Talk:IMRAD

Schema contradictions

There is a contradiction in the article. The citation from the Vancouver guidelines state that "This so-called “IMRAD” structure is not an arbitrary publication format but rather a direct reflection of the process of scientific discovery. but further down the text it says that "This neat order rarely corresponds to the actual sequence of events or ideas of the research presented; the IMRaD structure effectively supports a reordering that eliminates unnecessary detail, and allow the reader to assess a well-ordered and noise free presentation of the relevant and significant information."

Either the Vancouver guidelines are wrong (or represent an ideal rather than fact) or the other text is someone's personal opinion. Citation needed? N.b. personally I agree with the latter quote and disagree with the Vancouver one, so I would not delete the section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.237.158.37 (talk) 15:12, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

Answer to the previous comment

The contradiction pointed out by the previous comment is spot on: the ICMJE statement is an expression of a legitimate ideal, but falls way short of being an empirical fact. In fact I know of no text structure that on its own would directly represent anything but itself. This is rather amusing: that empiricists should be praised for expressing an ideal that bluntly contradicts empirical data! I have tried to keep and modify the expression of this contradiction. My aim is to keep it, but to express it in a reverent manner. (Khflyum (talk) 17:45, 19 June 2011 (UTC))

acrostic?

Section five - "Other elements that are typical although not part of the acrostic" - why has acrostic, an odd word whose definition is not very appropriate, used? Acrostic refers to a poem or word puzzle, like a crossword. I would edit it out, but perhaps its a jargon term that deserves more attention. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.80.117.214 (talk) 03:21, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

References

It simply means "Other elements that are typically included although not represented by the letters of the acronym". But it says it in a shorter way than the latter circumlocution. I don't see how the word "acrostic" is odd or how its definition is not appropriate. If you look at the opening of the article (as it stands at this writing), where the expansion of the letters of the acronym is explained line-by-line, you are looking at an acrostic, plain and simple. I think maybe the real argument is not that the word is odd or inappropriate but that "some readers won't recognize it and would have to look it up." The solution to that is to link it. Which I just did. When you click through to the acrostic article, its opening sentence explains, "An acrostic is a poem or other form of writing in which the first letter, syllable or word 'of each line, paragraph or other recurring feature in the text spells out a word or a message." That's what you see here: The first letters of each line spell out the acronym IMRAD. Cheers. Quercus solaris (talk) 19:46, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

Critique

Wouldn't be appropriate to have a "critique" section in the article ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.202.53.202 (talk) 19:04, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Weaknesses of the "wine glass" and "plot and story" content

I'm not proposing that it be deleted (acknowledging good faith contribution), but I'm pointing out ways it should be improved if it's going to remain here. It isn't really that strong in idea content considering the amount of words it takes up. Issues as follows:

• The idea that IMRAD has "plot" and "story" and "story development" is a little eccentric. It's not usually described in those terms, which apply better to narrative writing such as history and fiction. Not that no compositional skill is needed to organize a cogent introduction or a logical discussion in an IMRAD article—but there's a reason why "plot" and "story development" are not the words usually used to describe the writing of one. They connote something that's not entirely applicable.
• The "wine glass" analogy seems pedagogically mediocre, because it is valid only for the difference in scope between sections—while it is meanwhile invalid for the differences in (a) importance or (b) amount of text. There are plenty of articles in basic research where the methods and results sections are both larger and more important than the introduction, and often just as large and important (or more) than the discussion. Thus to present a diagram in which they are smaller and the others are larger is pedagogically dubious. So is alleging that the overall result, when the writing is done, is supposed to be "symmetrical". Most students would come away from that thinking that the intent referred to length and importance. The truth about IMRAD articles is that the relative length and importance of the sections, relative to one another, varies widely by article topic, which is only appropriate. When you think critically about what to say in an IMRAD research article section, it will be as short or long as it needs to be, regardless of how short or long any other section is.
• Solecisms (for example, "are ... presents"), and some degree of unnecessary wordiness—this is probably explained by ESL and natural first draft improvability. It is fixable.

Quercus solaris (talk) 18:46, 9 May 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

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IMRAD not rigid in all Journals

Should this article not include a section on the common deviations from the IMRaD format/order used in several scientific journals?
Some of the more common deviations include:

• the materials and methods section appears after the discussion (mostly to not disrupt the flow of the story)
• Results and Discussion are often fused into a single section with many topic-specific subheadings.
• For some Journals the Conclusion section is a separate section on par with any of the four IMRaD sections