How To Write A Boring Scientific Paper

Someone sent me a link recently to a 2007 paper entitled, "How to Write Consistently Boring Literature", by Kaj Sand-Jensen (Univ. of Copenhagen). I met the author many years ago and can quite imagine him writing such a tongue-in-cheek article.

The first line of the abstract reveals his motivation for writing it: "Although scientists typically insist that their research is very exciting and adventurous when they talk to laymen and prospective students, the allure of this enthusiasm is too often lost in the predictable, stilted structure and language of their scientific publications."

The paper is divided into four sections:

How to turn a gifted writer into a boring scientist
Why are scientific publications boring?
Ten recommendations for boring scientific writing
Alternative writing style and variable outlets

The first two sections are quite short and serve to introduce the main content in the third section. Here are the ten recommendations guaranteed to make your writing dull, incomprehensible, and impersonal:

1. Avoid focus.
2. Avoid originality and personality.
3. Write l  o  n  g contributions.
4. Remove most implications and all speculations.
5. Leave out illustrations, particularly good ones.
6. Omit necessary steps of reasoning.
7. Use many abbreviations and technical terms.
8. Suppress humor and flowery language.
9. Degrade species and biology to statistical elements.
10. Quote numerous papers for self-evident statements.

I find most of these suggestions to be quite useful if your goal is to write a boring paper. Not so sure about the "flowery language". I find that boring writers are adept at producing ornate and excessively verbose narratives. Perhaps what is meant is "colorful", "entertaining", or "provocative"?

There are some additional recommendations I might add:

11. Include all data collected, no matter how irrelevant, and describe it in excruciating detail.
12. At the beginning, fail to articulate your questions, objectives, or hypotheses.
13. At the end, fail to address the questions, objectives, or hypotheses posed at the beginning.

The latter two are essential if your goal is to be incomprehensible.

In the final section, the author suggests some alternative outlets for scientists who wish to have more freedom in their writing styles: books and essays. To those suggestions, I might add: blogs.

Although the article is humorous, it has a serious message, articulated in the last line: "In an atmosphere of increasing competition among educations and scientific disciplines, I argue here that we desperately need more accessible and readable scientific contributions to attract bright new scientists and produce integrated understanding."

If you would like a good laugh (and also learn something about how to avoid being so boring in your scientific writing), you might take a look at this paper. Here's a link to it.

In the next post, I will talk about a new app and book (by Randy Olson) for communication-challenged scientists.


Image Credit: photograph by DrDoyenne; quote from the paper reviewed in this post.

How to Read a Scientific Paper

I remember the point in my graduate training when I realized that I was capable of reading and understanding scientific articles outside my field, even those that involved methods and terminology I was not familiar with. This was quite a revelation to me at the time because I was under the misapprehension that, once I completed my training, I would only be able to critically review papers in my own field or closely related fields.

What changed my mind was a course I took (plant biochemistry) in which the professor assigned published articles on a variety of topics to us to read and discuss. Quite a few of the papers involved molecular and other techniques that were as mysterious to me as the process of flying might be to an elephant. Being a conscientious student, however, I endeavored to teach myself how to read and understand scientific papers about unfamiliar topics. To make a long story short, I developed a procedure not unlike the one recently posted by Jennifer Raff, a Research Fellow in Anthropology at the University of Texas (which I'll get to in a moment).

With my method, I was able to effectively critique all the assigned papers and to enthusiastically participate in class discussions (we were graded on our class participation). I discovered that not only could I hold my own with the rest of the class (mostly biochemistry grad students who were more familiar with such articles), I was able to point out critical flaws in the studies that no one else saw. My strong background in statistics was particularly useful in poking holes in experimental designs (to my surprise, most of the assigned papers reported no statistics whatsoever, not even standard error bars). When the professor began calling on me for my assessment of a paper's experimental approach and whether the conclusions were supported by the data, I knew I would never wonder again whether I could understand any scientific paper and whether its findings were valid.

If someone with scientific research training can feel inadequate when faced with an unfamiliar topic, imagine how non-scientists must feel–particularly science writers who are assigned the task of writing a newspaper or magazine article about a new discovery reported in a scientific journal. To help such folks, Jennifer Raff has written a nice blog post called "How to read and understand a scientific article: a guide for non-scientists".

Her post is not only a good guide for non-scientists, it is an excellent primer for science students and even scientific researchers wanting to improve their skills at reviewing papers.

Presentation Myths: Tell a Joke to Lighten the Mood

In this latest series of posts, I've been talking about myths surrounding public speaking, specifically focusing on the scientific talk. In this post, I thought I would tackle the idea that a speaker should tell a joke or a funny story during professional presentations to put the audience at ease. Is this a good idea or a disaster waiting to happen?

