Abstracts

Abstracts in research papers

Research papers provide writers the possibility to become members of a discourse community. They also are essential for the sharing of ideas about a certain topic. A research paper is divided into several parts that compose the paper as a whole. Those parts are: Title, Abstract, Acknowledgement, Introduction, Literature Review, Methods, Results, Discussions, Recommendations, Reference, and Appendixes.  The present paper delves into the analysis of the Abstract of four different papers, one of them coming from the medicine field and the other three coming from the education field. 

Those papers are “Treatment of hypertension in patients 80 years of age or older” written by Hypertension in the Very Elderly Trial (HYVET) in 2008; “Using DVD feature films in the EFL classroom” published in 2002 and written by Jane King; “Video in EFL classroom” written by Rammal in 2006; and “The video in the classroom: Agatha Christie’s 'evil under the sun' and the teaching of Narratology through the film” written by Kokonis in 1993. The abstracts of these papers will be analyzed by exploring their structure, by classifying them and by analyzing their linguistic features.

            Abstracts are defined within the meta-textual nature of genres as they need another text to exist. They are “a brief summary of a major point made by an author in a book or article” (Hubbuch, 1996, p. 126). Therefore, they are expected to be written once the author has finished the article or book. Abstracts are also descriptive texts as they describe the main text, which is the article or book. Swales and Freak (1994) also state that abstracts “consist of a single paragraph containing from about four to ten full sentences”.

            Bearing this in mind, especially noteworthy is the fact that not all the papers follow this rule posited by Swales and Freak. The paper coming from the medicine field has four different paragraphs divided into different sections. Should one join all the sentences, one would have a paragraph of 10 sentences. Apart from that, the paper written by King has two sentences. Therefore, it seems that there is no exact length for an Abstract.

            Depending on the type, Abstracts may have different structures. The most accepted layout forms a paragraph that contains an Introduction/Background part, with one sentence long; Materials and Methods part, with two to three sentences; Results part, with three to four sentences; and the Conclusion part, with one or two sentences. Considering the four Abstracts that are being analyzed, there is only one of them that follows this pattern, which is the RP that comes from the medicine field. This paper has the first two sentences that form the Introduction, two sentences for the Materials and Methods part, 5 sentences for the Results and one sentence for the Conclusion.

            On the other hand, the paper written by Rammal (2006) has one paragraph that contains one sentence that forms the Introduction and one sentence for the Conclusion. The paper written by King has no Results, neither Conclusion. And the paper written by Kokonis has no sentence in the Conclusion part. Consequently, it can be said that even though there is one most accepted layout, writers use the structure that they think is convenient for them according to their own set of beliefs.

            As regards the linguistic features used by the authors, it can be acknowledged the fact that all the abstracts have full sentences and that there is absence of negatives in all of them. Passive voice is present in all these papers although some active voice sentences could be found. Regarding tenses, present is the most frequently used even though some past sentences have been detected when stating the methods and the results. In all the papers coming from the education field, there are no abbreviations. However, in the paper dealing with medical issues, there are some abbreviations which are likely to be part of their medical jargon.

         Swales and Feak (1994) classify abstracts according to what their main aim is. Therefore, Abstracts can be informative or indicative. The former will provide the reader with the main findings; and the latter will indicate what kind of research has been done. Besides, Abstracts can also be divided into unstructured or structured depending on their organizational format. It is very likely that informative Abstracts are unstructured. However, this is not what the analysis of the four papers has shown. On the contrary, the medicine paper, which is rather informative with specific data and results and which describes what the authors have done in detail, is also the only one which is structured. All the other Abstracts are indicative and unstructured, that is to say, all of them do not include specific information nor contain bolded or italicized headings.

Reference

Hubbuch, S. M. (Ed. 4th). (1996). Writing research papers across the curriculum. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace.

Hypertension in the Very Elderly Trial (HYVET, 2008). Treatment of hypertension in patients 80 years of age or older. The New England Journal of Medicine, 358(18). Retrieved from http://caece.campusuniversidad.com.ar/mod/resource/view.php?id=24127

King, J. (2002). Using DVD feature films in the EFL classroom. ELT Newsletter.  Retrieved from http://www.eltnewsletter.com/back/February2002/art882002.htm

Kokonis, M. (1993). The video in the classroom: Agatha Christie’s “evil under the sun” and the teaching of narratology through the film. Education Resources Information Center. Retrieved from http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/search/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED393427&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED393427

Rammal, S. (2006). Video in EFL classroom. Karen’s Linguistic  Issues, November. Retrieved from http://www3.telus.net/linguisticsissues/using%20video

Swales, J.M., & Feak, C.B. (1994). Academic writing for graduate students: Essential tasks and skills. Ann Harbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press.

