More Tips for Being Concise

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Because abstracts generally appear with the full bibliographic citation or other identifying information about the paper, you don’t need to include the title of your paper in the abstract. Look at the first example again with a substitute for the title of the paper. We can also replace "by a ratio of 2:1" with "twice as" to save a few words. (With these changes, the abstract that was 130 words is now 94 words.)

Palmquist, M. (1995). "Students in Networked Classrooms." Computers and Composition, 10(4), 25-57.

This paper examines whether students in a computer classroom are more likely to engage in peer review than students in a traditional classroom. Two classes in each environment were studied. An observer participated in all four classes for the semester, noting interactions between students. Further, the observer interviewed both students and teachers about peer interaction and review. The study finds that students in computer classrooms are twice as likely to engage in peer review. The paper concludes that, for this one variable, computer classrooms are a more effective environment in which to teach writing.