There is nothing inherently wrong with being funny during a formal presentation, especially when the material being presented is deadly dull. God knows, the audience is likely desperate for something to break the monotony or seriousness of the meeting. The problem is that this is sometimes very difficult to pull off.

Some speakers are naturally funny or have a knack for telling amusing stories. I know colleagues (and students) who could easily become successful stand-up comedians. They are not the problem. It's the rest of us scientists who are so serious and, let's face it, deadly dull. Of course, it's always possible to be so dull as to be hilarious, e.g., Ben Stein in the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off:



By the way, that stint as an economics professor in this movie launched Stein's career in film (before that, he was a speechwriter for Presidents Nixon and Ford, among other things).

But back to professional talks. The problem comes in when a speaker tells a joke or a funny story that really has no bearing on the speaker's topic. It almost always falls flat. Some even tell highly inappropriate jokes that worked on their beer-buddies (so everyone must like it, right?). The most recent, public example of of a joke-gone-wrong was the knock-knock joke told by one of George Zimmerman's attorneys during the opening statements.

The biggest sin is often not that the joke is inappropriate but that it isn't funny.

Sometimes it's just the wrong audience. A memorable example occurred at a botanical conference and during a talk about gravitropism in plant roots (how plant roots grow in a downward direction). The speaker explained that he had figured out that the chemical signal guiding root growth was dependent in part upon a mucous coating on the root tip (that facilitated ion movement, I think). He had tried all sorts of media in an attempt to replicate this mucous material, but the only one that seemed to work was the "personal lubricant", K-Y jelly (interestingly, the main ingredient is methyl cellulose). He then proceeded to describe his experience buying up large quantities of this product at his local Walgreens and the exchange he had with the checkout clerk. It was hilarious. However, no one laughed, except me, as I seem to recall. The audience was composed of mostly botanists (who are not known for their sense of humor). Upon further reflection, I suspected that this particular audience failed to find this story funny, not because they thought it was inappropriate but because they did not get the reference to K-Y jelly and what it is commonly used for. At least that's my working hypothesis. Perhaps some botanist readers would like to rebut?

The botany story might have gone over much better with another audience. But it was the high point of that meeting for me. In fact, it's been over twenty years since I heard that talk, and I still remember it (both the technical and the humorous aspects)....which relates to my previous post about telling a good story.

My own experience with using humor in professional talks is mixed. Humor only seems to work for me when it is unplanned. All the times I planned to tell an amusing story or make a humorous aside, the audience did not laugh. However, when I have added something on the spur of the moment, even when I was being serious, I've gotten a big laugh.

For example, I was once giving a talk at a conference on restoration of tropical forests and was describing my field site. It was located in Florida adjacent to a golf course. I showed an aerial photo of the site and described how I and my students had to trek across the golf course to get to our study site and were sometimes stopped by the groundskeeper who thought we were illegal aliens (we were dressed in field clothes and carried garbage bags). I thought that would get a laugh. It didn't. Then I later mentioned, off-handedly, that my students, on their first excursion to this site, always expressed fear of snakes, alligators, spiders, or some similar beast. I told the audience that I tried to allay their fears by telling the student that the most dangerous creatures out there were senior citizens lobbing golf balls into the forest. I was serious...getting beaned by a golf ball was much more likely than encountering a dangerous animal. It was a spur-of-the-moment statement that got a tremendous laugh. Go figure.

I suppose the take-home message is that humor can be used in a professional talk but it takes good timing, the right audience, and perhaps some comedic talent (but not always) for a successful outcome. If you have an example (successful or not), please share. We scientists need a good laugh now and then.

Presentation Myths: Tell a Good Story

Most of us plan our scientific talks the same way we write our technical papers. We use the typical paper format of introduction/objectives, methods, results, and conclusions–in that order–to design our seminars and conference presentations. This approach is the one that is expected by a technical audience and that the presenter usually finds most logical and convenient, especially when designing a presentation based on a paper in preparation. We simply follow, in a linear fashion, the steps we took in conceiving and conducting the study.

Some would argue that a traditional format is the correct (and only acceptable) way to give a formal talk about scientific research. Here are my objectives: 1, 2, 3; here are my methods: 1, 2, 3; here are my results: 1, 2, 3; here are my conclusions: 1, 2, 3. Any questions? Anything else is unprofessional. I would like to play devil's advocate here for a moment and consider whether this viewpoint is totally justified and whether there is another approach that might work better–and that is to tell a story. This idea is not a new one. Many experts advise speakers that the best way to capture and hold an audience's attention is to tell a story. The idea of storytelling as a professional presentation device has become fairly widespread in business circles. Maybe even to the point of attaining myth status (hence, my title).

