Tyler J. Bateman
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Academic Methods Blog

I think the methods behind what we do in academia is what determines their quality and success. Here I will post about academic methods, to hopefully help you develop your own methods.

A Study of Journal Article Structure

2/21/2023

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After a rejection at a journal, I was asked by my PhD supervisor to make my article more conventional in its structure. I thought I was being conventional, but clearly didn’t have the knowledge of structural convention that was needed. So I took some articles recently published by my PhD supervisor, and one ethnography article (since the study I was trying to publish was an ethnography), and reverse outlined them.
 
I used Jessica Calarco’s outline of a journal article (located here as of 21 Feb 2023: http://www.jessicacalarco.com/teaching-resources-1/2019/8/30/article-writing-101 ) as a basis for reverse outlining these articles (it is on her website, under Tips & Tricks > Teaching Resources [link at the bottom of the page]). So in a way, this paper asks how widely and how exactly Calarco’s outline is applied (with an admittedly small and homogeneous sample).
 
What I found was that, for the 7 articles I coded, Calarco’s outline was never exactly applied. Of course, the authors of these articles probably weren't looking at her outline and thinking whether they wanted to apply it or not — but Calarco's outline is clearly not only hers but is a set of usually unstated assumptions in the field. But with that caveat, it is still the case that the outline isn't exactly what everyone does. Some articles ranged very far from the outline in particular sections. Sometimes they followed some of the outline and neglected others. Sometimes they did most of the things but mixed up the order.
 
After doing this, however, I know what usually happens in each section (at least across these 7 articles).
In the following sections of this post, I will italicize the codes I used (I used Atlas.ti to code these).
 
I will put numbers in parentheses to mark how many times I coded a particular move in the articles. So this is not number of articles that had these passages, but instead how many times the move happened. So if a paper mentioned the data, then mentioned the findings, then mentioned the data again, in that sequence, there would be Data (2) and Findings (1).

ABSTRACTS

This is Calarco’s outline for abstracts:
 
250 words or less
  • State your research question
  • Explain how this research question speaks to a larger theoretical puzzle or gap in the literature (Gap in existing literature)
  • Describe the data that you use to answer your research question (Data)
  • State what you find (Findings)
  • Describe what these findings suggest about the answer to your research question
  • Explain why these findings are important (Contribution to understanding world / Explain why these findings are important)
 
The most common moves in abstracts were to talk about Findings (13) and to describe the Data (11). Then the next most common moves were to discuss the Contribution to Literature (9) and to discuss Existing Literature (8).
 
The moderately common moves in the articles were to Identify an empirical case that has had relatively little attention in the literature (5), State the research question (even if it wasn’t exactly in the form of a question, something like, “This paper analyzes how X and Y relate”) (4), and State a fact about the world (such as, “ethical consumption is a popular form of everyday politics”) (4).
 
Rare in abstracts were to explicitly articulate a Gap in existing literature (2), define a Theory/Concept (2), and mention a Contribution to understanding world / Explain why these findings are important (2).
 
Abstracts ranged from 172–251 words.

INTRODUCTIONS

Calarco’s Sections (she says the introduction should be 3 paragraphs) with my edits
 
Describe the puzzle or gap in the literature that you will address with your data
  • What do we know?
  • What do we not know (or not know well enough)?
  • What does the existing research suggest might be the answer to that unanswered question?
 
Identify your research question and explain how you answer it
  • What question will you answer? (Or what hypothesis will you test? )
  • What data will you use to answer this question? (Or test this hypothesis? )
  • What do you find?
 
Explain the importance of your findings
  • What is the answer to your research question?
  • CONTRIBUTION: How does this answer broaden, clarify, or challenge existing knowledge/theories? / TB edit: How does the paper’s answer to the research question(s) broaden, clarify, or challenge existing knowledge/theories? (I made this edit because sometimes this comes before the authors state the research questions)
  • CONTRIBUTION: How does the paper’s answer to the research question(s) broaden, clarify, or challenge existing knowledge/theories?
 
