I’m sooooooo sick of reading research papers that I just don’t understand. Why must you torture me with sentences that need a second brain to comprehend!? Of course older papers are hard because they used to be written by them old folks who talk all olde worlde but is there any need for that any more. Is it time researchers got down with the kids a bit more, you get me homedizzle?
I think the answer is yes it is about time! And the main reason for this is because I believe research should become more accessible to everyone. Since the creation of the internet people have been striving to make information open to everyone and give us the freedom to get hold of it and use it as we wish, so isn’t it about time scientist #caughtup? I feel there is a need to not only make papers and research more accessible without having to be part of a university or have money to burn on buying them, but to then make that information understandable. And why is this? Well we have the potential to open ground breaking research up to the public, to inspire people and more importantly show people all the incredible things that are being discovered in the world around them.
I really can’t think of any positives as to why papers need to written with ridiculous jargon that only masters of the proffesion can understand, so i open to floor to discuss!
So to all boring and pretentious researchers out there… talk proper and you’ll be #trending before you know it, izzit.
YAWN. Caela.
#xoxoxox
ItsDefinitelyCaela 
I like how easy your blog is to read and follow, not too long or dull! And I think your topic kind of follows on from the whole whether psychology should be written for layman or just exclusively for science. Personally I think there is a place for scientific writing in psychology, especially when it comes to research papers. There does need to be some criteria that these papers follow, otherwise if they were written more casually they would not get any scientific respect. However there often simplified versions of papers or scientific ideas placed around the internet and the media. Take the Stanford prison experiment* for example, everyone knows about it, and lots of people know great detail on it, but how many of us have actually read the paper? It is often through easier versions, like Wikipedia and the like, where we learn the key facts.
* http://www.prisonexp.org/
Pingback: Homework for TA, semester 2, third lot of comments :) « Statistics for Tea
I agree with you to a certain extent.One of the key ethical principles of any research is that it benefits everyone or anyone to wants it. By restricting the way research is presented and using ‘jargon’ words that can’t be understood and interpreted by everyone, we’re restricting those who can benefit from the research, that is unless the research is carried out on a wide scale ie/ implementation of vaccinations. However, this brings with it another issue, being unable to understand the original study means that society is having to base their own judgement on what the ‘elite’ minded tell them. An example of this is was the flu vaccine. I imagine the original research report is incomprehensible to the vast majority, however a large proportion of people had the vaccination regardless. They believed that because it was endorsed by governing bodies that it is correct, however I now understand that in a select number of cases it has been correlate with the onset of child-hood narcolepsy. Had the population been able to read the report in terms they understand they would have been able to make an informed decision, however this is not the case. This potentially highlights a second breech of ethics in the form of deception, if those in society can’t read the report and can’t read the side-effects then surely this constitutes a form of deception of at least lacking proper informed consent.
It would appear that with reference to the use of terminology in sciences there is a bigger issue than simply the majority not being able to understand but also a possible breech in ethics, as it restricts those who can benefit by directly reading the report. In large scale studies such as vaccinations, the use of terminology that is not understood could also be leading to a form of deception and or lack of informed consent.
An interesting topic considered, with a clear thesis statement argued that research papers should be written in layman speech.
Arguably the most important point you made here was the fact that research should be accessible to everyone who wants it. This is due to the fact that one of the main principles of science is that the findings should benefit society and mankind. If only the educationally elite were able to access and comprehend these findings, others in society would potentially not benefit from research. An example of research that can benefit one’s life if read could have been included in order to fully support your opinion of how fundamental this point is, such as research conducted recently into the effects of eating red meat. Researchers’ found that eating large amounts of red meat significantly increases the risk of death from heart disease by 20% (Hu et al, 2012). With papers being written with complex scientific terminology, many would be unable to access this research and, as such, would not have the opportunity to adjust their diets accordingly. This is ethically wrong due to the fact that every person should be able to access information that could potentially improve their lives; not just the academically elite.
