Punctuation

Commas

•After adverbs or adverbial phrases at the beginning of sentences e.g., On the other hand,

Nevertheless, Therefore,

•However is always punctuated in one of these 3 ways:

. However, ; however, , however,

•In non-defining (extra information) relative clauses e.g., This research, which was conducted under stringent conditions, proved that the theory is correct. (Shows the information is extra and is not required to define the noun i.e., we already know which research).

•Where you pause to take a breath in a sentence is where a comma (or some other form of punctuation) should be. Read your assignment aloud and you’ll realise this.

Semi-colons

•To link two related independent clauses e.g., I always proofread my essay; it helps eliminate any unnecessary mistakes. This is particularly useful if you have long sentences.

•When listing long ideas that already contain commas

Colons

•To start a list at the end of a clause e.g., Three groups of students scored well on the test: females, nurses, and history students.

Apostrophes

Punctuate the following abstract:

This study examined agreeableness and conscientiousness between undergraduate and postgraduate Psychology Business and Law students. The Big Five factor model was measured using the NEO-PI-R (Costa & McCrae 1992) to assess students personality traits and compare the groups. It was hypothesised that first year students would score significantly higher than postgraduate students on agreeableness yet lower on conscientiousness. The findings in this study indicate that undergraduate Psychology Business and Law students are significantly more agreeable than the postgraduate students however there were no significant differences found in the levels of conscientiousness amongst the variables. This studys results are useful from a practical standpoint for future research yet further studies in this area are highly recommended.

Adapted from a first year psychology laboratory report