Academic writing requires a lot more than knowledge; it requires extensive research, proper formatting, expertise in referencing, formal writing with a rich vocabulary, and other things.
As such, academic writing can overwhelm students and cause a lot of stress, especially if they focus on perfection. But let me remind you that we’re human, so it’s normal and perfectly okay to make mistakes. The issue lies in making the same mistakes over and over without learning from them.
Familiarizing yourself with the common mistakes in academic writing as early as possible will save you a lot of trouble. Knowing what not to do will help you become an expert academic writer and it will take the stress out of the writing experience. Without further ado, let’s get started!
6 Common Mistakes in Academic Writing
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Ineffective Research
Proper research is what successful academic writing is made of. However, many college students avoid it or don’t give it as much importance as they should. Inadequate research is the main thing that will affect your academic writing because it leads you to use wrong information, forming unclear ideas, and arguments that lack a proper foundation.
If you do understand how important research is to academic writing but you don’t know how to recognize proper resources, that can be fixed. We recommend you go to the library regularly to explore different books on the topic you’re working on. Online resources are also there for you, just make sure you choose good databases. Such as ScienceOpen, Google Scholar, and more.
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Informal Writing Style
Using an informal writing style will not help you craft academic papers that will hold up to scrutiny and get you good marks. Academic writing is all about formality and simplicity, which is why using long sentences is also not a good idea. Your writing should be easy to understand and readable.
That means you need to use formal vocabulary and play with sentence styles. This will help you avoid long, confusing sentences and still get your point across. Also, remember to use the first and second person when you’re writing academic papers. An informal writing style is not something you can get away with, so why even try? Take this as an opportunity to hone your formal writing style.
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Improper Formatting and Referencing
As you may already know, academic writing has a specific formatting and referencing style you must follow. If there are any errors in formatting or referencing, all your hard work may be affected by that. As such, it’s very important to become familiar with the guidelines of your university and academic patterns.
You will need a lot of patience to learn proper formatting and referencing, but it will be worth the effort. Be very strict when following all the relevant guidelines and you will get good scores. Needless to say, you should review your academic paper more than once before submitting it. It could also be helpful to get another pair of eyes on it!
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Plagiarism
It’s quite common for college students to have trouble avoiding plagiarism, which is very unethical in academic writing. As such, you need to go above and beyond not to borrow identical content from other sources. Your academic writing must be your own.
You can use as many sources as you’d like to form your own arguments and word them in a unique way, but never take someone else’s work. To avoid plagiarism, we recommend you be careful about the way you reference sources. Also, use online plagiarism checkers to make sure your academic paper doesn’t have even a pinch of plagiarism in it.
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Shunning Expert Advice
When it comes to academic writing, it’s common for college students to avoid expert advice. Especially when it comes to proofreading and editing. However, you should take advantage of it! No matter how great you think your writing is, experts have trained eyes and they can detect issues that may be difficult for you to see.
Grammar, syntax, punctuation, sentence construction, and other errors can hurt the quality of your academic writing. Consulting with someone who knows more than you about proofreading and editing is the smart thing to do. Especially if you’re not writing in your mother tongue. Additionally, you will learn a lot from working with an expert and you’ll be able to apply that knowledge later on.
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Grammatical Mistakes
Last but not least, grammatical mistakes are quite common in academic writing and they shouldn’t be. Once again, we’re all human and we’re bound to make mistakes. However, you need your review process to be on point to catch those mistakes before they reach anyone else’s eyes.
Seeking expert assistance is always a good option, but if that’s not always available to you, consider taking steps to improve your grammar. To help with that, here are some of the most common grammatical mistakes in academic writing:
- Using commas in the wrong places. Learning when and how to use commas is a must. They help you convey meaning a lot more effectively, so they can change the entire meaning of your sentences.
- Improper use of the semi-colon. While commas separate items, semi-colons help you distinguish two independent sentences. They are also very important to master.
- Subject-verb agreement. The number of subjects and verbs you use in a sentence can get confusing sometimes, leading to subject-verb disagreement. That can hurt your academic writing so it’s something to pay close attention to.
These are only a few of the most common grammatical mistakes and we encourage you to look further into this. There are many resources available to help you improve your grammar, such as Grammarly, Oxford Dictionaries, and more, so use them to your advantage.
Final Words
There you have it! Those are the 6 most common mistakes students make in academic writing. Being aware of the pitfalls will help you avoid them a lot more effectively and grow as an academic writer so you feel more at ease with each paper.