Mid-term

Analysing Papers

Research papers (RP) are defined as a scientific type of papers in which research must be systematic, controlled, empiric, and critical (Samperi, Collado, Lucio, 1998). As regards layout, research papers in general are composed of several parts: title, abstract, acknowledgements, introduction, literature review, methods, results, discussions, recommendations, conclusions, references, and appendixes.  The aim of this paper will be to deeply analyze a paper written in 2011 by Judith Bennett, Martin Braund, Fred Lubben and Yvonne Mason.  The source will be evaluated taking into account the American Psychological Association (APA) style. Besides, the different sections will be explored so as to shed light on the analysis of introductions.

Taking into account the APA style, one can acknowledge the fact that these authors do not follow this style. On the contrary, except for some small details, there are several instances that show that the APA style was not taken into consideration. An example that is immediately spotted is the fact that the complete paper is justified and that there is no indentation at the beginning of each paragraph. Regarding the analysis of the table included in this part of the paper, once again, these authors seem not to bear the APA style in mind, as each word of the title should be capitalized, each table should begin on a separate page and the authors should not use vertical lines. 

Besides, these authors state their ideas with myriads of acronyms, which may make the reader feel at a lost. This illustrates the fact that the authors would seem not to be considering the fact that they may have a wider audience. It is certain that they are taking some information for granted as if all their readers knew what they are referring to.  The fact that these acronyms are not always explained when they should shows the authors are not following APA since “a term to be abbreviated must, on its first appearance, be written out completely and followed immediately by its abbreviation in parentheses” (APA, 2009, p. 107).

Regarding the layout of the paper, the authors have chosen to include different sections so as to organize the information. These sections are not the ones expected in a RP. However, the section named Review of Relevant Literature can be analyzed as if it were the introduction of a RP. According to Swales and Freak (1994) introductions have an organizational pattern that contains moves which have certain semantic and syntactic characteristics. Following this idea, this section has the moves Swales and Freak (1994) refer to.

 The first move, establishing a research territory, can be found in the first three paragraphs of that section. On the fourth paragraph move 2, establishing a niche, starts. It contains only one sentence that starts with the word “however” in a bid to show that the authors have found an area that raises questions about the situation. After that sentence, move 3, occupying the niche, begins by announcing the most important findings and by presenting the purpose of the investigation.    

Taking all this information into consideration, it can be stated that based on the previous analysis these authors would appear not to follow the APA style. Neither would they be considering the different section a RP should have.  Nevertheless, there seems to be a section which is not named “Introduction” but it functions as such since it is likely to have the same organizational pattern an introduction has.

  

Reference

American Psychological Association. (2009). Publication manual of the American

Psychological Association. (6th ed.) Washington, DC: American Psychological

Association.

Bennett, J., Braund, M., Lubben, F., & Mason, Y. (2011). Modes of Professional Development: An evaluation of the impact of different course modes operated across the National Network of Science Learning Centres. University of York, Department of Education.

Samperi, R., Collado, C., Lucio, P. (1998) Metodologia de la investigación. Mexico, D.F.: McGraw-Hill Interamericana.

Swales, J.M., & Feak, C.B. (1994). Academic writing for graduate students: Essential tasks and skills. Ann Harbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press.

Introductions and Methods sections

Analyzing Introductions and Methods sections

Particularly invaluable are research papers (RP) in any fields of studies since they provide the possibility to share knowledge and carry out investigations in any field. At the same time, they allow researchers to become members of a discourse community. RPs have distinctive characteristics and are composed of several parts: Title, Abstract, Acknowledgement, Introduction, Literature Review, Methods, Results, Discussions, Recommendations, Reference, and Appendixes. The present paper will delve into the Introduction, Literature Review and Method sections of two RPs from the education field and medicine field in order to depict their peculiarities. The former is named "Newspaper Articles in University EFL Reading Classes" (Ito, 1993) and the latter is named "Placebo Use in the United Kingdom: Results from a National Survey of Primary Care Practitioners" (Howick et al., 2013).

