Parts of a Science Research Paper

Title Page and Title

The title page is the first page of the paper and includes the title of the paper and the author’s name.  The title should be as short as possible and as long as necessary to communicate to the reader the question being answered in the paper.

The title is a statement of the problem and gives insight as to what the report is about. If you have a properly stated question, you can reword it as a statement and use it as a title. See “Writing Proposals“. If an organism is used, include its scientific name in the title. Remember that the Title Page is a separate page and requires its own format.

Abstract

An abstract is a short summary of the paper.  This section includes only the essence of the other sections.  It should be as brief as possible, telling the reader what question/problem being investigated, the methods used in the experiment, what was found (result), and conclusions (findings) drawn.  The abstract is often placed after the title page.  In this way, the reader should have an idea about the investigation without reading the entire paper.

Basically, an abstract is a one-paragraph summary of the entire paper, not exceeding 250 words. The abstract is composed after the entire paper is completed.  An abstract is composed after the entire paper is completed so that it accurately reflects the content of the paper.  It is better to reword the abstract in more common language.

I. Introduction

The introduction has two functions:

1. Provides context and background for the investigation.
2. States the question asked and the hypothesis tested in the study.

II. Review of Related Literature

Review of related literature is very important in writing a scientific paper.  A literature review is designed to identify related research, to set the current research project within a conceptual and theoretical context.  It gives an overview of what has been studied, who the key writers are, what are the prevailing theories and hypotheses, what questions are being asked, and what methods and methodologies are appropriate and useful.  As such, it reports on other findings.

III. Materials and Methods

This section describes the details about the experiment so that it can be performed by others.  The information in this section should not be a list of steps.  The procedure is written concisely, but in paragraph form using the past tense.  The way the independent variable was varied, the numbers of replications, the control treatments, and the method of measuring the dependent variable(s) are all included.

IV. Results

The results section consists of at least three components:

1. One or more paragraphs that describe the results
2. Figures (graphs, diagrams, pictures)
3. Data tables

V. Discussion

This is where the results of the experiment are analyzed and interpreted. The conclusion is clearly states in this section. The word “prove” is not used in the conclusions; the results will support, verify, or confirm the hypothesis, or they will negate, refute, or contradict the hypothesis.  The word “prove” is not appropriate in scientific writing.

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