Every researcher has biases. Too often I don’t see those backgrounds acknowledged when teaching academic writing, yet it certainly shapes how we teach — and how we learn. I want to mention mine so you know how my thinking shapes this hub.
Knowledge as interpretation
I assume knowledge is our current best interpretation of empirical data, framed as research questions answered with evidence. This interrogative mode—asking “how does the world work?”—shapes how I structure writing advice. This means I assume a “research question → most likely answer” framing when writing for scientific journals, which requires handling uncertainty in Discussion writing not explicitly taught in all disciplines.
Cognitive shift
If you experience your research as solving problems or building mechanisms rather than answering questions about nature, my framing may require a cognitive shift you have been trained in explicitly. This means I will push you to articulate what your study asks and what it concludes, even if your training focused on what your study does or builds.
Societal/interdisciplinary work
I was trained as an (applied) ecologist (see my Google Scholar profile for some of the topics I’ve worked on). That means I’m used to writing IMRaD papers with a heavy focus on statistical analysis, societal applications and interdisciplinary research, and less used to writing more fundamental research papers or ethical considerations.
Explicit logic + clear language
During my master’s I worked in a research group heavily focused on clear, logical decision making. This influenced my thinking and skewed it further towards preferring explicit logic, and clear language — as opposed to the implicit reasoning and more traditional academic language preferred in other academic sub-cultures.
Perfectionism
Most of the Writing Process articles are written keeping my own struggles with writing in mind, including perfectionism, not knowing how writing works, procrastination, etc. This means I tend to emphasise low-stakes drafting and ‘permission to be messy’ over grammar perfection.
A note on AI usage
While I have mixed view on the use of AI (lots of environmental guilt), I also love the way it speeds up getting ideas across. It can phrase things in ways I can’t do as quickly myself. That means that certain parts of the hub have been drafted with AI — and then heavily edited by myself to make sure it actually makes sense what it wrote.