According to Swales and Freak (1994), Introductions must catch the readers’ attention as the writers need to sell their product to the readers. They compared writers to plants by saying that “as plants compete for light and space, so writers of RPs compete for acceptance and recognition” (p. 174). Introductions can be analyzed by taking the Create Research Space Model (CARS) in consideration. Following this model, Introductions are written in a general-specific manner. This means that statements go from a general topic of discussion to a particular situation of the analysis. Apart from considering this model, writers are expected to use an organizational pattern to present their introductions.  These patterns are composed by three moves or cycles, which have specific semantic and syntactic characteristics.

In both papers the different moves are likely to be detected. The main aim of the first move is to review previous research. Although writers have chosen to introduce other investigations directly, the way that has been done was different. In "Newspaper Articles in University EFL Reading Classes", Ito (1993) starts the section by saying “It has been long acknowledged that…” (p.1). On the other hand, in the other paper writers start less subtly by saying “Surveys in other countries suggest…” (Howick et al., 2013, p.2).  As regards tenses, both Introductions have the same pattern as writers have chosen to use present tenses. In the paper that comes from the medicine field, writers have used Present Simple to refer to the state of current knowledge. In the other paper, the author has used not only Present Simple but also Present Perfect in a bid to refer to the previous studies so as to show they are of utmost importance.

Especially noteworthy is the fact that the second move is presented in different ways. Its aim is to present the gap that exists in the previous research, which will provide meaning to the current paper. In a bid to show that gap, writers normally use connectors that express contrast. This is what Ito (1993) had done in his paper when using “but” in the following sentence “Newspaper articles in those textbooks, no doubt, represent authentic use of English, but they usually report events that took place more than a year before at best” (p. 1). Contrary to this, in the other paper, writers used words that carry negative connotation to show there is a gap. Some examples of these words are: only, unknown, barrier and confusion. These words were included in different sentences within the second move. Howick et al. (2013) stated:

 The only survey of placebo use in the UK was a 1976 qualitative study restricted to Welsh practitioners. Hence current prevalence of placebo use in UK primary care is unknown. A barrier to investigating placebo use is that confusion surrounds the ‘placebo’ concept.  For example, placebos are often characterized as inactive and nonspecific when in fact they can be active, and have specific effects, especially for relieving pain. (p. 2)

The aim of the third move is to occupy the gap that the writers have found by outlining purposes of the present studies and announcing the principal findings.  There are two different statements to start this move. Statements can be purposive or descriptive. The former states the purpose and the latter describes the present study. The paper written by Ito (1993) has started  with a purposive statement as he claims “This paper reports a simple but effective use of current newspaper articles in the form of a weekly short quiz in advanced EFL reading classes at Nara University of Education, Japan” (p.2). Ito (1993) continues with a descriptive statement by expressing

This weekly newspaper quiz not only takes full advantage of newspaper articles as authentic reading materials but also focuses on their immediacy as an important motivating factor for Japanese university students, whose motivation to learn English has generally dwindled very much after they have passed the all-important entrance examinations which determine most of their future career. (p.2)

In the other paper, the third move starts with a descriptive statement and then a purposive statement is introduced when the authors claim “We aimed to discover if UK general practitioners (GPs) prescribe placebos as frequently as elsewhere and also to understand the conditions under which general practitioners find placebos ethical” (p.2).

            Literature Reviews might be embedded in the first move of the Introduction indicating that a gap in the previous research has been found; or sometimes Literature Reviews can stand in isolation as a separate section. Both papers have their Literature Review inside their Introduction. Ito (1993) presents it inside the first move. In the paper coming from the medicine field, the Literature Review can be seen in the first and second move, as the authors start without mentioning any previous work in particular but referring to “surveys in various countries” (Howick et al., 2013, p. 2); and then, they continue by presenting another survey which was carried out in 1976  which is the one that shows there is a gap that needs to be filled.

            When producing the Methods section, authors should take into account that some specific information must be included, such as, the tool that has been used to collect data, the people who have participated and what is exactly what has been done. A peculiar characteristic of this section is the fact that it is often written in passive voice in order to avoid being personal. In these two papers, this rule has been applied as the use of passive voice sentences in the present and in the past is very frequent.

