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Errors Corrected at Wallace

Reasons that Taiwanese journal papers are significantly revised or rejected

  • Poor writing style and use of English
  • Subject of little novel interest or not generally applicable
  • Authors did not follow manuscript instructions
  • Poor quality supporting figures
  • Not enough contribution to field
  • Faulty methodology
  • Outside the scope of journal
  • Poor written discussion
  • Inadequate references
  • Title not representative of study

Based on editors and reviewers’ comments, the following figure shows the writing errors that lead to the revision or rejection of Taiwanese journal papers.

  • Redundancy
  • Verb Tense
  • Passive Voice Errors
  • Weak Verbs
  • Verb Agreement
  • Omitting Comparisons
  • Clear Pronouns
  • Poor written discussion
  • “It” and “There”
  • Noun Verb issues

The above data were sampled from the comments of 64 electrical and mechanical engineering reviewers and editors over a period of three years. Errors differ among authors.


We modify grammar, including noun and verb usage, strong and weak verbs, verb types, verb-subject agreement, use of clear pronouns, modification of redundant and long sentences, deletion of redundancies and extra words, and correction of misused comparisons. Our editors will also suggest alternative phrases or remind you to change passive voice into active voice.

Our editors can modify your papers to improve their readability, replace inadequate phrases, and modify spelling and grammatical errors. To improve the structure and clarity of your papers, we will also change sentence order when necessary. We will also clearly mark sections that require modification for your reference, and you can decide whether to accept our changes.

We have carefully investigated writing errors commonly found in Taiwanese research papers, and we make the following modifications during editing:

  • Active voice corrections
  • Noun to verb change corrections
  • Creating strong verbs
  • “It" and “There"
  • Use pronouns clearly (they, which, them, this, it, he, she, etc.)
  • Deleting redundancy and extra words (while maintaining the author’s meaning)
  • Verb tense change within a sentence
  • Omitting comparisons
  • Subject and verb agreement

Active voice corrections

“Generally, I think you could improve the whole paper by using more active voice sentences. It will improve the flow and allow the reader to follow your meaning." 1st Reviewer, Journal of Hydrology"

Examples:

Original:
Identification of poor food, bad housing, inadequate hygiene and large families as the major causes of poverty was made by Jones (2005).
Modified:
Jones (2005) identifies poor food, bad housing, inadequate hygiene and large families as the major causes of poverty.

Original:
Consideration of whether countries work well on cross-border issues such as immigration is undertaken by Raul (2007).
Modified:
Raul (2007) considers whether countries work well on cross-border issues such as immigration.

Noun to verb change corrections

“It seems that many of your errors come from your using nouns instead of verbs. This makes your sentence longer because you need additional “meaningless" verbs to complete your sentences." Associate Editor, Journal of Retailing

Examples:

Original:
Enumeration of three reasons why the English language has become so important was made by Thompson (2006).
Modified:
Thompson (2006) enumerates three reasons why the English language has become so important.

Original:
Discussion of the challenges and strategies for facilitation and promotion of ERP is performed by Smith (2007).
Modified:
Smith (2007) discusses the challenges and strategies for facilitating and promoting ERP.

Creating strong verbs

“Another suggestion for your paper is to find a native editor to help you with your verb use. Strong verbs move sentences. Helping verbs often confuse the reader in your technical descriptions."Reviewer, Journal of Technology Management

Examples:

Original:
Smith (2003) asks the questions as to whether conventional methods are the best environment for execution.
Modified:
Smith (2003) questions whether conventional methods are the best environment for execution.

Original:
Smith (2008) makes use of examples of these various techniques as evidence that innovation continues.
Modified:
Rao (2008) uses examples of these various techniques as evidence that innovation continues.

"It" and “There." Avoid starting sentences with the words, “It" and “There"

Your sentences are too long, especially your methods section! Try cutting them into individual units of complete thought instead of stringing together thoughts without stopping for breath."– Reviewer, Journal of Water Resource Management

Examples:

Original:
It was vital that quantitative measures would usefully supplement and extend the qualitative analysis.
Modified:
Quantitative measures must usefully supplement and extend qualitative analysis.

Original:
It is necessary that the best method to adopt for this investigation was to determined by the committee.
Modified:
The committee must decide the best method to adopt for this investigation.

Use pronouns clearly (they, which, them, this, it, he, she, etc.)

“Line 12 on page 3 of your paper is an example of your ongoing problem using pronouns clearly. There are at least 3 different nouns “it" could refer to. You must make your pronoun references clear!" -3rd Reviewer, IEEE Transactions on Advanced Packaging

Examples:

Original:
A case study approach was chosen, this allowed a closer observation of a single specimen.
Modified:
A case study approach was chosen to allow a closer observation of a single specimen.

Original:
In most recent studies, they measure X in four different ways.
Modified:
In most recent studies, X is measured in four different ways.

Deleting redundancy and extra words (while maintaining the author’s meaning)

“The whole paper should be shorter. I am confident that you could say everything you need to in 30% less space." – Reviewer, IEEE Journal of Engineering Management

Examples:

Original:
It may be said that there are not fewer than one explanation which could this result.
Modified:
There are several possible explanations for this result.

Original:
The current study was unable, insofar as we could determine, to analyze these variables.
Modified:
The current study was unable to analyze these variables.

Verb tense change within a sentence

“Your discussion section changes verb tense often. Sometimes you change several times within a sentence. It makes it difficult to understand what has been done and what you are still planning to do" – Reviewer, IEEE Signal Processing Letters

Examples:

Original:
All studies described as using the X procedure are included in the analysis.
Modified:
All studies described as using the X procedure were included in the analysis.

Original:
X will be synthesized using the same method that was detailed for Y, using CO2.
Modified:
X was synthesized using the same method that was detailed for Y, using CO2.

Omitting comparisons

“Line 20 of page 2 should read, ‘The finance department focuses on profits more than their department does.'" -1st Reviewer, Finance Review

Examples:

Original:
Country A funds high tech innovation more than Country B.
Modified:
Country A funds high tech innovation more than Country B does.

Original:
The device formulated in this experiment has higher luminance.
Modified:
The device formulated in this experiment has higher luminance than conventional models.

Subject and verb agreement

“Read the submission guidelines! English should be checked first! There are many basic errors that should have been corrected throughout this paper." Reviewer, IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics

Examples:

Original:
This paper seek to address the following questions:
Modified:
This paper seeks to address the following questions:

Original:
However, there have been no controlled studies which compare difference in X and Y.
Modified:
However, there have been no controlled studies which compare differences in X and Y.