 
Introductions most commonly discussed What we Know (12) and Findings (12).
 
They often discussed What do we not know? (8), discussed the contribution (7), described the data (7), stated the research question(s) (7), and discussed what the existing research suggests might be the answer to the research question (6).
 
They sometimes discussed the general analytical strategy of the paper (4) and clarified a concept (3).
 
The papers rarely mentioned a fact in the world (2) (e.g., “a growing cultural narrative that children are “at risk””), a problem in the world (1), explained theoretical concepts (2), mentioned an exciting new trend in research (1), signposted what was to come in the article (2), provided a data excerpt (1), and gave wider context for findings (1).
 
Introductions ranged from 401–1,188 words.

JUSTIFICATION/LITERATURE REVIEW

Calarco’s Outline (She says it should be “1,000 words or less”)
  • Restate the puzzle or gap in the literature that you will address
  • Explain why this puzzle or gap is important to address
  • Describe (in more detail than in the intro) what we know about this topic/issue
  • Describe (in more detail than in the intro) what we do not know about this topic/issue
  • State your research question (i.e., “In light of these lingering questions, I seek to examine…”)
  • Explain how your research question solves the puzzle or fills the gap in the literature (i.e., “Answering this question allows me to…”)
  • Note: The point of a literature review is not actually to review all of the relevant literature. The point is to make the case for why your study is important.
 
Calarco calls this the “justification” section to highlight that “The point of a literature review is not actually to review all of the relevant literature …The point is to make the case for why your study is important.”
 
As you can guess, the most common move in the justification section is to talk about What we Know (39). The next common move is to Restate the puzzle or gap in the literature that you will address (12). Then the most common move after that is Justifying choice of literature or concept(s) (5).
 
Then there are several less-common moves, such as: Clarifying/Defining a Concept (4), Contribution(s)/Clarifying the relationship of the paper to what we know (3), mention the research question(s) (3), mention facts about the world (2) or problems in the world (1), mention a general question (“how queer people connect in the digital age”), coining a concept (1), and discussing a new trend in research (1).
 
Justification sections ranged from 776 – 3,390 words.

METHODS

Calarco says these should be “4-6 short paragraphs”, and this is her outline:
  • Provide a brief overview of the study
  • Describe your research site, why you chose it, and how you gained access
  • Describe your research participants (the people you observed)
  • Discuss your role in the field and how your identity shaped your observations
  • Describe the fieldwork you conducted and the data you collected
  • Describe how you analyzed the data you collected
  • Describe the limitations of your study (i.e., explain how your study is limited by your methodological choices)
 
Most common in methods sections was Characterizing the Sample / Describe the Data Collected (24). The articles were mostly qualitative, and the next most common codes were Interviewee/Focus Group Recruitment Methods (8), Qualitative Coding Method / Describe how you analyzed the data collected (7), a general discussion of analytical strategy (8) (e.g., “By studying the political talk of organizational leaders advocating eat-local food practices in three cities, we aim to capture a sense of
the broader discourse animating eat-local activism in the Canadian context”.), describing interview questions asked (6), describing the research sites (6), describing the general strategy for data collection (5) (e.g., “This geographic range allowed us to access a diversity of perspectives that were not constrained to the specific environmental and regulatory conditions of a single region or province.”), and giving a brief study overview (4).
 
Less common moves were to make a statement that all names reported were pseudonyms (3 – the other articles did this in the analysis sections), make a statement about the representativeness of the findings (3), provide some findings (2), discuss empirical or theoretical literature (1), discuss methodological literature (1), describe political jurisdictions in which the data was collected (1), defining concepts (1), and explaining unfamiliar methods (1) (latent class analysis was the unfamiliar method described).
 
Methods sections ranged from 469–2,464 words. The article with the 2,464-word methods section was a mixed-methods study. Methods sections had 3–7 paragraphs.
 
