Research Methodology

Indicative Slides
Module 2 and Module 3
Hypothesis
• Hypothesis is a proposed explanation for a phenomenon

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Hypothesis testing
• In hypothesis testing a statement is made about a parameter about a
population
• A random sample is taken from the population and hypothesis is
tested with the appropriate sample statistic
• Based on evidence (probability) the hypothesis is accepted or
rejected

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Hypothesis testing
• Null Hypothesis [H0]
• Statement that the statistical differences or relationships have occurred
purely due to chance operating in an unrestricted manner
• State of affairs
• As usual
• Alternate Hypothesis [Ha]
• Statement which asserts that the observable differences or relationships are
not just due to chance but also due to the phenomenon
• Claim
• Assumption

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What to test?
• It is the responsibility of the Ha proposer to test the claim
• Ha cannot be tested
• It is always the Ho that will be tested for significance
• The statistical analysis indicates that there is enough evidence to
either reject or not to reject the Ho.
• Rejecting Ho doesn’t mean blindly accepting Ha, but rather there
could be a possibility of Ha. [The chance of Ha appears to be too
significant enough to ignore; The Ha might not be just a fluke]

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Conditions to evaluate hypothesis tests
• Confidence Level
• A confidence level refers to the percentage of all possible samples that can be
expected to include the true population parameter.
• How sure you can be
• 90%; 95%; 99%; 99.9%
• Probability Level/ Significance Level
• The significance level is the probability of rejecting the null hypothesis when
it is true
• The value of p depends upon the type of error the researcher is willing to
tolerate

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Decision and Error

Do not reject Ho Reject Ho

Incorrect
Correct
Ho is true Decision
Decision
(Type I error α)
Incorrect
Ho is false Decision Correct Decision
(Type II error β)

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Probability of making an incorrect decision + Probability of making a
correct decision = 1

Probability of making an incorrect decision

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α + (1-α) = 1

When α is more, the probability of correct decision is less

So what is an optimum α?

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Optimal α level
• Depends on the seriousness of the issue
• How sensitive is the decision
• Who will be affected by the decision
• What will be the implication
• Can we afford to make some mistakes

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• Probability of an event happening = p
• The event here is that the expected output falls within an interval
• Confidence level: 95%
• α=5%
• If the probability of the event is less than or equal to α (say 5%),
reject Ho

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Drill it down..

If p≤ α, reject Ho

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Data Analysis Process
• Problem Definition / Scenario Comprehension
• Hypothesis
• Data Collection
• Analysis
• Inference
• Recommendation

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Hypothesis testing – flow chart

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Validity
• Validity refers to the extent to which a test/instrument measures
what we actually wish to measure
• A scale or a measuring instrument is said to possess validity to the
extent to which differences in measured values reflect true
differences in the characteristic or property being measured.
Scope of Validity
• External Validity
• The external validity is the generalisability of findings of a study to other
situations, people, settings and measures
• Internal Validity
• This is the extent to which differences found with a measuring tool reflect
true differences among those being tested
Types of Validity
• Content Validity
• the extent to which it provides adequate coverage of the topic under study.
• Criterion-related Validity
• how well scores on one measure predict scores on another measure of
interest
• Construct Validity
• testifies to how well the results obtained from the use of the measure fits the
theory around which the test is designed
Reliability
• The stability and consistency with which the instrument measures the
concept
• A measure is reliable to the degree that it supplies consistent results
• A reliable instrument need not be valid, but a valid instrument is
reliable
Reliability
• A reliable instrument should work well under different conditions and
at different times
• Classified based on
• Stability
• Equivalence
Stability
• The ability of a measure to maintain stability over time, despite
uncontrollable testing conditions and the state of the respondents
themselves, is indicative of its stability and low vulnerability to
changes in the situation
• Test-retest reliability
• The reliability coefficient obtained by the repetition of an identical measure
on a second occasion
• Parallel form reliability
• When responses on two comparable sets of measures tapping the same
construct are highly correlated, there will be parallel-form reliability.
Equivalence
• Equivalence is concerned with variations at one point in time among
investigators and sample of items or with the internal consistency.
• A good way to test for the equivalence of measurements by two
investigators is to compare their observations of the same events
• Split-Half Reliability technique, can be used when the measuring tool
has a number of similar questions or statements in response to which
the subject can express himself
• Inter-item consistency reliability is a test of the consistency of
respondents’ responses to all the items in a measure
Spearman-Brown coefficient
R = n r/[1+(n–1)r]