You also raised the important point that if scientific research was written in layman speech instead of using complex words and phrases, it could potentially inspire others who were not currently involved in education or science to engage with and become excited about research. In effect, many people could become engrossed in scientific subjects and even begin to consider studying the discipline concerned, improving their own lives and the lives of others who could benefit from findings that may have not been discovered if the individual had not become interested in science.
An additional point that may have added weight to your argument that research papers should be written in layman speech is the fundamental question of what is really the point in writing in such a complex way that it is difficult for others to fully comprehend? Any good researcher should be able to present their findings in a clear and understandable way, and what is the point in exluding other people? Furthermore, as students we are constantly searching for research papers to support our research hypotheses and some will have difficulties in reading. Is it fair to disadvantage students who struggle with reading or who have not quite developed the scientific vocabulary that the discipline expects?
However, as you noted what would have been beneficial to add to your blog would have been the advantages to writing in layman speech. One of these is the fact that it is dictated by the APA and by journals that papers should be scientifically written and no reputable journal would publish papers that were not written scientifically. Obviously this should not be the case, but it is, and as a result researchers’ are powerless and must write accordingly in order for their work to be published. Another point to add is the fact that science is highly academic and well-respected and it is a priviledge to be part of this academic community. If papers were written in layman speech, it is questionnable whether the scientific community would be held in such a high regard by other disciplines. With the constant fight for funding between different subjects, the need for the subject to be regarded as highly academic is of upmost importance and this level is maintained partially through the complex nature of scientific papers.
Additionally, another point which demonstrates the disadvantage of scientists writing papers in layman speech is the notion that there is a very fine line between what is easily understandable and what it not. This is extremely subjective, and what seems simple to one researcher may not actually be easy to understand for others. As a result, researchers’ who write in layman’s speech effectively may be disadvantaged as others may not be able to or want to do the same. Furthermore, the researcher must ensure that the paper is easy to understand, whilst maintaining a professional tone and not appearing to be patronising. This may be highly challenging for some who have spent their careers writing complex academic essays and the need for them to write in layman speech may result in them writing unprofessional or patronising papers. This would not be beneficial for science and would risk the reputation of the discipline.
Despite the disadvantages of the use of layman’s speech, I generally agree with your argument that papers should be written this way as the number of advantages vastly outweigh the disadvantages. However, perhaps an alternative idea to the problem could be the publication of the paper twice: once in scientific speech and once in layman speech. As a result, researchers’ who would like to present their own findings and read others results in a more complex way are able to do so, whilst others can still access the more simplistic version of the paper (perhaps with important/interesting definitions). This would obviously take time and money, perhaps more than a researcher or journal is willing to give however, it would in effect solve this argument.
Well done on a good blog!!!!!
Link to research:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2113986/Red-meat-early-death-study-Eating-regularly-increases-risk-death-heart-disease.html
Very interseting and different choice of vlog topic. I do agree with you that research should be more accessible thus to avoid using jargon in research papers. This way, it would be eaier to understand and be of more relevance to a wider target audience. On the other hand i do think there is a point why papers are written using complicated jargon because this highlights their scientific importance in society. I also think that because papers are written by masters of the professions this is well known familiar language to them and they don’t seem to consider the benefits which it would have on society if it was written in a simpler form.
I think you raise a fair point, is it one of those situations where these experts assume everybody understands their concepts, because they know them so well and in the researchers head have become very simple to them? We get this in all aspect of life, including teaching, for a teacher of maths the concept of pie is so simple but to a 15 year old it is so alien. It could be suggested that not only do we need to check that these research papers are accurate but check that they are understandable and are written in a concise and simple manner. No wishy washy information. I know it looks impressive to write something no one understand but I think its a violation of peoples right to open and accessible information. Even as a student who had a deeper knowledge of the subject than say my friend who does Art, I still could not explain around 2/3 of the papers I come across to them! That’s ridiculous and it closes me off to the information that I have available to me to use in my own work because it just takes me far too long to comprehend it!!
ahahhahahaha….I can see the frustration that comes with this blog. But in all seriousness, YES!!! I think it is about time that this happens. I speak for myself, half of the time I am busy trying to find the meaning of words from the dictionary or should I say the “LEXICON” as I learned today in the language lecture…I mean why ca’t you just simply say…dictionary…a word that even a five year old understands…but wait, LEXICON makes it that more intelligent. It is frustrating that when you finally figure out the meaning of these words written in these papers, you realise that it was mostly unnecessary jargon indeed.
