More about the best way to read scholarly articles

If students are still puzzled about the way to read a scholarly article, we may remind them:

How we read an article depends on what we want to get from it.

For example, when we read abstracts, we should consider that an abstract is like a television commercial. It should give us an idea of whether the full paper is of interest to us or not. If the abstract does not appear to be useful for our own research, we will not spend any more time with the research paper. Comparing abstracts to TV commercials is accurate as a business technique, since some publishers give full abstracts of articles, allowing readers to decide whether to purchase the full contents. In this way, abstracts do sell the research and are a form of commercial marketing. For this reason especially, writers of theses and academic research should follow the recommended rules for writing abstracts. If an abstract is longer than it should be, it shows a lack of respect for the reader, who has little time to devote to reading abstracts. Writers want to communicate the most information clearly in as little time as possible. If a writer of TV commercials said to an employer that the product being sold is so important or interesting that a TV commercial should be ten minutes instead of one minute, the writer would not be doing a good job. The challenge is to get as much information as possible in a deliberately limited space. If the student asks us:

Why do some abstracts have background information, while others just state what was done in the research summarized in the thesis or academic research paper?

We may answer:

Since space is short in an abstract, every word counts. Sometimes writers of English as a foreign language are especially aware that the more words they write, the more it is likely that they will make mistakes. If they write fewer words, chances are that statistically, there will be fewer problems with their writing.

Here the challenge is to avoid the style in Thai English, especially at a university level, of thinking that longer words and sentences are more impressive than shorter ones. So writers of academic research and theses in Thai English sometimes include difficult words, spelled wrong, in their writing. It is much more impressive to write English without making mistakes, even if what is written are simple words. Short words and sentences are usually the easiest and quickest to understand. If we use these words and sentences, we are showing courtesy to our reader, helping them to understand as fast as possible what we are trying to communicate. If the student asks again:

But what about the background information at the beginning of the abstract?

We may explain further:

Sometimes background information is really helpful for understanding the context of research. However, many times, the background information is only partly useful for seeing what happened in research before the thesis or academic paper.

If students who have problems writing Thai English write lots of background information, their sentences can have many mistakes, and also not have essential information. They do not help the reader and they also are a risk for the student, who is trying to persuade the reader to spend time to consult an entire thesis or research paper. One example might be an imaginary Ph.D. thesis on The Effect of Health Department Information on Consumer Choice of Desserts eaten in Malls in the Bangkok Metropolitan Area. The abstract to describe this enjoyable subject might begin in different ways. If the abstract begins this way, it may not be worth reading:

Most people like eating desserts. Small children and adults all love desserts after meals. More and more people in Bangkok have a sweet tooth and like their desserts, sometimes eating them early in the morning and before meals instead of after meals.

As readers of this abstract, we may note that these observations are possibly true, but they do not tell us anything new. They do not inform us of the subject of the student’s original research. We have read a few sentences and still have no idea what the thesis or academic research paper is about. If we are a very busy researcher, we may give up and go on to the next research paper where the writer may tell us more quickly what the research is about. If we also insert several mistakes in English writing in the above beginning of an abstract, this makes even less of an impression. We get the feeling as readers of an abstract that thr writer may have nice things to say about desserts, but apparently nothing new, and lacks the English writing skills to communicate them anyway. This abstract for a thesis or academic research paper will probably not attract many readers. As readers ourselves, we will feel safe in skipping it and looking for more concise writings about the same subject, to inform us quickly and efficiently.

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