These reports describe methods results and conclusions to report upon an empirical investigation

A report is a written account of something that one has observed, heard, done, or investigated. It is a systematic and well organized presentation of facts and findings of an event that has already taken place somewhere. Reports are used as a form of written assessment to find out what you have learned from your reading, research or experience and to give you experience of an important skill that is widely used in the work place.

Table of Contents Show

Covering Letter or Memo
Executive Summary
Recommendations
Acknowledgements

Reports communicate information which has been compiled as a result of research and analysis of data and of issues. Reports can cover a wide range of topics, but usually focus on transmitting information with a clear purpose, to a specific audience. Good reports are documents that are accurate, objective and complete. They should also be well-written, clearly structured and expressed in a way that holds the reader’s attention and meets their expectations. The true value of the research may be assessed through a report since the written report may be the “only tangible product of hundreds of hours of work. Rightly or wrongly, the quality and worth of that work are judged by the quality of the written report – its clarity, organization and content” (Blake & Bly, 1993: 119). Often reports are structured in a way that reflects the information finding process and the writing up of the findings: that is, summary of the contents, introduction or background, methods, results, discussion, conclusion and/or recommendations. The inclusion of recommendations is one reason why reports are a common form of writing in industry, as the informed recommendations are useful for decision making.

The scope and style of reports varies widely. It depends on three key factors: the report’s intended audience, the report’s purpose and the type of information to be communicated; for example, technical reports communicate technical information, so the degree of technicality in the report will depend on the reader’s familiarity and understanding of technical concepts.

At university, you may be required to write several different types of reports.

Technical and Business disciplines with an applied focus such as Engineering, Information Technology, Commerce, Accounting and Finance, will set report writing assignments that simulate the process of report writing in industry. Assignments are set in the form of a problem or a case study. The students research the problem, and present the results of the research in a report format to an imaginary client.
Field reports are common in disciplines such as Law, Industrial Relations, Psychology, Nursing, History and Education. These types of reports require the student to analyse his or her observations of phenomena or events in the real world in light of theories studied in the course. Examples of field reports are a Court observation report, an observation report of a child or a patient for Developmental psychology or Nursing, a History site report, and a teaching observation report for Education.
Scientific reports (also called laboratory reports) are another kind of report. They are common in all the Sciences and Social Sciences. These reports use a standard scientific report format describing methods, results and conclusions to report upon an empirical investigation. A more detailed and extensive type of this report is the research project report for fourth year honours students or research students involved in postgraduate studies.

The purpose of scientific and report writing is to communicate ideas in a way that is efficient and simple to understand. Though your report will include some specialist vocabulary, you do not need present your ideas in a complicated way or use unnecessarily complex language. Here are some key points to help develop your scientific/report writing:

1. Personal vs Impersonal Voice

Report writing should be written in a formal, impersonal way; this means avoiding the inclusion of personal expressions or statements to ensure that your work is impartial and objective. Consider the following example:

"The participants had big, purple bags under their eyes"
vs. "The participants showed clear sign of sleep deprivation"

The first example uses subjective language ("big") and fails to convey the information in an impartial way. By contrast, the second example tells the reader the relevant information but does so in a way that is objective and clear, rather than being vague or open to interpretation.

2. Tenses

Reports are usually largely written in the past tense as they often describe events, such as experiments/observations that happened before the time of writing. It is important to note however, that you will not write your whole report exclusively in the past tense. For example:

The past tense will be used when writing your literature review and describing methods: "Grayson and Drake (2017) found that…"

"The data were analysed using a…"

The present tense will be used when detailing your interpretation of your results and conclusions: "These results seem to suggest that…"

"This provides a clear demonstration of…"

The future tense will be used when describing your recommendations for future research/recommendations for professional practice: "Though these results represent a promising first step, future research must seek to…"

"It will be necessary for future researchers to address…"

Appropriately using a combination of these tenses in your writing will help to improve the clarity of your writing.

3. Technical Terms

As mentioned before, you will be required to use some specialist language but you should try and keep this to a minimum - don't try and show off by overloading your writing with unnecessarily technical language! Relatedly, whilst abbreviations can be helpful when used appropriately, too many abbreviations can actually make your report harder to understand. As a guide, if an abbreviation is in common use, feel free to use it in your report (remembering to write the name out in full the first time you use it), if not, don't start creating abbreviations just to save words or avoid repetition! For example, "Magnetic Resonance Imaging" is commonly referred to as "MRI" so this would be appropriate to use in your report, whereas "sleep deprivation" is not generally abbreviated, so substituting this for "SD" in your writing would not be appropriate.

Good scientific and report writing requires the same level of planning and attention to detail that you put into designing experiments, and collecting/analysing data.

For more tips on scientific writing, take a look at this handy guide from Hallam Library.

A scientific report is a document that describes the process, progress, and or results of technical or scientific research or the state of a technical or scientific research problem. It might also include recommendations and conclusion of the research.

The title page will include the following:

Title of the report:
- Usually 4-12 words in length.
- Should be short, specific and descriptive, containing the keywords of the report.
Authorship:
- Always publish under the same name.
- Include author addresses.
- Indicate the corresponding author and their contact details.
Date:
- The date when the paper was submitted.

