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Writing A Scholarly Abstract

Katie W., Writing Center tutor

Please keep in mind that these are only general guidelines; always defer to your professor's specifications for a given assignment. If you have any questions about the content represented here, please contact the Writing Centers so that we can address them for you.

Abstracts for Research Papers and Journal Articles

Undergrad and graduate students frequently write research papers, which prepare students to eventually write and submit articles for publication in scholarly journals. A research paper or article using APA citation style requires an abstract, a paragraph that describes the key points of the research in a concise and comprehensive way.  The points covered by abstracts for research papers and journal articles are the same. The differences between the two are mainly in the formatting.

For  Beginners

1. An Abstract is about a Paper in Progress

Conference abstracts usually describe research in progress rather than a completed paper. Many academics will send off an abstract first, and then use the deadline to plan out their research and writing process.  It’s understood that the paper you present at the conference may be slightly different from what you described in the abstract. However, it should not be on an entirely different topic. To avoid this problem, your research should already be in progress at the time you write your abstract. As part of your pitch, you may also want to use a brief anecdote or creative lead to interest the readers.

2. Seeking Advice

If you are writing your first conference abstract, you may want to ask for advice from a writing center tutor, or fellow students or colleagues  who have already submitted abstracts and presented at conferences. It is also a good idea to have senior students and faculty members read over your abstract before you send it in. Faculty members who have been on conference paper selection committees may be able to show you examples from past years.

3. Organizing your Ideas

When writing your first conference abstract, you may want to move from the general to the specific in a few short paragraphs. One simple way to organize your abstract is as follows:

Paragraph 1: Introduce the topic, with or without a creative lead.
Paragraph 2: Describe how your paper will treat the topic.
Paragraph 3: Suggest the significance of your research and what conclusions it may bring.

How to Write a Conference Abstract

  1. Follow the conference guidelines. The “call for papers” will provide guidelines you should follow. One of the most important is word count, which is usually 250-300 words.  Conference organizers must read through numerous submissions and excessively long abstracts may be disregarded. Your topic should also be relevant to the conference theme. Read the conference description and suggested topics carefully to determine how your idea might relate.
  2. Show how your paper relates to current research. A successful conference abstract shows how you insert yourself into the scholarly conversation surrounding the topic. You will want to show that your paper is well researched and responds to or extends the work of other scholars in the field.
  3. Attract your reader’s interest.  Your abstract should make the reader want to know more. It should show serious academic research and also sound interesting, even to scholars not working on the same topic. You may take on a slightly more informal tone than research paper or journal abstracts: feel free to be creative and even use a brief anecdote to introduce the topic.
  4. Edit and proofread carefully. After spending so much time on your research and abstract, you want to be taken seriously.  Make sure your abstract is free from spelling and grammatical errors, take a close look at word choice, and cut our all superfluous language. This will make your final product clear and concise.

What to Include in the Abstract

The abstract should be a clear, concise summary of your paper. This is a lot to achieve in 250 words, so every sentence must count. Abstracts should include:

  1. The research question or problem and your objectives
  2. The thesis
  3. The significance of your research
  4. Methods or research approach used
  5. Results, conclusions, and comment

Qualities of a Good Abstract

The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (p. 26) suggests that good abstracts are written in a way that is accurate, non-evaluative, coherent and readable, and concise.

  1. Accurate:  Give your reader a clear idea of the purpose and content of your paper. Avoid adding anything extra, superfluous, or overly detailed.
  2. Non-evaluative:  Think of it as a report rather than a sales pitch. You don’t need to “sell” your paper or comment on it. Rather, give a clear summary of your work.
  3. Coherent and readable:  Use language that is clear and understandable. Use active voice rather than passive voice. ( e.g., Participants took a survey rather than A survey was taken by participants).
  4. Concise: Don’t try to cover everything in your paper. Choose the four or five most important points of your work; these points can refer to concepts, findings, or implications. Use key words from your paper, especially words you think readers will use when doing electronic searches.

Research Paper Abstracts

Research papers using APA citation style require an abstract. The abstract is placed on its own page right after the title page. The abstract page should also include the page header that shows on every page of your paper as well as the page number 2. Center the word “Abstract” at the top (first line) of the abstract page. Do not use bold, italics, underlining, or quotation marks.  
The body of the abstract should begin on the next line after the word “Abstract.” Do not indent. The paragraph should be between 150-250 words.

Journal Article Abstracts

Journal abstracts are a brief summary (usually 150-200 words) placed just before the article in a scholarly journal. The purpose is to allow the reader to decide if the article interests him or her before reading on further.  The APA Publication Manual calls the abstract “the most important single paragraph in an article” because students, scholars, and researchers using on-line databases will usually read a number of abstracts to decide which articles to select. 

Journal abstracts are requested by the editor after the full article is accepted. Scientific journals almost always require abstracts, while journals in the humanities and social sciences do not always include them.

Here is an example of an abstract at the beginning of a research paper using APA style.

This link will allow you to see a sample paper using APA citation style and shows how the abstract fits in to the whole format.

This website offers tutorials on APA citation style which cover research paper abstracts and shows how they fit into the whole research paper.

Conference Paper Abstracts

When submitting a paper to an academic conference, most hosting institutions ask for an abstract (also called a paper proposal.)  This is a one page summary of the academic paper you would like to present at the conference. It allows conference organizers to select and group presenters.

Abstracts for conference papers are different from abstracts preceding research papers or articles, which tend to be more formal and technical. You are allowed a little more freedom and creativity in writing your abstract for a conference paper submission. However, there are still guidelines to consider if you want to improve the chances of your paper being accepted. Your abstract should communicate that your paper is both well researched and interesting to a broader audience.

Resources

This website gives a brief description and advice for writing conference abstracts. It describes the abstract as “part resume, part sales pitch.”

This site gives some helpful advice for a student submitting a paper to a conference for the first time. It is geared towards conferences in the sciences.

 

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