How to write an amazing abstract, and use abstracts as a thinking tool to make writing the paper easier.

What will you get?

Abstracts are high-stakes texts. They can make the difference between an editorial desk reject or your paper being sent out for review. They are freely available for anyone with an internet connection to read. And they may be all that someone reads of your work. So getting them right is crucial. If you find writing abstracts easy, you’re not writing good abstracts. However, help is at hand! This workshop will:

1. Look at a formula for the conceptual and written structure of abstracts
2. Explore examples of real abstracts
3. Consider how abstracts can be used as a thinking tool to help write good papers
4. Give participants opportunity to review others’ abstracts and get feedback on their own.

Pre-workshop preparation

1. Watch this short video about reviewing others’ work – this is important as we will be doing some real reviewing during the workshop, and we need to do so helpfully and ethically.
2. Print off three hard copies of an abstract (i.e. the same one three sides) this should
   1. Ideally be 100-250 words
   2. Have your name clearly printed on the top
   3. Each copy on a separate page (so the reverse is blank)
3. If you can, imagine what your key findings and overall conclusion/argument might be. It doesn’t matter if you haven’t got to this stage of your research yet; you can still think what might be the case (e.g. best case scenario, what would you be writing?).
4. If you don’t have an abstract (e.g. from a proposal or conference), then write a new one. If you have an existing one, see the point above about including findings/conclusions.

Venue: Pipitea campus, RH MZ 03

Presenter:

Associate Professor Nick Hopwood teaches at the University of Technology, Sydney. You can find out more about Nick from his blog, youtube channel, and twitter feed