Common Writing Mistakes

The following is a list of some of the most common writing mistakes that I observe when grading papers. I've organized this review in three sections:

• Citations
• Grammar & Style
• Organization

Citations

And or &

In the text of a paper, always write out the word "and" to connect two or more authors of a single work. Inside parenthetical citations and in the references section, use the ampersand symbol (&).

Balance

Many students will err either on the side of too many or of too few citations. The key is balance. As an initial proofreading rule of thumb, you should be able to associate a unique idea or research finding with each citation in your paper. The following is a helpful resource with for students working to develop balance:

Lipson, A., & Reindl, S. M. (2003). The responsible plagiarist: Understanding students who misuse sources. About Campus, 8(3), 7-14.

Citing Content That is Really Your Thinking

Example Mistake :

• I thought the office culture was quite political (Bolman & Deal, 2003).

Comment:

• In this sentence, the assessment of the office culture is the writer's idea, not Bolman and Deal's idea. While the writer may have drawn her or his understanding of political cultures from the work of Bolman and Deal, Bolman and Deal did not evaluate this office culture. The writer should first discuss Bolman and Deal's writing about politics and political organizational cultures and then present her or his evaluation of the office culture using that framework.

Formatting

Many writers, both new and experienced, make mistakes in the format of citations - where to place commas, periods, quotation marks, spaces, etc. Regarding this point, I encourage you to review pages 207 to 214 in your APA manual.

Page Number Citations

Whenever you cite a source, you must identify the author and the year. When presenting a direct quote, you must also include a page number in the citation. In rare situations where you do not present a direct quote, but where you do include highly specific information in the text of your paper, you should add a page number to the citation.

Purpose

Remember that the purpose of citations is to direct your reader to the appropriate source in the references section of your paper - do not try to provide the full source of the information in your citations (e.g. a URL for a website). Likewise, avoid citing works (e.g. the title of a book); instead, cite the authors and use the citation to direct the reader to your references where she or he will find the full reference information including the title of the work. When proofreading your paper, make sure that you can use each citation to find the correct source in your references quickly and easily.

The References Section

APA uses a "references" section at the end of the paper, not a "works cited" or a "bibliography." In the references section of your paper, include every source that you cite in your paper, but only those sources that you have cited.

Tense

Example Mistake :

• Astin (1985) states that "students learn by becoming involved" (p. 113).

Comment:

• Typically, one should cite authors and their work from specific publications. Since these publications were printed at a specific point in time, one should use the past tense when citing these sources. This is especially helpful when discussing how a particular author's thinking has evolved over time.
• At times, you may choose to personify a theory (see the second correction below) - at this point, the theory takes on a life of its own, so to speak, and thus you may use the present tense. Note, however, that APA and most other scholarly styles discourage personification in academic and research papers.

Corrections:

• Astin (1985) stated that "students learn by becoming involved" (p. 113).
• Astin's (1985) theory of involvement suggests that "students learn by becoming involved" (p. 113).

Grammar & Style

Agreement - Pronouns

Example Mistake:

• When working with a student, be sure remember their name.

Comment:

• The pronoun "their" is plural, but the antecedent "a student" is singular - these should match, or "agree," meaning that you should use a singular pronoun for singular antecedents and plural pronouns for plural antecedents. See the section on pronouns (pp. 47-50) in your APA manual for more information.

Corrections:

• When working with students, be sure to remember their names.
• When working with a student, be sure to remember her or his name.

Agreement - Subject & Verb

Example Mistakes:

• John and Joy, a married couple, is leading the session.
• Joy, along with her husband John, are leading the session.

Comment:

• The subject and verb must agree -- match plural verbs to plural subjects and singular verbs to singular subjects. This comes naturally for most writers; the mistake typically comes when the writer inserts a phrase between the subject and the verb as in the examples above. See pages 44 to 47 in your APA manual for more information.

Corrections:

• John and Joy, a married couple, are leading the session.
• Joy, along with her husband John, is leading the session.

