An abstract represents a short summary of key elements of the manuscript. The purpose of this essay is to discuss the function, contents, and types of manuscript abstracts. The essay concludes with a few tips for authors to writing effective abstracts.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
AllanR. J., & WeilB. H. (1982). Abstracts in primary journals. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 33, 5–6.
2.
American Psychological Association. (2010). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (6th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.
3.
AndradeC. (2011). How to write a good abstract for a scientific paper or conference presentation. Indian Journal of Psychiatry, 53(2), 172–175.
4.
AtanassovaI., BertinM., & LarivièreV. (2016). On the composition of scientific abstracts. Journal of Documentation, 72(4), 636 – 647. doi: https://doi.org/10.1108/JD–09–2015–0111
5.
Author Information Pack. (2017). The Internet and Higher Education. Retrieved from https://www.elsevier.com
HartleyJ. (2000). Are structured abstracts more or less accurate than traditional ones? A study in the psychological literature. Journal ofInformation Science, 26(4), 273–277.
8.
HartleyJ. (2008). Academic writing and publishing: A practical handbook. London, UK: Routledge.
9.
HartleyJ., & BettsL. (2007). The effects of spacing and titles on judgments of the effectiveness of structured abstracts. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(14), 2335–2345. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.20718
10.
HartleyJ., & BettsL. (2008). Revising and polishing a structured abstract: Is it worth the time and effort?Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 59 (12), 1870–1877. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.20909
11.
HartleyJ., & BettsL. (2009). Common weaknesses in traditional abstracts in the social sciences. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 60 (10), 2010–2018. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.21102
LiuH., HuanC., & Gimenez–GalanesJ. (2013). What makes an effective abstract in sport science?Journal of Physical Education and Sport, 13 (1), 53–56.
14.
MontesiM., & OwenJ. M. (2007). Revision of author abstracts: How it is carried out by LISA editors. Aslib Proceedings, 59 (1), 26–45.
15.
PitkinR. M., & BranaganM. A. (1998). Can the accuracy of abstracts be improved by providing specific instructions? A randomized controlled trial. Journal of the American Medical Association, 280(3), 267–279.
16.
PitkinR. M., BranaganM. A., & BurmeisterL. F. (1999). Accuracy of data in abstracts in published research articles. Journal of the American Medical Association, 281(12), 1110–1111.
17.
RoccoT. S., & PlakhotnikM. (2011). Increasing the odds of publishing a qualitative manuscript. In RoccoT. S., & HatcherT. (Eds.), The Handbook of Scholarly Writing & Publishing (pp. 161–178). San Francisco: Jossey–Bass.
18.
SauperlA., JamarN., NemeckováL., VeseláE., & DobrovolnyV. (2013). Contents and structure of abstracts. Journal ofDocumentation, 69(2), 309–319. doi:https://doi.org/10.1108/00220411311300093
19.
ShannonS. (2000). Writing a structured abstract. Canadian Association of Radiologists Journal, 51 (6), 328–329.
20.
Submission Guidelines. (n.d.). Adult Education Quarterly, retrieved from https://us.sagepub.com
21.
WeilB. H., ZaremberI., & OwenH. (1963). Technical abstracting fundamentals. II. Writing principles and practices. Journal of Chemical Documentation, 3(3), 125–132.