Professors' Writing Pet Peeves: Part II

Today's topic: Professors' Writing Pet Peeves, II

As you may recall, in the spring I devoted one of my "tips of the week" to this same topic: http://writingtipoftheweek.blogspot.com/  It's an enormous topic, though; if I got all the UK faculty together and had them list their pet writing peeves, I could probably put together a book the size of the Oxford English Dictionary.  For now, I offer you part deux in hopes of helping you polish your writing (and your grade point average).

Many thanks to the CON faculty for offering these.

1. Phrases like "this study found," "this study said," "this study stated," etc.  This was a popular one.  Remember, studies are inanimate.  They aren't alive, so they can't find or say or do anything.  The researchers and authors can, though, so say "The authors stated..." instead.

2. Using "many," "a few," "some," etc. instead of including actual data.  This one falls under the "show, don't tell" rule.  Specificity is crucial in scientific writing.  Don't tell us that many researchers found X.  Show us which ones.   

3. Confusing plural nouns with possessive nouns, a.k.a. misusing apostrophes.  Remember, apostrophes have only two uses: to create contractions (don't, can't, isn't, etc.) and to show ownership (as in Sarah's car, the cat's bowl, the university's policy).  It is incorrect to use apostrophes for simple plural nouns (as in "I love cupcakes" or "Journal editors can be harsh critics").  The only time an apostrophe is appropriate in a plural noun is when you need to indicate ownership by multiple parties.  For example, let's say Jeff just bought a new toy for his three dogs.  He might say "Check out the dogs' new toy."  Note that in this case the apostrophe goes after the s. 

It is also incorrect to use an apostrophe to indicate the plural of an acronym or abbreviation.  WRONG: APRN's.  RIGHT: APRNs.

Here is a full blog post on apostrophes:  http://writingtipoftheweek.blogspot.com/2013/05/apostrophes.html

4. Wordiness and redundancy.  Conciseness is important for both clarity and readability.  When you read your work, look for places where you can trim the language.  If the sentence would mean the same thing without a word or phrase, that word or phrase can go.  One quick tip: Avoid "ly" adverbs (extremely, totally, absolutely, actually, basically, completely, etc.) and words like "very."  These are filler words.  Use stronger verbs and adjectives instead.  For example, instead of "very important" say "crucial."  Instead of "completely finished" just say "finished."  Instead of "extremely useful" say "invaluable."

5. Inconsistent grammar in lists.  This one came up four times on the survey.  Lists can be tricky, especially when the sentence is long and complex.  It's important to make sure that each item in a series fits the grammar of the rest of the sentence.  For example, let's look at this sentence:

The patient must be educated about the disease, the risks and benefits of various treatment options, and actively involved in self-management.

Do you see the problem?  The sentence sets us up with the phrase "the patient must be educated about."  So we expect each item in the list that follows to be an example of something about which the patient needs education.  We're fine for the first two items--the disease and the risks/benefits of various treatment options--but then we get to the phrase "and actively involved in self-management," and now we're confused because that phrase does NOT seem to relate back to education. 

To avoid this problem, test the sentences that include lists. Pretend that each list item stands alone and follows directly after the first part of the sentence, and see if the wording fits.  Like this:

The patient must be educated about the disease.  Check.
The patient must be educated about risks and benefits of various treatment options.  Check.
The patient must be educated about actively involved in self-management.  Nope.

How could we fix this sentence?  One way is to rearrange the list items.  For example:

The patient must be actively involved in self-management and educated about the disease and the risks and benefits of various treatment options.

Another way is to turn the sentence into two sentences.  For example:

The patient must be educated about the disease and the risks and benefits of various treatment options.  He or she must also be actively involved in self-management. 

Another way is to just reword the whole thing (and in this case, we could also change the passive voice to active voice by specifying WHO is educating the patient):

The nurse must educate the patient about the disease and the risks and benefits of various treatment options.  He or she should also ensure that the patient is actively involved in self-management.

6. Incorrect punctuation--use and placement.  I can't cover something this huge in such a small space, so I encourage you to view the punctuation guides on the Purdue OWL if you are less than confident in your usage.  However, I can say that commas, semicolons, and colons seem to be the most frequently  mistreated punctuation marks.  You may want to just brush up on those.

Here's my blog post on "Mystery Punctuation," which may be of some help: http://writingtipoftheweek.blogspot.com/2013/03/mystery-punctuation.html

And my post on semicolons: http://writingtipoftheweek.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-dreaded-semicolon-pink-plastic.html

7. Saying something is common without citing any supporting evidence.  Remember, your reader can't just take your word for it.  Show support for your claims.  This one goes back to the "show, don't tell" rule from # 2.

8. Being general rather than specific.  For example, saying that something is "a major problem" without giving any specific statistics is a bad idea.

9. Saying that two  means are different when the p value is >0.05.  Okay, I confess I don't know enough about research methods or statistics to fully understand this one.  But I assume that most of you do, so avoid doing this.

10. Citing websites (especially non-authoritative ones) as references to support an argument.  I know the Internet is a convenient source of information, but here's the thing.  Many websites are unreliable and there is a ton of misinformation out there.  So when you cite a non-authoritative website to support your argument, your reader then has to go and look up that source to make sure it's reputable.  As you can imagine, that gets tiresome.

Here are some resources to help you determine the value and trustworthiness of a web source. https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/553/04/ and http://www.library.georgetown.edu/tutorials/research-guides/evaluating-internet-content

I hope you've found this week's post helpful.  Happy scribbling!