the reader typically learns how the experiment turned out, and
this part of the story is told in the results section.
In describing the results of our isotopic paper, I focused on pointing out the main
patterns that had emerged from the isotope data as well as environmental conditions that
might be useful in interpreting the isotopic patterns.
I avoided describing every blip in the data and let the reader scrutinize the tables and
figures to get the details.
By focusing on the main patterns in the results, I developed a clear view of what needed to
be explained in the discussion.
The resolution follows the climax of the story and is where everything is explained.
In the scientific paper, the discussion section is where you tell the reader what the data
mean and how the results agree with or deviate from work reported previously in the literature.
Inexperienced writers fail to discuss their findings and instead restate the results with
a few references to previous work.
In a traditional story, repetition of what has already been described will only annoy
the reader, who is looking for a resolution, an explanation for what has happened.
To avoid this mistake, the scientific writer needs to focus on answering the questions,
explicit or implied, raised in the introduction.
This approach adds to the narrative structure and brings the scientific story full circle.
In the end we identified two possible mechanisms to explain the observed isotopic patterns
and to suggest directions for future research.
In other words, the story did not end with our paper and would be continued in succeeding
papers on the topic, written by us or by other researchers.
In conclusion, even though academic papers must adhere to a traditional format, narrative
techniques can be used to improve them.
Keeping the story arc in mind will help you structure your narrative and develop a logical
argument.
There are also more specific techniques described in this paper that include.
Writing strong descriptions of when and where the study was done.
Narrative perspective such as occasionally using first person.
Sensory or vivid language.
Use of conjunctions which reveal a logical order.
Connectivity which is emphasized by repetition or reference to prior statements.
And appeal to the reader by explaining the point of your work.
I would add to their list use of active versus passive voice, which will make your writing
more dynamic.
Humans are hardwired for receiving information in the form of stories.
As scientific writers, we can take advantage of this human tendency to craft articles that
are more enjoyable to read.
Also, by thinking about the story you are telling, you will find it easier to write
a paper with a clear take-home message.
Thanks for watching and please like my video if you found it helpful.