Writing the Manuscript - Part 3 This week, faculty will focus on appropriately presenting their evidence and findings when writing the Results section of their manuscript.

Objectives: After successful completion of this module, faculty will be able to: Describe how to present evidence and findings in the Results section. Write a rough draft of the Results section.

Writing the Results Section

The purpose of the Results section is to objectively present the key findings from your research without interpreting their meaning.  The results section simply states the results through the use of text, figures, tables, and graphs. Overall, the results should be presented in an orderly sequence that follows your Methods section.  Following is a list of guidelines and tips that should be followed when writing your about your results:

Before you begin writing:

• Begin by determining which results to include.  The Results section does not need to include every result. Include those that are relevant to the research question and that you plan to focus on in your Discussion. Avoid providing data that is not critical to the research and does help answer the research question.  It may confuse readers and will not advance your argument.
• Choose how you will organize your results.  It is best to either follow a chronological sequence that follows your Methods or to present them in order of most to least important.
• Decide which results, if any, would be best represented by a table, graph or figure. 

Tips for drafting the Results:

• Use past tense to write the results.
• Your Results should begin by restating the research problem to provide an overall context for understanding the results that will be presented.
• As you present your findings, resist the temptation to explain them.  Save that for the Discussion.
  Provide the reader with information about nature of the differences or magnitude of change.  Be specific. For example, you might say that there is an 18% reduction in injuries by college volleyball players that follow a stretching routine.  It is typically best to use some type of summary representation, such as a percentage, rather than stating raw data.
• Tables, graphs and figures are helpful, but follow these guidelines:   Tables, graphs, and figures should be assigned numbers that can be referenced in the text.  Each item should also have heading.  Overall, you should summarize your findings and point the reader to the correct figure, table, or graph.  Each one should be discussed within the text, but the text should complement the tables, figures, or graphs and not simply repeat the same information.  The text should provide clarifying information that helps the reader understand the results.
• Point out trends, correlations, important relationships, significant differences and other aspects of the results that you will be highlighting later in your Discussion section.
• If you did not get the anticipated results, that is important information and you should report it in your findings.  The results serve to help you and the reader understand the research problem, but they do not prove anything. Therefore, it is important to consider all perspectives pointed out by the results.
• When reporting statistical results, follow the guidelines for the style of the journal.  In general, they should be reported parenthetically (test name, p-value) within the text.  Also, avoid the use of word "significant" within the text unless it actually referring to the results of a statistical analysis that indicated its significance.
• Always be sure to include the appropriate units for all data that is reported and for any summary statistics.

The following video describes how to appropriately construct an effective Results section. It includes information on what to include and what not to include in the Results, as well as a discussion on how to best present findings using tables, charts, and graphs.

Resources

The following resources contain additional guidelines, tips and samples that will be useful as you write the rough draft of your Results section.

• The Results
• Twelve Steps to Writing an Effective Results Section
• Sample Results Section

Assignment: Your assignment for Week 5 is to submit a rough draft your Results section.