Guidelines for Writing a Formal Lab Report
The following is a breakdown of what is included in a formal laboratory report. Remember, lab
reports just like scientific journal articles, are meant to convey information to the scientific
community.
Title – Be descriptive but to the point
Authors – Your name 1st, the others in your group in alphabetical order
Abstract – Write this last. Overview of entire lab report
Limit to 1 paragraph
Make sure you answer the following questions, ~ 1 sentence for each:
What is your question?
Why are you doing the research (Not because you were told you had to)?
What is your hypothesis?
How did you test your hypothesis?
What did you find?
What are the implications of your finding?
Introduction – Background information/ research.
This should be the longest part of your paper.
What background information do you know about the subject matter?
What is your question? Why?
What is your hypothesis? Why
How will you test this, be brief (1-2 sentences)
Why will did you choose to test the variables that you did?
Procedures – Step by step what you did.
In paragraph form!
Lab set up
What equipment did you use?
How did you make your solutions, what did you do with them, what items or organisms
did you use?
What was your sampling procedure?
What math calculations did you have to do to the data (ie. average)?
Results – What were your observations?
Give specific explanation of results. Be thorough.
Describe data obtained for each treatment
Graphs and tables
Discussion – What does it mean?
Do your results match your hypothesis?
How do your results relate to your research/background info?
What are the real world implications/connections?
References – Where did you get your information?
Must have at least 4 references.
Must cite them in the proper APA format. A web address is not enough.
You may use Citation Machine.