00:00: Hello, and welcome to unit 2 of the publication cycle. So, in this unit we are going to talk about the abstract of your research paper. The abstract is a brief summary of your research, and is meant to emphasise the significance of your work. It provides an overview of your paper’s content and should be relevant to current debates in your field.
00:32: Some journals may require a single paragraph abstract, while others may ask for separate sections covering background, methods, results and conclusion. There are two main types of abstract: the descriptive abstract and the informative abstract. These types indicate the kind of information that you are presenting.
00:57: The descriptive abstract summarises the purpose, methods and scope of your work. It may also include a section on expected outcomes or anticipated findings based on some preliminary data analysis. This type of abstract is typically written when results have not yet been completed and it captures the introduction – as I said earlier on – the methods and the expected findings.
01:32: The informative abstract serves as a summary of your paper. When reading the abstract alone, we should be able to understand exactly what the paper is about without any ambiguity or confusion. When writing an abstract, it’s important to start by placing your paper within a larger discussion.
01:57: This could involve considering its relevance to global issues, such as the Sustainable Development Goals. For example, if your work focuses on access or mobility within cities, you can state your work within the context of SDG 11, which pertains to sustainable cities and communities. In addition to the SDGs, there are several global debates in which you can position your work.
02:31: In terms of urban research, we have the Urban Agenda that was signed by various mayors. You can also situate your work in that context and discuss how your work contributes to helping mayors achieve sustainability in their development initiatives in cities. Now, let us look at the content of the abstract. When you are writing the abstract, the first sentence should actually highlight the problem that you are trying to solve with your work.
03:05: So, what problem does this work attempt to solve? Once you have the answer to this question, you can use your answers to define the scope and state your main objective or the main thesis of your research. You can actually combine the problem statement, the rationale, and the objective into your first and third sentences. The first sentence would address a broader context.
03:34: For example, the study can be situated in policy or practice or in a research field. So if you locate your research in policy or practice, for example, you can talk about practice and argue that during post-COVID-19 lockdown, women are not getting access to health care because health care costs are now expensive due to economic crisis. When you state your problem this way, you have located your research within the impact of COVID-19 effects in the broader population.
04:07: That is a practice question. When considering research, it can be argued that there is still a need, for example, for climate change research. This is because we are striving to comprehend how to adapt to, and to mitigate climate change, as well as how to even empower women to be climate resilient.
04:29: When you state your research in this way or when you state your problem in this direction, you are situating or locating your research in the context of research. The second sentence establishes a problem that is also related to the broader context. It often starts with a “but.” You can use “but,” “yet,” or “however.” So, linking it with the climate change example above, you can say that there has been a lot of climate change research, but not in this area.
05:02: A lot of research has been done to address women empowerment, for example, but not social protection when it comes to fisher communities. Or, there is a lot more to be done, or this is yet to be done in this particular research area. The third sentence of your abstract tells your objectives. So, for example, you can say, in this study, I analysed the effects of food insecurity on child health in Nigeria.
05:32: Again, after writing the rationale and the objective of your research in your abstract, the next session is your methodology, and your methods section must be very, very specific. You have to indicate the data that you are using. If you are using multiple data sets, you have to mention them. If you are using your own data, you are using primary data, you must mention it. After writing the methodology of your abstract, the next thing you want to write is your results.
06:04: For that section, prioritise your main findings, the novelty of your research, and what you are adding to the literature. In this section, please minimise background information and demographic characteristics. You can present just maybe one sentence about demographic characteristics, but don’t present about three sentences describing the characteristics of your participants when you are describing the result of your abstract.
06:36: The final section of your abstract highlights your implications. What are the implications of your research for knowledge, for research, and also for practice? In this section, you actually would highlight the implications of your research. In the slides, you find that there is a particular slide titled “Research as a story,” and you can use that guide to write your abstract.
07:00: So, here is a summary of questions that you should ask yourself after you have written your abstract. Number one, does it identify the research problem? Number two, does the abstract outline the research design? Does it provide the method, sample size, methodology? Does it also indicate the data, then the analysis method that was used? Does the abstract report the major findings of your study, and does it include the major conclusions or implications of your research?
07:32: If you look at your abstract and you notice that all these four questions have been answered, then you have a very effective abstract.