Despite being the most demanding category of the return communication, economic writing needs clarity, formal registration and precision, which set it apart from everyday language. Even multiple writers, academics, researchers and graduate students regularly get trapped by using phrases and words which make their argument vulnerable. Additionally, these words can undermine their credibility and provide a sloppy feel to their writing.
Recognising the words which need to be avoided in academic writing is just as significant as knowing those words which should be used. A single vulnerable world can make the well reason argument foggy. With the informal expression, your professional tone will set the entire paperwork for establishment. Moreover, the overuse of phrase fillers can also make your thesis sound hollow, even when they underline ideas with strength.
This blog breaks down the most common types of academic writing with problematic language. It explains the reason why each group fails to recognise and give you better options. Whether you are going to write a dissertation, journal article, or literature review, this blog will assist you in introducing authoritative and tighter prose.
Before exploring the specific words which should be ignored, it is significant to recognise the principles behind all practice. Academic writing deals with a set of shared conventions. These conventions exist for the appropriate reasons.
When you are going to use emotionally loaded, informal or vague language, you are intentionally or not going to break these conventions.
Your word choice in academic writing affects:
With the help of this, the context will be established. Let's check out the categories which you should avoid and what to use instead of them.
The most vulnerable trait of academic writing is vagueness. Vague words provide the reader with the impression that you do not have the clarity of thought regarding the things which you have stated. Moreover, you are obscuring a vulnerable argument behind language ambiguity.
Precision is also a significant hallmark in academic writing. Every word must be accurately placed by conveying the particular and defensible meaning.
These are the words which are most precise in the English language. When you are going to write, “many things that impact the growth of the economy, the reader does not have an idea what things you are talking about”. You have to replace them with actual nouns, including aspects, elements, phenomena, mechanisms, variables, and factors.
Weak: “There are multiple things that impact the performance of students.”
Strong: “Several factors, such as access to resources, study habits and sleep quality, affect the performance of students.”
These words are considered informal quantifiers because they have no place in the. You can replace them with the quantitative language wherever it is possible or utilise the formal alternatives.
Avoid: lots of, a lot of, plenty of, instead of these words utilise significant number of, extensive, considerable, are substantial portion of, numerous
These terms are evaluator and far too general for making any academic analysis. They give information to the reader that is not meaningful regarding why something merits a negative or positive evaluation.
Avoid: terrible, awful, great, nice, bad, good
Instead of it use: beneficial, counterproductive, negligible, affective, problematic, ineffective, detrimental, advantageous, significant
These words are intensive fired with actually make your writing vulnerable instead of making it strong. Instead of making your meaning amplifier, they signal that you have not selected the precise word enough.
Avoid: quite large, really significant, very important
Instead of it use: substantial, critical, extensive, pivotal, considerable
Academic writing needs a formal register. It never means that utilising unnecessary language with complexity is appropriate because clarity is a significant aim. However, you should take care of avoiding the conversational and casual tone which you can use in social media posts, emails, and everyday speeches.
Contractions, including they’re, won’t, can’t, isn’t, don’t, and are the Spoken English staples and part of informal writing. In academic writing, they are out of signal and place with a formality lacking.
Avoid: won’t, isn’t, can’t, don’t, hasn’t, they’re, it’s
Use: will not, is not, cannot, do not, has not, they are, it is
Idiomatic phrases cannot translate culturally specific and imprecise all of it because of the bad choices for academic writing. The main aim of academic writing is to be understood universally.
Avoid: in a nutshell, at the end of the day, add mushroom growth, mingle all corners of the study, and many more.
Use: in summary, ultimately, approach creatively, the main finding is to clarify or illuminate, despite the difficulty
Some phrases add words without providing meanings. You have to cut them to make your prose tight and make the direct argument.
Avoid:
Use:
Particular transition words in informal or speech writing, however, sometimes feel out of the places in the academic domain.
Avoid: also, anyway, besides, plus, so, at the initial stage of the sentence
Use: in addition, therefore, furthermore, consequently, nevertheless, moreover
One of the main requirements of academic writing is balance with great care. You must not provide overstatements of your claims and make the assertions sweeping which your evidence cannot support. On the other hand, you should also not hedge against the excessive losses of your argument by all forces. Both extremes undermine your credibility.
Words including all, none, proves, always, never, and every make claims which are almost not able to be supported with the evidence. Academic arguments rarely work in absolutes.
Avoid: no one, everyone, never, always, it is proven that, all studies show, obviously, undeniably
Use: rarely, typically, most participants, evidence indicates, the significance of studies suggests, it appears that, arguably
These words are problematic, particularly because they are implicitly dismissing readers who may not find something clear or obvious. They may come across as often utilising and condensing the proper use over reasoning gaps.
Avoid: needless to say, clearly, obviously, of course, as everybody knows
Use: your evidence will make it to, if something is evident, state your explicit reasoning
There is a great connection between an appropriate heading academically, “the data suggest,” and qualification excessively, that make your writing unconvincing and uncertain.
Avoid: qualifiers stacking: “it may perhaps be appropriate that in a few cases”
Use: This approach may be useful in a certain context
Academy writing has the expectation to prepare with free from personal bias, with an evidence-based and objective approach. Utilising emotionally charged or politically loaded language undermines the analysis's credibility and signal the readers that your conclusion can be derived through feelings instead of evidence.
Words which contain strong emotional connotations can make your writing biased before you have had the option to identify your evidence.
