Finding articles can be challenging, but sometimes it's even harder to know what to do with them once you find them. How do you go from a 10-page dense article to a few lines in your own literature review or introduction to a study? Although I’ve previously written about what those brief summaries should look like in introductions, today I’m going to provide advice on how to read, make sense of, and summarize for yourself, the content of the articles you find.

Reading the article
Make sure you fully understand the major sections of the article, which generally have an hourglass shape:

a. Introduction. In this section, the authors are describing past work, and how their study fits into past work. When you are writing your own literature review, if you are reading a paper by Brown and Jones, and they cite work by Smith, you should not summarize the authors' summary of Smith and then cite Brown and Jones. If Smith sounds relevant to the paper you're writing, track down Smith and read it directly. When you are reading a journal article for your own literature review, you can use the introduction to find other articles, but you shouldn’t use their summaries of past work for your summary. What eventually will go into your literature review or introduction will focus on the authors’ findings. But, including their conceptual framing and theoretical perspective in your summary for yourself is often helpful.

b. Methods. A description of the sample, procedures, and measures. This section is very useful for fully understanding what the authors did, although you’re unlikely to write much about it in your literature review.

c. Results. An explanation of the statistics performed, and what the authors found. This section is important for learning the main findings of the article. However, many articles use very complicated statistics, and sometimes a reader can get lost in those details. Don't worry if you can't understand everything they did. Focus instead on their explanation of what they found.

d. Discussion. In this section, authors summarize their findings, interpret their findings, link their findings back to the literature, and discuss limitations, future directions, and implications. The summaries in the discussion can be particularly useful if you had trouble following the details in the results section.
 
e. References: This section is very useful for tracking down articles the authors refer to, that are relevant to your own work.

Summarizing the articles
When I write a literature review, I find it helpful to summarize each article for myself in the same way, in one document, so that I can then work with my summaries, rather than the articles. I provide myself enough information so that I don't frequently need to go back to the article. When I do this, I make sure to PUT THINGS IN MY OWN WORDS so I can work from the summaries and know that I am using my words, not the authors'. This point is critical for avoiding unintentional plagiarism. If you think, I’ll just copy and paste, and change it later, when you come back to it a couple of months later, you may not remember you haven’t already put it in your own words.
I also want to make sure I have enough detail about the methods so I can easily write it into my paper e.g., I need to know if it was only female participants, only one ethnic group, what age the participants were, etc. Here's an example of one I did:

Once you have summarized all of your articles, you can then write your own literature review, using your article summaries. I like to start by creating an outline of the full literature review, so that as I add each article to my paper, I can make sure it goes in the correct place. This technique also helps me realize if there are sections of my paper where I have too few articles and need to find more.
 
Having these summaries makes the transition to writing the actual paper so much more straightforward, and saves you time in the long run. And I’m all about efficiency in any way possible.

“How to read and summarize research articles first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on November 6, 2018.”

I speak a lot about intentional writing, and you can find links to all my prior posts on intentional writing here. The most similar topic to today’s topic is about the importance of integrating, rather than listing, prior studies’ findings.
 
Today I want to talk about the importance of centering your summary of others’ work around the research findings, rather than the authors. I’m going to cheat and use the same example I used previously with slight alterations. Here’s an example of author-focused summaries:
 
Smith, Bogle, Talbott, Grant, and Castillo (2006) found that college students are more likely to drink, and drink more heavily, on their 21st birthday compared to other days. Rutledge, Park, and Sher (2008), in a more representative study, found similar increases in drinking on 21st birthdays. Neal and Fromme (2007) found that alcohol use was elevated on holidays like New Year’s Eve, as well as on football weekends. Similarly, Del Boca, Darkes, Greenbaum, and Goldman (2004) found that alcohol use increases on New Year’s Eve and other holidays. Other researchers have also found elevated rates of drinking on Halloween and St. Patrick’s Day (Glindemann, Wiegand, & Geller, 2007). Patrick, Morgan, Maggs, and Lefkowitz (2011) found that another event, Spring break, also has higher rates of drinking. Finally, Grekin, Sher, and Krull (2007) found that increased drinking during Spring break occurred only when students were with friends.  
 