Audiences love stories–presumably even audiences composed of scientists. We enjoy a good story just as much as regular folks. But should we use a story to present scientific information? What kind of story are we talking about? Let's explore the idea a bit.

Some of you may have heard of Nancy Duarte, the guru of presentations. If not, you might want to check out her books, Slide:ology and Resonate. Anyway, she suggests that there are three things you must do to ensure a successful presentation: 1) keep the audience in mind, 2) understand your role as the presenter, and 3) tell a good story. Her point is that to really connect with an audience, a speaker needs to tell a compelling story...one that appeals to that particular audience and that ensures all audience members hear and understand the message. A good story helps a speaker connect with the audience and helps the audience understand the content of the presentation.

In a scientific presentation, we are presenting facts and figures, for the most part. I'm sure there are scientists out there who want to present only the facts and sneer at the suggestion that those facts might be presented in the form of a story or in a way that helps the audience follow the material being presented. You've probably heard such speakers. They jump right into their talk without providing any background or stopping to explain complex concepts or terminology; they assume that the audience understands why their research is important. If someone in the audience is not up to speed, then too bad. This example sits at one extreme along a continuum in the connection between speaker and audience. At the other extreme is the situation in which the speaker has made not only an intellectual connection with the audience, but an emotional one as well.

This is where storytelling comes in. Its purpose is to enhance the connection between speaker and audience. A story will elicit some type of emotional reaction: surprise, intrigue, laughter, curiosity, excitement. But does a more compelling, humorous, or interesting storyline really help make our information more appealing, understandable, or memorable for an audience?

I've been pondering this question and how to go about telling a good story in a scientific presentation for some time. For example, is it possible to make slight changes in the traditional format of scientific presentations so that the speaker addresses all three of Duarte's suggestions? The idea is to capture the audience's attention right from the beginning and make them pay attention through to the end. I don't think it requires much of a change in the traditional format to turn what could be a boring presentation into one that makes the audience sit up and pay attention. There are a few ways to do this. Some presenters tell a personal story, e.g., how they became interested in their topic or what their motivation was. Other speakers use humor, either by delivering a "tongue-in-cheek" talk or by telling an opening joke or amusing story (that relates to the topic; just telling a random joke usually falls flat).

Another approach is to spark the audience's curiosity by posing the work in the form of a broader question or a deeper mystery. You might even combine the mystery and personal story approaches by starting your presentation this way:  "I was at my field site (or in the lab), finishing up measurements, and made an interesting observation.....I wondered what was going on....so I decided to conduct a little side-experiment....the results of that experiment turned out to be the most important discovery of my career."

That is telling a story....and one that will get the immediate attention of everyone in the room. They will want to hear how the story turns out.

If your research result is not so career-changing, you might say, "That experiment led to a most surprising conclusion about [insert research topic]." Or you might say, "That experiment led to the most interesting aspect of my dissertation research." Then you can proceed with the typical format of introduction, methods, results, and conclusions to describe your study. At the end, you would return to your "story" and perhaps explain how this has led you into an exciting new area of research or to new research collaborations. Variations on this theme might be: ...that experiment opened up a whole new area of research for me....that experiment led me to question my whole approach to [insert science topic]....that experiment made me question the well-known theory of [insert theory]...that experiment showed me how I had gone wrong in previous attempts....etc.

Most audiences will find such personal comments not only acceptable but will remember your talk because you injected some emotion into it (in contrast with all the dry, passionless talks they will attend at that conference).

You may have heard that there are only 7 (or 20 or 36, depending on the source) basic plots in storytelling. Here is a list of 20 (from 20 Master Plots by Ronald Tobias) that might be fun to ponder as a possible storyline for a scientific presentation (note: I'm not necessarily recommending these; this is just a mental exercise to get us thinking about story lines):

1) Quest
2) Adventure
3) Pursuit
4) Rescue
5) Escape
6) Revenge
7) The Riddle
8) Rivalry
9) Underdog
10) Temptation
11) Metamorphosis
12) Transformation
13) Maturation
14) Love
15) Forbidden Love
16) Sacrifice
17) Discovery
18) Wretched Excess
19) Ascension
20) Descension

The example I gave above might fall into the Riddle, Metamorphosis, Transformation, or Discovery type of plot. Some of these plots seem tailor-made for science (e.g., Rivalry, Sacrifice), whereas others may be inappropriate or inadvisable to use (e.g., Forbidden Love (although this might work for research on reproduction!)).

