1 Basic rules of writing 写作基础 1
Brevity 2
Logic and clarity 2
Clean typing 3
2 Comments on scientific language 科技语言的使用 4
English as a foreign language 5
Follow the “ leitmotif” 7
Verbosity 8
He/she 9
Active or passive voice 10
Tense 12
Noun clusters and modifiers 13
Prevalence and incidence 14
Avoid the use of “ respectively” 15
The “and/or” construction 15
Unnecessary hedging 16
How old is young？ 16
Avoid synonyms to achieve elegant variation 18
The remote verb 18
3 Drafting the manuscript 草稿 20
Write down your thoughts as they arise 21
Where and when to write？ 21
The other way around 23
Handwriting or word processing？ 24
4 Choosing a journal 选择发表的杂志 25
Instructions to authors 27
5 Preparing a graph 准备图表 28
The line graph 28
The chart 32
Before submission 49
6 Drawings 绘图 50
7 Figure legends 图例 53
8 How to design tables 设计表格 55
The descriptive title 55
The declarative title 56
Rounding off 57
Table or graph？ 58
9 Title 标题 62
Whenever possible， use a declarative rather than a neutral title 62
Titles ending with a question mark 64
Begin with the keywords 64
Use verbs instead of abstract nouns 65
Avoid abbreviations in the title 65
A title for your thesis 66
Running title 67
10 Authors 作者 69
Guidelines on authorship 69
The contributors list 71
A question of coauthorship 73
11 Abstract 摘要 75
The conventional abstract 76
The structured abstract 76
12 Introduction 前言 79
13 Methods 方 法 82
The subjects 83
Informed consent 84
Omissions in reporting of randomized controlled trials 85
14 Results 结果 89
Participant flow and follow-up 89
Study outcome 94
15 Discussion 讨论 96
Evaluate the results -not the authors 100
Avoid claiming priority 100
The reference-13 trick 101
16 Acknowledgments 致谢 103
Always give credit for financial support 104
17 References 参考文献 106
Vancouver versus Harvard style？ 107
Accuracy of references and quotations 112
Your own author name 114
Chinese names 114
Anonymous 115
Record titles in the language of publication 117
Names of journals 118
How to refer to World Wide Web 118
18 Ph.D.and other doctoral theses 博士学位论文 120
Compilations： the theses of the future 121
Contributors 122
Thesis at a glance 124
General introduction 124
Aims 125
Methods and results 126
General discussion 127
Acknowledgments 128
Cover illustration 129
A fresh look 130
The structure of the thesis overview 131
19 Letters and case reports 快报及事例报告 134
The thalidomide letter 134
Transforming a paper into a letter 136
Case reports 136
20 Numbers 数字 140
Two numbers side by side 141
Decimal point 142
Thousands 142
Numbers with several zeros 142
Quotients of units 143
Percentages 144
Rounding to two significant digits 145
Enumeration 146
What do we mean by“ often”？ 146
21 Abbreviations 缩写词 147
Units of measure 148
General principles 149
22 How to present statistical results 呈现统计结果 151
Using mean when median is meant 152
Using standard error instead of standard deviation 153
Failure to distinguish between statistical significance and biological importance 153
Selected presentation of multiple statistical testing 154
Overinterpretation of subgroup effects 155
Using relative instead of absolute figures 156
Some further comments 157
23 Typing 打印 159
Do not mimic the journal’s style 169
The length of the manuscript 169
The importance of punctuation 170
24 Dealing with editors and referees 编辑与审稿人 172
Do referees delay？ 173
Unpublished work 174
Shortening the manuscript 175
Accepted or rejected 176
25 Correcting proofs 校对 178
How to read proof 178
What to correct 179
Correction marks 180
Electronic proof 181
26 Authors’ responsibilities 作者的职责 184
Subjects’ right to privacy 184
Duplicate submission 185
Borrowing published material 186
Saving your original data 190
Literature needed on your desk 193
On phraseology 193
On synonyms 193
On manuscript preparation 193
On how to abbreviate a journal’ s title 193
Further reading 进一步阅读 194
Guides to writing 194
Punctuation 195
The English language 195
Style manuals 195
Illustrations 195
Statistics 195
Literature cited 引用文献 196
Index 索引 203