Formal does not mean complicated, and trying to sound academic is what makes writing sound bad
The most common style problem in student work is not informality. It is overcorrection: long words chosen over short ones, passive constructions that hide who did what, and sentences built to sound serious rather than to be clear.
Precision, not complexity
Academic writing is formal because it needs to be precise, not because it needs to be impressive. Those two goals often pull in opposite directions.
Trying to sound academic
Prior to the commencement of the intervention, it was necessary to ascertain the baseline parameters utilized in the subsequent analysis.
Actually academic
Before the intervention began, we established the baseline measures used in the analysis.
The second is shorter, clearer and no less formal. Every substitution in the first version adds length without adding meaning: prior to for before, commencement for began, ascertain for established, utilized for used.
| Instead of | Write |
|---|---|
| utilize | use |
| prior to | before |
| in order to | to |
| due to the fact that | because |
| a large number of | many |
| at this point in time | now |
| ascertain | find out, establish |
| commence | start, begin |
Naming who did what
The passive voice is legitimate and overused. It earns its place when the actor genuinely does not matter, which is common in methods sections. It becomes a problem when it is used to avoid naming anyone at all.
Actor hidden
It was decided that the protocol would be amended.
Actor named
The research team amended the protocol after the second site withdrew.
The second is more informative and is not less formal. Where your discipline permits first person, use it rather than writing “the researcher” about yourself, which reads as stilted rather than objective.
Hedging at the right strength
Your claim should be exactly as strong as your evidence supports. Both directions are errors.
Overclaiming
This proves that scheduling autonomy causes higher retention.
Overhedged
It could possibly be suggested that scheduling autonomy may potentially tend to have some relationship with retention in certain cases.
Right
These findings suggest scheduling autonomy is associated with higher retention, although the cross-sectional design cannot establish causation.
One hedge is enough. Stacking them is a recognizable weakness, and it usually indicates uncertainty about the evidence rather than care about the claim.
Watch causal verbs in particular. Caused, led to, resulted in and improved all assert causation, and a correlational design does not license any of them. This single substitution accounts for a large share of the corrections we mark.
Things that read as informal without being obvious
Contractions. Write do not, cannot, it is.
Vague quantifiers. A lot, loads, huge, massive. Use the actual number, or a precise word.
Conversational openers. Of course, obviously, needless to say. If it is obvious, it does not need writing; if it is not, the word is doing your argument’s work for it.
Unattributed generalizations. “It is widely known that” usually means the writer could not find a source. Either find one or drop the claim.
A style pass worth doing separately
Read the document searching for one thing at a time.
Search for the words in the table above and replace them.
Search for contractions using the apostrophe.
Search for causal verbs and check your design supports each one.
Search for “very”, “really” and “quite” and delete almost all of them.
Each of these takes a few minutes and none requires you to reread the whole document, which is why they actually get done.
Frequently Asked Questions
In most disciplines now, yes. APA explicitly prefers first person to awkward third-person constructions like the researcher. Some fields and some instructors still prohibit it, so check. Where it is allowed, using it is usually clearer than the alternatives.
No, and it is sometimes the right choice, particularly in methods sections where what was done matters more than who did it. It becomes a problem when used throughout to avoid naming an actor, which makes sentences longer and responsibility unclear.
When a reader has to work to extract the meaning. If a shorter word says the same thing, use it. Utilize instead of use, and prior to instead of before, add nothing except length, and experienced graders read them as padding.
In formal academic writing, yes. Write do not rather than don't. It is one of the simplest graders of register and it is easy to fix with a search at the end.
Hedging qualifies a claim to match your evidence: suggests, appears to, may indicate. It is necessary because data rarely supports absolute statements. Too much produces claims so qualified they assert nothing, and stacking hedges such as may possibly tend to is a recognizable weakness.
Rarely, in most academic writing. They work in some disciplines and in speech. In a written argument they usually delay the point, and a section that opens with one often reads as avoiding a direct claim.
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