How to Write Brilliant Psychology Essays. Paul Dickerson
of how tough the whole essay will be and it is often best to come back to the introduction after we have written at least some of the main body of our essay – the sections in between the introduction and conclusion.
This chapter is the first of seven which will examine the actual words of your essay. These chapters aim to clearly demonstrate how you can write an evaluative, smoothly interconnected, crisply written, relevant, well-referenced essay, with a strong conclusion and, as detailed here, an effective introduction. One snag with ‘how to’ writing is that it varies enormously – recipes, flat-pack furniture instructions, Google travel advice and YouTube tutorials on how to make a rocket that can go into space are all part of the extremely broad ‘how to’ family. This chapter attempts to show as well as tell what bad and good writing looks like and to identify some of the steps that can help you to improve your work. It is not quite as step by step as most recipes are, and there are fewer left-over screws than when following most flat-pack furniture instructions, but if you do your bit, practising the suggestions and applying the ideas, I think you will notice a change that you yourself will have brought about.
In this chapter, and those that follow, there are many examples of academic writing. In some cases, these are followed by responses that a reader or marker might have made to the writing. To aid clarity these responses are indicated in italics.
In this chapter you will learn…
What is special about introductions for student academic essays
What introductions are and why they matter
How to write a brilliant introduction – step by step
How to write introductions like a reader
How to make sense of feedback concerning introductions
The special case of student academic essays
Academics often make the mistake of treating good academic writing as synonymous with good writing. There is much that is common across different forms of writing, especially if we narrow down to non-fiction writing. But it can be helpful to be aware of the special case of academic essay writing. A well-written newspaper article and an opening statement in an academic debate may share some similarities with a well-written student academic essay, but you will notice differences. We can think about the different audiences that they are addressing and the different formats they take. Crucially, though, they each do a different job. Until we get a really sharp, clear sense of the specific thing a good essay should do, we are quite likely to misfire, producing essays that, from the first paragraph, look journalistic or opinionated when what we are really aiming for is scholarly.
Newspaper article – The first paragraph is shaped around a title and byline (or strap line), which is usually composed by the journalist and will summarise the key points – the who, what, where, why and how questions – relating to the article. It needs to both present a summary and hook the reader so that they will want to read more. A good introduction to an academic essay can be similar – in that it indicates the key issues that the essay will address. However, the academic essay is typically more formal in tone and focuses on clearly showing the reader the ideas and debates at the heart of the issues identified in the essay title.
An opening statement in a debate – In order to be effective, an opening statement in a debate will identify some of the questions and issues that will be addressed in the subsequent debate. Furthermore, it will demonstrate an awareness that the motion being considered can be seen from different perspectives. Both of these features – identifying key issues and awareness of different perspectives – are present in good academic essay introductions. However, an academic essay does not declare a position and then marshal the evidence – it investigates the evidence and the issues and draws out the often subtle and complex implications.
Student academic essay – The first paragraph usually orientates to a title that the essay writer has not composed themselves. The essay has to demonstrate a scholarly understanding of the key issues relating directly to a given academic essay title. The first paragraph has to show an awareness of the relevance of the title and outline the sensible, well-reasoned, thoughtful approach that the essay adopts in addressing it.
The comparison above perhaps sets the scene that student academic essays are special – it is quite a niche type of writing, although the skills you learn in doing it are incredibly helpful. In particular, the careful planning and execution of an evidence-based argument can be very helpful, even if you never write an actual ‘academic essay’ again for the rest of your life. Being able to write in that way means that you can think, talk and read in that way, bringing a critical, evaluative eye to evidence, half-truths and mis-truths, a skill that has perhaps never been more important than now.
What am I doing and for whom?
It is perhaps worth reflecting on a couple of these issues in a little more detail – specifically, what level of knowledge should be assumed on the part of your reader, and what, actually, does an ‘introduction’ do?
The knowledge that should be assumed on the part of the reader of your essay is a tricky one. On the one hand, you have probably been told the importance of defining your terms clearly, which suggests a limited reader knowledge. On the other hand, your principal reader is likely to be someone who has taught you psychology, or at the very least has studied it at postgraduate level. First, a caveat – do take into account the guidance on this that you may receive from your course or module tutor(s). Different essays are designed to test different things, so make use of the on-hand, proximal advice. With that in mind, a useful, if slightly cryptic, rule of thumb is to assume that your reader has sufficient knowledge to ask the question that is set in the essay title and that they require a display of knowledge that is relevant to that title. Your essay title should – normally – set the parameters of your essay and different titles do suggest different levels of reader (or essay title-setter) knowledge. This issue is addressed in detail in Chapter 4, where the focus is on how to genuinely address the essay title. For now, we can note that the title itself gives a sense of the parameters for framing our essay in the introduction.
If our essay title refers to the multistore model of memory, then we will want our essay, from the introduction, to convey a scholarly understanding of that model, an understanding that is in the service of the essay, which forms a part of that essay rather than a dictionary definition, an encyclopaedia of psychology or Wikipedia entry. From the very beginning of our essay the reader should get a clear sense of why they are being told what they are being told. The reader should never ask, ‘why is this term being defined?’, ‘why is this being described?’ or ‘why is this perspective being referred to?’. The introduction, which outlines how your essay will address the title, conveys that rationale, so your reader does not need to ask all of those ‘why’ questions. Implicitly (‘This essay will first address…’) or explicitly (‘In order to better evaluate the strengths of …, the essay will first address …’), the introduction presents your rationale for what your essay covers. Your introduction can get your reader off to the best possible start in your essay by enabling them to get a sense of your scholarly mind at work.
Ace your assignment What is being introduced to whom?
Although we all talk about introductions, we rarely stop and think about these links, connectors, bridges and the slightly amazing work that they do. In your essay, your introduction does – or can do – something almost magical. It connects the body of your essay with your reader. Wow! That is such an important role. With a strong introduction, your reader will be ready to step into your essay, see your rationale and know where you are taking them. Without an effective introduction, your reader will feel frustrated, possibly