Laboratory Reports for Animal Behavior

Lab report guidelines

Papers that exceeds the specified page limit will not be read.

Both granting agencies and many scientific journals have strict page limits and will not accept any papers that exceed page limits. Therefore it is important to learn how to write papers that are precise and concise. Essential skills in scientific writing include determining what information is essential and what is not, and stating the essential information in the most precise and concise manner possible.

Specifications (so that we can read your paper without going blind or crazy):

Fonts should be no smaller than 12 point times, 10 pt is good.
Spacing between lines should be 1.5 lines (we have to put comments somewhere!)
Indent at the beginning of paragraphs or put a line between paragraphs

Tips:

Before you save space by formatting, tighten up your writing by removing superfluous words and repetition.
Start Early. Nothing helps you to think through a problem like writing. If you start early, then you will have time to work out concepts that you thought you understood until you started writing. Also, this will leave you time to discover and resolve formatting or content questions (e.g., Is there a lower limit on type size? Do I need to develop the methods more fully?). Finally, if you start early, you have more time to polish and incorporate the feedback from peer reviewers.
Remember the power of the topic sentence. Try to start each paragraph with a sentence telling the reader the general idea that will be developed in the paragraph that follows. A paragraph should be formed by developing the idea presented in the topic sentence and should end with a summary statement or a transition sentence for the next paragraph. A paragraph should usually contain at least 2 supporting sentences and detail either a single idea or tie ideas from previous paragraphs together.
Figures and tables are your friends. Figures and tables should occur on their own pages at the end of the report. Often, it is much better to present information in figure or table form because it will save a great amount of text and allows the reader to observe trends in the data much more easily.
For really long manuscripts, include a 'navigation' paragraph early in the document. This paragraph will state the overall goal of the paper and outline the route you will take to achieve it. Such a paragraph allows the reader to anticipate ideas and gives a logical framework in which to place ideas as they are presented.
Polish at least twice. Try to finish your document a few days (the more the better) in advance. Put it aside for a while and then review it again, tightening up the writing. It is amazing how much a document can be improved if you get a break from it. Once you are satisfied, give it to a colleague (preferably someone that writes well and knows the topic; see info on the writing center) for comments. Consider their feedback carefully; just because they offer a suggestion does not mean that it should be incorporated. However, ideas often need to be developed more fully, clarified, introduced earlier, etc. Such revisions help the flow or the development of an idea considerably but take time. This is another reason to start early. A common problem I have is keeping the same (and appropriate) voice throughout the paper (examine this document). Revising voice can take considerable time. If you bring your paper to me (Diana) at least two working days before it is due, I will be glad to read it early and make comments, so you can make changes.
Run spell checker.

Sample of paper format

Below is a general, quick outline of what should go into each section of a paper. I follow each section with an example from one of your lab reports in an attempt to make my points clear. As your skills improve, you will depart from this straight-forward approach, but this will help you to get started.

Abstract. Many papers require an abstract. An abstract is a short section which summarizes the entire paper. When first starting to write scientifically, the easiest way to write an abstract is to summarize each section of the paper (introduction, methods, etc.) with no more than 3 sentences. Many students fail to include numbers and statistics in their abstracts. If your data contain numbers, your abstract should too, i.e. "the frogs jumped an average of 6.5 ± .2 cm" or " the green frogs jumped significantly farther than the red frogs (t = 5.6, P .001)."

Introduction. The introduction sets the tone of the paper and introduces the concepts relevant to understanding the project being described. It is best to start with the broad biological concept or application of the work and slowly become more specific. By the end of the introduction, the reader should know the broad biological phenomenon of interest, the way that this system is related to that concept, and the most general hypotheses or predictions involved in the study.

Methods. The methods should basically explain the nuts and bolts of the experiment in two parts. The first portion of the methods describes the experiment in sufficient detail such that the reader (with a background similar to your own) could repeat it. This includes stating the statistical tests used and the comparisons made by the statistical tests. The second portion of the methods may describe unanticipated changes in protocol. Justification for methodology is sometimes necessary when a more appropriate technique was not used (e.g., all animals in one treatment died, so the comparisons between treatments were not made. These other comparisons were made instead). Also, the results of planned analyses often lead to unanticipated trends and further analyses. These should be mentioned as well.

Results. The results section should tell the reader what the basic results of the experiment were. A good format to follow is to go through the experiment stepwise, hypothesis by hypothesis / research question by research question, and address it. If possible, present data in a figure. Figures are usually the easiest ways to quickly understand trends in data. Tables should be your second choice. Present data in text format only if it is extremely simple. Don't forget figure and table legends.

Examine your figures and tables for interesting trends or notable comparisons and direct the readers attention to them. Do not explain or interpret the results; simply present them.
A note about figures and tables. Figures and tables should go on their own pages and be attached to the end of the text. Figure legends go under the figures, table legends go above the table. Keep these tips in mind:

They should be clear and uncluttered. Too many similarly shaped symbols, tightly packed lines, or crowded statistical tests are frustrating. Keep in mind that you are trying to relay information (data and trends). Play with different presentation styles. For example, bottom-up histograms imply levels or totals (e.g., number of survivors or hormone concentration) while points seem more appropriate for point data (e.g., endurance time) and pie charts are nice for showing proportions (e.g., energy allocation within individuals).
Avoid flashiness. Color is generally overrated, especially in written work. If you must use color, consider the color blind reader in choosing color schemes (e.g., avoid red and green on same figure) and consider adding subtle texture to the figure (e.g., soft hatching versus dots in the red and green bars respectively). Generally, subtle patterns in lines (broken versus solid) or symbols (filled versus open dots) are superior to colors.
When possible, indicate statistical differences on figures. For example, stars above histogram bars generally indicate a difference between the value of that bar and other bars.
Good captions and headings are critical. A good figure (or table) caption is one that can be understood independent of the manuscript. Captions may sometimes be 3 sentences long, but try to keep them tight.

Once you have narrowed a figure down to a few styles, show it to someone and simply ask how it looks. Get feedback on information content and then aesthetics. A figure is well done when it is clear, aesthetically pleasing, and relays all information with the caption, axes headings, and legend. Making good figures and tables takes considerable thought and effort, but in the end it can make or break an argument and possibly a paper. The clarity of data presentation is critical to convincing a skeptical reviewer you are correct in your interpretations.

Discussion. In the discussion you explain and interpret your results and compare your work to that of other investigators (previously published papers). Again, it may be best to start with the broad biological concept. Remind the reader why this is important. Answer your research questions, one at a time. Weave together all the data which support your conclusion, and discuss why the data support your conclusion. Discuss results contrary to your predictions, etc. Towards the end of the paper, discuss the implications of the research, compare your work to the findings of other investigators (published literature) and perhaps point to new directions for further study. When writing the discussion, refer to the introduction. They should be linked conceptually. If there are significant portions of one that do not appear in the other, then add or delete information so they fit together.

References. References come at the end of the document and nearly all publications have their own style. Consult journals for details.

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