Language: common problems
•Punctuation
•Tense
•Noun/pronoun confusion
•Subject verb agreement
•Troublesome words
•Overly long sentences
Punctuation – commas
• Use a comma before and and or when there are three or more items:
The participant, confederate, and experimenter all entered the room together.
•Use a comma before and after a non-defining relative clause (i.e., a clause that provides additional information to a subject and does not define it). For defining relative clauses (i.e., a clause that defines the subject), commas are not used. Compare the following examples:
The participants, who were aged between 25 and 35, were given the |
test. |
The participants who were aged between 25 and 35 were given the test. |
|
•Use a comma to separate two independent clauses that are joined by a conjunction (e.g., and, but, so):
The experimenter exited the room, and the participant sat down.
Punctuation - semicolons
•Use a semicolon to separate two closely related independent clauses (clauses which include a subject, a verb, and object if required):
George proceeded to ask the participant several personal questions; he pretended to be unsurprised at the responses.
•Use a semicolon to separate items in a list that already contain commas:
The four participants were born in Melbourne, Australia; Daegu, South Korea; Yamaguchi, Japan; and Venice, Italy respectively.
Punctuation - colons
• Use a colon to introduce a list at the end of a sentence:
There are three main kinds of dangerous Australian animals: snakes, spiders, and sharks.
According to Smith (2012), there are three main reasons to explain the low scores: lack of preparation, lack of sleep, and nerves.
• Use a colon between a title and a subtitle:
Agreeableness and Conscientiousness: A Comparison Study Between Undergraduate and Postgraduate Psychology Students
Punctuation - apostrophes
•The boy’s books (1 boy; his books)
•The boys’ books (several boys; their books)
•Students’ assignments / Student assignment
•The child’s toys (1 child; his/her toys)
•The children’s toys (several children; their toys)
Task
What’s wrong with these sentences?
•One of the main reasons that it’s roof flew off in the storm was that it was tin.
•Lenny stated that it was the hospital staffs fault.
•His salary is higher than a teacher.
Answer
What’s wrong with these sentences?
•One of the main reasons that it’s its roof flew off in the storm was that it was tin.
•Lenny stated that it was the hospital staffs staff’s fault.
•His salary is higher than a teacher teacher’s.
Task
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.
Tense
•Use a past tense when referring to an event or situation that took place in the past.
–studies that were conducted
–literature that was written
–hypotheses (including yours) that were tested.
use a past tense when stating your hypotheses and writing the literature review, methods, and results sections.