Swales and Freak (1994) claimed that Methods sections are normally divided into three subcategories, which are: participants, materials and procedure. In the paper written by Ito (1993), there is no Methods section as such, but there is a subtitle after the Introduction under the name of Preparation and Administration of the Newspaper Quiz. This section is also divided in three subsections: Quiz Format, Sources and Administration. It can be said that the first two subsections are part of the materials subcategory Swales and Freak (1994) refer to. In these two parts the author gives details about the quiz that has been used. A very clear example of this is the beginning of the Quiz Format subsection.

The newspaper quiz takes the form of a modified cloze test. It is different from the ordinary type of cloze test in several ways: the blanks, 10 in all, are placed rather deliberately instead of being placed at regular intervals; only nouns and verbs, usually those which are closely related to the content of a selected article, are deleted; the deleted words are listed on the blackboard in alphabetical order as the alternatives for the blanks; the use of a dictionary is allowed and encouraged. (Ito, 1993, p. 2)

The Administration subsection can be identified as the procedure section mentioned by Swales & Freak (1994). In this section how the research has been carried out is explained in detail. Ito (1993) creates a list of the different steps that the students have gone through when using the quiz. The participants section is not included in this paper. I adhere to the view that this happens because there is nothing in particular that the readers needs to know about them as the author has already said they were Japanese university students after passing the all-important examinations that will determine most of their future career.

In the other paper, writers have chosen to use a similar strategy, that is to say, they also divided the Methods section in four different subsections, which are Participants, Defining Pure and Impure Placebos, Survey Instrument and Statistical Analysis. The second and third parts can be taken as if they were one since they both refer to the material that has been used. The last section is the procedure part of the research. It is interesting to mention that in this last part, writers have changed the way to present their work as they are constantly using active voice with the personal pronoun “we”.

We used descriptive statistics (means and 95% confidence intervals) to describe practitioner characteristics and frequencies of placebo use. We reported how often respondents used all pure and all impure placebos at least once in their career (mean and 95% CI). For each type of placebo we categorized prevalence of use into: frequent (daily or approximately once per week), occasional (approximately once per month or once per year) and rare/never (more than once per year or never). (Howick et al., 2013, p. 4)

It can be concluded that even though these two papers have some differences, authors have used similar strategies and linguistic features. As regards organization, both papers have a similar structure even though the titles and subtitles of the Methods section do not coincide. In both Introductions authors have chosen to present a gap by the use of the three moves which have been easily identified. In both cases, Literature Reviews have been included in the Introduction section within the first and/or second move.

Reference

Howick et al. (2013). Placebo use in the United Kingdom: Results from a national survey of primary care practitioners. Plos One, 8(3), doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0058247

Ito, H. (1993). Newspaper articles in university EFL reading classes. Bulletin of Institute for Educational Research of Nara University of Education, 29, 49-61.

Swales, J.M., & Feak, C.B. (1994). Academic writing for graduate students: Essential tasks and skills. Ann Harbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press.

Research Papers Analysis

“A Comparative Analysis of Two Research Articles:

Their Results, Discussions and Conclusions”

 Research Papers in general are composed of several parts: title, abstract, acknowledgements, introduction, literature review, methods, results, discussions, recommendations, conclusions, references, and appendixes.  The aim of this paper will be to deeply analyze different sections of two articles in a bid to describe them and explore whether all research papers have the same layout. Despite the fact that they are from different fields –medicine and education respectively- they both share one main characteristic which is that they are research papers. The Results, Discussions, and Conclusions sections will be compared and contrasted so as to explore the differences and similarities of those sections in both papers. 

            Barrs’s (2012) as well as Di Angelantonio’s et al.'s (2010) articles comprise all the elements required in an Action Research (AR) paper. The former belongs to the field of education and it is clearly divided into different sections which explore the results and the discussion of the investigation. Then, it is concluded by the analysis of the limitations of the study. The latter belongs to the medicine field and it is also divided into different sections so as to attempt to quantify associations of chronic kidney diseases with cardiovascular disease and non-vascular mortality.

            Concerning the results sections in the articles, Barrs’s (2012) result section is divided into different parts which are: Planning the action research, Taking action, Analyzing and reflecting on the data, Hypothesizing and Speculating based on the initial investigation, intervening, observing and reporting, writing and presenting, which is the reflection. Following the definitions provided by Swales (1990), and bearing in mind Barrs’s (2012) article, one can conclude that the author  both presents the findings and interprest their meanings and outcomes.  