That paragraph is written so that the authors are the subjects of each sentence, placing the most importance on the author names (or in one case, “other researchers”). However, when you are reading an introduction, you rarely care who did what study (sorry authors! I know you care!). What you do care about is what the authors found. In the occasional instances where, as a reader, you do care about who did the study, the information will still be easily accessible, it’s just not distracting you from the main findings. Here is the passage in the actual paper – much shorter, but without any loss of information:
 
College student alcohol use is known to increase during the celebration of special events such as 21st birthdays (Rutledge, Park, & Sher, 2008; Smith, Bogle, Talbott, Grant, & Castillo, 2006), football games (Neal & Fromme, 2007b), Spring Break (Grekin, Sher, & Krull, 2007; Patrick, Morgan, Maggs, & Lefkowitz, 2011), and holidays like Halloween and New Year’s Eve (Del Boca, Darkes, Greenbaum, & Goldman, 2004; Glindemann, Wiegand, & Geller, 2007).  
 
In the second example, we have integrated the findings across studies, but we also have made the research findings, rather than the author names, the star of the sentence. Which is now one sentence. No information was lost, but the reader comes away with a much better sense of what has been found in this research area.   
 
It probably takes a bit more time to write the second example than the first. But that’s because you are doing the work for the reader, and therefore, it will take the reader a lot less time to understand your points – which should be the goal of writing in any context.
 
“Intentional writing: Finding-focused, not author-focused literature summaries first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on October 25, 2018.”

Last week I wrote about some general guidelines for writing reaction papers and other grad class papers. Today I want to cover some smaller issues that arise in writing graduate papers.
 
Multiple times in my upper level undergraduate courses I’ve had students complain that I marked off for writing quality – spelling, grammar, clarity. Students’ argument is generally, I already took my W (writing) course, why should I be graded on writing in a non-W course?
 
Hopefully by graduate school you recognize that clear, accurate writing is important in any writing setting [well, hopefully you realize this in undergrad, but if not…]. So, here are some things to be aware of in your writing. Note that these issues are based on ones that I’ve noticed most frequently in graduate student class papers. Some of them arise more frequently because of the kinds of classes I teach (e.g., adolescence vs. adolescent).

• Identify your writing foibles: A general point is that everyone has different writing issues. The ones I’m listing are those I notice frequently; yours may be different. Start to notice what errors your instructors and/or advisors note on your writing. And then be aware of them. I know for myself, for instance, I have issues with consistency. So before I submit a paper, I figure out what terms I am using interchangeably, decide which ones I want, and go through and search and replace. I had an international student who had great English, but often confused she and he. Figure out yours, and check for them before submitting papers.
• Tense switching: An easy one to go back through your paper and check on. Make sure that you are not being inconsistent.             
  • Incorrect example: Lifetime rates of kissing and touching are similarly high for male and female adolescents and college students (Garcia et al., 2008; O’Sullivan et al., 2007; Regan et al., 2004), but reported daily rates were higher for female than male students (Patrick et al., 2015).
  • Corrected: Lifetime rates of kissing and touching are similarly high for male and female adolescents and college students (Garcia et al., 2008; O’Sullivan et al., 2007; Regan et al., 2004), but reported daily rates ARE higher for female than male students (Patrick et al., 2015).
• Singular/plural switching: Make sure that you consistently use singular or plural. So don’t go back and forth between describing people vs. a person. For instance:
  • Incorrect: An adolescent who feels rejected by his/her peers may be less open to seeking out new friendships. Feeling rejected by peers, therefore, may lead adolescents to perpetuate future rejection.
  • Correct:  ADOLESCENTS who feel rejected by THEIR peers may be less open to seeking out new friendships. Feeling rejected by peers, therefore, may lead adolescents to perpetuate future rejection.
• Too long sentences: Think about your sentence length. You will lose the reader if it goes on too long. It’s relatively easy to break up your points into two separate sentences.
• Contractions: Avoid contractions in formal writing. I get to use them in blog posts; but don’t use them in manuscripts, theses, or class papers
• While vs. although/whereas: Use WHILE for comparing time. Use ALTHOUGH or WHEREAS for comparing arguments:
  • Incorrect: While limited past work has examined longitudinal changes, our findings are in line with prior cross-sectional work…
  • Correct: ALTHOUGH limited past work has examined longitudinal changes, our findings are in line with prior cross-sectional work…
  • Incorrect: Some research demonstrates similar reported rates of couple-level oral contraception use for men and women, while other research demonstrates…
  • Correct: Some research demonstrates similar reported rates of couple-level oral contraception use for men and women, WHEREAS other research demonstrates…
  • Correct: While the participants completed surveys, the researcher surreptitiously rated their Tanner level.
• Since vs. because: Use BECAUSE for logical arguments; only use SINCE to describe time.
  • Incorrect: Since multilevel models allow for incomplete data, we retained all measurements…
  • Correct: BECAUSE multilevel models allow for incomplete data, we retained all measurements…
  • Correct: Researchers have recognized the value of human subjects protection since several high profile unethical research studies.
• That/which: This rule has taken me the longest to learn of any grammar rule, I think. Use THAT if the clause (defined as a restricted clause) is critical to the sentence’s meaning. Use WHICH to add additional information (nonrestrictive clause).
  • Future research might consider whether such health benefits are especially true for nonpenetrative behaviors, WHICH do not have accompanying risks of unwanted physical health outcomes.
  • We excluded behaviors THAT do not have accompanying risks of unwanted physical health outcomes from other analyses.
• Relationships/associations: People have relationships; variables have associations. This distinction is particularly important when writing about relationships. Otherwise, you end up with sentences like “the relationship between relationship satisfaction and depression was…”
• Male/female vs. women/men or boy/girl: APA style says to only use male/female as adjectives when referring to humans; use them as nouns only for non-humans. Use women/men or boy/girl for humans. Yes, this wording can be challenging when describing adolescents. Depending on the age, we sometimes use boys/girls, sometimes young men/young women, sometimes male adolescents/female adolescents.
• Adolescents vs. adolescence: For whatever reason, students often mix up these two forms. I know if asked which is used when they could quickly identify; I guess because they sound similar, in writing quickly students sometimes mistype them.
• Plural vs. possessive: Students often use apostrophes when they intend the plural form, or vice versa.
• Others: See my other posts for how to dis the this; use consistent ordering (different from consistent terms); and vanquish the vague.

