Como Hacer Un Paper

[This Article appeared in the American Scientist (Nov-Dec 1990), Volume 78, 550-558. Retyped and
posted with permission.]

The Science of Scientific Writing
If the reader is to grasp what the writer means,
the writer must understand what the reader needs
George D. Gopen and Judith A. Swan*
*George D. Gopen is associate professor of English and Director of Writing Programs at DukeUniversity. He holds a Ph.D.
in English from Harvard University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. Judith A. Swan teaches scientific writing at
Princeton University. Her Ph.D., which is in biochemistry, was earned at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Address
for Gopen: 307 Allen Building, Duke University, Durham, NC 27706

Science is often hard to read. Most people assume that itsdifficulties are born out of necessity, out of
the extreme complexity of scientific concepts, data and analysis. We argue here that complexity of
thought need not lead to impenetrability of expression; we demonstrate a number of rhetorical principles
that can produce clarity in communication without oversimplifying scientific issues. The results are
substantive, not merely cosmetic: Improving thequality of writing actually improves the quality of
thought.
The fundamental purpose of scientific discourse is not the mere presentation of information and thought,
but rather its actual communication. It does not matter how pleased an author might be to have
converted all the right data into sentences and paragraphs; it matters only whether a large majority of the
reading audience accuratelyperceives what the author had in mind. Therefore, in order to understand
how best to improve writing, we would do well to understand better how readers go about reading. Such
an understanding has recently become available through work done in the fields of rhetoric, linguistics
and cognitive psychology. It has helped to produce a methodology based on the concept of reader
expectations.
Writingwith the Reader in Mind: Expectation and Context
Readers do not simply read; they interpret. Any piece of prose, no matter how short, may "mean" in 10
(or more) different ways to 10 different readers. This methodology of reader expectations is founded on
the recognition that readers make many of their most important interpretive decisions about the
substance of prose based on clues they receivefrom its structure.
This interplay between substance and structure can be demonstrated by something as basic as a simple

table. Let us say that in tracking the temperature of a liquid over a period of time, an investigator takes
measurements every three minutes and records a list of temperatures. Those data could be presented by a
number of written structures. Here are two possibilities:t(time)=15’, T(temperature)=32º, t=0’, T=25º;
t=6’, T=29º; t=3’, T=27º; t=12’, T=32º; t=9’;
T=31º
time (min)
0
3
6
9
12
15

temperature(ºC)
25
27
29
31
32
32

Precisely the same information appears in both formats, yet most readers find the second easier to
interpret. It may be that the very familiarity of the tabular structure makes it easier to use. But, more
significantly,the structure of the second table provides the reader with an easily perceived context (time)
in which the significant piece of information (temperature) can be interpreted. The contextual material
appears on the left in a pattern that produces an expectation of regularity; the interesting results appear
on the right in a less obvious pattern, the discovery of which is the point of the table.If the two sides of this simple table are reversed, it becomes much harder to read.
temperature(ºC)
25
27
29
31
32
32

time(min)
0
3
6
9
12
15

Since we read from left to right, we prefer the context on the left, where it can more effectively
familiarize the reader. We prefer the new, important information on the right, since its job is to intrigue
the reader.
Information is...