- 23 June 2014
Writing an abstract
When writing an abstract, the following principles should be kept in mind:
- The abstract should contain the core of the author’s research;
- The abstract should relate the crucial aspects of the work and should not contain exaggerations or any material absent in the body of the article;
- Based on the abstract, the reader should be able to judge whether it is worth reading the full text to obtain information he needs.
Standards for the structure of the abstract:
- The abstract should describe the main purposes of the research, the reasons for which it is undertaken;
- The abstract should explain the way the research was performed;
- The abstract should summarize the crucial results of the research as well as their significance.
The acceptable structure of the abstract is as follows:
- — introduction
— goals and objectives
— methods
— results / discussions
— conclusions
However, the subject-matter, the topic and the purpose of the work are only mentioned if they are not evident from the title. It is desirable to describe the method or methodology of the research if they show some novelty or are of interest from the viewpoint of the work concerned.
The results of the work should be described in a very precise and informative way. The main theoretical outputs, factual data, correlations and regularities are to be adduced. Preference should be given to new results and long-ranged data, important findings and conclusions that refute or question some of the existing theories as well as to data significant from the author’s viewpoint.
The text should be consistent, each proposition logically following from others.
The abstract should be rather long (some 200-250 words); too short and formal abstracts are not accepted. However, it should be kept in mind that a big abstract is not always the right one.
Unnecessary parenthetical phrases and historical notes should be avoided unless they refer to the article’s main content; in addition, the abstract does not contain references to previously published works and items of common knowledge. The abstract’s text should be concise, clear and free of secondary information, unnecessary parentheses, general and unimportant formulations.
The abstract is intended to serve as a source of information independent from the article.
The abstract’s text should not contain quotations or abbreviations.
For examples of abstracts for different types of texts (reviews, articles), please see: Emerald Group Publishing website.
Writing an abstract in english
(as a supplement to the requirements indicated above)
Basic principles
It should be remembered that an abstract provides basic information on the article’s content in international information systems and databases indexing the journal, which means that abstracts serve as sources of information independent from the articles. It is by the abstract that authors outside Russia may judge a publication, which helps them decide whether it is of interest and use to them. Based on the abstract they may make references to the article in their own publications, they also may open up a discussion with the author or request the full text.
The Russian-speaking authors should keep in mind the following: even if an abstract in Russian is the basis for writing an abstract in English, nevertheless it should not be literally translated; it should be written in accordance with the rules and stylistics of the English language.
Thus, abstracts should be:
- — informative (they should not contain generalities)
- — original (an abstract in English is not an exact copy of the Russian abstract)
- — substantial (so as to reflect the content of the article and the results of research)
- — structured (following the logical structure of presenting the research results in the article)
- — written in good English
- — concise but not too brief (within 250-300 words)
When writing an abstract in English, it is preferable to use the active voice (and not the passive voice), for example: "The study tested", not "It was tested in this study".
Brief guidelines for grammar and style of the articles and abstracts in English are presented on the website of the American Psychological Association (Grammar and Writing Style), which elaborated the most popular bibliographic standard widely used in scholarly journals as well as the APA 6th referencing style.
The order of information on the article
- The title
- The author(s)
- The author’s affiliation and e-mail address
- Information about the authors
- The abstract
- Keywords
- Acknowledgements
- References in the alphabetic order (at the end of the article)
Keywords
The keywords (7-9) should reflect the main content of the article and include terms defining the subject matter of the research; if possible they should not repeat the terms used in the title and abstract. Importantly, keywords facilitate finding the article through information retrieval systems.
Information on the author
(attached in a separate file)
This information should contain:
- The author’s affiliation (post, academic degree, academic title (if any))
- Institution / place of work (several places of work may be indicated: permanent position, participation in a project etc.)
- ORCID
- The address of the institution / place of work (indicating the ZIP/postal code, city and country)
Examples:
Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Institute of Philosophy, 11000 Prague, Czech Republic.
Kuban State University, 350040 Krasnodar, Russian Federation.Томский государственный педагогический университет, 634061 Томск, Россия.
- The e-mail address
- Scientific interests
- Contribution to the article (if co-authored)
Referencing and footnotes
Sources are referenced within the body of the text and enclosed in parentheses. First the author’s surname is indicated, followed by the publication date after a comma.
In-text references (generally) appear in the following format:
(Author’s Last Name, Year of Publication)
- Example:
(Kant, 1999) — When referring to an entire work.
When indicating specific pages:
(Author’s Last Name, Year of Publication, Page Number(s))
- Example:
(Kant, 1999, 987) — If one page is referenced. - (Husserl, 1973, 364-365) — When referring to several pages or to an extensive fragment.
The author’s name can be included in a sentence within the text, with the publication date and the page indicated in parentheses.
- Example:
In this context Husserl (1973, 364-365) draws attention to the fact that...
