Caution
This is an editing strategy. Do not edit your sentences while you draft. That’s not efficient. See also: How to draft (fast)
1. Formulate precisely
As I have mentioned throughout this course, formulating previously is key to writing a strong paper. Vague wording does the opposite – it creates extra work for the reading, trying to understand what you mean.
Vague words: an effect, the effect, an influence, to affect, to influence, to impact; some, most, many, few, several, a considerable amount of, a lot of, several; it, that, those, which, the latter, these, there, ‘was altered
❌We determined the effect of the treatment.
✅We determined the effect of caffeine consumption on cognitive performance in college students.
❌ Many studies suggest an effect of diet on health. ✅Several longitudinal studies indicate that high dietary sugar intake increases the risk of type 2 diabetes in adults.
2. Use hedging appropriately
Similarly to formulate precisely, use hedging words appropriately. Hedging is the use of ‘uncertain’ words to indicate that you’re not completely sure about something.
Hedging words: May, would, could, might, suggest, seem, indicate, possible, etc.
Hedging is not necessarily a bad thing, because it helps to ensure that you introduce uncertainty where needed. However, when every sentence is hedged, the argument loses direction.
❌ This could suggest X, which might mean Y, perhaps leading to Z.
✅ This suggests X, which affects Y, leading to Z.
If there is too much, and inappropriate hedging, the reader will struggle to distinguish what is supported by evidence versus what is speculation.
3. Balance word choice
Academic language is official, hence you should choose your words appropriately. At the same time, don’t overdo it, because then your text turns into a jumbled mess of academese. To sound more academic, include words of Latinate origin (and vice versa, to avoid academese, include words of Germanic origin). As a rule of thumb, use no more than 1 to 3 words of Latinate origin in one sentence.
❌ The mechanisms by which machine learning models are capable of discerning among the diverse patterns inherent within the data have yet to be elucidated.
✅ How machine learning models can discern among the diverse patterns in the data is yet to be elucidated
4. Avoid nominalisations
Nominalisations are nouns that should be verbs or adjectives. Using this many nouns requires a lot of energy from your reader’s brains. That’s because nouns are more abstract than verbs. We need to hold all these abstract concepts in our working memory, while trying to make sense of how they relate. This is tiring, because our brains are not wired for so much abstraction.
Nominalisations often have these suffixes: -ion, -ment, -ness, -ation, -ity, -ment, -al, -age, -int
❌ The exploration of the interplay between soil composition and irrigation patterns in agricultural crops is crucial for the advancement of our understanding of the impact of climate variations on food security.
✅ Exploring the interplay between soil composition and irrigation patterns in agricultural crops is crucial for understanding how climate variations impact food security.
Here’s how to recognise nominlaisations:
- Can this word be a verb? The development → to develop
- Can you add ‘the … of’ to the word? The growing of → to grow
You can reduce nominalisations by writing actively:
Passive: This study was conducted to determine the effects of natural processes on trace metal distribution.
Active: We determined the effects of natural processes on trace metal distribution.
Tip: This strategy can be challenging, but it’s excellent practice and has a major impact on the “feel” of your text. Your writing will still sound academic, but it will be much easier to read and understand.
5. Remove filler words
Filler words make it harder for readers to grasp the meaning of your sentence – much like searching for something in a messy room. The more clutter there is, the harder it is to find what you’re looking for.
Common filler words and phrases: past history → history; advance planning → planning; future prospects → prospects; end result → result; close proximity → proximity; at this point in time → now; for the purpose of → for / to; it should be noted that → (delete entirely, usually unnecessary); the reason why → because; on the basis of → based on; at the present time → currently / now; with regard to → about; in order to → to
❌ There are several sustainability principles that are relevant to energy conservation that are relatively well-understood, including resource efficiency, technology effectiveness and adoption, as well as regulatory policies. ✅ Sustainability principles relevant to energy conservation include resource efficiency, technology effectiveness and adoption, and regulatory policies.
6. Use similar grammatical structures
Parallelisms are similar grammatical structures that create a sense of balance. Our brains like it. Without parallelism, they ‘stumble’ over the awkward sound of a sentence.
❌ The study aimed to investigate how environmental stressors affect plant growth, assessing whether soil composition has a significant influence on water retention, and the role of nutrients and sunlight in photosynthetic efficiency.
✅ The study aimed to investigate how environmental stressors affect plant growth, how soil composition affects water retention, and how nutrients and sunlight affect photosynthetic efficiency.
7. Write right-branching sentences
Right-branching sentences place the main action at the beginning, making it immediately clear what the sentence is about. This style is easier to follow, because you are not required to hold any information in memory before you can interpret the sentence correctly (which happens in left-branching sentences).
❌ By combining predictive forecasting with experimental approaches that identify species-level physiological tipping points, we may increase our ability to predict responses to future marine heatwaves. ✅ We may increase our ability to predict responses to future marine heatwaves by combining predictive forecasting with experimental approaches that identify species-level physiological tipping points.
Note that sometimes it makes more sense to have a left-branching sentence, for example at the start of a paragraph, or when applying the old-to-new principle.
Tip
Don’t have time for all this? Just cut the word count in half. That alone can already substantially improve the clarity of your text.
Further reading: Ott, D.E. (2018) ‘Hedging, Weasel Words, and Truthiness in Scientific Writing’, JSLS : Journal of the Society of Laparoendoscopic Surgeons, 22(4), p. e2018.00063. Available at: https://doi.org/10.4293/JSLS.2018.00063.