Chapter 6: Writing the Research Article, Part II: Results and Discussion

1 Based on the chapter, please select the following statements that are true. Check all that apply.

In the Results section, all data gathered in the research are reported.

In the Results section, writers need not explain which data were selected for presentation and why.

The Results section presents data but does not analyze it.

In the Results section, researchers present selected data, justify that selection, and then analyze the data.

In the Results section, writers move from data presentation to larger significances beyond the current study.

f.tIt is sometimes difficult for researchers to choose which analysis goes into Results and which goes into the Discussion.

2 Based on the chapter, which of the following are good reasons for including or leaving out certain data in a Results section, and which reasons are poor? Please select the examples that can be described as good reasons. Check all that apply.

We want our reviewers to know how conscientious we are as researchers, so we want to be sure to include a lot of data, as well as a lot of charts and tables.

We had so much data, much more than were really pertinent to the focus of this article, so we chose to present only those data that pertained to our research questions, and analyzed those.

We had a strict character limit for the article, so we chose to present only those data points that clearly supported the statistical tendencies in our analysis.

The instructions to authors stated that we could add a supplement with further data, so we decided to limit what we included in the Results section to those data which seemed most pertinent to our analysis and organized the rest into a supplement.

We realized that if we were to meet the space limitations, we had to choose carefully the data we presented; so we decided to include the statistical tendencies and then present specific data that illustrated the range of results.

3 According to the chapter, the Discussion section of the IMRD research article often includes ... (Check all that apply.)

statements about the broader significance of the findings we made in the Results section

analysis of raw data

proposal of implications from our findings for further research

presentation of further data not presented in Results

proposal of possible relevance of our research to environmental or economic issues

statements of the limitations of our methods in the current study toward proposing further research

Fill in the blanks with a word or phrase

According to the chapter, writers of research articles need to be careful in choosing the ___________ language to state implications, if they are to be _______ science writers. The Discussion section offers the researcher-writer some _______ to imagine the wider significance of a study, more than the other sections offer. But writers need to indicate that these implications are ___________, only possibilities, rather than the more easily verifiable statements in Results. Writers often use __________ terms or phrases to state implications—phrases such as “it is possible that” or “_____________________”—and readers need to pay attention to this more guarded language.

Please note that this question is not scored.

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