Grammar Checks

You have a draft of your article, now what? First give yourself a cheer and celebrate, then begin the rewriting process. Rewriting?? Yes, you have done a first draft, hopefully including all of the necessary parts, but it is rough, and needs a lot of polishing. I suggest reading through the draft in full, make notes to yourself (I use track changes) and mark areas that are not complete, may not be clear to someone reading it for the first time, or need more support with citations. Then start at the beginning and read each sentence aloud, is there a way to make it clearer, more concise? Picture your grandmother, who knows nothing about your area of study, reading it: would she understand that sentence? Check for any pronouns (they, he, and she); is it clear to whom the pronouns are referring? Check your plurals versus possessives (this makes me crazy when they are wrong): plurals (e.g. “girls”) do not have an apostrophe, possessives do have an apostrophe (e.g., “the girl’s bike;” “the girls’ bikes”). Do you know a former English major? Someone who is a great writer? If so, ask them to read through your paper and offer suggestions.

Updating your literature

If you are working on rewriting your dissertation into an article for publication, be sure that you update your literature. Research moves quickly these days with the internet, and you want to make sure when your paper is published it has the most current thinking. Authors often forget to check on literature related to theory, which can get them into trouble, so do your homework! 

Rewriting Your Dissertation into an Article: Rewriting and Polishing

Once you have a draft of your article, it is time to begin the rewriting and polishing phase. Everyone has to do it, including very experienced writers. Accept that rewriting is part of the process, and spend that extra time now to save you pain later.

Where to start? I suggest reading through the draft in full, make notes to yourself (I use track changes) and mark areas that are not complete, that may not be clear to someone reading it for the first time, or that need more support with citations. Then start at the beginning and read each sentence aloud, is there a way to make it clearer, more concise? Picture your grandmother who knows nothing about your topic reading it, would she understand that sentence? Have you explained any terms that might be considered jargon? Check for any pronouns (they, he, and she), is it clear who the pronouns are referring to? Check your plurals versus possessives (this makes me crazy when they are wrong): plurals (e.g. “girls”) do not have an apostrophe, possessives do have an apostrophe (e.g., “the girl’s bike;” “the girls’ bikes”).

Do you know a former English major? Someone who is a great writer? If so, ask them to read through your paper and offer suggestions.

Check your results sections' APA format. There are very specific ways that statistics should be written, check the APA Manual that you are doing it correctly. If you are including tables or figures, then PLEASE read the sections on these in the APA Manual, not only on how to do them but also when to use them.

Print out your references, then go through the paper crossing off each time you have cited the reference. They should come out even. Double check if the citation has 3+ authors (e.g., Smith, Jones, & Johnson, 2015) then use et al. after the first citation (Smith et al., 2015).

Rewriting Your Dissertation into an Article: Discussion

The final text section of your paper is the Discussion, similar to the dissertation's Chapter 5. In your discussion, you will evaluate, interpret the results, and draw conclusions about them. Emphasize the theoretical or practical consequences of your findings. Be very careful that you are not misinterpreting or misrepresenting your findings (e.g., "the results are clear that older adults…" Did you examine ALL older adults? No? Then do not over generalize).

Begin your discussion with a clear statement of support or nonsupport for original hypotheses (it can also be structured in term of your research questions). Relate the findings to the previous literature, how do your results fit in with others' work? Your interpretations should take into account sources of bias and threats to internal validity. Also, consider limitations or weakness or your study. Bring in the theoretical implications of the study; does it fit with previous theories- why or why not? If not, could the theory be modified to account for your findings? Finally, end with problems remain unsolved, and what future areas of research have you identified? 

Rewriting Your Dissertation into an Article: Results

The results section of your article is taking Chapter 4 of your dissertation and reducing it to the essentials. I find it helps to discuss the results through your research questions. Your results should be unbiased and provide enough detail that others can interpret them. Do not hide ones that did not come out as expected. Indicate whether your data violate the assumptions of the statistics you used.

It generally makes the most sense to set it up based on your research questions, keep it concise and to the point. Do not include unnecessary figures and tables. A good rule of thumb is if you discuss the data in detail in the text, do not also include a figure, or table on it.

Quantitative Studies. Keep your reporting of results non-biased and assume your reader has a professional knowledge of statistics (so do not explain basic concepts or give citations for common procedures). Be sure to explain how you handled any missing data in the analyses, and the percentage that were missing.

Qualitative Studies. Report your findings in a non-biased way; explain how you went about your analyses. Provide participant quotes to illustrate your themes. It is a good idea to assign pseudonyms to participants and briefly provide any relevant information after each quote (e.g., Rose, age 68). Discuss any discrepant cases, and how these were addressed.

Rewriting Your Dissertation into an Article: Methodology

We are now into Chapter 3 of your dissertation, this needs to be cut down to just a couple of pages for an article. It is helpful to go to the APA manual and read the section on methodology and look at their examples. You also might want to read a recent article with similar methodology to yours. When you are ready, start with an outline, which will look something like this:

                           Method

                           Participants

                           Materials

                           Procedure

Remember, your method section must be in sufficient detail that someone else can replicate your study based on your description. Therefore, each section needs to be written in detail, however, note that there are fewer sections than in your dissertation; so some things will need to be included in a sentence or two, such as a brief mention of the approval by the IRB (give approval number).

Rewriting Your Dissertation into an Article: Literature

Reducing your 50-75 pages of Chapter 2 to a couple pages of literature review in an article is a very daunting prospect! I suggest beginning by thinking through your key concepts/ variables. What does your reader absolutely have to know about to understand your study? Then write these down as the beginning of an outline for your article. My guess is it will look something like this:

             Intro

             Theory

             Variable 1

             Variable 2

             Gap in the literature

With your outline as a map, now take each section individually and think about what is the most important literature you need to include? You do not have to do an exhaustive review, but you do need to show you understand the literature. You may find it helpful to treat each section as a summary of your literature on the topic in c. 2. Remember, you should not have more than five pages or so of literature, so keep to the essentials. Do a first draft and let it set for a day or two, then go back and see if you can eliminate any nonessential sentences. Have someone else read it for coherence, does it make sense to him or her, and make an argument for your study? Be sure you end the literature review sections with a couple of sentences emphasizing the gap you are addressing and why your study is needed. Mentioning your research questions helps the reader know where you are going.