Essay Writing

In the course of your university studies there are likely to be many occasions on which you will be called upon to write an essay. It is important, therefore, that you understand what you are being asked to do in an essay, and how a good essay differs from a poor one.

Although most of the essays you write will be assessed in some way and will contribute towards your final grade, this is not their only function. They also play an important role in helping you to learn. They do this by encouraging you to explore a topic in depth, and by helping you to develop the ability to

• locate and retrieve relevant information;
• interpret, analyse, and evaluate facts and opinions;
• construct a clear and logical argument.

In assigning a grade to your essay the marker is assessing how much you have learned. They will thus be interested, not only in

• whether you have demonstrated a sound knowledge and understanding of the issues raised by the topic,

but also in

• whether you have shown that you have acquired the research, thinking and communication skills that are necessary for good academic writing.

Characteristics of good essays

There is no single formula for writing a good essay. In fact, the very best essays often treat the same subject matter quite differently. There are, however, a number of characteristics that distinguish good essays from poor ones. In general, good essays

• show evidence of research that goes beyond lectures, and the textbook;
• develop and sustain a position on a subject or issue;
• are clearly and logically structured;
• use and integrate a wide range of detailed evidence;
• accurately reference all sources of information.

Poor essays, on the other hand, usually display one or more of the following weaknesses:

• a lack of understanding of the requirements of the topic and of the issues it raises;
• insufficient research;
• an inability to use evidence appropriately;
• an inability to communicate ideas clearly and logically.

Using your time efficiently

Since writing an essay is a complex and demanding task, it is important to use your time efficiently. It will help you to do this, if you think of writing as a process that consists of three distinct stages:

• Pre-writing which involves researching the topic and planning your approach
• Writing which involves completing the first full draft of the essay
• Re-writing which involves re-drafting, revising and proofreading your work

How long you spend on each stage will vary according to the nature of the writing task and the amount of time you have been given to complete it. Try, however, to leave yourself at least three days to correct and edit you draft, and to re-write sections of it if necessary.

Understanding the question

The basis of good writing is a clear understanding of what you are trying to achieve. Before you begin to research or to draft your essay you should therefore make sure that you know exactly what is required of you. If you have been given a specific question, you should begin by analysing the information it contains. To do this, you will need to carefully examine the words of the question. There are three kinds of words you should look for:

• content words which indicate the subject matter with which the essay should deal;
• limiting words which specify the particular aspect or aspects of the subject on which the essay should focus;
• instruction words which tell you how to approach the topic.

The following table lists some common instruction words and their meaning.

analyse	to separate and examine the main ideas and issues
compare	to look at, and identify similarities
contrast	to look at, and identify differences
define	explain the exact meaning of a word, term, theory, concept or idea, using examples where helpful
describe	give details about something so that it can be understood
discuss	examine key points and possible interpretations; give arguments for and against, and draw a conclusion
evaluate	give an opinion, supported by evidence, on the worth or value of something
examine	similar to analyse
explain	give a detailed account of; give reasons for
illustrate	make something clear by providing details and examples
interpret	explain the meaning of something
justify	provide reasons and evidence for something; show that it is reasonable
outline	indicate the principal features
show	demonstrate by examples

To help you to understand how the process works in practice here are two examples.

Example One - Sports Studies

Topic:	Discuss the benefits and problems associated with exercise in the elderly, children, and spinal cord injured.
Content word:	exercise. This word indicates the main subject of your essay.
Limiting words:	benefits, problems, elderly, children, spinal cord injured. These words narrow the scope of the topic. They tell you that you should concentrate on the benefits and problems of exercise and that you should focus your attention on three groups: the elderly, children and the spinal cord injured.
Instruction word:	discuss. This word implies that there are different views on the subject of exercise, and asks you to use your judgement to assess the extent to which exercise benefits the groups mentioned and the extent to which it poses problems for them.

Example Two - Nursing Practice

Topic:	There is a body of opinion which holds that the only way in which nursing practice can advance will be to encroach into some areas of medical practice. Discuss.
Content words:	nursing practice, medical practice and body of opinion. These indicate that you will be expected to look at nursing practice within the wider context of medical practice, and that you will need to locate and examine the literature containing the body of opinion referred to.
Limiting words:	only way, advance and encroach. These indicate that you should focus on a particular aspect of the topic which is the view that the only way that progress can take place in nursing practice is if nurses take on a more "medical" role.
Instruction word:	discuss. This indicates that you are expected to examine the pros and cons of this view and not merely to look for evidence to support it.

