Editing To Lengthen & Add Substance to an Academic or Scientific Paper
Although some scholars are extremely verbose when it comes to writing up the results of their research, there are many other academics and scientists who struggle with producing enough text to constitute a complete research paper. Writing is a challenging task, especially when that writing reports the methods, results and conclusions of complex research, and it can be very difficult indeed to transform thoughts into prose that clearly communicates sophisticated ideas and their logical development based on sound evidence. Journal guidelines usually indicate upper word limits that should not be exceeded, but fewer provide minimum word limits for papers submitted for consideration. This does not mean, however, that acquisitions proofreaders do not have the notion of a minimum publishable unit in mind when they assess research papers for possible publication.
A minimum publishable unit is generally understood as a manuscript that represents a complete study – one that contains and explains original research, significant results and a meaningful argument. It is therefore wise to focus on these three essential elements while reporting your work and to increase the amount of text dedicated to each when attempting to lengthen a manuscript. You might, for instance, work at describing your research and its methods in more detail and perhaps add a figure or two to help your readers visualise instruments and processes. You might present your findings at greater length, perhaps by adding more material or comparing, if you have not already done so, the results achieved through different trials or instruments. Remember that tables are almost always useful when sharing complicated data, so they might be added to clarify the presentation of your findings.
Finally, the overall argument of an academic or scientific paper can usually be enhanced and highlighted for readers, so perhaps your introduction or background material could be shored up with a more specific or more compelling description of the topic you are exploring, one that engages readers immediately by demonstrating how the problem affects lives and how its resolution, guided by your research, will improve them. The analysis and discussion of results and the presentation of implications and recommendations can almost always be expanded as well by reading and reflecting on what you have already written. Often reconsidering these aspects of your writing in relation to some of the main sources you have cited will give you plenty of substance for producing new thoughts and new text.
It is essential to keep in mind, however, as you lengthen your manuscript that everything you write should have a purpose within the larger design of your article. Adding material to your first draft should be an exercise in clarifying your research for your anticipated readers and advancing your own thoughts and ideas. It should not be an exercise in padding your prose with redundant or irrelevant text that will only bog down your argument and make it appear as though you did not have enough real research and argumentation to fill your paper. In extreme situations more research may need to be conducted in order to provide the substance you require for a lengthier discussion, but before taking such a monumental step it is wise to have a mentor or colleague who has successfully published his or her own scholarly writing take a look at your draft. Such a reader will be able to come to your work with an informed objectivity that may be beyond you at present, deeply involved as you are in your own research. He or she may therefore be able to identify very quickly instances in which more information or explanation would be useful and even necessary to fill gaps in your argument or increase the persuasive nature of your conclusions.
Why Our Editing and Proofreading Services?
At Proof-Reading-Service.com we offer the highest quality journal article editing, phd thesis editing and proofreading services via our large and extremely dedicated team of academic and scientific professionals. All of our proofreaders are native speakers of English who have earned their own postgraduate degrees, and their areas of specialisation cover such a wide range of disciplines that we are able to help our international clientele with research editing to improve and perfect all kinds of academic manuscripts for successful publication. Many of the carefully trained members of our expert editing and proofreading team work predominantly on articles intended for publication in scholarly journals, applying painstaking journal editing standards to ensure that the references and formatting used in each paper are in conformity with the journal’s instructions for authors and to correct any grammar, spelling, punctuation or simple typing errors. In this way, we enable our clients to report their research in the clear and accurate ways required to impress acquisitions proofreaders and achieve publication.
Our scientific proofreading services for the authors of a wide variety of scientific journal papers are especially popular, but we also offer manuscript proofreading services and have the experience and expertise to proofread and edit manuscripts in all scholarly disciplines, as well as beyond them. We have team members who specialise in medical proofreading services, and some of our experts dedicate their time exclusively to PhD proofreading and master’s proofreading, offering research students the opportunity to improve their use of formatting and language through the most exacting PhD thesis editing and dissertation proofreading practices. Whether you are preparing a conference paper for presentation, polishing a progress report to share with colleagues, or facing the daunting task of editing and perfecting any kind of scholarly document for publication, a qualified member of our professional team can provide invaluable assistance and give you greater confidence in your written work.
If you are in the process of preparing an article for an academic or scientific journal, or planning one for the near future, you may well be interested in a new book, Guide to Journal Publication, which is available on our Tips and Advice on Publishing Research in Journals website.