R = estimated reliability of the entire instrument

r = correlation coefficient between measurements
n = ratio of the number of items in the changed instrument to the
number in the instrument
When n = 2, split-half reliability, R’ = [2r/(1+r)]
Cronbach’s alpha
• The most popular test of inter-item consistency reliability is
Cronbach’s coefficient or Cronbach’s alpha (Cronbach, 1951), which is
used for multipoint scaled items
• A series of two random subsets are chosen from the items. For each
pair of subsets so chosen, the Spearman-Brown coefficient is
calculated. The average of the series of coefficients generated gives
the Cronbach alpha, which is a better indicator of reliability than the
Spearman-Brown coefficient.
Aspects of Model Development
• Degree of abstraction
• between the phenomenon and the model in its general physiognomy
• Capability of manipulation
• apply experimental procedures in order to understand changes in
phenomenon
• Degree of analysis required for developing models
• amount of research or scientific effort that is required to be put in to develop
the model
Modelling Process
The modelling process can be divided into three phases:
• identification of problem structures,
• symbolic representation or development of model, and
• deriving solutions.
Testing of Models
• The objective of model testing is similar to that of determination of
Type I and Type II errors in hypothesis testing.
• A model may include variables, that are not relevant (which is Type I
error) or it may fail to include relevant variables (which is Type II
error), which significantly affect the models effectiveness.
• Further, the model may represent a wrong relationship—a
relationship that is different from the true one. This is Type III error -
which is characterized by wrong identification of the problem.
• Even when all these three errors are under control, the model may
not give good results because of poor estimates of the parameters.
Sensitivity Analysis
Varying only one parameter and observing the variability in the model
results make a sensitivity analysis. The joint variabilities of parameters
could also be tested similarly
These procedures will ensure that the external validity of the model is
high
Evaluation of Heuristics
Heuristics are based on experience, analogy, or the creative reflection
of the analyst

Evaluation needs to be done to establish external validity

Criteria for evaluating heuristics
• Quality of Solution
• Running time
• Difficulty of implementation
• Flexibility
• Robustness
• Simplicity and Analysability
• Interactive computing
Validation of Simulation Models
The goal of the validation is two fold:
• To produce a model that represents true system behaviour closely
enough for the model to be used as a substitute for the actual system,
for the purpose of experimenting with the system; and
• To increase the credibility of the model to an acceptable level, so that
the model will be used by decision-makers.
Considerations while validating a simulation
• Experimentation with a simulation model is a surrogate for actually
experimenting with an existing or proposed system
• A simulation model of a complex, real world system is always only an
approximation to the actual system, regardless of how much effort is
put into developing the model.
• It is pointless to seek the absolute validity or invalidity of a model, but
rather of determine the degree to which the model agrees with the
system.
• A simulation model should always be developed for a particular
purpose
Considerations while validating a simulation
• A simulation model should be validated relative to a specified set of
criteria, that will actually be used in decision-making.
• Validation is not something to be attempted after a simulation model
has already been developed; Instead, model development and
validation should be done hand in hand.
• The use of formal statistical procedures is only part of the validation
process
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Why communicate research?
When scientists are able to communicate effectively beyond their peers
to broader, non-scientist audiences, it builds support for science,
promotes understanding of its wider relevance to society, and
encourages more informed decision-making at all levels, from
government to communities to individuals.

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Need to communicate research
• The responsibilities of the researcher extend beyond the immediate design,
conduct, and supervision of the research. Those additional responsibilities
have both epistemological and ethical implications for what it means to do
work that goes by the name of research, and those implications have to do
with how the research is circulated and shared.

• ‘Research is not done or complete, until it has been made available to

others, and how it is made available carries with it a new set of
epistemological and ethical responsibilities. Research worthy of the name
has always had to appear in some publicly accessible form.’
- (Willinsky, 2006, p 439)
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Epistemology and Ethics
• From an epistemological perspective, sharing findings is an essential
part of opening one’s work up for peer review and public challenge
• One requisite for believing that a study’s conclusions are true, and
not mistaken or misguided, is that the study has been subject to
critical scrutiny.
• Researchers have an ethical responsibility to see work that has
arrived at some warranted conclusions enter the public domain by
some means
Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge

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Effective Research Communication
• ‘Getting the right information to the right people in the right format at the
right time’ (Morris et al., 2007)
• These factors include questions of audience (‘the right people’), questions
of content (‘the right information’), questions of outputs (‘the right
format’) and questions of other influences (‘the right time’).
• Four dimensions of effective research communication are:
a. knowing the audience
b. identifying key messages
c. tailoring outputs
d. supporting uptake and use.

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Knowing the Audience
• Absolutely critical for effective research communication is a clear
sense of audience
• Who is this research for?
• Who are the users of our research? How do I engage with them?
What has been/could be the effects of this engagement?’ (Brewer,
2013)
• It is important to remember that there is not one single, well-defined,
and internally homogenous professional audience, but rather
multiple, overlapping publics whose boundaries and characteristics
are ill-defined
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Typical users of research
• Business and the corporate sector – major corporations, small and medium sized
enterprises, tech start ups etc.
• Government and public policy making – local and regional government, national
government, international bodies, etc.
• Civil society – Trade unions, interest groups, think tanks, charities, NGOs, etc.
• Culture – NGOs, civil society (national and global), educated citizenry, cultural
consumers, librarians, archivists, schools, media, public bodies, private organizations,
charities, individuals, families, etc.
• The state – governments (local, devolved, national and regional), political parties,
politicians, policy makers, civil servants, national and international strategists, etc.
• The media and public engagement – print and broadcast media, social media, etc.
• The market – business, industry, trade unions, consumers, workers, etc
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Key Messages
• Research users (including researchers) want to know clearly what a
research study found (findings) and what that means or could mean
for them in their context (implications).
• The primary function of any research output is to communicate the
main findings and implications of a research study for a particular
audience or set of audiences
• Clarity of findings
• Identification of implications

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Clarity of findings
• Clarity of findings involves more than just issues of presentation.
• There is a need to manage the clarity of communication and
sophistication of argument.

