15 reasons why you will have to re-write your methods section

Category: Education

The methods section is the main portion of an academic paper that talks about you as a researcher. It is the juiciest chunk of your paper reflecting purely your research and your writing skills at the same time. It reveals to the reviewer or the audience how you tend to conduct research and whether you follow the best research practices. This section is what differentiates a good researcher from a bad one. Therefore, without any doubt, this is the most carefully examined section by reviewers or examiners. It tells them if you can actually apply the technical aspects of research. After going through several papers that fail to get published and several lists of reviewers’ comments, here is a small list of issues that will definitely require you to re-write your methods section. Your methodology is in conflict with the theoretical framework or the research tradition of your study. You have failed to understand the difference between methods and methodology. You have failed to explain how your methodology and research design choices were developed. You have failed to describe why you have chosen a particular methodology. You have not discussed the arguments within the chosen research tradition. Your chosen methodological approach is inappropriate for your research design. Your chosen methodology does not fit your research question. You have provided inadequate explanations for your methodology using insufficient references to the related literature. You have failed to consider you own position or perception and how it will impact your entire study and mainly the results. You have failed to address the limitations of your methodology. You have failed to sufficiently describe the research design: Sample size, chosen method, analytical approach, and the relevant literature. Your chosen methods fail to answer the research question. Your results are inappropriate for the employed methods. You have failed to follow the ethical principles absolutely imperative for your chosen research design. You have failed to include the information regarding “what,” “where,” “how,” “with whom,” and “when” were the steps in your methods section undertaken. If you have any one of the aforementioned instances in the methods section of your research paper, then you can surely expect a few nasty comments from the reviewers. If you manage to have several of these instances, then rest assured that you will be asked to re-write your methods section or even worse, your paper might get rejected. Just as planning your study cautiously is important, writing your methods section cautiously is as important. Find a few tips on the structure and content of the methods section in the diagram below. Happy writing!!