A Table of Contents is only required for length reports (usually 6 pages or more).

The Abstract is a self-contained synopsis of the report - an informative summary of what you did and what you found out.

The Abstract should include the following:

Objectives (as outlined in the Introduction) and scope of the investigation.
A brief reference to the Materials and Methods.
A summary of the results and conclusions - a brief but thorough statement of the outcome/s of the experiment.

If there is a hypothesis, you may state what it is and whether it was supported or refuted.

The following should not be included in the Abstract:

Literature citations.
Formulae and abbreviations, references to tables.

Although the Abstract comes first in a report, it is best to write it last, after you have the results and conclusions.

This provides a summary of the analysis to be undertaken. The purpose of the Introduction is to put the reader in the picture and place the research/experiment within a context.

The following may be included in the Introduction:

Background about the analysis to be carried out.
A brief review of previous research (relevant literature) to give a background - paraphrase relevant facts from the scientific literature, citing the sources to support each statement.
Reason/s why the research was undertaken.
Statement of the hypothesis (an idea or concept that can be tested by experimentation) if there is one.
An explanation of the different techniques and why they are used.
A statement of the objective/s - what you hope to achieve.

The Introduction is the what and why of the experiment, and should answer the following questions:

What was the purpose or objective of the experiment/research?
Why was the experiment/research conducted in a particular manner?
Why was it important in a broader context?

The Introduction should not include any results or conclusions.

The Materials and Methods, sometimes called Experimental, is a description of the materials and procedures used - what was done and how. Describe the process of preparation of the sample, specifications of the instruments used and techniques employed.

The Method should include such things as sample size, apparatus or equipment used, experimental conditions, concentrations, times, controls etc.

While the Method does not need to include minute details (e.g. if you followed a set of written instructions, you may not need to write out the full procedure - state briefly what was done and cite the manual), there needs to be enough detail so that someone could repeat the work.

Do not keep using the word "then" - the reader will understand that the steps were carried out in the order in which they are written.

The Method must be written in the past tense and the passive voice.

This section states what you found.

The following will be included in your Results:

Pictures and spectra.
Tables and graphs whenever practical.
Brief statements of the results in the text (without repeating the data in the graphs and tables). When writing about each picture, graph or table, refer to it parenthetically e.g. (Figure 1).
If possible give a section of related results and then comment on them rather than presenting many pages of unrelated results and then discussing them at the end. Subheadings can be used to divide this section so that it is easier to understand.

Massive quantities of data or raw data (not refined statistically) can be presented in appendices.

Include only your own observed results in this section.

The following should not be included in your results:

What you expected to find or what you were supposed to have observed.
References to other works (published data or statements of theory).

Use the Discussion section of the report for these.

The Results section should be written in the past tense and passive voice, avoiding the use of "I" and "we".

State your interpretation of your findings, perhaps comparing or contrasting them with the literature. Reflect on your actual data and observations.

Explain or rationalise errant data or describe possible sources of error and how they may have affected the outcome.

The Discussion must answer the question "What do the results mean?" It is an argument based on the results.

This is the summing up of your argument or experiment/research, and should relate back to the Introduction.

The Conclusion should only consist of a few sentences, and should reiterate the findings of your experiment/research.

If appropriate, suggest how to improve the procedure, and what additional experiments or research would be helpful.

References

Cite any references that you have used, ensuring that each item in the reference list has an in-text citation, and every in-text citation has a full reference in the reference list at the end of your paper.

Ensure that the references are formatted according to the style required by the journal (or your lecturer/supervisor), and be careful with spelling (the author whose name you misspell may be asked to review the paper!)

If a scientific report is being prepared for an employer or client, the following additional elements may be included:

Covering Letter or Memo

A formal covering letter (if the the report is for someone outside your organisation) or memo (if the report is for someone within your organisation) which accompanies the report will include the following:

Identification of the report topic.
Identification of the person authorising the report, and date of authorisation.
Key findings.
Acknowledgement of any assistance received.

Executive Summary

This would be situated at the beginning of the report (before the Abstract).

The Executive Summary will

explain the purpose of the report.
describe the methods used in the investigation.
give the main conclusions and recommendations (if applicable).

Because the readers of the report will not necessarily be scientists, the Executive Summary should be in simple language, avoiding the use of technical jargon.

Recommendations

If the report is of an investigative nature, the final section (after Conclusion) will be any recommendations that you make on the basis of the scientific results.

Acknowledgements

If other people or organisations assisted in any way with the experiments/research (e.g. funding, facilities, guidance etc.), they should be thanked at the end of the document (after Conclusion and Recommendations).

Dintzner, M. R.; Niedziela, R. F. Elements of laboratory report writing.
http://chemistry.che.depaul.edu/LabReport/ (accessed August 2004).

Emerson, L.; Hampton, J. Writing Guidelines for Science and Applied Science
Students, 2nd ed.; Thomson/Dunmore Press: Southbank, Vic., 2005.

Lobban, C. S.; Schefter, M. Successful Lab Reports: A Manual for Science Students;
Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 1992.