Some Further Tips

When you have identified the key words in the topic,

• rephrase the topic in your own words. This will help you to gain a better understanding of the task.



• note any terms or words that need to be defined or clarified. In example one, how would you define such words as exercise, children, elderly and spinal chord injured? In example two, how would you interpret advance and encroach, and how would you define nursing practice and medical practice?



• list any issues that the question raises e.g. in example one, are there more benefits than problems associated with exercise, or are the problems so great that they reduce the benefits? Are there different benefits and problems for each of the specified groups? Are there any similarities? What conclusions can be drawn? In example two, what are the implications of nurses taking on duties and responsibilities normally considered the province of doctors and other medical professionals? What legal and ethical issues are involved?



• look for any underlying assumptions e.g. the assumption in examples one and two that there is no single opinion on the topic and that your essay will debate the issues being raised.

Getting Started

Once you are fairly certain that you understand what the essay question is asking you to do, you will need to work out

• what you already know about the essay topic and the issues it raises, and
• what you will need to find out in order to write your essay

A good way to begin is to try brainstorming. This is how you do it.

• Write down anything you can think of that relates to the essay topic.
• When you have nothing more to add, read over what you have written, and edit it.
• Eliminate anything that is irrelevant, and gather related ideas under one heading.
• Use the ideas you have generated to outline a preliminary response to the essay question.
• Identify the aspects of the topic about which you know nothing, or very little, and make a list of the things you think you will need to follow up in your research.

If you are able to do so, you may also find it useful to discuss your essay topic with others, as hearing other people’s views frequently stimulates our own thinking.

Finding Information

Searching for information when you only have a vague idea of what you are looking for can be frustrating as well as time consuming. To avoid wasted effort, and to save yourself valuable time, it is advisable to plan and prioritise your activities. Here are some suggestions that will help you to become more systematic in your approach.

• Begin by reading through the relevant sections of your lecture notes and other resources e.g. handouts, readings, textbook(s).
• Identify any important issues that have been raised, and compare these with any lists you have made previously (ie. when analysing the essay question, and when brainstorming). Expand and delete as necessary.
• Use the recommended reading list to develop your understanding of these issues and to identify any associated opinions and debates.
• Locate and read any supplementary material you feel is necessary to enhance your understanding of the topic.
• Look for evidence to illustrate and support the issues you have identified.

NB. For advice on how to locate resources see the Guide to the Library.

Recording and Keeping Track of Information

A well-tried method of keeping track of your research is to make notes on what you have read. Even if you have borrowed or photocopied books and articles making notes is still a useful activity since it will help you to remember key points and arguments, and will make it easier for you to draw on the information and evidence you have gathered. You should not, however, attempt to record every detail you have read. To be useful, notes need to be

• clear ie. able to be read and understood at some later point;
• relevant ie. they should target key points, opinions, and arguments, and include appropriate examples;
• accurate ie. they should clearly indicate all sources of information, provide bibliographic details of sources (eg. author, title, place of publication, publisher, edition, date address of internet site and date accessed), record quotes correctly, and include page numbers for all quotes. Being careful about these things will help you to avoid unintentional plagiarism.

When to take notes

It is not advisable to make notes while reading material for the first time. Your notes will be of far greater benefit to you if you wait until you have read through the material quickly, and have obtained an overview of the information being presented. You will then be in a position to know what is important, and what you will need to record, and what you can safely ignore. You may also find it useful to include comments of your own in your notes. Such comments might take the form of questions, reflections, or criticisms.

Where to record information

Finally, you will need to think about where to record your notes, ie. whether you will use a note book, cards, folder or a computer database. It does not matter which method you choose as long as you make sure that your notes are intelligible, and that you have filed them where you can easily find them. Avoid scraps of paper at all costs; these are easily lost or mislaid.

At an early point in the planning process you will need to make a final decision about what you want to demonstrate or to prove in your essay. Once you are clear about this, you should try to express your thoughts as a single statement. Such a statement is often referred to as the thesis statement.