Antecedents - None

Example Mistakes:

• It is common knowledge that the sun rises in the east.
• There are 7 days in a week.

Comment:

• In the examples above, the pronouns "it" and "there" do not have antecedents (what is it? where is there?). The purpose of the pronoun in these sentences is simply to get the sentence going. As a rule of thumb, avoid this means of getting sentences started, especially at the beginning of a paragraph.

Corrections:

• Most people know that the sun rises in the east.
• A week consists of 7 days.

Antecedents - Unclear

Example Mistake:

• The girls are on the blue team and the boys are on the red team. They are leading by two points.

Comment:

• Who is leading? The antecedent for "they" is unclear.

Correction:

• The girls are on the blue team and the boys are on the red team. The blue team is leading by two points.

Capitalization

Example Mistakes:

• Albert Einstein developed the Theory of Relativity.
• I spoke with Jane Lewis, the President of the college.

Comment:

• The rules for capitalization are not the same across disciplines or styles, so you will need to refer to your APA manual (pp. 94-99) often until you learn its rules for capitalization. Among other rules, note that you should not capitalize the names of theories or position titles (unless they are used as proper nouns).

Corrections:

• Albert Einstein developed the theory of relativity.
• I spoke with Jane Lewis, the president of the college.
• I spoke with President Jane Lewis.

Commas

Example Mistakes:

• In short the movie was a waste of time and money.
• She likes playing the flute, listening to jazz and funk and dancing to hip hop.
• He ate his pizza, and drank his beer.

Comment:

Follow these rules when writing APA style papers:

• Use a comma at the end of conditional phrases;
• Use a comma after the last word before the conjunction when connecting three or more words or phrases;

Consider the following rules of thumb in most of your writing:

• Use a comma when there should be a natural pause in the writing;
• Do not separate a subject and verb with a comma;
• When using commas in lists, you should be able to substitute the word "and" for the comma.

For more information, see your APA manual, especially pages 78 and 79.

Corrections:

• In short, the movie was a waste of time and money.
• She likes playing the flute, listening to jazz and funk, and dancing to hip hop.
• He ate his pizza and drank his beer.
• He ate his pizza, and he drank his beer.

Conjunctions

Do not begin sentences with a conjunction.

Contractions

Don't use them in scholarly papers!

First Person Plural

Example Mistakes:

• Freedom of speech is an important value in our society.
• We in higher education must do more to engage students in the learning process.

Comment:

• Avoid using the first person plural (we, us, our) in scholarly writing unless you are referring to the co-authors of the paper. In the first example above, note that some readers may not feel included in "our society."

Corrections:

• Freedom of speech is an important value in the United States.
• Educators in higher education should do more to engage students in the learning process.

Inclusive Language

Example Mistake:

• Policemen promote justice and safety for all mankind.

Correction:

• Police officers promote justice and safety for all humankind.

See pages 61 to 76 in your APA manual for more help on reducing bias in language.

Numbers

APA has detailed rules for when to write out numbers and when to use numerals. The basic rule is to spell out numbers less than ten and use numerals for numbers greater than 10. That said, there are several exceptions to this rule, so use your APA manual carefully (see pages 122 to 130).

Parallelism and Parallel Construction

Example Mistake :

• The instructions for the test were difficult to understand and read.

Comment:

• This is a common mistake. If you can find an old late elementary or junior high grammar text that teaching sentence diagramming, that might be helpful. Otherwise, read the section in your APA manual (pp. 57-60) carefully. The basic idea is that both "sides" of the conjunction should be "parallel;" they should use the same form. While this may seem awkward or unnecessary for simple sentences such as the example here, this will help you to be more clear and precise when writing complex sentences.

Correction:

• The instructions for the test were difficult to understand and to read.

Passive Voice

Example Mistake:

• The test was completed by the students.

Comment:

• Except in rare instances when you intend to emphasize the object of the sentence, write with the active voice - it is more clear, succinct, and engaging. See the section on verbs (pp. 41-44) in your APA manual for more information.