 
Getting a handle on these issues, and your other writing foibles, early in your academic career isn’t just about getting better grades. It’s about your ability to communicate your ideas and your research with other academics and outside of academia.

What are your writing foibles?
 
“ first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on September 13, 2018.”

Last week I wrote about reading journal articles and chapters for graduate courses. For many graduate courses, once you have finished reading, you have to create a written product. Oftentimes the format is a reaction paper. Many students never had to write reaction papers in undergrad, so it is a new format as a first year grad student. Other times the instructor may provide questions or prompts for you to frame your paper. Either way, though, you are frequently taking multiple readings and trying to respond in a clear way that goes beyond summarizing the readings and presents your own ideas.
 
Here are some suggestions for writing strong reaction papers:
 

• Citations: I know I sound like a broken record, but cite any sources. Sometimes students think that because they are writing about a reading assigned for class, they do not need to provide a citation. You still do. You need to attribute the source, and you need to start good habits of citing other people’s ideas, even if you aren’t quoting word for word.
• Stick to the page/word limit: Most reaction papers have word limits. Instructors do not only place word limits because they don’t want to read too much (though let’s be honest, that could be part of the motivation). If there’s a word limit, it means the instructor thinks you can achieve the task in that many words or pages. The rest of your career will be filled with word limits, for journals, grant applications, tenure narratives, etc. Practice sticking to them.
• Avoid repetition: How do you stick to the page/word limit? Get to the point quickly, and avoid repetition. Just about any time I have graded a paper that is too long it is quickly obvious to me that there are redundancies that could be cut. Or…
• Avoid irrelevant details: there are irrelevant details that do not need to be in the paper. Rarely does a reaction paper need to include specific details about the sample, such as the sample size or how the sample was recruited. Of course, there are exceptions if relevant to a point you are making, but make sure that what you write responds to the prompt or moves your arguments along.
• Be clear, don’t be vague: Be specific about what you say, and avoid being vague. Vague language does nothing to forward your argument.
• Make connections: I’ve previously discussed the importance of integrating across multiple studies in journal article introductions. Integration and making connections are also important in reaction papers. Instructors do not want you to simply summarize the readings. They know the papers – they assigned them. Instructors want you to demonstrate your own critical thinking. To do so, you need to integrate across the readings, and make connections between them.
• Limitations/future directions: Another way to demonstrate your own critical thinking is to describe limitations of prior theories/research, and suggest future directions in this area. I’ve previously written about how, in an article introduction, you shouldn’t focus on others’ weaknesses but instead should write about your strengths. A reaction paper is a bit different in that you aren’t presenting your own data/analyses, so you have to spend more time critiquing prior work. Prior work often has flaws, and it’s fine to critique it. However, do remember that just because someone didn’t ask a specific research question in their work, doesn’t mean their study was flawed. It just means they asked a different question. You can discuss new directions/next steps without calling it a flaw in prior work. One pet peeve of mine is when writers (not just students) suggest future work without explaining why. An easy go to is, future work should consider samples that are X. E.g., this sample was all White and middle class, and future work should consider more diverse populations. That’s probably true, but explain why. What differences might you predict? Perhaps families from lower economic status have fewer resources and thus time spent supervising homework might be more challenging for that sample, and less indicative of poorer parenting quality. Explain why considering these other groups may be important.  