If you have been asked to debate an issue or to discuss a particular point of view, your thesis statement will take the form of a claim or proposition. In the case of the Nursing Practice essay question cited earlier you might, for example, wish to claim that you support the view that "the only way in which nursing practice can advance will be to encroach into some areas of medical practice." Alternatively, you might wish to disagree with this view, or to adopt a more neutral position, in which case you might claim that the issue is a very complex one that has no clear cut answer. Whichever of the three approaches you take, you will be expected to provide evidence to support the claim you are making, and to defend your claim against counter claims.

If, on the other hand, you were asked to examine why the transition from school to university is difficult for many students, your thesis might be "There are three main reasons why students have difficulty in making the transition from school to university." You would then be expected to identify the three reasons (ie. the need to adapt to unfamiliar styles of teaching and learning, being under prepared for the course of study being undertaken, isolation from friends and family), and to discuss each of these reasons in detail in the body of your essay. In doing so you would present facts and opinions supported by evidence drawn from research studies.

Types of evidence

The evidence you provide in support of your thesis statement, or as part of your discussion of the issues it raises, can take a number of forms. It may consist of:

• reasons and arguments based on expert opinion and research findings;
• examples and case studies;
• facts and statistics.

Criteria for judging evidence

Not all evidence, though, is reliable, or of equal value. Statistics, as we know, can lie, research findings can be erroneous, or based on questionable methodology, and opinions can be subject to personal and cultural biases. Even so called facts can be influenced by perception. Before choosing evidence you should, therefore, make sure that you assess its quality. You can do this by asking the following questions:

• Is it accurate?
• Is it relevant?
• Is it representative?
• Is it adequate?
• Does it contain any biases?

The final step in the planning process is to produce a diagrammatic outline of your essay. This will provide you with a conceptual framework that will help you to maintain control of your writing. You may wish to draw a concept map rather than to present an outline in point form, but the latter method has a number of advantages. It allows you to see the order in which your ideas are presented, to note the relationship between ideas, and to recognise any gaps in logic, or any abrupt shifts in subject matter that may confuse the reader.

Your essay outline should consist of the following:

• your thesis statement;
• the main points of your argument or the main issues you intend to address;
• any sub-points or issues;
• the evidence which supports each point or argument.

As an example, suppose that you have been given the following essay topic: It is often claimed that regular exercise promotes good health. To what extent is this true? Discuss.

After examining the implications of the topic, and completing the necessary research, you have discovered that the question is a very complex one to which there is no clear answer. Your thesis statement might, therefore, be that "It is difficult to estimate how beneficial exercise is to health since much of the evidence that has been presented is inconclusive."

A possible outline for your essay would then be:

Introduction

Body

1. The psychological and physiological benefits of exercise			1st main point
	A. Role in reducing stress and anxiety		1st sub-point
		(i). Studies on stressed rats	evidence
		(ii) Comparative studies of active and inactive people
	B. Effect on heart, blood pressure, cholesterol levels, and weight		2nd sub-point
		(i) Discussion of expert medical opinion	evidence
2. The role of exercise in reducing the risk of disease			2nd main point
	A. Link between exercise and lower rate of bone density loss		1st sub-point
		(i) Study of women who participated in College gymnastics	evidence
	B. Link between exercise and lower level of hormones associated with cancer		2nd sub-point
		(i) American breast cancer study	evidence
		(ii) Chinese endometrial cancer study
	C. Inconclusive results of studies investigating link between exercise and coronary and cardiovascular disease		3rd sub-point
		(i) Study by Paffenbarger et al.	evidence
		(ii) Study by Sandvik et al.
		(iii) Additional studies
3. The potential risk factors of exercise			3rd main point
	A. Risk of cardiac complications		1st sub-point
		(i) Discussion of expert opinion	evidence
	B. Dangers of over exercising		2nd sub-point
		(i) Statistical data	evidence

Conclusion

Note that the example provided contains a minimum of detail. In your own outline you may wish to include more information in some sections. How much information you choose to include, however, is up to you, and will no doubt depend, both on the length and purpose of your essay, and on the complexity of your argument. Think of your outline as a working plan rather than as something fixed and unchangeable, and be prepared to revise or refine it as the need arises.