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Clarity of findings
• Clarity is not just about distilling out the key findings but also thinking
about how they can be best illustrated and contextualized for
different audiences
• Research findings can be presented in ways that help to open up
rather than close down discussion

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Identification of implications
• Practitioners are looking for evidence about impact, clear implications
for practice, as well as rich, logistical information on implementation
to be able to take the evidence and apply it in real world contexts
• Research evidence does not translate easily into simple ingredients
for developing practice or improving policy.
• There is a need for creative thinking not just about the research and
what it has found but also about the contexts in which these research
findings might be used and what the findings might mean in those
contexts.

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Identification of implications
• Practical Implications
• Theoretical implications

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Tailoring Outputs
Research teams need to take full advantage of the ever-increasing range of
possibilities for presenting and sharing information. This is about researchers
meeting the needs of their target audiences by developing outputs that are:
• varied – considering a range of possible digital (e.g. e-newsletter, online
presentation, website, blog post, podcast, videos, sound clips, data visualisation,
infographics, social media, etc.) and print (e.g. research report, key findings
summary, magazine article, press release, policy brief, fact sheet, etc.) formats
• interactive – using events (e.g. workshop, training course, meeting, conference,
debate, webinar, talks, radio/TV/podcast interviews, etc.) as well as publications
• useable – creating tools (e.g. toolkit, handbook, checklist, guidelines, model,
framework, teaching resource, etc.) to be used as well as reports to be read
• timely – sharing regular interim updates as well as final outputs

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Supporting uptake and use
• Telling key audiences about the outputs well before completion.
• Linking the outputs to well-known topical issues or initiatives.
• Timing the distribution of outputs carefully for target audiences.
• Getting support for the outputs from respected opinion formers.
• Emphasising how and why the outputs could help end-users.

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Integrated communication
Research communication needs to be understood as integral rather
than separate from research

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Research Communication Outlets
• Posters
• Conferences/ Colloquia
• Monographs
• Books
• Thesis/ Dissertations
• Book Chapters
• Conferences Proceeding
• Peer reviewed Journals

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Posters
Research poster is a visual representation of research process
organized and consolidated in an easily understandable format

Research posters summarize information or research concisely and

attractively to help publicize it and generate discussion

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Preparing Research Posters
TITLE
Author(s) Name and Affiliation
Summary of
• Objectives
• Hypotheses/ Model
• Methods
• Findings
• Conclusion

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Preparing Research Posters
• A3 or A2 dimension
• Minimal Text
• Maximum Visuals
• Separated into sections with headlines
• Readable from a distance
• Contact Information of corresponding authors

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Preparing Research Posters
• MS PowerPoint
• MS Publisher
• Adobe Illustrator/ Photoshop
• GIMP

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Conference
An academic conference (also called as research conference or
symposium) is a meeting which researchers attend to present the
findings from their research and to listen to others to learn about the
latest work within their field of interest.

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Types of Conferences
• Academic Conference with Paper Presentation
• Symposium – scaled down version of a conference
• Seminar – one or few presenters
• Colloquium – focused conference
• Workshop – practice based / skill development

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Monographs
• A detailed written study of a single specialized subject or an aspect of
it.
• The word monograph is derived from the Greek mono (single) and
grapho (to write), meaning "writing on a single subject".
Example: How Gaseous CFCs contribute to the Ozone layer depletion

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Books
• A substantial amount of research goes in to writing a non-fiction.
• A research consolidation written in easy language.

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Thesis/ Dissertations
• Repository

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Book Chapters
• Contributory
chapters in
edited books

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Conference Proceeding
• A published record of conference that may include papers published
by participants

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Peer Reviewed Journals
• Journals that publishes articles after rigorous review process.

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Research Communication Outlets
• Posters
• Conferences/ Colloquia
• Monographs
• Books
• Thesis/ Dissertations
• Book Chapters
• Conferences Proceeding
• Peer reviewed Journals

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Writing for Publishing
• Abstract
• Introduction
• Literature Review
• Methods
• Result/ Findings
• Discussions/ Recommendation/ Implications
• Conclusion
• Reference/ Bibliography

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Read before you write
• Abstract
• Objectives
• Methods
• Findings
• Conclusion

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Parts of a research paper
• Title
• Abstract
• Keywords [JEL Classification]
• Introduction
• Literature Review
• Methods
• Results
• Discussion
• Conclusion
• References

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Title
Every word in your title is important

The first piece of communication that the external world come across
about your research

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Ensure that your title
1 will immediately make sense to the referee
2 will easily be found by a search engine or indexing system
3 will attract the right kind of readers rather than discouraging them,
and will also catch the attention of browsers.
4 does not consist of a string of nouns and will be immediately
comprehensible to anyone in your general field
5 is short
6 has a definite and concise indication of what it is written in the paper
itself. It is neither unjustifiably specific nor too vague or generic

