The Influence of Research on Academic Writing and Editing

Academic writing is a requirement for every student. It does not matter whether one is in high school, college, or graduate school; academic writing is a necessity. There are many types of academic writing; such as, essays, creative writing, term papers, dissertations, theme papers, and anything else the teacher or professor deems appropriate. Academic writing involves a process, one which a person can slightly change. One must have a topic, whether it is chosen for them or they must choose one. Once a topic is decided upon, research must be done before, during, and perhaps even after the writing of the piece. Research is finding information that one will use in writing the paper. It can be facts, quotes, opinions, and anything the author would like to utilize. With research gathered, one can then construct their writing piece and finalize it before turning it in. However, depending on the academic writing some steps of the process may be unnecessary; such as one might not have to do research for a short poem or creative writing piece. It can be argued that researching for the written assignment is the most difficult part of the academic writing process due to the details in researching.

Selecting Sources

What sources to utilize may be the most difficult part of researching for the academic writing piece. There are many places to find sources and finding all the information needed for a piece may be time consuming. Depending on the type of writing that one is doing, there may be a source requirement. For example, a professor may assign an 800 word term paper with four sources including one academic source. The student in this situation knows that they need to use three sources and one academic source. An academic source is a textbook or course materials.

Now, one must decide if they want to use primary or secondary sources in their piece. Primary sources are sources that give the information first hand. They can be double checked and are from a reputable source. Secondary sources can be explained as someone's interpretation of the primary source. This difference is important when finding sources as one will want to utilize as many primary sources as they can in their paper. However, there may be certain papers where secondary sources are acceptable; such as, opinion papers. One also has to be careful when using graphs as these can be interpreted in different ways. One would need to check all the facts associated with the poll or graph.

Keyword Success

Whether one is conducting research on the internet, article databases, or books; selecting the correct keywords can make your searching easier. The Internet allows for the sharing of vast information and from multiple sources. This tool allows for research to be done quicker and with a variety of sources. Unfortunately, the Internet also allows for one to view a lot of irrelevant information. It all depends on the keywords that are used. Someone will have to add, delete, and change keywords in order to get the search results that are useful to them. This also applies to article and book databases. Choosing the appropriate keywords can save time in the research process by locating valuable information from the desired sources efficiently.

Conclusion

Academic writing is a process developed at all kinds of schools. Researching is just one step in that process, but it is the most difficult step. One has to decide on what types of sources that are going to utilized in the paper and how the information is going to be obtained. Primary sources and academic sources should be the first choice; however, secondary sources can be used correctly in some situations. Searching for the correct material and sources can take time. Keywords are used to quickly locate relevant material on the Internet or in databases. Choosing the right key words to use while searching can narrow down a long list of articles into ones that are the most relevant. This can drastically cut down how long it takes for the research process.