Avoid: miraculous, devastating, outrageous, wonderful, horrific, shameful, amazing
Use: Considerable, notable, marked, adverse, significant, substantial, severe
Hyperbole can be persuasive in political speech or journalism however, in academic writing, it is read as a symbol of a vulnerable argument
Avoid: “This study makes our understanding revolutionized of”, this is the most significant discovery in this century”
Use: “This study provides an important contribution to the provided literature on”, “This result contains significant implications for”
The optimisation of “he” as a general pronoun is not considered ideal in academic writing. According to the modern style of academic writing, the recommended gender is neutral alternatives.
Avoid: “Every student must submit their essay on Friday”
Use: “Every student should submit their essay by Friday”
Avoid: policeman, manpower, mankind, chairman, fireman
Use: humankind\humanity, personnel/workforce, firefighter, police officer, chairperson/chair
Some words feel sophisticated and formal but are actually considered inappropriate, impressive, or weak in an academic context. These false friends must be tricky, particularly because they are considered the appropriate choice.
A lot of writers use the word “utilise” as a simpler alternative to the word “use”. In multiple cases, use is the more precise correct choice. Utilise technically has the meaning to make anything effective or practical optimisation of something which not only originally have intention for that purpose.
Unnecessary: “the researchers utilised a technique for data collection”
Better: “The researchers used a technique for data collection”
This phrase is a worthy method of saying “because”. Academic writing places great value on conciseness.
Wordy: “The study was cancelled due to the fact that funding was not provided”
Concise: “The main termination of this study was because of the unavailability of funding”
This phrase is used as a vague conductor when a proposition would serve better.
Vague: “In terms of the outcome, the treatment group shows improvement.”
Precise: “regarding the outcomes, that group of treatment showed improvement.”
“Unique” contains the meanings of a category. It is appropriate for something that is either unique or sometimes not. modifying it with rather quiet or very is a grammatical mistake.
Incorrect: somewhat unique, quite unique, very unique
Correct: singular, distinctive, unique, novel, unprecedented
The use of these words is not incorrect, but they are the variants which give the look of stiltedness in modern style of academic writing. “first”, “second”, and “third” are considered cleaner.
Stilted: “Firstly, the data was collected. Secondly, they were identified.”
Better: “First, the data was collected. Second, they were identified.”
These quantifiers are vague and must be replaced with the actual number of the quantity whenever your data supports it, and with multiple process quantifiers when it does not support.
Weak: “A number of participants complained about it.”
Strong: “33 participants (67%) complaint about it.”
Without a particular timeframe or date, “recent” is a word without meaning. However, in academic writing, the main requirement is temporal precision.
Vague: “recent studies share that…”
Precise: “The studies which are published in 2013 and 2018 have shown that.”
Always know that which words you should avoid is only half of the task. You also required or system to catch these words in your own writing. Here is a practical process of editing.
When you have completed your draft, utilise the words find by the processors function to search for the following terms: good, bad, really, very, things, obviously, a lot, stuff. It is significant to note, utilise, due to the fact that
Every example you find is a chance to make your writing strong
Read your paper in a loud voice. If a sentence is sounding like you have something to say is a significant and casual conversation, then it must be rewrite. Academic writing contains a rhythm which is distinctive and formal but not precise and pompous.
Always ask for every sentence: what would you like to lose if I am going to delete this? if the answer is “no” then delete this. Academic writing gives great value to the language economy.
Scan your demonstrated text for the abstract noun, including issues, aspects, factors and things, and the generic verbs, including get, do, make, and show. Replace all these words with precision and particular alternatives whenever it is possible.
For every near absolute or absolute claim, ask: Does my evidence contain any support for this? If not, then hedge appropriately or repeat the claim.
To conclude, ignoring informal, vogue and weak language is not about following rules of arbitrary but it is about giving respect to the reader. Moreover, it provides you with good ideas for communication and gives strength to your argument with the authority and Precision that is the main requirement of academic writing.
The word you selected shape the way through which your ideas get received. A careful paragraph writing, free of impression and fillers, conveys not only the argument but serious intellect for its author. By separating the phrases and words covered in this blog, you will easily produce the writing which is more credible, compelling and cleaner.
Initiate with your next draft. Check out the checklist. Seek the vulnerable words. Replace these words with purposeful language and precision. By the time these habits become second nature, your academic writing will get stronger.
The passive voice contains an important and legitimate role in academic writing. Specifically, when it comes to writing any scientific task where the main emphasis is on the findings or procedures instead of the researcher. However, the overuse of the passive voice may make your writing feel body or evasive. Utilise the passive constructions when the actor is deliberately the emphasised irrelevant or unknown. You need to use active constructions when the action of matter is attributed directly and clearly.
Absolutely. The academic writing conventions contains the variety significantly throughout multiple fields. Scientific writing, like in journals, tends to give great favour to impersonal language, passive constructions and extreme precision. The writings in humanity permit the greater flexibility of a style in more interpretive language. Social Sciences always fall in between humanity and scientific writing. You should always read broadly in your discipline and follow the particular style guide.
Yes, in many cases you can use it. The blanket prohibition for the use of first person pronounce get softened for about previous 20 years in multiple journals and disciplines. However, the use of the first-person can improve the transparency and clarity. On the other hand, these conventions depend on the institution and discipline, so you should always check your journal guidelines, style guide and requirements of instructors before utilising the first person with consistency.
