How to write an abstract for a scientific article

According to the rules existing in modern science, each scientific article intended for publication should be accompanied by a brief annotation. Usually editors of publishers are not involved in compiling annotations, so this work rests with the authors themselves. If you plan to often write and publish your articles in scientific journals, you must also be able to compose annotations to them.

Instruction manual

one

The first thing you need to remember firmly: An annotation is a brief description of a printed work, not its retelling. The main purpose of any annotation is to give a potential reader an idea of ​​the content of the article. The abstract should clearly explain what is discussed in this paper and how it may be of interest to the reader.

2

Starting to write the annotation, do not try to squeeze into it a fragment of the text of the main article. Your task is to briefly and clearly state its essence. Do not forget that the abstract should not be voluminous. Its optimal volume is one third to one half of a sheet of A4 format, typed in 12 pins. That is, it is approximately 500-1000 printed characters without a space.

3

An annotation is easiest to compile on the basis of four universal questions: “Who?”, “What?”, “About what?”, “For whom?”. That is, in the annotation you should explain who the author is and what is the level of his professional qualification, what the work is, what its internal content is, for whom it may be interesting or useful. In the abstract to the scientific article, describe the main idea presented in this work.

4

Keep in mind that in the abstract to the scientific article you do not need to mention the sources used in the work, describe the process of working on the article or retell the content of individual paragraphs. An annotation is simply a characteristic of an article that allows you to create a general impression of it. Accordingly, the annotation should be objective and contain only facts.

5

When writing annotations, pay particular attention to your writing style. Try to avoid long and complex sentences. Your thoughts should be stated as briefly and clearly as possible, since it is precisely this style of presentation that makes reading comprehension as easy as possible. Also keep in mind that scientific articles are never written in the first person, therefore, the annotation should also not contain expressions such as “in this my work”, “I think”, “my scientific position”, etc. The same applies to cases when you write an annotation on other people's articles. The text should be as impersonal and objective as possible.

Useful advice

Try not to overload the annotation with highly specialized terms, even if they are used in large quantities in the article itself. A good annotation should be understood by any person who is not even a specialist in this particular field of science.

scientific abstract