The methods section were called “Data and Methods” (3), “Data and Method” (2), “Methods and Data” (1), and “Study Design and Data” (1).

ANALYSIS

Calarco’s outline (she gives no word limit suggestion)
  • State your argument
  • Identify 2-3 supporting points – how your data support your argument
  • Identify 2-3 patterns in the data that provide evidence for each supporting point
  • For each pattern:
    • Individual Example(s) – Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion
    • Briefly explain how this example represents the larger pattern
    • Provide a brief fieldnote, interview, or other data excerpt
    • Explain how this subtheme links to the overall theme – may include developing/enhancing overall theme [TB addition]
  • Offer EXPLANATION for observed patterns
  • Caveats and clarifications identify any key exceptions to or variations to the overall patterns, and if possible, offer an explanation for these exceptions/variations
 
Most common in analysis sections was to Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion (e.g., through a quote) (129), Generalizing Across Sample (64) (e.g., “For many mothers, the nutritional importance of meat for a growing child’s diet was a matter of common sense.”), and Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme (52).
 
Calarco, in her outline, talks about the difference between “supporting points” and “patterns in the data that provide evidence for each supporting point”. I did not find that distinction intuitive. Instead, I talked about analysis sections as having an “overall theme” (i.e., the main message of the findings). Then all of the papers broke that overall finding into subthemes. I called those subthemes just “subthemes” or “First Order Subthemes”. Then if one of those subthemes had a subtheme, I called that a “Second Order Subtheme” (I’m getting the idea of first, second, etc. “order” from Greek Philosophy — I’m using the idea loosely, but I wanted to use this language instead of saying things like “Sub-sub theme” or “Sub-sub-sub Theme”; so in the way I am using it, a “Sub-sub Theme” is a “Second Order Subtheme”). And so on. Some of the papers ended up having Fourth-order subthemes, and one paper even went so far as to have Sixth-order Subthemes. So it just refers to nesting of subthemes within each other.
 
So what I found in terms of that is that there were the overall theme was not mentioned that often, as might be expected (7 times), subthemes were mentioned a lot more (37 times), Second Order Subthemes were a main aspect of the articles (mentioned 45 times), as were Third Order Subthemes (used 58 times). Then the more nested categories beyond that were rare: Fourth Order Subthemes (19), Fifth Order Subthemes (3), and Sixth Order Subthemes (2). So as you can see, most of the papers had 3 levels of subthemes. Something like this:
 
Overall message of paper
  • Subtheme 1
    • Second Order Subtheme 1
      • Third Order Subtheme 1
      • Third Order Subtheme 2
    • Second Order Subtheme 2
      • Third Order Subtheme 1
      • Third Order Subtheme 2
      • Third Order Subtheme 3
  • Subtheme 2
    • Second Order Subtheme 1
      • Third Order Subtheme 1
      • Third Order Subtheme 2
      • Third Order Subtheme 3
    • Second Order Subtheme 2
      • Third Order Subtheme 1
      • Third Order Subtheme 2
 
That was the typical kind of structure in these articles.
 
Some of the other common moves that happened in the articles were discussing how the findings were consistent with previous literature (31), introducing a set of first/second/third/fourth/fifth/sixth order subthemes (14), and generalizing beyond the sample/contextualizing the findings (12).
 
Less common moves were discussing a conflict between the data and existing literature (7), offering an explanation for the observed patterns (5), stating the research question(s) (4), stating that the respondents’ names were pseudonyms (3), stating an analytical strategy (3) (e.g., “Our focus group data allow us to paint a richer picture of this orientation to food”.), and defining or clarifying a concept (2).
 
Analysis sections were 2,859 – 6,411 words (the highest one there is not the mixed methods study).

