Research Paper Template

Title: this should be an explanatory title that summarizes in one sentence, what you did.

Authors: Write your name under the title

Date:

Abstract: Write a short summary (<150 words) of what you set out to find out, what you expected to see, what you
did and what you found. The purpose of an abstract is to summarize what the rest of the article is about so that the
reader can decide whether to continue reading or not. It should be written in the past tense.

Introduction: Introduce your topic here. Describe what is already known about the topic and what observations or
prior knowledge led to your question. When describing information that you found from any source, you MUST cite
the source. When describing current knowledge, use the present tense. E.g. It is known that mice eat cheese (cite
your source). When describing other peoples’ work or ideas use the past tense – e.g. Darwin thought… (cite).
Remind you reader what you were trying to find out. Briefly describe how you did your experiment. This part
should be in the past tense, and you should use active voice. E.g. we wanted to know if A would affect B, so we
added A to B…

Methods: This should be a more detailed description of the procedure you used to carry out your experiments. It
should be written in full sentences (not as a list or flow chart), in the past tense. You should use active voice (I
measured the width of the birds’ beaks in photographic images… First I…, then I…). Your methods should include
enough detail for another person to repeat your experiments exactly (think about what they would need to know),
but should not include any irrelevant or informal information. E.g., it is inappropriate to say that your instructor gave
you the materials or a part of the method was tedious. It may be useful to have a diagram of a bird beak, showing
what you measured.

Results: Here you describe your findings and include processed data (distribution graphs in this case) that supports
those findings. Also include the results of any calculations you did, such as mean, standard deviation etc. Each graph
is referred to as a “figure”. Label each one, Figure 1 or Figure 2 etc., and include a descriptive figure legend
underneath it. When you describe a result in your text, you should refer to the appropriate figure. E.g. The
distribution of seed types in year XXX shows that grass seeds were most abundant (Fig. 1).

All of your graphs should be correctly labeled; Graphs should have axes labels (see example below). Note that in the
example below, the graph is simple in design, not cluttered with special effects or bright colors. The figure legend is
short, but informative
 Figure 1. The height distribution of 56 female college students at Duke Kunshan University, China

Discussion: This is where you discuss your data. Restate what you were trying to find out then, summarize your
main findings and your conclusion. Discuss the findings; did they show what you expected or not? If not, why not?
What alternative explanations are there for your results and how could you test these explanations? Avoid vague
phrases like “our experiment didn’t work because of human error”. Discuss how your results may contribute to our
understanding of the field, e.g. how do they support Darwin’s theory of natural selection? When describing the
conclusion of an experiment use the present tense, e.g. our experiments show....

End with a general conclusion.

Literature cited: See your poster template for guidelines.