Writing Your Conclusion and Abstract 129 could not be achieved [evaluation]. Further investigation could be extended to cover the government hospitals so that a comparison between the main public and private healthcare providers in the country can be studied [recommendation]. Negative evaluations of your research may be used as a springboard for your recommendations, as shown in the examples above. However, researchers may prefer to conclude by recommending an extension of their research rather than by highlight- ing the limitations of their research if they do not wish to show their work in poor light, especially if justifying their research limitations proves to be difficult. 7. Applications of Your Research Finally, to wind up this section of your report, as well as to provide closure for the entire report, you may wish to discuss the usefulness of your research. This may take the form of elaborating on the practical applications or the theoretical contributions of your research to a particular field of study. Example By improving the information system that is currently used to retrieve information in hospitals, less manual work will be required in the process of collecting data. In addi- tion, the problem of staff having to decipher the handwriting of doctors will be over- come. It will also reduce the number of cases of underreporting by nurses and doc- tors, thus making the quantities measured more accurate. In the reports of beginner researchers, it is advisable to end with a discussion of the practical applications of your research. Although seven main elements have been discussed above, you may not have to include all seven every time you write a conclusion for a report. Some of the elements like the restatement of the objectives and review of findings are more important than the other elements. The closing elements — implications, recommendations and applica- tions — are optional and often, only one or two may be included to provide closure to the section or the whole report. Eventually, the elements you decide to include in a particular report will be dependent on the type and nature of report. Language Conventions in the Conclusion The language features of a conclusion vary depending on the function of the different elements. In addition, the language used in this section reflects the writer’s attitude towards his research. Therefore, the language features covered in this section include correspondences between tenses and functional elements, attitudinal expressions that reveal the writer’s opinions and cohesive devices used to weave together the different elements. Verb Tense The general rule for the conclusion section is pretty simple: use the present tense for