ENTRY 13: ABSTRACTS

Overview - Structure

Academic Articles are part of the genres that teachers can write if they want to do research, if they want to study from "authentic material". 

Not only do FORMAL (academic) ARTICLES share these features, but also they are headed by ABSTRACTS. An abstract is an independent text that comprises the most important concepts of the paper, the purpose of the research, the state of the art, what is missing, and the results of the investigation.

When writing an abstract:

AVOID all kind of "supporting material":

• Long background information,

• paraphrased sentences, too many adverbs or adjectives,

• quotes, references from other sources, overgeneralizations e.g. "studies have indicate that..."

• figures, statistics, tables, etc.

There are four types of abstracts:

• Critical Abstract.

• Descriptive Abstract.

• Informative Abstract.

• Highlight Abstract.

Each sentence in an abstract fulfils a specific purpose. These are called "MOVES"

• the overall purpose of the study and the research problem(s) investigated,

• the basic design of the study,

• major findings found as a result of the analysis

• a brief summary of the conclusions

 WHAT is an abstract?

An abstract is a concise summary of a research paper or entire thesis. 

It is an original work, not an excerpted passage. An abstract must be fully self-contained and make sense by itself, without further reference to outside sources or to the actual paper. It highlights key content areas, your research purpose, the relevance or importance of your work, and the main outcomes. It is a well-developed single paragraph of approximately 250 words in length, which is indented and single spaced. The function of the abstract is to outline briefly all parts of the paper. Although it is placed at the beginning of your paper, immediately following the title page, the abstract should be the last thing that you write, once you are sure of the conclusions you will reach. 

WHY write an abstract?

Abstracts are important for both selection and indexing purposes. 

• Selection: Abstracts allow readers who may be interested in the paper to quickly decide whether it is relevant to their purposes and whether they need to read the whole paper. 

• Indexing: Most academic journal databases accessed through the library enable you to search abstracts. This allows for quick retrieval by users. Abstracts must incorporate the key terms that a potential researcher would use to search. 

WHEN is it necessary to write abstracts? 

Abstracts are usually required for:  

• submission of articles to journals  

• application for research grants  

• completion and submission of theses  

• submission of proposals for conference papers 

What is IN an abstract?

What to include in an abstract: 

The format of your abstract will depend on the discipline in which you are working. However, all abstracts generally cover the following five sections: 

1. Reason for writing: What is the importance of the research? Why would a reader be interested in the larger work? 

2. Problem: What problem does this work attempt to solve? What is the scope of the project? What is the main argument, thesis or claim? 

3. Methodology: An abstract of a scientific work may include specific models or approaches used in the larger study. Other abstracts may describe the types of evidence used in the research. 

4. Results: An abstract of a scientific work may include specific data that indicates the results of the project. Other abstracts may discuss the findings in a more general way. 

5. Implications: How does this work add to the body of knowledge on the topic? Are there any practical or theoretical applications from your findings or implications for future research? 

Types of Abstracts

♦ Critical Abstract

A critical abstract provides, in addition to describing main findings and information, a judgment or comment about the study’s validity, reliability, or completeness. The researcher evaluates the paper and often compares it with other works on the same subject. Critical abstracts are generally 400-500 words in length due to the additional interpretive commentary. These types of abstracts are used infrequently.

♦ Descriptive Abstract

A descriptive abstract indicates the type of information found in the work. It makes no judgements about the work, nor does it provide results or conclusions of the research. It does incorporate key words found in the text and may include the purpose, methods, and scope of the research. Essentially, the descriptive abstract only describes the work being summarized. Some researchers consider it an outline of the work, rather than a summary. Descriptive abstracts are usually very short, 100 words or less.

♦ Informative Abstract

The majority of abstracts are informative. While they still do not critique or evaluate a work, they do more than describe it. A good informative abstract acts as a surrogate for the work itself. That is, the researcher presents and explains all the main arguments and the important results and evidence in the paper. An informative abstract includes the information that can be found in a descriptive abstract [purpose, methods, scope] but it also includes the results and conclusions of the research and the recommendations of the author. The length varies according to discipline, but an informative abstract is usually no more than 300 words in length.

♦ Highlight Abstract

A highlight abstract is specifically written to attract the reader’s attention to the study. No pretense is made of there being either a balanced or complete picture of the paper and, in fact, incomplete and leading remarks may be used to spark the reader’s interest. In that a highlight abstract cannot stand independent of its associated article, it is not a true abstract and, therefore, rarely used in academic writing.

Writing Style - HOW to write an Abstract

• Use the active voice when possible, but note that much of your abstract may require passive sentence constructions. 

• Use concise, but complete, sentences. 

• Get to the point quickly.

• Always use the past tense; you are reporting on a study that has been completed.

Formatting

• Abstracts should be formatted as a single paragraph in a block format and with no paragraph indentations.

• The abstract page immediately follows the title page. 

• Do not number the page. 

• In general, you should center the word "Abstract" at the top of the page with double spacing between the heading and the abstract. 

• The final sentences of an abstract concisely summarize the study’s conclusions. 

Composing Your Abstract

Although it is the first section of your paper, the abstract should be written last since it will summarize the contents of your entire paper. A good strategy to begin composing your abstract is to take whole sentences or key phrases from each section of the paper and put them in a sequence that summarizes the contents. Then revise or add connecting phrases or words to make the narrative flow clearly and smoothly. Note that statistical findings should be reported parenthetically [i.e., written in parentheses].

What to AVOID?

• Long background information,

• Repetitive information and phrases,

• Acronyms or abbreviations,

• Ellipticals or incomplete sentences,

• Paraphrased sentences, too many adverbs or adjectives,

• Quotes, references from other sources, overgeneralizations e.g. "studies have indicated that..."

• Figures, images, illustrations, statistics, tables, etc.

METACOGNITIVE REFLECTION

An abstract is a concise summary of a research paper or entire thesis. As it is a summary, it is usually the first thing that readers read so it may be strategic to make a good impression. A good abstract can make an academic paper or an essay more attractive to the writer's intended audience. 

An abstract gives the reader a preview of what they can expect to find in it helping them to select those papers that are relevant to them, without poring through the whole paper.