• Know your instructor: I would never suggest catering to your professors. But paying attention to your instructors and the kinds of arguments they may can be useful in thinking about the kinds of arguments they may find compelling. It can also be useful in the details. In grad school, we had an instructor who often used the expression “on the one hand… on the other hand” during lecture. I made sure that every reaction paper used those phrases, and the instructor consistently wrote “good point!” next to those points in particular. Other instructors might prefer a more one sided perspective. You can get a sense of the instructor, and write accordingly.
• Outlines: When you are working to improve your writing, I recommend two outlines. First, write an outline before you start writing, to help organize your writing. I imagine everyone knows about that outline already. But I also recommend writing a second outline of your paper after you finish writing, based on your actual paper. This second outline helps demonstrate the logical flow (or lack thereof) of your paper, can point out repetition to you, and generally helps you see your paper in another way.
• Don’t write the first sentence first: Students often get stuck on first sentences. Jump in, and return to it later.
• Timing: Do not start your paper the day before. There is no way you can fully proofread your paper if you write it all in one day. Write it at least 2 days before, so you can reread it the day before. I even save drafts of every blog post I write and read them 24+ hours later before posting them. I still have errors, as I don’t spend as much time rewriting them as I would more formal writing, but I definitely notice and fix errors and find ways to make my points more clearly.
• Read aloud: If you’re struggling with awkward writing, try reading your paper aloud. It can make a huge difference in noticing when your writing is awkward or unclear.
• Talk to your professor: If you want to improve your reaction papers, and aren’t sure how, go talk to your professor about one you’ve already written and received feedback on. Don’t go in asking to get a better grade on that paper. Go in asking to understand how to improve in the future. Professors want their students to do well, and are generally happy when students reach out to try to improve. They just don’t like grade grubbing.  

 
“How to Write Strong Papers in Grad School first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on September 6, 2018.”

People consider lots of things when writing journal article or chapter titles. Does it capture the meaning of the paper? Is it catchy enough? Is it clear? Is it succinct enough? But, there’s another issue that people may not frequently consider when writing a title, and I would argue it is the most important consideration, because unlike these other things, it isn’t specific to this paper. It sticks with you forever. And that is, how will this title look on your CV for the rest of your career?
 
It appears I’ve yet to write about strong titles, but I have written about strong first sentences. In that post I argued that your first sentence should be strong, clear, and interesting. All true of your title as well. BUT, your first sentence can actually get away with being catchier than your title, because your first sentence is contained within the manuscript, and does not appear elsewhere. It catches people’s attention in the context of the paper, but nowhere else.
 
In contrast, your title appears on your CV, in your tenure dossier, in people’s literature searches. Yes, it’s the advertisement for the paper, and thus can get people’s attention. But it’s also a reflection of you and your body of research, something that follows you forever, for better or for worse. 
 
For instance, when I was asked to write a chapter about erectile dysfunction, I asked my students if they were interested in first authoring it. When one of my students expressed interest, I asked her to think about having the title “erectile dysfunction” on her CV. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. But it would be on her CV forever, and she would want to think about the kinds of institutions where she might want positions, and if that might matter at those institutions. For a lifelong sex researcher it’s probably not a big deal, but it was a consideration.
 
