Writing Methods and Results Sections of a Scientific Paper
Your assignment
You are assigned to write Methods and Results sections in the style of a peer-reviewed
scientific paper. You have worked with other people to do your experiment but your
write up of your results should be your own work (your own words – not copied from
your lab partners). You are obviously expected to share data with your lab partner, but
the figures you create and the text you generate should be your own. For examples of
scientific papers see the readings for the jigsaw assignment that you did prior to the
Daphnia lab.
Scientific Papers
Writing and reading scientific papers is an acquired skill. Scientific papers are generally
organized in a very specific way. They begin with an Abstract, and then have
Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion sections. For this assignment you will be
writing only the Methods and Results sections, but it might be helpful to have a brief
overview of the other sections.
Abstract: A very short synopsis of the entire paper. The take home message of each of
the other sections of the paper is generally represented in 1 or 2 sentences in an abstract.
Introduction: Why we care about the issue and what background information is
necessary to understand the topic.
Methods: What you did and how you did it. Make sure to include what data analysis you
did with your data (ex: We generated summary statistics of gathered data.)
Results: What data you collected in the form of written text (describing important
observations or results in your data including trends and patterns noticed in your data
analyses), a table, graph and/or summary statistics.
Discussion: What your results mean in the broader context of the science. What the
implications of your experimental results are.
Methods
In the Methods (sometimes called Materials and Methods) section, you explain
how you carried out the experiment. In order for the results of scientific research to be
considered reliable, it is important that an experiment be repeatable by other researchers.
Keep this concept in mind when you write your Methods. You should give enough detail
to allow another person to set up and run the exact same experiment. This will include
what equipment you used (and sometimes where you bought it). The Methods section
should be a narrative that explains what you did to test your hypothesis. This should
include a description of the experiment setup, how the experiment was carried out (i.e.
what you did), what kind of measurements or observations you made, and the methods
you used to collect and analyze your data. Brief “why” statements can be very helpful in
making your methods section clear. For example, “To estimate the Daphnia
population...” Also subsection headings within the methods section can help with the
organization of this section. Possible subsection headings include “DNA Extraction” or
“Data Analysis.”
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A methods section is not a “how to” guide. It should not be written like a cookbook
describing how to do something, it should be written in the past tense describing how
things were done in your experiment.
Sometimes a figure or table is helpful in describing methods used, such as a sketch of
your experimental setup, or a table of volumes added to various vials. If you decide to
include a figure or a table, you must reference it in your text. See “Tables and Figures”
section below for proper formatting. Give each table or figure a number (in order it is
referred to in the text).
Results
As the name implies, this is the part of your report in which you state your results.
It is important that you do not interpret or explain what your results mean in this section
(that is what the Discussion section is for). The text of your Results section will
essentially be a written guide to your data. It is not necessary to state all of your numeric
results – after all, that is what your graphs and tables are for. You should simply point
out the highlights of your findings. This may include stating the maximum value,
minimum value, significant patterns you see in the data, etc. Consider presenting your
data as a chart or a graph. This does not replace having written text in your results; your
reader should be able to understand all of the notable information you present without
looking at your figures. If you include a chart or graph, be sure to reference it in the text
of your paper. It is also good to include any qualitative observations you made while
carrying out the experiment.
See “Tables and Figures” section below for more details on how to format any tables and
figures.
Tables and Figures
Tables and figures (graphs) should be numbered. Tables should be given one numbering
sequence, and figures should be given another sequence. Therefore, if you write a report
that includes 2 tables and 4 figures, your tables will be numbered “Table 1” and “Table
2”, and your Figures will be numbered “Figure 1” through “Figure 4.” The order of the
tables and figures should match the order in which they are referenced in the text of your
paper.
Tables
Number your tables and include a descriptive title. Below is an example table:
Table 1. Cytochrome P4501A (CYP1A) inhibitors used in this study.
Compound
Abbreviation
Alphanaphthoflavone
ANF
2
Mechanism of
action
Partial aryl
hydrocarbon
antagonist and
competitive
CYP1A inhibitor
Sample
references
Goujon et al.
1972; Lu et
al. 1996
Piperonyl
butoxide
PBO
P450 inhibitor;
Binds heme group
of P450
Fluoranthene
FL
Aminoanthracene
AA
Competitive
inhibitor of
CYP1A
CYP1A inhibitor.
Hodgson and
Philpot 1974;
Miranda et al.
1998
Willett et al.
1998, 2001
Watson et al.
1995
Adapted from Wassenberg and Di Giulio (2004)
Figures
Label axes on graphs, and include a legend if appropriate. Include a caption explaining
your figure with enough detail so that someone glancing at the figure (without reading the
text of the paper) can understand what the figure is demonstrating. Below is an example
of a figure:
100.00
90.00
80.00
70.00
Percent survival
60.00
0 ng/L
10
ng/L
50.00
100
ng/L
1000
ng/L
40.00
30.00
20.00
10.00
0.00
0.00
10.00
20.00
30.00
40.00
50.00
60.00
Time (hours)
Figure 2. Effects of embryonic exposure to various polychlorinated biphenyl 126 (PCB)
concentrations on survival of 2-week-old killifish larvae. PCB treatments were for 1 hour
beginning at 7 hours post fertilization. Error bars indicate standard error of the mean
(n=4).
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