But I then suppose that when it comes down to it, these writters/scientist, that is their normal every day language and to them it just comes as second nature. And in a way if we keep it up, we will just be like them by the time we get that degree certificate!!! But it is not harmful at all to consider the masses. After all research is conducted not only for the masters of the profession alone but especially for the benefit masses and yet the masses are unable to understand the RIDICULOUS jargon thrown at them. I persist with going backward and forth to the dictionary because it is currently my job to do so if I want to pass, but otherwise if it was just for leasure, I would probly just look at it and close the book as soon as I could not understand the first paragraph. SO scientists, psychologist, think about the average individual before safocating us with the unnecessary jargon!!!
Done an done.
Pingback: Miss TA…Sem2- Comment3 « thought3
I agree with you on this topic. I think one aspect you missed out is that taxpayers help to fund a good deal of psychological research, and that it is pretty bad that they may not get to benefit from and even comprehend the results of research that they helped to fund. Also, there is the issue of jargon in other places, such as debrief forms. If a researcher uses standard psychological jargon in their debrief forms then this could mean that even someone who participated in an experiment would not know what they were helping to ocntribute to. It’s a strange topic, and it seems obvious that research should be interpretable by everyone.
I agree. It’s even tempting for me to say it’s OBVIOUS scientists have to write in a clear way as everyone needs to understand what’s written on a research paper, not simply only those with a scientific background, and even foreign readers need it to be written simple in order to understand the writer’s explanation. Research is in fact globally shared and it has to be able to be reproduced, which is an additional reason why it needs to be clear and easy to understand. Furthermore, there should not be doubts or misinterpretation of the data, otherwise what would be the point?
Turney (1996) once suggested scientists are responsible for explaining scientific information in a simple way in order to let anyone interested understand. I think this is more evidence underlying how beneficial it is having scientific papers written in layman.
A very important point is that the statistical analysis needs to be comprehensible by everyone. It does happen that some use not appropriate stats tests. All of this ought to be easily comprehensible by the reader, so that he\she also figures out if they are in front of strong and solid data or not. Experimental data has to be reproduced else where. Hence detailed explanation on how the subjects were and so on are essential.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3178846/pdf/yjbm_84_3_181.
Pingback: Last comments for Alex | martiferrari90
I really like this post because I’ve been struggling to understand around half of the research papers I have to look at for my proposal! I agree that in some ways, it would be nice if researchers could make their work a little bit less on the dense/wordy side. As a psychology student, it’s depressing to think I don’t understand the work and I can’t imagine how another person who isn’t used to reading them would find it.
On one hand, it would be good if the wider population could understand some of the research papers as I believe things are often taken quite out of context when reported in the news and sensationalised (drinking water helps your grades did you know!). On the other hand, publishing a piece of your research is a hard and lengthy task and I think the notion of “dumbing it down” may seem like a bit of a slap in the face to someone who’s just done a Phd! Writing scientifically is a skill and trying to describe a construct continually instead of using a term (such as lexicon that someone mentioned above) could lengthen the writing and make it flow less, which could actually make reading them worse.
So I agree with you, perhaps groundbreaking research needs to be clear and understandable for the general public whilst maybe more specialised studies just need to define their key terms a little more clearly. 🙂
I’m not sure if research papers can be made simple. Psychology covers such a vast area that surely you can’t expect it to simplified into a form that everybody could read and understand in five minutes. I believe if your research is going to be posted in journals that will be read by other people who study the same field, then you can’t go about simplifying everything, your peers will be interested in what seem the more complicated parts of the paper, and with your peers support they can replicate results or find contributing evidence within your field which will help benefit psychology far more than the benefit you will get from it being simple to read.
Pingback: Comments for t.a « roydeanschlipp