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Points to note
• Titles can be 5-15 words long
• Longer titles can be broken down into two parts (using a colon)
• Use Title Case or Sentence Case

• Titling is a creative task

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Examples
• A study of the factors affecting the trihyroxyindole procedure for the
analysis of deoxyribonucleic acid
• Factors affecting the trihyroxyindole procedure for the analysis of
deoxyribonucleic acid
• What factors effect diversity among men and women in old age?
• Will women always live longer than men?
• Silicon Wafer Mechanical Strength Measurement for Surface Damage
Quantification
• Quantifying Surface Damage by Measuring the Mechanical Strength
of Silicon Wafers

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Articles in Titles
• Although a title is not generally a complete sentence, it does have to
be grammatically correct.
• Survey of importance of improving design of internal systems
• A survey of the importance of improving the design of internal
systems

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Spell-checks
• Incidence of Hearth Attacks and Alzeimer’s Disease among Women
form East Asia
• An atmospheric tape reorder: rainfall analysis trough sequence
weighing

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Spell-checks
• Incidence of Hearth Attacks and Alzheimer’s Disease among Women
form from East Asia
• An atmospheric tape recorder: rainfall analysis through sequence
weighing

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Quality of a Title
The title should be:
• in correct English - in terms of syntax, vocabulary, spelling and
capitalization
• understandable (no strings of nouns)
• eye-catching and dynamic (through effective use of vocabulary and
even punctuation)
• sufficiently and appropriately specific
• reflects the content of your paper
• expressed in a form that is acceptable for a journal
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Abstract
• Abstract is a Latin word meaning "pulled away; detached“.
• In research, abstract means a summary of the contents of a book,
thesis, article, or description of research.

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Abstracts will enable
• editors to make a quick decision on whether the paper is relevant to
their journal (without having to read the whole paper) and is thus
worth submitting to referees who will then judge the paper in its
entirety
• a reader to identify quickly what the paper is about, to judge how
relevant it is to their interests, and so to decide whether they should
buy / read the whole paper or not. This process is sometimes known
as ‘screening’
• information managers (e.g. librarians) to put it in their indexes

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When to write an abstract
Beginning AND End !
• Write a rough draft of the abstract before you start writing the paper
itself. This may help you to decide what to include in the paper and
how to structure it.

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Types
• Unstructured Abstract
• A single paragraph of between 100–250 words containing a very brief summary of
each of the main sections of your paper
• Structured Abstract
• Divided into sections
• Extended Abstract
• A mini paper organized in the same way as a full paper (e.g. Introduction, Methods,
Discussion…), but substantially shorter (two to four pages).
• Conference Abstract
• Normally a standalone abstract (sometimes up to 500 words), designed to help
conference organizers to decide whether they would like you to make an oral
presentation at their conference

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How to structure an abstract?
An Abstract generally answers the following questions, and generally in
the following order
• Why did I carry out this project? Why am I writing this paper?
• What did I do, and how?
• What were my results? What was new compared to previous
research?
• What are the implications of my findings? What are my conclusions
and/or recommendations?

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Example 1
Educators need actionable information about student progress during the school year. This
paper explores an approach to this problem in the writing domain that combines three
measurement approaches intended for use in interim-assessment fashion: scenario-based
assessments (SBAs), to simulate authentic classroom tasks, automated writing evaluation
(AWE) features to track changes in performance and writing process traits derived from a
keystroke log. Our primary goal is to determine if SBAs designed to measure English
Language Arts skills, supplemented by richer measurement of the writing task, function
well as interim assessments that are sensitive to differences in performance related to
differences in quality of instruction. We calibrated these measures psychometrically using
data from a prior study and then applied them to evaluate changes in performance in one
suburban and two urban middle schools that taught argument writing. Of the three
schools, only School A (the suburban school, with the strongest overall performance)
showed significant score increases on an essay task, accompanied by distinctive patterns of
improvement. A general, unconditioned growth pattern was also evident. These results
demonstrate an approach that can provide richer, more actionable information about
student status and changes in student performance over the course of the school year.

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Example 2
Eyeriss is an accelerator for state-of-the-art deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs). It
optimizes for the energy efficiency of the entire system, including the accelerator chip and
off-chip DRAM, for various CNN shapes by reconfiguring the architecture. CNNs are widely
used in modern AI systems but also bring challenges on throughput and energy efficiency
to the underlying hardware. This is because its computation requires a large amount of
data, creating significant data movement from on-chip and off-chip that is more energy-
consuming than computation. Minimizing data movement energy cost for any CNN shape,
therefore, is the key to high throughput and energy efficiency. Eyeriss achieves these goals
by using a proposed processing dataflow, called row stationary (RS), on a spatial
architecture with 168 processing elements. RS dataflow reconfigures the computation
mapping of a given shape, which optimizes energy efficiency by maximally reusing data
locally to reduce expensive data movement, such as DRAM accesses. Compression and
data gating are also applied to further improve energy efficiency. Eyeriss processes the
convolutional layers at 35 frames/s and 0.0029 DRAM access/multiply and accumulation
(MAC) for AlexNet at 278 mW (batch size N = 4), and 0.7 frames/s and 0.0035 DRAM
access/MAC for VGG-16 at 236 mW (N = 3).