Another issue is cutesy titles. I support clever titles, but there is a fine line between clever and cutesy (or just silly) titles, and unfortunately, different scholars draw that line in different places. I sometimes do a literature search and come across a title that makes me cringe a little, and I confess, it can affect the way I think of the author. I won’t share examples, but I did find this Slate article about clever and gone-too-far journal article titles. So, before you finalize a clever title, ask a few other people what they think of it. If you're early career, make sure some of the people you ask are more senior than you, because they are the group of people who will evaluate your work for things like tenure. Because again, that title will be on your CV forever.  When you study a topic like sexual health, there are a lot of ways you could go clever, and a lot of ways you could go wrong, and I’ve seen both happen.
 
Perhaps I’m lucky that I’m just not very good at clever titles. I think the most I’ve done are these two:
He Said She Said: Gender Differences in Mother-Adolescent Conversations About Sexuality
and
Never been kissed: Correlates of lifetime kissing status in U.S. university students
 
I’m pretty comfortable living with both of those titles, forever.
 
Some questions to ask yourself before finalizing a clever title:

• Will it look silly on my CV 5/10 years from now?
  
• Could someone misinterpret it?
  
• Would everyone think it’s funny, or could it read as offensive?
  
• Will it fit with any job I apply for? For instance, if you look for a job at a religious institution or a government job, could it offend someone?
  

 
It may help to think of article titles like the CV version of tattoos – don’t just think about whether it’s fun in the moment, but think about whether you want to live with it for the rest of your life.
 
“Your Title Will be on Your CV Forever first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on August 23, 2018.”

Leavitt, C. E., & Lefkowitz, E. S. (2018). Erectile dysfunction. In Bornstein, M. (Ed.), The Sage Encyclopedia of Lifespan Human Development (pp. 766-768). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications Inc.

Waterman, E. A., & Lefkowitz, E. S. (2018). Sexuality. In Bornstein, M. (Ed.), The Sage Encyclopedia of Lifespan Human Development (pp. 1984-1988). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications Inc.
 
About three years ago I was invited to write a couple of chapters for this encyclopedia. Two of my students expressed interest in taking the lead on the entries, so we went ahead with them. Although I’ve written book chapters before, this may have been my first experience with encyclopedia entries. They were fun to (co-)write in that they were less technical and more summarizing than the average journal article or chapter. I think that encyclopedia entries could be a good opportunity for a student, particularly a student around the time of comprehensive exams. They require you to be relatively comprehensive with an area of literature, but also to be able to write about it in a clear, straightforward, succinct way.
 
One strange component (in stark contrast to comprehensive exams) was that we were not allowed to include citations. After a career of carefully citing every point and teaching students to do the same, it was strange not to do so in the entries. We had a further reading section, but no references for specific points. Another challenge was to write only 9 pages of text on all of sexuality across the lifespan for one entry. I think Emily did an excellent job with this entry. She covered childhood through later adulthood, and touched on a number of important topics in the process.
 
The other chapter was 6 pages, but on such a specific topic, erectile dysfunction, that it was relatively easy for Chelom to cover the relevant material. It serves a very different purpose than the overarching sexuality one, but could serve as a good resource for people looking for a summary of what is known on this topic. 
 
We enjoyed writing both of these chapters. My only regret is that I just saw the huge price tag on the encyclopedia. I hope that some people will have access to the chapters through their university libraries, because I can’t imagine any individuals being able to afford the full set.
 
“Our Entries in the Encyclopedia of Lifespan Human Development first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on August 7, 2018.”

Our first paper written in Google Docs
 
Recently I described our paper in a special issue on relationship dissolution. Writing this paper was a completely collaborative experience, and my first time doing it this way, so I thought I’d describe how that process went for us.
 
We read a call for papers for a special issue on romantic relationship dissolution in Emerging Adulthood.  I had three doctoral students at the time, so at our research group meeting we discussed whether we had any data that might fit the special issue. The thing about special issues is that the turnaround time is generally relatively short, certainly shorter than my usual time from paper conceptualization to submission.  It would be challenging to collect data for a special issue in time to write it up, and even challenging (not impossible) to start entirely new analyses on a brand new paper.
 
If you can pull it off, though, there’s value in submitting to a special issue. First, your submission is not a shot in the dark – you know the journal is interested in the topic, so if you submit something of good quality, I believe your likelihood of acceptance is higher. Of course it depends on the submission rate, but the guest editors need a certain number of papers to fill the issue. Second, you are then grouped with similar papers, increasing the likelihood that researchers interested in the topic will stumble upon your paper.
 
