Effective Strategies for Presenting Research Projects to Various Audiences

1. 2.2 Important points when presenting a research project • There are a number of different texts, research papers, workshops, training materials etc. with different scientific levels.

2. Who is the audience, who should the text be directed to? • Descriptive, popular, political, etc. • Present a central point for a specific audience.

3. Form, dependent upon journal or publisher. • Consult closely the journal, or the publisher firm of intention. • Some journal allow only short articles, while in they are quite long in others. Some have maximum number of words – be ware! • What is the structure of the paper (recall last lecture)? Look for intro, methods, study area, results etc., what are and how are the different headlines stated?

4. Instruction to authors for reports in the journal of Science: (up to ~2500 words or ~3 journal pages) present important new research results of broad significance. Reports should include an abstract, an introductory paragraph, up to 4 figures or tables, and a maximum of 30 references. Materials and Methods should usually be included in supporting online material, which should also include information needed to support the paper's conclusions. • Instructions to authors in Current AnthropologyMajor articles with commentaries those that receive the CA treatment must make theoretical or methodological interventions into current controversies within anthropology, broadly construed. Most major papers are 14,000words or fewer in length and must be accompanied by abstracts of a maximum of 200 words. Reports present research findings of theoretical significance to anthropology, and this significance must be made clear in the text. Reports are usually about 5000 words in length, including references.

5. Form, dependent upon journal or publisher. • Bold text, italic texts, capital letters, small capitals? • Are there several figures or no figures, and what about tables? • Do the journal allow footnotes? Footnotes are common in social science, but uncommon in natural science. • Be aware of references, how are they written – it seems each journal has its own form.

6. What about inter-disciplinarity, how to present the data? • The best way to undertake interdisciplinary research is through collaboration between researchers with different disciplinary backgrounds (McNeill and García-Godos). • The first author and then his/hers discipline will normally make the highest imprint on the article. • An inter-disciplinary article (based on authors from different disciplines) is considerate of the point of view from those disciplines.

7. -Being able to illuminate an area from different perspectives. -The possibility of getting feedback and inputs from other disciplines ensure the right methodology. - A resettler community’s harvest of Xate.. within the Maya Biosphere Reserve in Guatemala, an example of an interdisciplinary article.

8. Language in different disciplines Population ? Human population / plant population / animal population. Sustainable, diameter at breast height, age structure of stands, idea of meaning, functionalism, externalities, opportunity cost. Each discipline uses its own specific language and vocabulary to express

9. Number of authors • Different author traditions in different disciplines. • It is in natural sciences common to include a person as a co-author if the person has contributed in any way. • It is important that you as a co-author is completely confident in the data. • !Note the number of authors in the articles of different disciplines in the compendium.

10. To critically read a research article from start to finish! • Always ask you self, what was the purpose or reason for conducting this study? • Try to answer a question about the general procedure, this tests your basic understanding of what the research that was performed.

11. An example, a research project “Poverty has been a major barrier to a healthy lifestyle”. The abstract • The elderly have chronic health problems attributed to obesity. • Research suggests that exercise can reduce the risk of some health problems. • The hypothesis of the study: “that older African American women living above the poverty level will practice more health promoting behaviours as measured by the Health-Promoting Lifestyle profile (HPLP) than women living below the poverty level.

12. The method, including the instruments and procedure. • What were good aspects of the design? Could there be aspects of bias in the design? • What were questionable aspects of the design? • What factors other than the projects might have resulted in positive attitudes.

13. Results • Try to evaluate the results! • Are the presented results supported by the study? • Do the results answer the purpose of the study? • Important part of interpreting the results - Do tables and figures present the results in a comprehendible way? • Are some results missing, are results confounding? • Look for speculation only!

14. Results, the example • Results lacking, would have been informative! • What percentage of those above poverty level had been graduated from college and high school. • A large percentage were married or widowed, but we don’t know their economic level. • Those below the poverty level had a large range of scores, along with greater variability. • Although not reported, the two means are significantly different.

15. Discussion • Finally you will evaluate the experimentor’s discussion of the results in terms of the extent to which the conclusion is justified, can be generalized and has limitations. • Statements – are they justified? • Look out for statements of which there is no good arguments based on own results. • Or statements where references are lacking.

16. A statement of fact should be followed by references. • Ex. Stige et al. 2006. Global climate change is no longer a hypothesis (IPC 2001). • Danielsen and Heegaard 1993. Within a few years most of lowland dipterocarp forests in Eastern Indonesia are likely to be cleared for plantation and agriculture. • Speculation ? • - Look for value laden words

17. Discussion • Is there an argument going on with regard to the subject? • Must be accounted for. • Ex. Peres et al. 2003. Despite early warnings that the exploitation of this wild seed crop might not be sustainable ( Huber 1910), it has generally been argued that current seed collection intensities may have little impact on the demography of natural populations (Vivana et al. 1998, Zuidena and Boot 2002).

18. Discussion / conclusion, the example • The conclusion is inappropriate! • Health-promoting behaviors were not observed., they were reported. • we don’t know the extent to which test items accurately reflect behavior. • we don’t know the accuracy of the self-reports • Note that score might have been higher if all forms of exercise, not just recreational were reported.

19. Conclusion • What did the author conclude? • Are the conclusions justified?

20. Conclusion, the example • This is misleading, because it implies that exercise is a main factor that accounts for the difference in HPLP between the two groups. • Thus if groups were matched on all non-poverty level variables and were tested by a naive (with respect to the purpose of the study) individual, it would be possible to reach a valid conclusion.