If you are a student, you might begin your talk by saying that you knew next to nothing about your topic or had a preconceived notion about it....then you conducted your research....and ultimately learned x, y, and z. This approach uses the "Maturation" story plot. If your research involved traveling to Antarctica or to a deep sea vent, then you might be able to use the Adventure plot and interject some interesting side notes about your experiences or the difficulties in acquiring your data. I know that such aspects appeal to scientific audiences because in my own presentations, I often get unexpected comments about the data that I've collected worldwide. The most common comment I get is not about how impressive my dataset (and scope of inference) is, but instead something along the lines of, "Wow, I'm impressed with all the exotic places you've traveled to and worked in." I'm always taken aback by such comments, but it tells me something about what people find interesting and memorable about my work (hopefully, they also find my results interesting).

Not everyone recommends this personal story approach, however, because it puts the speaker at the center of attention instead of the topic of the talk. As Duarte advises, "So many people feel like they’re the central figure — kind of like the hero of the story — because they’re the one talking the most. But in reality, your role is that of a mentor — you should be giving the audience a magical gift or a special tool, or helping them get unstuck in some way."  I agree. In any professional presentation, the topic should be center stage–although it is possible to use a personal story that compliments or enhances the science story, as the examples above illustrate. 

I think a much better (and safer) approach is to tell a story about the science. So how do you tell a story about your research using the science topic as the basis of the plot?

You might begin by considering your research question or hypothesis and then design your story around it. You likely conducted an experiment (or a series of experiments) to test some hypothesis. Try to think of a popular analogy that relates to your hypothesis and use it to introduce your talk. Let me give you an example...one that I saw someone use in a conference presentation. The topic was ecosystem restoration, and the title was something along the lines of "Field of Dreams: If You Build It, Will They Come?" The talk opened with a picture of a baseball field, and the speaker briefly referred to the movie, Field of Dreams, and then described how it related to her question about ecosystem restoration: whether recreating the physical landscape or framework of a particular habitat would naturally lead to colonization by plants and animals typical of that habitat and eventually to restoration of key ecosystem functions. Her research tested this idea. She used the baseball analogy to put a clear image in the audience's mind....one that most movie-goers could immediately relate to. The speaker then used a baseball diamond (and the bases) as a framework to make various points throughout the talk. It was very effective from several standpoints. First, the baseball analogy captured the audience's attention and told them that this was not going to be a typical talk....that the presenter had gone to extra effort to help the audience understand her topic (meeting Duarte's first point about keeping the audience in mind). Second, the baseball analogy provided a framework for the talk and put the speaker into the role of a guide or mentor who helped the audience understand the overall concept of her research (meeting Duarte's second point about the role of the speaker). And third, the baseball analogy created an effective storyline (meeting Duarte's third point about telling a good story).

Another effective way to tell a good science story is simply to describe how the research relates to humans. For example, imagine that you conduct research on how to model sea-level rise. Start off by explaining how sea-level rise will impact human communities living along the world's shorelines and how your research will lead to more accurate identification of the most flood-vulnerable areas. That's a story that causes an emotional reaction or emotional connection between the audience and your topic–and only takes a few seconds to relate. Now, people in the audience will understand at a gut level why your research is important, even if they cannot follow all the technical details of your modeling work. Everyone should be able to use this human-interest approach to tell a story about their research. It just takes a bit of effort to make the connection for your audience. Don't assume they will know it; and even if they do, they will appreciate your pointing it out, especially if you tell it well.

You can also tell a story by putting your research into a historical perspective. Describe how previous discoveries or insights have led up to your question or hypothesis. The audience will then wonder how your story will turn out. Will your work add to that history? Will it overturn long-held dogma? Audiences always appreciate having things put into a historical perspective, even those who are intimately familiar with the topic (and especially those who contributed to that history).

Similar to the historical perspective approach, you can also present what is known and what is not known about your topic and then explain how your research attempts to fill that information gap. You can use facts and figures to support your story, but it will still be a story. How will it turn out? Will your data be sufficient to bridge the gap or will more work need to be done?

So does the advice about telling a good story extend to scientific presentations? Or is it just a myth? Well, think about which presentations you've heard that really stuck with you. Did they tell a good story?

Presentation Myths: I Need a Laser Pointer

I've been periodically writing about presentation myths (see previous posts), and today I thought I would tackle another one:  the need for a laser pointer. Everyone seems to want to use one, even those speakers who clearly cannot hold the light point steadily enough for the audience to pick out what it is the presenter is trying to emphasize. I know a few colleagues whose hands are so unsteady that the laser light point literally jumps all over the screen and momentarily touches on every datapoint in view. Which one are we supposed to focus on?