Correction:

• The students completed the test.

Personification and Attribution

Example Mistakes:

• This paper will review the five principles of leadership.
• The researcher will discuss three points in this paper.

Comment:

• APA encourages writers to write with clear and precise language. Personification and attributions, among others, are a barrier to this precision. Note how, in the examples above, using personification or the third person leaves the impression that the work of the paper or the researcher is not your work. APA encourages writers to use the first person to aid with clarity and precision (see pages 36-39 in your APA manual).

Correction:

• In this paper, I will review the five principles of leadership.
• I will discuss three points in this paper.

Second Person

Example Mistake:

• You will find that the organization has a very clear and well-structured mission statement.

Comment:

• When writing informally (such as in this guide), the second person (you, your, yours) can help to personalize a work. However, in scholarly writing, one should not directly address her or his audience with the second person.

Correction:

• The organization has a clear and well-structured mission statement.

Split Infinitive

Example Mistake:

• In order to completely understand this concept, one must first consider its assumptions.

Comment:

• This is a bit tricky as I believe that this is an area where the English language is evolving. The point is that one should not place an adverb in the middle of an infinitive (to + verb). I would only address this in papers if a student uses split infinitives repeatedly.

Correction:

• In order to understand this concept completely, one must first consider its assumptions.

That/Which

Example Mistakes:

• The teams which played well early in the tournament did not win in the end.
• The final game of the tournament which otherwise was not exciting was a thriller.

Comment:

• Many writers use the word "which" incorrectly and in cases when they should use the word "that."
• Use the word "that" when writing restrictive clauses. In the first example above, the writer should use the word "that" because the intent is to restrict the subject to only those teams that played well early in the tournament.
• Use the word "which" for nonrestrictive clauses. As a test, if you can remove the clause from the sentence without any problems, or if the clause feels like an aside comment, the clause is most likely nonrestrictive. Always use a comma when using the word "which" as a relative pronoun.

Corrections:

• The teams that played well early in the tournament did not win in the end.
• The final game of the tournament, which otherwise was not exciting, was a thriller.

Toward/Regard/Beside

Example Mistakes:

• I was hungry towards the end of class.
• In regards to the example in class, I was confused.
• Come sit besides me.
• No one besides June was able to arrive on time.

Comment:

• In Britain, use the words "towards," "regards" and "besides" with the "s" at the end; in the United States, however, use the words "toward," "regard," and "beside" without the "s." Note that you should not use the word "beside" synonymously with "except for."

Corrections:

• I was hungry toward the end of class.
• In regard to the example in class, I was confused.
• Come sit beside me.
• No one, except for June, was able to arrive on time.

Weak Words

The following are a list of words that I encourage students to avoid in academic papers because they are weak or overused.

Organization

Outlines

In this age of word processing, most young writers simply sit down at the computer and begin to write - at the most, they might first sketch out several headings for their paper. For the sake of argument, let's suggest that a typical paper will take 10 hours to write using this approach. I suggest that if this writer would first spend 2 hours thinking and organizing an outline for the paper, she or he could cut the writing time by 30%, thus completing the paper in 7 hours. What's more, this student will not only save time, she or he will write a stronger paper.

Paragraphs

Many inexperienced writers write poor paragraphs - they are often short and choppy, and the flow of ideas from one paragraph to the next is unclear. In some cases, the content of the paragraphs themselves does not fit together well. This is rarely a reflection of the writer's ability; it is more likely that this is a reflection of the writer's discipline. As with the comment about outlines above, I believe that most writers could be more efficient with their time and more effective with their writing if they first spent more time thinking through and organizing the content of the paper. In the case of paragraphs, I suggest that inexperienced writers first develop a comprehensive outline for the paper, then write topic sentences for each corresponding section in the outline, and then finish writing the paper. This may seem tedious at first, but the discipline will ultimately help the writer to develop a stronger paper.