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Structured Abstracts
• Structured format helps the authors to write clearer abstracts.
• Structured abstracts also force the author to answer all the questions
(including limitations to their research) that referees and readers are
likely to ask.
• They are much more readable as referees (for their peer reviews) and
readers can find exactly what they want quickly.

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Nature of abstract
• Although the style of an abstract may differ from discipline to
discipline and from journal to journal, the structure and information
provided is quite similar.
• The aim is always to tell readers all they need to know to help them
decide whether to buy /read the paper

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Extended Abstract
• Longer Abstract
• ~2000 words
• Detailed description of the research
• Can include tables and figures
• Include References

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Writing Styles
Style 1 I found that x = y.
Style 2 We found that x = y.
Style 3 It was found that x = y.
Style 4 The authors found that x = y

• The style you use will depend on your discipline and on the
requirements of the journal

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Keywords
• it makes sense to have key words in your abstract (and title to)
because it forces the author to decide what words in your paper
really are important.
• The key words are also the words that readers are looking for in their
initial search and then when they actually scan your abstract.
• 4-6 keywords

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What not to include in Abstract
• background information that is too generalist for your readers
• claims that are not supported in the paper
• terms that are too technical or too generic - this will depend on your audience
• definitions of key terms
• mathematical equations
• generic quantifications (e.g. many, several, few, a wide variety) and the overuse
or unjustified use of subjective adjectives (e.g. innovative, interesting,
fundamental).
• unnecessary details that would be better located in your Introduction, such as the
name of your institute, place names that readers will not have heard of
• references to other papers. However, if your whole paper is based on an
extending or refuting a finding given by one specific author, then you will need to
mention this author’s name.
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One final check
• Journal’s instructions to authors
• The right structure (i.e. structured, unstructured) and style (we vs
passive)
• The relevant points [background / context; research problem / aim -
the gap; methods; results; implications and/or conclusions]
• Keywords that enable the readers to locate the abstract
• Can the Abstract be made less redundant? Ask: If I tried to reduce it
by 25% would I really lose any key content?
• Grammar (tense) and Spelling

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Remember
• Title and Abstract are the first things readers (and reviewers)
encounter about your research paper.
• Keep on revising the title and abstract until they convey the actual
meaning you intended.
• Double check with someone who is not familiar with your research
about their intended meaning

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‘Introduction’
The Introduction presents the background knowledge that readers
need so that they can appreciate how the findings of the paper are an
advance on current knowledge in the field

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Need for ‘Introduction’
• You have to give the reader the tools for understanding the meaning
and motivation of your experiments.
• Tell your readers how you plan to develop your topic. Give them a
roadmap to follow - show them what your line of argument is.

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Introducing the ‘Introduction’
• Follow a ‘funnel’ approach [Start broadly, then narrow down]
• Start with ‘Statistics’
• Start with a story/ vignette/ question
• Start with a ‘quote’ [old fashioned]

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Scope of ‘Introduction’
An Introduction generally answers the following questions
• What is the problem?
• Are there any existing solutions (i.e. in the literature)?
• Which solution is the best?
• What is its main limitation? (i.e. What gap am I hoping to fill?)
• What do I hope to achieve?
• Have I achieved what I set out to do?

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Contents in ‘Introduction’
• definition of the topic plus background
• accepted state of the art plus problem to be resolved
• authors’ objectives
• introduction to the literature
• survey of pertinent literature
• authors’ contribution
• aim of the present work
• main results / conclusions
• future implications
• outline of structure

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FAQ
• How is ‘Introduction’ different from ‘Abstract’?
• How long can be the ‘Introduction’?
• Can I use references in ‘Introduction’?
• What ‘tense’ should I write ‘Introduction’?

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Literature Review
A literature review is not an annotated bibliography in which you
summarize briefly each article that you have reviewed. While a
summary of the what you have read is contained within the literature
review, it goes well beyond merely summarizing professional literature.
It focuses on a specific topic of interest to you and includes a critical
analysis of the relationship among different works, and relating this
research to your work.
It may be written as a stand-alone paper or to provide a theoretical
framework and rationale for a research study

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Aim of Literature Review
• The key skill is to provide readers with just the right amount of
literature regarding the sequence of events leading up to the current
situation - not too much to make it tedious, nor too little so that the
context of your research is not meaningful to them.
• Systematically elaborate the achievements and limitations of other
studies
• Relate your new facts and data to these studies

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Questions in Literature Review
1. What are the seminal works on my topic? Do I need to mention
these?
2. What progress has been made since these seminal works?
3. What are the most relevant recent works? What is the best order to
mention these works?
4. What are the achievements and limitations of these recent works?
5. What gap do these limitations reveal?
6. How does my work intend to fill this gap?