DISCUSSION

 
Calarco says that this should be 1,000 words or less. This is Calarco’s outline, with additions I made. In general, I found Discussion/Conclusion sections to be the most variable in terms of format. I numbered Calarco’s sections and added a “title” section. “TJB” are my initials, indicating where I added a section.
1 – TJB > Title of Section
2 – Summarize your findings
2.1 Remind readers of the puzzle/gap in the literature that you are trying to solve
2.2. Remind readers of the specific research question that you have answered
2.3. Review what you found
2.4. Explain what these findings imply about the answer to your research question
3 – Discuss the implications of your findings
3.1. TJB > State Implication(s) of Findings (without doing any of the sub-tasks Calarco outlines)
3.2. Explain how your findings solve the puzzle or fill the gap in the literature
3.3. Explain how the resolution of the gap/puzzle helps to clarify, challenge, or expand existing knowledge or theory
3.3. TJB > Explain how themes and/or subthemes, or the implication(s) of the findings, clarify, challenge, or expand exiting knowledge or theory
3.4. Using existing literature, explain why your findings are or are not surprising
3.5. TJB > Simply explain how previously published literature relates to your findings, without commenting on whether it is surprising relative to findings, and without saying that your data clarifies, challenges, or expands previous literature
3.6. TJB > Identify areas of social life where your argument likely applies
3.7. TJB > Draw out implications of your findings, without referring to literature
4 – Identify possible explanations for your findings
4.1. TJB > Identify a possible explanation for your findings without referring to existing research
4.2. Use existing research to discuss the most likely explanation for your findings
4.3. Consider alternative explanations for your findings and explain (using your data and/or other research) why these alternative explanations do or do not seem plausible
4.4. Conclude by reviewing why these findings (and the larger puzzle/gap they address) are important
5 – Apply Findings
5.1. TJB > Evaluate social change strategy held by respondents or scholarship activism more broadly by referring to literature and/or through argument referencing the study’s data
6 – TJB > Discuss Limitations
7 – TJB > Future Research
8 – TJB > Generalizing Beyond Sample without Referencing Literature
 
The titles were pretty boring and consistent — either “Discussion” or “Discussion and Conclusion”.
 
Most of the articles didn’t have a separate “Conclusion” section. So I just lumped them together. It seems, in general, that it is conventional enough to just forego the conclusion, unless you want a dedicated place to talk about future research. Future research isn’t in Calarco’s outline.
 
The most common move in the Discussion was to review the findings (13).
 
Then the general “implications” move was to 3.3. Explain how the resolution of the gap/puzzle helps to clarify, challenge, or expand existing knowledge or theory (8). Sometimes, though, this main implications move was done a bit differently, and I reworded it to 3.3. TJB > Explain how implication of findings, themes and/or subthemes clarify, challenge, or expand exiting knowledge or theory (5).
 
Then the most common moves were:
  • 3.1. TJB > State Implication(s) of Findings (without doing any of the sub-tasks Calarco outlines) (6)
  • talk about future research (5), 2.1 – Remind readers of the puzzle/gap in the literature that you are trying to solve (4)
  • 3.6. TJB > Identify areas of social life where your argument likely applies (4)
  • 4.4. Conclude by reviewing why these findings (and the larger puzzle/gap they address) are important (3)
  • Generalizing Beyond Sample without Referencing Literature (3) (e.g., “As urban Canadian and American consumers are encouraged to understand how meals arrive on the plate, educating children about “where food comes from” has become central to an idealized performance of maternal foodwork.”)
  • 2.2. – Remind readers of the specific research question that you have answered (2)
  • Literature CONSISTENCY (2) (discuss how your findings are consistent with literature)
  • 5.1. Evaluate social change strategy held by respondents or scholarship activism more broadly by referring to literature and/or through argument referencing the study’s data (2)
  • 4.2. Use existing research to discuss the most likely explanation for your findings (2)
  • 3.4. Using existing literature, explain why your findings are or are not surprising (2)
  • 3.5. TJB > Simply explain how previously published literature relates to your findings, without commenting on whether it is surprising relative to findings, and without saying that your data clarifies, challenges, or expands previous literature (2)
  • 3.7. TJB > Draw out implications of your findings, without referring to literature (2)

OVERALL ASSESSMENT

Overall, I did find Calarco’s outline to be a good general guide for understanding the structure of journal articles. But as you can see, the structures varied widely.
 
