When analyzing the format of the scholarly article, I was able to formulate a thesis statement into my introductory paragraph. However, it was not until the end when I had entirely finished my paper that I was able to write out the thesis statement and then insert it into the introduction. I think that was a way of me “enhancing my revising and editing strategies” and skills, because when I finished and reread my paper was that I self-assessed my writing, what I wanted to say, and then edit in what I realized was missing. The thing I struggled with most for this portion was the word-count. I ended up being repetitive in my writing in an effort to reach the word count.
When reading the New York Times article “Eating Processed Foods Tied to Shorter Life” by Nicholas Bakalar, it references the scholarly article published on February 11, 2019 in JAMA Internal Medicine titled “Association Between Ultra-processed Food Consumption and Risk of Mortality Among Middle-Aged Adults in France,” by Laure Schnabel, Emmanuelle Kesse-Guyot, Benjamin Alles, et al. In the process of reading different scientific journals and articles, it is important to keep in mind what information is being presented and how efficiently. This can be measured through analyzing the format and wording used by an author(s), to give validity and credibility to their work. In this article, the first characteristic that is noticeable is the format in which the headings for each section are labeled. Schnabel et al does not begin with an abstract as is custom, but instead they have a section labeled “Key Points,” in which there is a concise summary of what question they are asking, what the results were, and what the results mean. In these three “key points”, as it was labeled, the information covered was a brief glimpse of what their introduction, results, and discussion might discuss. Following the “Key Points” there is an “Abstract” heading which further breaks down the subheadings as follows- “Importance”, “Objective”, “Design, Setting, and Participants”, “Exposures”, “Main Outcomes and Measures”, “Results”, and “Conclusions and Relevance”. The information which Schnabel et al presented in the Importance and Objective sections, align with the information which would be expected of an Introduction in the typical style of writing research reports. The Importance section describes the knowledge present beforehand which gave rise to the question being asked- as presented in the objective section. Moving onto the “Design, Setting, and Participants” and “Exposures” subheadings, there is a direct comparison to the information for a “Methods and Materials” description. Schnabel et al go into detail about how they conducted their research, how they chose their subjects, and what the specific diets they used consisted of. Following this section, their “Main Outcomes and Measures” works alongside of their “Results” section to encompass the entirety of what is typically expected of a “Results” heading. They delve into what was observed over the two years they conducted the research, and then it is backed up by all of their numerical data. Lastly, the “Conclusions and Relevance” portion of Schnabel et al’s article embodies the description designated for the “References” heading. Here they discuss why their findings were important and mentioned the need for possible future studies to reinforce what they found. More than just analyzing the format in which Schnabel et al set up their research report, there can also be an analysis of the vocabulary and voice used. Throughout the entire report, there was a consistency of the passive voice to give the spotlight to their research and findings. Instead of saying “we chose…” there were numerous phrases in the form of “participants were selected…”, to make the topics of the research the subjects of the sentence. When writing for the sciences, a commonality might be to use hedging verb phrases to show that, no matter how much work is done or what results are observed, there will or should always be a level of caution and uncertainty to one’s research- as to not claim one’s research as the basic facts. This is seen through different phrases, like “appears to be,” which is used by Schnabel et al in their “Conclusions and Relevance” section. Overall, in this article, Schnabel et al were able to stay true to the information expected of a well-written research report. Even though their format was not explicitly an IMRAD labeling method, their information was presented in an IMRAD way, for a more wholistic delivery of knowledge.
References
Bakalar, N. Feb. 12, 2019. Eating Processed Foods Tied to Shorter Life. New York Times[Internet]. [cited 2019 February 13]; Available from:
Penrose, A. 2010. Writing in the Sciences: Exploring Conventions of Scientific Discourse. 3ed. Chapter 4. Pearson [Print]. [cited 2019 February 20].
Schnabel, L., Kesse-Guyot, E., Alles B., et al. Feb. 11, 2019. Association Between Ultraprocessed Food Consumption and Risk of Mortality Among Middle-aged Adults in France. JAMA [Internet]. [cited 2019 February 20]; Available from: < https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-abstract/2723626>