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What to focus?
• The Author
• The Medium
• The Message

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What to focus?
The Author
• Who is the author? What can I find out about him/her? Has he/she
written other books, articles etc.?
• What is the author’s position in the research process, e.g., gender,
class, politics, life experience, relationship to research participants?

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What to focus?
The Medium
• Where and when was the document produced? What type of document is
it?
• Is it reporting original research that the author has done, or is it presenting
second-hand information about a topic?
• Is it formal or informal?
• Is it 'authoritative' (e.g., academic, scientific) or 'popular' (newspaper or
magazine article)?
• How has it been produced? Is it glossy, with lots of pictures, diagrams, etc.?
• If it is contained on a website, is the website from a reputable organisation,
or is the document drawn from some other reputable source?
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What to focus?
The Message
• What is being said?
• What is not being said?
• How is the argument presented? Why?
• What use has been made of diagrams, pictures etc.?
• Who was or is the intended audience?
• Whose interests are being served by this message? Are there political implications, for instance?
• What evidence is presented to support the claims that are made?
• Does the evidence actually support the claims? Is the evidence presented in enough detail for you
to make up your own mind whether you agree with the claims?
• Are there errors or inconsistencies?
• What is the significance to my topic and the research that I wish to carry out?

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Presenting Literature Review
• 20:80 format
• Broad to Narrow format
• Chronological format
• Argumentative format
• Sectioning

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Presenting Tables and Figures
• Figure Numbers and Captions
• Table Numbers and Title

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Tense
• “Jones (2001) argued that…”.
• Many authors of academic papers prefer the present tense when
describing opinions or views (“Jones (2001) argues that…”). However,
it is always possible that Jones has subsequently changed his/her
view, and therefore the past tense is preferable.
• The past tense is always going to be correct for something that was
expressed in the past; the present tense may no longer be true.

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Citation
A reference to a source
In-text citations are brief references in the running text that direct
readers to the reference entry at the end of the paper
• Author 1 (2009)
• Author 1 and Author 2 (2009)
• Author 1 et al. (2009)
• …(Author 1 et al., 2009)
• Author 1(2009a)
• [3]

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Plagiarism
• Plagiarism is presenting someone else's work or ideas as your own,
with or without their consent, by incorporating it into your work
without full acknowledgement
• Plagiarism is usually defined as a discrete offense, a specific failure to
give credit to a particular source.
• All published and unpublished material, whether in manuscript,
printed or electronic form, is covered under this definition.
• Plagiarism may be intentional or reckless, or unintentional.

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Plagiarism
Plagiarism takes many forms, but it falls into three main categories:
- using a source’s language without quoting,
- using information from a source without attribution, and
- paraphrasing a source in a form that stays too close to the original.

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Methods
• The secret of writing this section is to be able to describe the
materials you used in your experiments and/or the methods you used
to carry out your research, in a way that is sufficiently detailed to
enable others in your field to easily follow your method and, if
desired, even replicate your work.
• Researchers generally agree that the Methods the easiest section to
write because your methods are likely to be clear in your mind, so it
may be a good point for you to begin writing your manuscript
Method Section includes..
• Sampling Design
• Sample Size
• Hypothesis
• Experiment Design
• Data Collection Process
Results and Findings
• Results and Discussions are combined or can be presented separately.

• If Results section is separate, then the standard procedure is to

present them with little or no interpretation or discussion. This means
that the Results is generally the shortest section in a paper
Results
The Results should answer the following questions.
1. What did I find?
2. What did I not find?
3. What did I find that I was not expecting to find? (e.g. that contradicts
my hypotheses)
Discussion
The purpose of the discussion is to interpret and describe the
significance of your findings in light of what was already known about
the research problem being investigated and to explain any new
understanding or insights that emerged as a result of your study of the
problem.
Discussion
The Discussion should answer the following questions, and possibly in the following
order.
1. Do my data support what I set out to demonstrate at the beginning of the paper?
2. How do my findings compare with what others have found? How consistent are
they?
3. What is my personal interpretation of my findings?
4. What other possible interpretations are there?
5. What are the limitations of my study? What other factors could have influenced
my findings? Have I reported everything that could make my findings invalid?
6. Do any of the interpretations reveal a possible flaw (i.e. defect, error) in my
experiment?
Discussion
7. Do my interpretations contribute some new understanding of the
problem that I have investigated? In which case do they suggest a
shortcoming in, or an advance on, the work of others?
8. What external validity do my findings have? How could my findings
be generalized to other areas?
9. What possible implications or applications do my findings have?
What support can I give for such implications?
10. What further research would be needed to explain the issues raised
by my findings? Will I do this research myself or do I want to throw it
open to the community?
Implications
• Sometimes ‘Implications’ are embedded with ‘Discussion’ or as a
separate section
• Research implications are basically the conclusions that you draw
from your results and explain how the findings may be important for
policy, practice, or theory.
• The implications of your research will derive from why it was
important to conduct your study and how will it impact
future research in your field. You should base your implications on
how previous similar studies have advanced your field and how
your study can add to that.
Conclusion
• The conclusion is intended to help the reader understand why your
research should matter to them after they have finished reading the
paper.
• A conclusion is not merely a summary of your points or a re-
statement of your research problem but a synthesis of key points.