When directly quoting from the source, the quotation should be enclosed in quotation marks and followed by the reference:
- "Im Miteinandersein in derselben Welt und in der Entschlossenheit für bestimmte Möglichkeiten sind die Schicksale im vorhinein schon geleitet. In der Mitteilung und im Kampf wird die Macht des Geschickes erst frei" (Heidegger, 2001, 384).
Note: if a quotation contains fewer than 40 words, it is incorporated into the body of the text and enclosed in quotation marks. If a quotation is extensive (containing more than 40 words), it should start from a new line and be indented by 5 spaces from the left. Quotation marks are not used, the quotation being delimited from the rest of the text with two blank lines.
- Example:
Selon les mots encore de Lefort: -
-
La question que fait au social son origine. La logique qui organise un régime politique, par-delà le discours explicite où nous l’appréhendons tout d’abord, celle d’une réponse articulée à l’interrogation ouverte par l’événement et dans l’avènement du social comme tel. Au travers des formes d’organisation de la répartition du pouvoir qui la régissent, une société communique d’une manière singulière avec le fait qu’il y ait société, qu’il y ait apparaître du social (Lefort, 1971, 8-9).
-
-
Dans une proximité évidente avec Pierre Clastres, mais étendue en phénoménologie du social et des formes de société, ce que l’œuvre de Lefort nous apprend d’abord, c’est que le pouvoir est avant tout la nécessité du social en tant qu’il est le site même depuis lequel la société s’apparaît à elle-même, se représente comme société.
A specific paragraph or section of the source may be referred to when referencing an idea:
- Example:
(Heidegger, 2001, § 52)
When referencing an indirect source (a source quoted in another source), the citation might read like this:
- Example:
Moore (as cited in Maxwell, 1999, 25) stated that... - Мур (цит. по: Maxwell, 1999, 25) заявляет, что...
- Important: it is Maxwell, not Moore who should be indicated in the Reference list.
- Note: it is always preferable to cite the original source.
Additional comments to the text are included in footnotes at the bottom of the page. If they refer to a source indicated in the reference list, the reference is formatted according to the rules for in-text references.
- Example:
We find that a comparative analysis of this statement and the relativist treatment of conceptual schemes suggested by D. Davidson (Davidson, 1993, 144-159) could be promising.
When referencing several works by different authors, the sources are indicated in alphabetical order (like in the Reference list) separated with semicolons.
- Example:
This conclusion supplements the results of research done by a number of authors studying the tradition of the phenomenological philosophy (Ströker, 1996, 376-392; Bast, 1986; Bruzina, 2010, 91-125; Moran, 2008; Wagner, 1972, 696-719).
No abbreviations are admitted instead of a reference, for example: Ibid, Op. cit, Ebd.
References
(reference list)
Formatting references should be treated with utmost attention. Correctly formatted references will have an impact on the way the author’s publication will be considered and cited and eventually used in ongoing scientific projects and investigations.
The Reference List should appear at the end of the article, starting from a new page.
The Reference List is unified for the entire article, while sources in Russian are transliterated into the Latin alphabet.
Transliteration rules
Transliteration in the list of references should be performed in the Library of Congress system.
The sites https://translit.ru/lc/ or http://www.convertcyrillic.com/#/convert can be used for transliterating. In the second case in the column Convert to you should choose ALA-LC (Library of Congress) Romanization without Diacritics [Russkii iazyk].
Transliterating references to journal articles, collections of articles and conference proceedings:
- Transliteration of the authors’ names/surnames/patronyms is followed by translation of the title and transliteration of the name of the journal/collection;
- At the end of the description the article’s DOI (if any) should be indicated;
- Only the name of the publishing house is transliterated, while the word «издательство» should be written in the English translation abbreviated (e. g., Nauka Publ.);
- If the source is published in a language using characters other than Latin (cyrillic, hieroglyphic), the language of the publication should be indicated: (In Russian), (In Chinese). In all the other cases no mention of the language is needed;
- The first clause is inapplicable to the author’s name (surname) if the author insists on another transliteration accepted and used in all her/his articles;
- Transliteration should obligatorily be accompanied by an English translation of the title of the article or book.
Transliterating references to books:
- The title is translated into English with the language of the book indicated at the end of the description (e. g., In Russian);
- If the book is a translation of a foreign (e. g., non-Russian) monograph, the indication «Rus. Ed.» is added at the end. The foreign authors’ names are spelled in the original (in Latin characters), without transliteration.
-
Examples:
Glukhova, I. (2008). Phylosophy and Pychotherapy: Practician View. Topos, 1 (18), 5-12. (In Russian)
Sedakova, O. (1993). Foreword to Selected Poems (Martin Heidegger). Iskusstvo kino, 4, 109-110. (In Russian)
Toporov, V. (2005). Studies on Etymology and Semantics. Vol. 1. Moscow: Iazyki slovianskoi kul’tury Publ. (In Russian)
Davidson, D. (1993). On Very Idea of the Conceptual Scheme. In A. F. Griaznov (Ed.), Analiticheskaya filosofiya. Izbrannye teksty(144-159). Rus. Ed. Moscow: Mysl’ Publ. (In Russian)
Heidegger, M. (2003). Being and Time. Rus. Ed. Kharkiv: Folio Publ. (In Russian)
The Reference List should include all the sources which are directly (by citing) or indirectly (by mentioning other research) contained in the article, that is only those sources which are explicitly mentioned in the text.
