Writing process
10 Structure of academic texts
General
The structure of academic texts depends not only on the logical development of a topic but also on conventions within disciplines. This book provides guidelines for finding the appropriate structure of a scientific report,and points out strategies to adapt this to project reports or seminar papers for design projects. Every type of academic text consists of an: Introduction – Main (central) part – Conclusion.
Depending on the specific genre the main part can consist of various parts. Project reports of engineers often follow the structure of a research article based on the IMRAD- model (introduction-methods-results and discussion, Fig 3):
The IMRAD model is not a formal structure but this is a structure based on a principle. This means that names of titles can vary – except for introduction and conclusion. However, the principle must always be the same, namely that the reader expects at the beginning to be informed what the paper is about, what questions it intends to answer, or which problem should be solved. They want to know something about the background, previous knowledge or research, and/or the theoretical framework. Then readers expect to understand how results were found and what they imply.
Depending on the length, purpose and genre, academic papers contain main chapters with appropriate subchapters. This structure is the result of the kind of research that was carried out, decisions on the hierarchy of information but also conventions of a certain academic discipline. If, for example, students of engineering base their report on the IMRAD structure, headings and subheadings basically follow this (traditional) pattern, which can be often seen in research articles. However, if the paper is written by students of architecture or design, the structure is often topic based. See a summary of possible structures in table 5.
Table 5: Summary of possible organizational structures
| Simple, traditional structure | Traditional, more complex | Topic based |
|
Title page Abstract a Table of contents List of figures (optional) List of tables (optional) List of table and figures (optional)b Glossary/ abbreviations (essential if abbreviated terms are used) |
||
|
Introduction (Backgroundc) Literature review Materials/ methods Results Discussion Conclusion Recommendations d
|
Introduction Study 1
Study 2
Discussion Conclusions |
Introduction
Topic 1 Topic 2 Topic 3 Conclusions
|
|
Acknowledgements e References/ list of references/ bibliography f Appendix g |
||
go to a Depending on the type of text this part is the management/ executive summary, summary or synopsis.
b This can be two separate lists or one list.
c A background chapter is necessary if this is not part of the introduction.
d if required
e Acknowledgements is sometimes placed after the abstract
f A bibliography may contain literature which was not explicitly referred to in the paper. The list of references lists all the literature used and referred to in the report.
g In case there is more than one appendix the heading is Appendices (Young, 2009).
Activity: Go to the library and find a report/ thesis or study paper with a similar research perspective to your own. Analyse carefully how it is divided up into sections, and consider the function each section performs in the overall goal of the thesis (adapted from Paltridge & Starfield, 2007).
For more details on titles/headings and subheadings, go to Outlines. For the writing of each section go to Chapter Writing the parts of scientific reports.