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Conclusion
• A conclusion is an important part of the paper; it provides closure for
the reader while reminding the reader of the contents
and importance of the paper
• A conclusion does not introduce new ideas; instead, it should clarify
the intent and importance of the paper.
• It is generally not more than one or two paragraphs long.
• Not merely a replication of ‘Abstract’

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Conclusion
A Conclusion section typically incorporates one or more of the following:
1. a very brief revisit of the most important findings pointing out how these
advance your field from the present state of knowledge
2. a final judgment on the importance and significance those findings in
term of their implications and impact, along with possible applications to
other areas
3. an indication of the limitations of your study
4. suggestions for improvements (perhaps in relation to the limitations)
5. recommendations for future work (either for the author, and/or the
community)
6. recommendations for policy changes
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Limitations
• The limitations of the study are those characteristics of design or
methodology that impacted or influenced the interpretation of the
findings from your research
• Describe each limitation in detailed but concise terms;
• Explain why each limitation exists;
• Provide the reasons why each limitation could not be overcome using
the method(s) chosen to gather the data

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Limitations: some examples
• Unfortunately, we could not assess how much of the difference in
outcome was due to ..
• Although some progress has been made using our model, this
incremental approach provides only a partial answer
• Regrettably, we did not have the means to …

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Overcoming limitations: some examples
• Although it is too early to draw statistically significant conclusions,
two patterns seem to be emerging …
• However, more definite conclusions will be possible when ...
• Nevertheless, our study confirms recent anecdotal reports of …
• Despite this, our work provides support for …
• In any case, we believe that these preliminary results indicate that …
• If we had managed to … then we might have been able to …

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Ending the Conclusion
• Show how your work could be applied in another area
• Suggest future work
• Make a recommendation.

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Application in another area
• Our findings could be applied quite reliably in other engineering
contexts without a significant degradation in performance.
• Further studies are needed to determine whether these findings
could be applied to components other than those used for …

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Future Work
• One area of future work will be to represent these relationships
explicitly …
• Future work will involve the application of the proposed algorithm to
data from …
• Future work should give priority to (1) the formation of X; (2) the
interaction of Y; and (3) the processes connected with Z.
• Future work should benefit greatly by using data on …

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Recommendation
• We suggest that policy makers should give stakeholders a greater role
in …
• We recommend that stakeholders should be given a great role in …

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References and Bibliography
• A reference list is the detailed list of references that are cited in your
work.
• References include sources that have been directly cited in your
paper.
• A bibliography is a detailed list of references cited in your work, plus
the background readings or other material that you may have read,
but not actually cited.
• Bibliographies, on the other hand, contain all the sources that you
have used for your paper, whether they are directly cited or not. In
a bibliography, you should include all of the materials you consulted
in preparing your paper.
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References Styles
• Modern Language Association (MLA)
• American Psychological Association (APA)
• Oxford
• Harvard
• Chicago
• IEEE

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MLA Style

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APA Style

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Oxford Style

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Harvard Style

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Chicago Style

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IEEE Style

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References from Journals
• Author name(s) [Last Name, First Name or Initials]
• Year
• Paper title
• Journal Name
• Volume
• Issue
• Pages
• doi

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References from Book
• Author name(s)
• Year
• Title of the book
• Edition
• Publisher
• Location of publication

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References from Book Chapter
• In addition to the above, also include chapter title, the Editor(s)
name(s) and the publication

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References from Internet sources
• Name of the author/ newspaper name/…
• Title of the article
• Year
• website url and the date of access

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References from (unpublished) Thesis
• Author Name
• Thesis Title
• Thesis Type
• University
• Year

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Writing for publishing
• Write and then choose a journal
• Choose a journal and then write

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Points to note
• Revise your Title and Abstract after you complete writing until
Conclusion.
• Expand all abbreviations at its first occurrence
• All citations should include the year
• If you are not sure of the ‘gender’ of the author, refer as “The Author
indicated that…” rather than “She indicated that…” or worse “He/She
indicated that..”
• Follow uniform font style and size

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Writing for publishing
• Follow the ‘Author guidelines’ meticulously
• Format – Font size – Style – References – Tables – Figures
• Create a ORCID
• Double check for spelling / grammar errors
• Create a Title Page
• Create a ‘Anonymous’ Manuscript
• Always have a covering letter for the editor
• Have a backup journal [paper format]

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Impact Factor
The impact factor (IF) is a measure of the frequency with which the
average article in a journal has been cited in a particular year. It is used
to measure the importance or rank of a journal by calculating the times
it's articles are cited.

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Other Measures
• Cited Half-Life [median]
• Immediacy Index [average number of times an article is cited in the
year it is published]

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Predatory Journals
Predatory journals and publishers are entities that prioritize self-
interest at the expense of scholarship and are characterized by false or
misleading information, deviation from best editorial and publication
practices, a lack of transparency, and/or the use of aggressive and
indiscriminate solicitation practices.