References should be listed alphabetically by the last name of the first author of each work (If the source is co-authored, it is the first author’s surname that determines the alphabetical order).
-
Example:
Gallagher, Sh., & Zahavi, D. (2008). The Phenomenological Mind. An Introduction to Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science. London, New York: Routledge.
In the case of works by different authors with the same family name, it is by the authors’ initials that the alphabetical order is determined.
-
Example:
Smith, C., & Laslett, R. (1993). Effective classroom management: A teacher’s guide (2nd ed.). London: Routledge.
Smith, R. (2010). Rethinking teacher education: Teacher education in the knowledge age. Sydney, NSW: AACLM Press.
In the case of multiple works by the same author in different years, they should be chronologically ordered (earliest to latest).
-
Example:
Husserl, E. (1973). Zur Phänomenologie der Intersubjektivität. Texte aus dem Nachlass. Dritter Teil. 1929-35 (Hua XV). Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff.
Husserl, E. (1984). Logische Untersuchungen. Zweiter Teil. Untersuchungen zur Phänomenologie und Theorie der Erkenntnis (Hua XIX). Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff.
When referencing the same author’s works with the same year of publication, they are alphabetically ordered according to the titles. In order to distinguish them one from another, place lowercase letters (“a”, “b”, “c”, etc.) immediately after the year.
-
Example:
Lefort, C. (1978a). Les formes de l’Histoire. Paris: Gallimard.
Lefort, C. (1978b). Sur une colonne absente. Paris: Gallimard.
All references are not labeled with numbers in the Reference List, they should have a hanging indent. That is, all lines of a reference subsequent to the first line should be indented.
General guidelines for formatting Reference Lists for all kinds of publications according to the APA 6th style can be found on the website of the American Psychological Association. We also invite our authors to consult the detailed guide to the bibliographic standard, when formatting the Reference List.
General rules for the References
Books
A single author:
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Poser, H. (2005). Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz zur Einführung. Hamburg: Junius Publ.
Several authors:
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Gallagher, Sh., & Zahavi, D. (2008). The Phenomenological Mind. An Introduction to Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science. London, New York: Routledge.
Book chapter:
-
Zahavi, D. (2010). Naturalizing Phenomenology. In D. Shmicking & Sh. Gallagher (Eds.), Handbook of Phenomenology and Cognitive Sciences (3-19). USA: Springer.
Collection or a handbook:
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Welton, D. (Ed.). (1999). The Essential Husserl. Basic writings in Transcendental Phenomenology. USA: Indiana University Press.
Journal article
One author:
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Lee, Nam-In. (2006). Problems of Intersubjectivity in Husserl and Buber. Husserl Studies, 22, 137–160.
Two or more authors:
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Lefort, C., & Gauchet, M. (1971). Sur la démocratie. Le politique et l’institution du social. Textures, 2 (3), 7-78.
Stern, D. N., Sander, L.W., Nahum, J.P., Harrison, A.M., Lyons-Ruth, K., Morgan, A.C., ... Tronick, E. Z. (1998). Non-Interpretative mechanisms of psychoanalytic therapy. The “Something more” than Interpretation. The Process of Change Study Group. International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 79 (5), 903-921.
An article with a DOI (Digital Object Identifier):
-
De Vignemont, F. (2011). A Self for the Body. Metaphilosophy, 42, 230–247. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9973.2011.01688.x
A DOI is a unique, permanent identifier assigned to articles in many databases.
Webpage
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MacDonald, P. (2007). Husserl, the Monad and Immortality. Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology, 7, 1-18. Retrieved from http://www.ipjp.org/index.php?option=com_jdownloads&Itemid=318&view=finish&cid=119&catid=31&m=0
Newspaper article
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Bagnall, D. (1998, January 27). Private schools: Why they are out in front. The Bulletin, 12-15.
Book review
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Marson, S. M. (2009). How big should we be? A Herculean task accomplished [Review of the book Human body size and the laws of scaling: Physiological, performance, growth, longevity and ecological ramification, by T. Samaras]. Public Health Nutrition, 12, 1299–1300. doi:10.1017/S1368980009990656
Conference proceedings
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Edge, M. (1996). Lifetime prediction: Fact or fancy? In M. S. Koch, T. Padfield, J. S. Johnsen, & U. B. Kejser (Eds.), Proceedings of the Conference on Research Techniques in Photographic Conservation (97-100). Copenhagen, Denmark: Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts.
When formatting an article, it is recommended to consult the last issue of the journal for guidance.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
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