In our discussion, we realized we had a conference presentation submitted on long distance dating relationships (LDDRs), and that it wouldn’t be that challenging to subsequently look at breakups in this sub-group to fit the special issue. But, given time constraints, and that all of us were in the middle of multiple other papers, we would need a highly collaborative process among the four of us.
 
I believe the process from start to finish (other than the original analyses for the conference submission, which were only part of the final analyses) was 6 months. 
 
One key feature in making this process work (for us) was that we identified a project leader. Emily had been lead author on the conference submission, and so she agreed to be project leader and first author on the manuscript. She set up timelines and tables, helped distribute tasks, ran the discussions at our group meetings, and kept us on track.
 
We had one google doc that we used for everything related to the project. It started with timelines and outlines and eventually had the fully drafted manuscript. Everyone had full rights on the doc so they could choose to write directly, or to edit/suggest.
 
Emily created timelines to keep us on track. The only one I could quickly find is this one, from the second half of the process:

We started with a lit review, divvying up the literature for different authors to summarize. I really appreciate the note that some of the reviewing is copy and pasted so needs to be reworded. Good reminder and good practice in general.

Then as each author tackled different sections, we could work on it simultaneously. I generally appreciate track changes in editing manuscripts, but one challenge is having two or more people editing simultaneously. Yes, you can merge changes, but I always find it cumbersome to receive three edited versions of the same paper and to try to merge them. In contrast, with everyone working in one google doc, there was no concern about order or turn taking. In addition, if each person was writing a separate section, they could simply write. But if they wanted to edit someone else’s text and wait on approval from the other author, they could use suggest mode.
 
Eventually, when we wanted to finalize formatting and make sure things looked pretty, we switched to a Word version and passed it along in a more traditional way. I appreciated seeing this heading at the top when I opened the original document this week:

Documentation of process is so important for continuity and I really appreciated finding this heading there.
 
Overall, I think all four of us would describe the experience as very positive. I can’t think of any negatives of doing it in google docs, besides having to fix formatting later. I don’t know that I would automatically write a manuscript I first author in google docs, simply because I’m more comfortable with MS Word. But, I wouldn’t hesitate to do it again through google docs as a fully collaborative paper. My life doesn’t always have space for writing a manuscript in 6 months, but for my research group at the time, it worked, and we are pleased with the result. 
 
“Our First Paper Written in Google Docs first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on July 26, 2018.”

Recently I discussed how I work with students to easily follow the edits they make between drafts. Today I wanted to write about how to provide students feedback in Word in ways that will provide them with scaffolding around writing.
 
In my first year of grad school, I handed my second reader a copy of my masters thesis proposal. About a week later, she returned it to me covered in red ink. She said, that’s the last time I expect you to make any of those mistakes. I’m certain I didn’t magically drop all of those errors in future writing, but I did pay close attention to every word she circled and marked up to figure out what I had done wrong, and to get a sense of how to write better the next time.
 
When I started as faculty I always handed students drafts in hard copy. Usually we would sit together and go through my comments, page by page. I even had a list of editing shorthand that I used, things like AWK for awkward and TS for tense switching.
 
Now I almost always email students a copy of their paper as a Word document with track changes and comments. I have mixed feelings, however, about simply correcting things in track changes. You know how you grade students’ exams, spending substantial time explaining where you deducted points and why? And when you hand them back you realize they are just looking at the grade on the last page? Well, with student theses and manuscripts, I am concerned that sometimes, some students simply accept all of the changes without actually going through and seeing what the suggested changes are, or trying to figure out why I wanted to change it.
 
So, depending on the student and where in the editing process we are, I may handle this process differently. If we are early in our time working together, I try to mark things carefully and write a lot of comments explaining what I think needs to be done. If there are errors that happen frequently, I may correct it the first few times it happens with a note, and I may even write “I stopped correcting these errors after this one. I marked some of them, but you should reread the whole paper carefully for more instances of it.” After that, I either just write a comment (e.g., tense switching) or simply highlight it for them to figure out what the issue is.
 
Similarly, if there is a lot of awkward phrasing, I may rewrite a couple of early ones as examples, and then just start marking awkward phrases/sentences. Or if, for instance, the student is reporting on 10 betas in a regression, and they are all written unclearly, I may rewrite the first one, and tell the student to rewrite the remainder using the one I rewrote as a model.
 
