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How NOT to Write an Academic Paper?

How NOT to Write an Academic Paper?. Nguyen Xuan Hoai, Hanoi University. Outline. Who am I? Why your papers get rejected? Common pitfalls in writing paper: Ethical aspect. Presentation aspect. Language aspect. Response to reviewers. Briefs about me.

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How NOT to Write an Academic Paper?

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  1. How NOT to Write an Academic Paper? Nguyen Xuan Hoai, Hanoi University

  2. Outline • Who am I? • Why your papers get rejected? • Common pitfalls in writing paper: • Ethical aspect. • Presentation aspect. • Language aspect. • Response to reviewers.

  3. Briefs about me • I come from the computer science background, working at the IT R&D Center, Hanoi University. • My publication count is around 80 (27 was published with Springer!)… not including many rejected ones! • I have reviewed hundreds of academic papers for prestigious academic conferences and journals in my field of study (including – IEEE Trans on Evolutionary Computation, IEEE Trans on Neural Networks, IEEE CEC, ACM SIGEVO GECCO, EuroGP, ….)

  4. Disclaimer • I will be more focused to publication in natural sciences (in particular Computer Science). • I do not try to over-generalize but only use my experience; everything said might have counterexamples. • I give some examples of my own and others without any mean to offense. • The list of common pitfalls in paper presentation is far from complete!

  5. So after a long period of hard working, you have decided to submit an academic paper … And wait ….

  6. Notification to your submitted paper: • Why? • Why? • Why? …

  7. Most common reasons for papers get rejected • Does not fit the scope of journal or conference. • Does not make any contribution to the knowledge of the field. • Lacking of new ideas/results. • Solving insignificant problems. • Does not meet the ethical standards. • Originality. • Ethical issues of research problems.

  8. Most common reasons for papers get rejected • Research contents are weak • Literature review is inadequate. • Methodological problems. • Data/samples are problematic. • Insufficient statistical analysis. • Misinterpretation of the results. • Reproducibility of the results. • The paper is poorly written. • Does not follow the journal’s guidelines for presentation.

  9. Badly Written Papers • Misconception: “My paper should not be rejected as long as the results (contents) are good” …. • The truth is: “Many papers have been rejected for they are badly written”

  10. Common Pitfalls in Writing Papers Ethical Aspect: • Plagiarism • Any text in the paper. • Tables, figures. • Zero tolerance. • Self-plagiarism • Is this paper look similar to your previous one? • Copy-and-paste. • Quotation and Paraphrase. • Plagiarism checking tools.

  11. Common Pitfalls in Writing Papers Presentation Aspect: • Write paper for you only! • Suppose reviewers/readers have known everything you know. • Lacking of context • Lacking of problem definition or crowded with them. • Lacking of literature review or unfairly diminish others work. • Purely descriptive • No alternative, no comparison, no comments just “we did this, we did that…”

  12. Common Pitfalls in Writing Papers Presentation Aspect: • Bad structured • Unbalance in parts. • Include irrelevant or unnecessarily long contents. • Incoherence. • Obscure writing • Many acronyms and abbreviations. • Inconsistence in notation usage. • Use footnote more than text.

  13. Common Pitfalls in Writing Papers Language Aspect: Academic writing is a discipline! • Writing paper with colorful language • Straight and simple. • Write long and complex sentences • KISS – Keep it short and simple • Context repetition • Should not repeat ourselves. • Inconsistent tense in a paragraph

  14. Common Pitfalls in Writing Papers Language Aspect: Academic writing is a discipline! • Active vs. Passive voice • Vietnamese tends to use more active voice while formal English tends to use passive. • Bad word choice • Over-sell/over-generalize words (e.g “paradigm”) • Buzz words (cool but shallow). • Controversy words. • Typos and bad graphics

  15. Response to Reviewers But if you have a chance to response to the reviewers of your paper …

  16. Response to Reviewers Don’t: • Use aggressive or defensive tone. • Use one reviewer’s response against another. • I am right because the reviewer is wrong! • Say things like “we agree” or “this is excellent ..” if you are going to change the paper as suggested by reviewers. • Referring back for similar comments • “See my response to comment X above..” • Submit same version to other journals.

  17. Response to Reviewers Do: • Give thanks to the reviewers and editor. • Understand and address all points raised by the editor and reviewers. • Pick your battle and present your disagreement in a polite way! • Restate the comments and clearly show your major revisions. • Resubmit your paper and response- to-reviewers on time.

  18. THANK YOU ! Acknowledgement – apart from my own experience, I have consulted various writings related to the topic on the internet; in particular, www.vietphd.org Prof. McKay from SNU should be thanked for giving his experience on the common academic language mistakes committed by Asian researchers

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