Writing scientific research is not an easy task because it requires you to be familiar with many things. You have to know how to write in English, you need to be aware of appropriate levels of jargon, you must understand basic concepts like experimental design and statistical analysis, and then there’s the structure of the paper!
It may sound complicated, but we can help you out here. In this article, we will go over some tips for writing academic papers that are good enough to get published in top quality journals.
We will focus on how to write scientific research under APA guidelines (American Psychological Association) as well as MLA (Modern Language Association) style. Both require similar level of literacy and formatting, so once you are comfortable using their format, you can switch between them easily!
But first, what is scientific research?
What is scientific research?
Scientific research is defined as systematic investigation or exploration conducted in accordance with rigorous standards of empirical evidence and theoretical reasoning.
Academic research studies aim to find answers to important questions by testing theories or hypotheses against observational data. As such, they are heavily influenced by statistical methods and mathematical equations.
The term ‘scientific’ comes from the Latin word scientia, which means knowledge or understanding. By defining research as a process informed by theory and experimentation, we also emphasize its importance in establishing true knowledge.
Peer review
The next step in writing scientific research is peer review. This is when other scientists look at your work and give you feedback on it!
Peer reviewers are usually working on similar topics as yours and will often take time to read through your article, make notes, and then write up a brief comment about what they learned and if their comments influenced how they approached the topic.
These reviews can be very helpful since most academic journals have several rounds of peer review before accepting the paper for publication.
After getting accepted, there’s an additional round or two where experts in the field can offer suggestions on how to improve the manuscript.
This not only helps ensure that the content is sound, but also gives credit to the hard work that went into crafting the article.
There are many ways to find peers to do this including word-of-mouth, social media, and specific journal websites and groups.