If we’ve been working together for a while, and the student makes an error that I know she commonly makes and I’ve corrected on prior papers (or drafts of this paper), I likely will comment on the first one, explaining it’s another instance of error X that we’ve talked about before.
 
There are times that I don’t use editing as a teaching moment. If, for instance, the student has defended her dissertation (and thus isn’t a student anymore!) and we are trying to get it published, I may spend more time editing the text outright and less time explaining or asking the student to fix things herself. At that point I’m an author of the document as well, so I’m more comfortable with inserting my own writing.
 
Good, clear writing is such a critical skill in academia. We as mentors have to make sure that, no matter what medium we use, we do not treat the editing of student work as if we were a book editor “fixing” things for someone else. Instead, it’s essential that we use this opportunity to teach students how to be better writers.
 
“Giving Students Feedback in Track Changes While Still Teaching Them to Write first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on June 14, 2018.”

Last week I wrote about how I now use a google spreadsheet to keep on top of my editing tasks. Today I thought I would share my strategy for making each editing task easier. I use this method specifically with students’ (or former students’) manuscripts and theses/dissertations, though I also try to practice what I preach and do the same thing when I share manuscripts on which I am first author.
 
I don’t think I ever read a draft of a paper only once. In the “olden days” I would read students’ drafts in hard copy, and make handwritten corrections/comments. When students handed me a new draft, I would ask for the prior version with my handwritten comments and go back and forth.
 
Now that I edit in Word using track changes and comments, I noticed that I was reading new drafts and going back and forth to the old draft to see my earlier comments and whether students replied. It contrasts with when I am a blind reviewer on a journal manuscript, and I receive a response to all of my reviewer points, so I can go through the response letter and see how the author responded to my requests.
 
It felt inefficient, and so I came up with a system that works much better for me. I ask that students follow these guidelines when sending me a previously read draft:

• Turn off track changes
• Go through each suggested edit, and either accept it, or add a comment as to why you didn’t accept it (yes, you can disagree with my suggestions, just explain why)
• Simultaneously you’ll be accepting your edits from the earlier round
• Find any comments that were from an EARLIER round of edits (e.g., I just read it on May 30th, but there are leftover comments from April 27th), and delete those older comments, unless they aren’t resolved (e.g., delete the April 27th comments)
• Turn track changes back on, and go through my comments
• For each comment, either edit the manuscript, or respond to the comment as a new comment (or both)
• Reread the whole paper, and make any additional changes/edits (with track changes still on)
• Send back to me.

 
If we are at a point where I don’t feel that I have to read the whole thing, I will highlight the paragraphs I want to reread, or put in a comment on the title page that says “Eva only has to read first paragraph and whole discussion.” This tracking also helps me immensely. When I was younger and editing fewer things, I likely could remember when someone returned something that I only needed to reread discussion that version. But now, with more years behind me, and more frequent co-authored editing, by the time something returns to me, I’ve lost track of where we left off.  To put it in perspective, not including first-authored papers, I currently have 5 co-authored submitted papers, and 6 co-authored drafted, so I am reading a lot of drafts in any given month.
 
I try to follow a similar process when I’m first author – when I send a new draft around, I have gone through and accepted (or not, with a comment) my earlier changes and suggested changes from co-authors, and then I turn on track changes and make new edits in response to comments. I also respond to comments as needed, e.g., if I don’t make a change, or if co-author had a question about something. Hopefully this annotating helps my co-authors as much as it helps me. 
 
“The post How to Edit Co-authored Papers More Efficiently first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on May 31, 2018.”

In Fall 2016, my family had just moved to a new state, and I was a first time department head in a new department. I was busy. But on top of all that, I had three students at my former institution all trying to complete their dissertations by Summer 2017 so that they could graduate with me as their committee chair.
 
All three students had their dissertation proposal meetings during a 3-day period in November. That October was… intense. There were many nights where I didn’t get to the dissertation drafts until about midnight, and I often stayed up until 2:00 or 3:00 AM editing, sometimes from a standing position so that I didn’t fall asleep. I occasionally took breaks to do down dog, again, so I didn’t fall asleep.
 