This is not to say that they should have varied widely. Perhaps it would indeed be better if everyone kept to the exact structure that Calarco outlined. At least in some cases of course (mixed methods or purely quantitative data), you couldn’t exactly follow that template.
 
But something I found in these articles is that they weren’t trying to deeply change theory. If you just looked at Calarco’s outline, you might think that every article had to have a major theoretical contribution. There is this article …
 
Besbris, Max, and Shamus Khan. 2017. “Less Theory. More Description.” Sociological Theory 35(2):147–53.
 
… where they worry about people trying to revolutionize thinking with every contribution. That is certainly something I have learned in graduate school: that you don’t actually have to make ground-breaking theoretical contributions every time or even ever. And if you do that, sometimes you are typecast as a “theory” person, as in, a particular subfield of sociology. There are many debates about the status of theory and I’m not going to give a literature review of that here (e.g., in terms of whether it should be ever considered a sub-category of sociology or whether everyone should engage with theory construction, among other issues). But when you read Calarco's outline and it says identify a “puzzle or gap in the literature” it doesn't mean a major theoretical gap. Replicating research is, of course, frowned upon in sociology (but not in e.g., biology etc.). So it isn’t that you don’t have to find some kind of a gap. You do. But the gap doesn’t have to be a major modification or take-down of a theory. It can be an empirical gap, and you can just imply that the gap is there, while constructing an argument with important implications.
 
I created this post (and document, see end of post) so that I would have template outlines for my drafts. I added all the quotes for the various coded parts so that I could know what I meant by a particular code. I’ve left that all here, you can take it or leave it (or modify it, or whatever). It also led to me drafting an alternative outline to Calarco's (see below).
 
Also, all the codings in the document (attached at the bottom of this post) is a first draft. As I work with this I may re-code something or refine some kind of this structure. The document has all the details of the coding, the kind of behind-the-scenes process that you usually don’t get in qualitative coding! And people don’t give it out because they don’t want to be proven wrong etc. (which some people, like Biernacki, find a way to do anyway! Biernacki, Richard. 2012. Reinventing Evidence in Social Inquiry. New York, USA and Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan). So the document's full coding looks messy and I’m sure you can find a way to improve the coding structure there (I know I will!). But if you want to see what I see as the outline of these articles (in a structural way) I wanted to provide all the detail, which you may find useful.
 
I outlined more abstracts than the full papers—at the abstract phase, I was trying to figure out which I wanted a full outline for. So if you open the full document, you'll see more abstracts than the other sections.

ALTERNATIVE OUTLINE

Given all of this, I have made an alternative outline, that I tried to simplify. There are, of course, many other things you can add. But from my reading, these are what are most important.
 
***Many of these are copied from Calarco’s outline; in some cases, moves that are distinct in her outline are combined here***
 
Abstract (150–250 words)
  • Existing literature / What we know
  • Research Question / Gap or Puzzle / State that your empirical case has had relatively little attention in the literature / What we do not know
  • Data
  • Findings
  • Contributions to literature
  • OPTIONAL: Contribution to how activists [or some other category of social actor – businesses, governments, etc.] should be thinking about something
 
Introduction – Basically it is an extended version of the abstract / a mini version of your full paper
  • Existing literature / What we know
  • Research Question / Gap or Puzzle / State that your empirical case has had relatively little attention in the literature / What we do not know
  • Data
  • Findings
  • Contributions to literature
  • OPTIONAL: Contribution to how activists [or some other category of social actor – businesses, governments, etc.] should be thinking about something
 
Justification
  • Existing literature / What we know
  • Research Question / Gap or Puzzle / State that your empirical case has had relatively little attention in the literature / What we do not know
 