Actually, the laser user I describe above is only one of several categories and subcategories. The category I call Unsteady Hands includes people who are nervous and are literally shaking from fear; people whose hands have a modest, involuntary tremor (either pathological or not); and those unfortunates who suffer from both. There is really not much these groups can do to eliminate the shaking. You would think that such people would say to themselves that this bit of technology just isn't working for them. But you'd be wrong. Instead, they resort to maneuvers such as holding the pointer with both hands or steadying the hand holding the pointer against the podium. This often doesn't work and draws attention to the fact that they can't manage with one hand.

Then there are the speakers who use the laser pointer as a reading aid by running the light along the text on the screen while they read the text to the audience. Let's call them the Readers. This group not only commits the sin of filling up their slides with a bunch of text, they add to the audience's suffering by painstakingly reading what the audience members are already perfectly capable of reading...AND they highlight the torture with their laser pointer.

Related to the Readers are the Circlers, who endlessly circle points on their slides while they are talking. Sometimes, they circle things for no good reason. I recall a colleague once commenting during a presentation that he didn't know why he was circling a particular point. Seriously? I imagine the answer is because this is a self-soothing behavior similar to the distracting habit of some speakers who jingle the change in their pockets or who rock back and forth. It's just a visual distracting behavior instead of aural.

The most dangerous are the Wavers, who wildly wave their laser light around the room like Obi Wan Kenobi, sometimes pointing at the ceiling, the walls, or directly into the audience's eyes. My husband is one of these. He's totally oblivious to the fact that he's doing it. He gets carried away with what he's talking about, excitedly points out some key piece of data on the screen with the laser point, then turns to the audience for their reaction....unfortunately while keeping his finger pressed on the laser button. Does he wonder why the audience is ducking?

I'm sure there are other types and variants, but these are the main ones that come to mind. The remote controllers that are used by a speaker to advance to the next slide are often outfitted with laser pointers, which only encourages these laser-challenged users. I say, get rid of them. Or at least invent one that automatically shuts the light off if the laser pointer is moved too erratically or for too long. Any inventors out there?

In the meantime, those of you who cannot hold the laser light point rock-steady should use another means to emphasize your point. For example, use animation to highlight things on your slides. An animated arrow or circle is an effective way to point out a key datapoint. Or animate in important numbers or text in a contrasting color. Don't get carried away, though, or my next post will be about overuse of animation. You should be designing your slides so that it is rarely necessary to point out a key piece of data or text. Important information or data should already be obvious without additional emphasis. If it's extraneous, it shouldn't be on the slide in the first place.

Stay tuned for more presentation myths....

It's a Jungle Out There

This morning I cleaned out my inbox, deleting without opening, three invitations (to submit manuscripts) from journals I've never heard of. Such invitations have become a weekly occurrence. Even though I've set my spam filter to block emails from repeat offenders, I continue to get new ones.

Coincidentally, I received a link to a blog post about predatory publishers by Ian Woolley writing for Soapbox Science. He goes into detail about the practices of these journals, how to identify them, and about a website that purports to be a watchdog of predatory publishers. You might find it interesting and thought-provoking.

Double-Blind Peer Review

Nature Geoscience recently announced they are offering the option for authors to remain anonymous to reviewers (here is a link to an editorial). Actually, both Nature Geoscience and Nature Climate Change are testing this option. The editorial that describes this new option explains that the journal's editors are convinced that this double-blind process will remove unconscious bias. In particular, the editorial states that "One of our motivations for setting up a double-blind trial is the possibility that female authors are subjected to tougher peer review than their male colleagues–a distinct possibility in view of evidence that subtle gender biases affect assessments of competence, appropriate salaries and other aspects of academic life ((Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA109, 16474–16479; 2012)." 

As the editorial mentions, some reviewers will attempt to guess the identity of the authors. There will be clues in the paper, no matter how careful the author is. A few reviewers will be certain they have guessed correctly (even though they likely will be flat wrong). To what extent this guessing will influence the review, is not clear. Hopefully, most reviewers will simply shrug and focus on the paper's content, which is what they should be doing anyway.

Coincidentally, I just completed a double-blind review (my first) a few days ago for a different journal. Interestingly, the journal did not explain that the paper's authors would not be revealed to me. Instead, I was provided the usual links to the paper, which contained no mention of the authors or their affiliation. Not finding that information anywhere, I finally realized that this was a double-blind review.

Did not knowing the author's identity affect how I conducted the review? Not really. In fact, I liked not knowing who the author was quite a bit more than I expected. I wonder if other reviewers will feel the same way?