             The result section, according to Swales (1990), should summarize the given information. Researchers resort to the use of texts, tables, and figures to state the results of their study. Barrs (2012) presents the results and the discussions in the same section. When referring to the results, the author divides the section into two sub sections that follow the steps undertaken throughout the investigation. The results are presented by means of tables which are explained and analyzed. These are clear, simple and they contain relevant information about the research that was carried out. All the tables included in the article follow the requirements of APA (American Psychological Association) (2007) as all of them are properly numbered and titles are correctly italicized and capitalized. Apart from tables, Barrs (2012) also provides instances of interactions among participants that serve for the purpose of exemplifying and clarifying the information provided. As well as tables, these exchanges are subsequently analyzed and explained. The tense mostly used in the results section is the Past Simple.

            On the other hand, Di Angelantonio’s et al.'s (2010) Results section has subtitles which organize the information the authors want to deliver. Contrary to Barrs’s (2012) results section, Di Angelantonio’s et al.'s  (2010) results section is full of numbers and percentages. There are tables and figures which appear in the type of scatter plots so as to show the correlation between variables. The tables have titles but the fact that they are not italicized and they are not presented with each word capitalized make one conclude that these authors are not following APA style. Below each table there are general and specific notes with a smaller font. The figures have a caption underneath them but the word “figure” and the corresponding number is not italicized. This is another instance in which the authors show that they do not follow APA style.

            The discussion section in Di Angelantonio et al.'s (2010) article is divided into two sub sections called strengths and limitations and conclusion respectively. When referring to the discussion itself, the authors describe the findings in relation to the initial hypothesis and they also remind the reader the main aim of the study.

        Before providing a conclusion, Barrs (2012) devotes a section of the paper to state and describe the limitations of the investigation as well as Di Angelantonio et al. (2010) do  in the strengths and limitations section of their article. Finally, Both research articles use the conclusion to tie the paper together.  Barrs (2012) concludes the article emphasizing the fact that further investigation would be of great value for the research. Regarding Di Angelantonio et.al's  (2010) conclusion, they also express the fact that further studies are needed to investigate the association made at the beginning of the paper. In both articles, authors constantly use modal verbs to show and express possibility.

To sum up, based on the formal observations authors from both papers intended to present a problem, analyze it and find a solution developing their papers in a similar way although both articles come from different fields. The fact that they both refer to the limitations of the investigations would make the reader feel the need to continue reading more about the topic.

 References

American Psychological Association. (2009). Publication manual of the American

Psychological Association. (6th ed.) Washington, DC: American Psychological

Association.

Barrs, K. (2012). Fostering computer-mediated L2 interaction beyond the classroom. Language Learning and Technology, 16 (1), 10-25. Retrieved from http://llt.msu.edu/issues/february2012/actionresearch.pdf

Di Angelantonio, E., Chowdhury, R., Sarwar, N., Aspelund, T., Danesh. J. & Gudnason, V. (2010). Chornic kidney disease and risk of major cardiovascular disease and non-vascular mortality: Prospective population based cohort study. BMJ (341), 1-7. Doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.c4986

Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre Analysis. English in academic and research settings. (Cambridge Applied Linguistics Series). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Discourse communities

Requisites of discourse communities.

With the view to describing a discourse community, Swales (1990) establishes a list of requirements that a discourse community should meet. Those are: Common goals, participatory mechanisms, information exchange, community-specific genres, highly specialized terminology and high general level of expertise. This aim of this paper is to provide evidence in a bid to support Swales idea(1990) .

Kelly-Kleese (2001) identifies the common goals a discourse community may have; she claims that a discourse community involves shared knowledge, common purposes and common relationships, among others. Hoffman-Kipp, Artiles, Lopez-Torres (2003) state that technical and political content should be included in the  vision of critical reflection.

Participatory mechanisms and exchange of information are vital for a discourse community. This idea is reinforced by Wenzlaff and Wieseman (2004) when they state that “a discourse community cannot exist in the absence of a collaborative culture and an environment that supports risk-taking (McLaughlin & Talbert, 1993) and reflection” (p. 9). Kellly-Kleese (2004) also asserts that “by redefining community college scholarship to include the knowledge gained and shared in the classroom, community college professionals will be better able to assert their knowledge and power within higher education” (p. 1). This statement also shows the importance of the interchange of ideas when carrying an investigation.