- Nature

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Identifying Predatory Journals
Questionable or predatory publications may display the following
behaviors:
• Charging a fee for peer review or paper submission
• Not sharing the comments of the peer reviewers with the author
• Promises of rapid publication

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Open Access Publishing
• Open Access is a paid channel of publication
• Open access is a publishing model for scholarly communication that
makes research information available to readers at no cost, as
opposed to the traditional subscription model in which readers
have access to scholarly information by paying a subscription (usually
via libraries).
Open Access Journals
• DOAJ [doaj.org] $11390
Nature

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Journal Quality
• Science Citation Index (SCI) Expanded - SCIE
• Emerging SCI
• Social Science CI - SSCI
• Arts and Humanities CI - AHCI
• Scopus
• ABDC (Australian Business Deans Council)
• UGC CARE

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ORCID
• Open Researcher and Contributor ID
• ORCID is a non-profit organization that provides researchers with a
unique digital identifier.
• For better visibility and associations

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Cover Letter
• Cover Letter is the introductory communication channel between the
author and the editor of a journal
• A good cover letter can help to “sell” your manuscript to the journal
editor.
• As well as introducing your work to the editor you can also take this
opportunity to explain why the manuscript will be of interest to a
journal's readers, something which is always as the forefront editors’
mind.

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Cover Letter - contents
• Editor’s name or the title [eg. Editor-in Chief]
• Your manuscript’s title
• Name of the journal you are submitting to
• Statement that your paper has not been previously published and is not
currently under consideration by another journal
• Brief description of the research you are reporting in your paper, why it is
important, and why you think the readers of the journal would be
interested in it
• Contact information for you and any co-authors
• Confirmation that you have no conflict of interest to disclose

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Cover Letter – some tips
• Don’t copy your abstract into your cover letter, instead explain in your
own words the significance of the work, the problem that is being
addressed, and why the manuscript belongs in the journal
• Don’t use too much jargon or too many acronyms, keep language
straightforward and easy to read
• Avoid too much detail – keep your cover letter to a maximum of one
page, as an introduction and brief overview
• Avoid any spelling and grammar errors and ensure your letter is
thoroughly proofed before submitting.

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Poor Cover Letter
Dear Editor-in-Chief,

I am sending you our manuscript entitled “Large Scale Analysis of Cell

Cycle Regulators in bladder cancer” by Researcher et al. We would like
to have the manuscript considered for publication in Pathobiology.

Please let me know of your decision at your earliest convenience.

With my best regards,

Sincerely yours,
A Researcher, PhD
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Manuscript preparation - Points to note
• Revise your Title and Abstract after you complete writing until
Conclusion.
• Expand all abbreviations at its first occurrence
• Acknowledge
• If you are not sure of the ‘gender’ of the author, refer as “The Author
indicated that…” rather than “She indicated that…” or worse “He/She
indicated that..”
• Follow uniform font style and size

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Writing for publishing
• Follow the ‘Author guidelines’ meticulously
• Format – Font size – Style – References – Tables – Figures
• Create a ORCID
• Double check for spelling / grammar errors
• Create a Title Page
• Create an ‘Anonymous’ Manuscript
• Always have a covering letter for the editor
• Have a backup journal [paper format]

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After Submission?
• Wait for the journal decisions
• Prepare a back-up
Four Decisions
• Accept
• Resubmit after minor revisions
• Resubmit after major revisions
• Reject

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Review Comments
Review comments are the feedback you receive from the anonymous
reviewers.

It may include reasons for rejection, areas for improvement, pointers to

enrich

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Typical reasons for rejection/ major revisions
• Does not fit the journal’s ‘Aims and Scope’
• No new knowledge
• No theoretical/ practical contribution
• Ethical issues
• Incomplete manuscript
• Improper method [lack of justification]
• Insufficient Literature Review
• Issues with formatting
• Grammar and Spelling

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Responding to Reviewer Comments
• Acknowledge the time taken to review
• Agree with or Acknowledge the reviewer comments
• Explain the corrections you have made
• Explain why you could not correct
• You can send a point-by-point response to the editor explaining why
you disagree with the reviewer's suggestion. Make sure your response is
backed by supporting evidence. If your viewpoint is justified, the editor will
definitely consider it.

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Presenting Your Research
• It is a good idea to get a feedback from learned experts about your
research before publishing
• Present your research in conferences and/ seminars
• Opportunity to also get to know about other areas of research

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Preparing Materials
• Visual Display
• Slides/ Videos/ Images
• Not lengthy document
• Do not outsource your presentation materials

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Points to not while preparing PPTs
• Not very colourful
• Follow 10-20-30 principle
• 10 slides
• 20 minutes
• 30 font size
• Sans-serif font
• Not more than two font styles
• Limit or Avoid Equations/ Numbers [as much as possible]
• Avoid Pie-charts
• Avoid animations
• All slides should have Titles and slide numbers
• Better not to have an exclusive slide for ‘Thank you’

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Other Materials
• Prototypes
• 2D/3D structures
• Blueprints
• Large sheets of data/ flowdiagram

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Tips
• Outfit matters!
• Rehearse
• Always have a Plan B [Murphy’s law]
• Carry a Notepad and pen/pencil

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