Methods and Data
  • Characterize the sample / Describe the data collected (this is going to happen at several different points in the section – it’s less of a section in itself and more of a move that you do several times in the methods section – it is for anything that gives some shape or contours to the data collected) (e.g., “Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 40 women who saw food as important to their identities”) (e.g., “Interviewees had varied meat practices and preferences. Sixty-four percent were meat eaters (49), with 6% eating meat at every meal (5), 35% eating it every day (27), and 23% eating it occasionally (18). Purposive recruitment was done to interview a significant number of people who don’t eat meat (in order to better understand this relatively unusual choice); as a result, 23% of respondents identified as vegetarian (18) and 12% as vegan (9).”)
  • Describe how you collected the data (interviewee recruitment methods, etc.)
  • Describe some of the instruments (e.g., explain Latent Class Analysis or give a few particularly relevant interview questions)
  • Describe the research site(s) (I mean “site” broadly defined—online, where interviews were done, fieldwork research site, etc.)
  • Describe how you analyzed the data collected
  • You may want to mention somewhere in the section that all names are pseudonyms – otherwise, plan to do that the first time a name is mentioned in the analysis section (e.g., with a footnote/endnote)
 
Analysis
 
FOR QUALITATIVE ARTICLES ONLY: Have a structure something like this.
***You do not have to have a certain number of subthemes, second order subthemes, third order subthemes, etc. – do what you actually have, whatever the nested structure is for your codes.***
***When you are coding, make sure you nest the codes so that you can write this section with ease when you get to the writing stage.***
 
I realize the structure here is very repetitive, but I want to show the general structure. (SEE BELOW FOR A WORD DOC WITH COLOUR CODES, for this and other sections).
 
  • Overall message of paper
  • Introduce the sub-themes
    • Subtheme 1
      • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
      • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
      • Introduce the Second Order Sub-themes
      • Second Order Subtheme 1
        • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
        • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 1
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 2
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
      • Second Order Subtheme 2
        • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
        • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 1
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 2
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 3
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
      • OPTIONAL: Generalize beyond the sample/contextualize the findings
      • OPTIONAL: Offer explanation(s) for the observed findings
    • Subtheme 2
      • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion
      • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
      • Introduce the Second Order Sub-themes
      • Second Order Subtheme 1
        • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
        • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 1
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 2
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 3
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
      • Second Order Subtheme 2
        • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
        • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 1
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
        • Third Order Subtheme 2
          • Describe data that typifies the pattern under discussion by GENERALIZING across the sample OR providing 1–5 INDIVIDUAL example(s)
          • Briefly explain how an example represents a larger pattern/sub-theme OPTIONALLY mentioning 1-2 pieces of relevant literature
      • OPTIONAL: Generalize beyond the sample/contextualize the findings
      • OPTIONAL: Offer explanation(s) for observed findings
  • OPTIONAL: Summarize the analysis sections / Generalize beyond sample / Offer explanation(s)
 
Discussion/Discussion and Conclusion
  • Review what you found
  • OPTIONAL: Generalize Beyond Sample, by referencing literature (or by reasoning)
  • OPTIONAL: Explain your Findings, by referencing literature (or by reasoning)
  • State implication(s) of findings
  • Explain how themes and/or subthemes, or the implication(s) of the findings, clarify, challenge, or expand exiting knowledge or theory
  • OPTIONAL: Identify areas of social life where your argument likely applies

FULL DOCUMENT

Below, you can download the document where I did this work. You can see how I coded each passage from each of the articles. I have this in the document because it helps me see how people dealt with particular issues, which I will have to reference as I continue to write journal articles.

I hope this is helpful for you! Certainly for me, randomly finding that outline from Calarco and thinking through it has been an important part of learning how to write journal articles.
reverse_outlines_main_document.docx
File Size: 305 kb
File Type: docx
Download File

ALTERNATIVE OUTLINE

This is a document with only the outline. The analysis section is for a qualitative article.
alternative_journal_article_outline.docx
File Size: 18 kb
File Type: docx
Download File

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    Tyler J. Bateman

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