The use of specific genres in a discourse community can be seen when Kelly-Kleese (2001) asserts that “The community college can be seen as adopting language that has been given particular meaning within the larger higher education community, meaning that is less applicable to its own community but is nonetheless consistently used” (p.2).

In conclusion, taking into account the papers published by the four authors cited, it can be claimed that the set of characteristics that has been provided by Swales (1990) characterizes a certain discourse community.

Reference

Hoffman-Kipp, P., Artiles, A. J., & Lopez Torres, L. (2003). Beyond reflection: Teacher learning as praxis. Theory into Practice. Retrieved October 2007, from

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0NQM/is_3_42/ai_108442653

Kelly-Kleese, C. (2001). Editor’s choice: An open memo to community college faculty and administrators. Community College Review. Retrieved October 2007, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0HCZ/is_1_29/ai_77481463

Swales, J. M. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Wenzlaff, T. L., & Wieseman, K. C. (2004). Teachers need teachers to grow. Teacher Education Quarterly. Retrieved October 2007, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3960/is_200404/ai_n934940

A book critique

A review of a book for students

Academic Writing: A Handbook for International Students is a book that caters for students who struggle to write academically and, as a consequence, be part of a discourse community. It was published in 2006 by Bailey. Although it is rather complete and full of useful and well sequenced exercises, there is a lack of information about quoting and using references in academic papers.

This useful resource aimed at foreign writers? is divided in 4 sections, each of them dealing with different pitfalls somebody can encounter when writing academically. The first section refers to the writing process, that is, how to start, how to organize the writing and so on. The second section deals with the elements of writing that must be borne in mind. Accuracy is dealt with in the third section and some models and samples of different text types are found in the last section of the book. Furthermore, each section is full of activities for students to practice and become accurate.

All these positive points notwithstanding, the book does not have enough information for students to work on quoting and creating reference lists. This is seen as a drawback as students must learn how to avoid plagiarism if they want to become respected members of a discourse community. Swales and Feak (1994) refer to plagiarism as a term related to the concept of property. They compare ideas with inventions and they claim that both are property of their creators. The meaning and the importance of taking into account plagiarism are dealt with in the first section of the book.

Moreover, in the second section, there is also a part that refers to quoting and reference in depth. This part starts by explaining when to use in-text citations. There are also some activities for students to identify when references are needed and what is considered to be a good example of acknowledging ideas. This is totally acceptable since it is essential for students to realize the importance of supporting their ideas with reliable sources. Up to this point, there is no reference to the different styles to document sources. After some activities, the author states “Find out which system of referencing is used in your subject area. You can do this by studying current textbooks and journals and checking departmental guidelines” (Bailey, 2006, p.99). Then, he explains there are three main systems but he just makes reference to the most popular one and provides some instances of how to quote. After that, the reference list section starts. In this part, there is an example of a reference list and then a note that says that students should seek specialist help if they want to write references. On the other hand, a reference list can be found at the end of the book. Since the title is “Sources”, it can be concluded that the author is not using the American Psychological Association (APA) style at all. If one reads the list, you could immediately identify that APA is not used, as years are not between brackets and punctuation of volume number and page number are also different.

The lack of information in this part of the book is evident. The author tenet of the importance of how to acknowledge ideas is not reflected in this section. Since students find documenting source a grueling task, a deep analysis of how to avoid mistakes when quoting should have been made. The APA style, which is one of the well-known systems, should have been mentioned and some examples with a guide should have been provided. As in any other book for students, a sequence of activities with a smooth progression of difficulty should have been created so as students could practice and achieve their aim, which is to avoid plagiarism successfully.

To conclude, it can be stated that the book is quite complete as it has a large number of useful activities based on different aspects of writing. Nevertheless, this book would not be useful for students who are willing to become members of an academic discourse community as all the information they need is not available in this book. When students want to acknowledge their source or create a reference list, they will need to resort to another book or articles with a full explanation of how to do so.

Reference

Bailey, S. (2006). Academic writing: A handbook for international students. Oxon, OX: Routledge. Retrieved from http://npu.edu.ua/!e-book/book/djvu/A/ii_kgpm_27.pdf  

Swales, J. M., & Feak, C. B. (1994). Academic writing for graduate students:

Essential tasks and skills. Michigan, MI: The University of Michigan Press.