Academic Papers: 7 Great Secrets Of Writing Grounded Theory
If we are to believe professors, writing is the problem child of the grounded theory. Taking into account that grounded theory is a research tool that allows making concepts and generating patterns out of bare arrays of statistical data, it becomes understandable.
While the research part takes a lot of compassion, dedication, and interest, a student gets almost drained out of capacities when the time is up for writing.
Worst and Best Case Scenarios
Academic writing always gravitates towards several scenarios.
The first one includes “beating everyone to the punch” with original but at times straightforwardly illogical ideas that have nothing to do with a research subject. In the other case, students really plunge into the depth of theoretical and philosophical foundations, depriving themselves of the ability to think and write creatively.
Grounded theory is still the academic discipline that demands a formal rather than creative writing approach, but the way the ideas are presented still makes a bigger part of their future success.
So why not let your research paper set you closer to the third scenario, where you balance the writing, and create a robust scientific paper that gets published by the authoritative source?
Things With “Yesterday” Due Date
The best idea that could come to the mind of a grounded theory writer is to start planning the paper as soon as the research data has been gathered and analyzed. You have the informational pillars by your side to lean on so it’s just about time to start writing.
Is there a room for sections and sub-sections? Are your linguistic style and references appropriate? Answers to all of these questions should be known to you beforehand as well as the format regulations that are set by the educational institution individually.
After you find out the core structure, you can outline the basic plan and start writing according to it. The following 7 writing secrets will help you to make the most out of every stage of the writing process.
1. Organization
Writing in public will help you to develop the discipline for regular writing. The secret behind it is that in such surroundings, you don’t have a chance to retreat or spend the time on emailing or internet surfing.
This concept originated in the San Francisco Bay Area and has been used by the creative writers and then research students worldwide.
The time span for the writing should be solid with fixed periods for the breaks. For instance, you can write in a group of 5 people, within 90-minute intervals and 15-minute breaks after each “writing course”. So-called “shut up and write” groups of students usually meet at the cafe or the library at pre-arranged times advertising the session via social media.
2. Style
Writing grounded theory is always associated with conventional reporting. However, writing in a brief, yet convincing manner could be of help when you need to summarize, critique, or make an introduction.
As sociologist Laurel Richardson (1990) declares, writing matters:
“You can make use of rhetorical devices and writing strategies that mirror how you constructed your grounded theory.”
There are more than 50 devices and rhetorical strategies that are applicable to rational writing. The most popular of them are:
Antithesis. Creating contrast in statements with parallel phrases, like “Many do speak but few are doing.” This one is good for creating emphasis.
Hypophora. Asking the question in writing and further answering it, like “Why is the question is so important? Because it yearly damages the economy for billions of dollars.” It is used for creating an emphasis and helping a reader to engage with your writing.
Parallelism. Similarly, structured phrases are used in one phrase, like “They found the solution, discussed implementation, and launched it”. This one is often used in long sentences to make their construction easier to digest.
In order to avoid killing your own creativity along the way of trying to write something valuable, abstain from refining the sentences along the way. Write the raw draft going straight from the thought flow where the sentences can be detached and grammar can be imperfect, and leave refining for later.
3. Intro and conclusion
The introduction is a kind of equilibrium between general and more specific problem representation. It takes 2000–3000 words with around seven chapters following them.
A bad opening line of introduction is: “Global warming is a really important problem that needs to be addressed immediately”. If the “Global warming” part was hidden, this sentence could be applicable to everything, that’s why it is bad.
Don’t be afraid to start off with a specific statement, based on your research findings, like “According to the analysis more than 80% of groups and organisms will vanish from planet Earth by 2080.”
From there you can extend the introduction, describing the types of effects global warming causes, its major causes, and give a little announcement about the solutions you are mentioning in the study.
Good conclusion length will take up to 4000–5000 words. Just like the intro, it should be specific. Mention your key findings as a ground to agree or disagree with a theory, view or concept.
4. Thesis statement
What comes off as the main argument of your research should be concise, specif,ic and challenging and take up at least 2/3 of your total writing. For a history Ph.D., it could have a past to present timeline; whereas for a science Ph.D., the order might follow the order of performed experiments.
The multidisciplinary subjects usually don’t demand certain structures, so it is possible to experiment a little. Rowena Murray’s book suggests extending the following sentences to figure out what to talk about in this important writing part:
This thesis contributes to knowledge by…
This thesis is important because…
The key research question is….
The sub-questions are…
5. Citation and academic honesty
Here’s a little factoid: in an interview with a psychologist Milton Erickson, he was asked why he never uses special terms, even when writing articles based on his own findings. He replied: “When I express my ideas, I do not want to overcite what I just read.”
In empirical studies such as grounded theory, you can’t completely avoid the terminology and here is where you will be doing a lot of citing. Mentioning the paraphrased sources, ideas and words in the research are obligatory for every type of academic writing.
A big note: Don’t forget to make in-text citations, as well as to mention the author in the bibliography with page numbers. The data and statistics should be cited, too.
In order to make sure your writing is original, it is better to run it through the plagiarism checker. The software will scan for similarities across web sources, open source databases, and private libraries recognizing and highlighting the citations and references at the same time.
6. Bibliography
The problem with bibliography is that students are often tempted to embellish it with fake sources. Never do this. The same with citations, don’t cite the things you have not mentioned in the bibliography.
The bibliography and citing should be formatted in accordance with the formatting used for the whole written work.
For printed materials, underline or italicize the book title and put it in quotes. Before getting down to internet sources research, check to see if any of the website materials are available in book format. This way you make the printed material section more extensive, as the quota for the used internet sources is regulated and internet sources are generally regarded as less reliable.
Learn how to navigate scholarly indexes like EconLit (economic research database) and count them in as sources. Sometimes, they provide the most relevant and updated data.
7. Formatting
Academic paper formatting demands perfection at all costs. After you double-check the grammar, spelling, and tailor the whole research paper to the formatting style, make sure someone triple-checks it for you. A “fresh eye” in fact can give you a great advice on how your ground study paper could be improved.
Avoid making your title a question; rather write it as a short statement that summarizes the main idea. All of the quotes over three lines long should be single-spaced and indented 1/2” on the left margin.
Both the content of your research and its appearance should be solid. Some teachers don’t like it when their students use geeky plastic binders. So, keep your hard copy in impeccable “unwrinkled” state and staple the papers instead.
The last remarks
Writing an academic paper in college or university is different from writing them for the high school. As demands for formatting, citations, and references grow, so do the expectations for the idea, originality, and style of your writing.
Writing the grounded theory is not a mystery if you have good quality analysis, relevant data, and essential materials you can strengthen your points with. All you have to do for effective finishing of your project is to develop your own writing strategy.
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