[I believe it’s important to interject at this point that I adore all three of these students; they all DID finish by Summer 2017, so 4 years for PhD or 5 years for combined masters/PhD; and they all now have awesome positions as assistant professor or post  doc ]
 
Part of the issue was a problem of perspective. I have a general rule that students can expect a one-week turnaround. To each student, they were sending me drafts at a reasonable rate for my response. But, that rate ignored the two other doctoral students; former students sending me co-authored manuscripts; manuscripts to review for journals; my own writing; and of course, every other aspect of my job, and my life.
 
I know I’m not unique in this situation. Part of being faculty is always having to balance one’s own writing, teaching, and service, with editing students’ and collaborators’ work and reviewing grants and manuscripts for external sources.
 
After we got through the defenses, I decided there had to be a better way. So, my students and I came up with a system to get through Spring semester and their dissertations. And the system worked so well, that I have continued the system and use it for the large category of research that I mentally refer to as “other people’s work” even though, of course, I’m often a co-author. I really think it has revolutionized my ability to get other’ people’s work back to them in a timely manner (I’m human though; I definitely slip up.).
 
What did we do? We created a google spreadsheet to account for my time. Here’s a screenshot that I took this past November, a few months after everyone had graduated:

Yes, I have very productive former students!
 
We created the spreadsheet based on my expectations of how much other people’s work I could handle in a given week. I decided that in any given week I could handle 2 manuscript-length editing projects, and 2 smaller editing projects. Recognizing sometimes I needed to do more, I added the “#3 if desperate” column. And, during that dissertation writing semester, we had to add the “super desperation” column, though fortunately we don’t use it much. I also look a few months ahead and black out cells – Thanksgiving week I cut back on the number of things I would edit by blacking out some cells. Spring break I did the same. I blacked out the whole week of our family August vacation.
 
I also defined for students what category they should use:

• Manuscript: manuscript (co-author or review for journal); chapter of a dissertation or dissertation proposal (if sending multiple chapters, counts as multiple manuscripts); masters or honors thesis; external tenure review letter; dissertation if I’m not the chair
• Lower-level editing task: conference abstracts; conference poster or talk drafts; job talk slides; job talk materials; up to 10 reference letters to write for set of similar jobs (if applying to 2 different types, e.g., faculty & post docs, count as 2 separate ones); looking at/going over analyses before writing up

 
Students all have access to the editing calendar for months ahead, so they can get on my calendar. This system was extremely helpful during the crazy-dissertation writing semester, when everyone had similar deadlines, and we had to figure out a way to make it all fit, so that I wasn’t reading everything in the same week. It also helped students stick to their deadlines, because they knew if they didn’t get something to me as planned, it might be four weeks later when they could get back on my calendar. I think it also provides students with insight as to what it’s like to be a professor, because they get a better sense of the big picture of what my time use is in terms of other people’s work. In addition to students being able to add their own work into the calendar, I will add things myself, such as manuscript reviews for journals, co-authored papers not by students, and external tenure reviews. 
 
I also have other expectations/assumptions, such as:

• Assume I am likely to edit any proposal, thesis, dissertation, or manuscript a minimum of 3 times, often more
• Only use “if desperate” column if truly desperate (e.g., external deadline). Otherwise, use a subsequent week
• I prefer not to read the same thing 2 weeks in a row, so with multiple rounds of edits on same document, make sure there’s a week off between when I receive them.

 
I know this system is unlikely to work for everyone. It doesn’t always work for me. Sometimes, unexpected things come up and I get a couple of weeks behind (a couple of times I’ve cried uncle and moved everything forward a couple of weeks). Other times I am just really tired and get behind because, for instance, everyone in my life is sick and I want to get enough sleep to try to have a halfway decent immune system. Sometimes, a student misses a deadline and she has to get someone else to swap with her. All that said, in my various administrative roles, I’ve talked to students about mentors who take many weeks and even sometimes months to provide feedback on writing, often slowing down students’ progress through the program or marketability for jobs. This system helps me to stay relatively on track with editing other people’s work, but also, not to let it take over my life. I like that when I get asked to review a manuscript I can look at the spreadsheet and see if I have a slot open in the next 4 weeks; if not, I turn it down. I like that on Sunday night I can look at my week ahead and know what my other people’s work tasks are. It works well enough for me that I wanted to share it with you. If you have a system that works well for you, please feel free to share it in the comments.
 
 “The post How I gained control of my editing tasks first appeared on Eva Lefkowitz’s blog on May 25, 2018.”