Writing My First Paper: Links to useful articles

I have recently begun to take steps down the long and winding road to publishing research from my Msc Dissertation. To help make my journey easier and in an attempt to prevent myself from 'lost', I conducted a quick search for articles/chapters on writing publishing work. I was so pleased with what I found, that I decided share links to them in the hope that they could be of benefit to others. Some of them repeat the same advice but for me this just adds to their credibility. Oh yeah, and most of them can be accessed for free!

 If anyone has any tips or advice, or useful papers they wouldn't mind sharing I'd like to hear about them. 

As always, thanks for reading! 

Mike

So here is the list:

From Qualitative Dissertations to Quality Articles: this a paper talks about the authors experiences of turning their Dissertation into Published papers.   This is not a technical paper but reading about someone else's experiences helped me feel more prepared and it was full of good advice. The paper outlines seven lessons the author learned: 1) a summary of dissertation won't do, 2) why a thick description of findings is needed, 3) the advantages of collaboration, 4) the necessity of adhering to guidelines, 5) the need to revise and resubmit is quite common. In particular, the advice on a paper not being a summary of a dissertation, but it is better to be written based one research aim, but it is also important to remember quality over quantity!

Bowen, G.A. (2010). From Qualitative Dissertation to Quality Articles: Seven Lessons Learned. The Qualitative Report, 15 (4) pp. 864- 879.

Available online from:

http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CDcQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nova.edu%2Fssss%2FQR%2FQR15-4%2Fbowen.pdf&ei=Zc4nUeOIHeag0QXljIH4CQ&usg=AFQjCNH90ZzpoGeLYvxjs5UMGTUhwEs5Rw&bvm=bv.42768644,d.d2k

Qualitative research articles: guidelines, suggestions and needs: Provides advice on common mistakes to avoid and some practical solutions to them.  It also discusses the difference between Qualitative and Quantitative research and that therefore the criteria for validity and resolvability should also be different. Yardley (2000) provides a bit more detailed overview of this if anyone is interested. 

This can be accessed online from:

http://www.h2mw.eu/redactionmedicale/2011/07/Qualitative%20research%20guidelines_Aout%2009_0860210505.pdf

Crescentini, A. and Mainardi, G. (2009). Qualitative research Articles: guidelines, suggestions and needs. Journal of Workplace Learning, 21 (5), pp. 431- 439. 

Yardely, L. (2000). ‘Dillemmas in qualitative health research. Psychology and Health, 15 pp. 215-28.

How to write publishable Qualitative Research: This was a book chapter I obtained from a quick Google search. Whilst not a published article, it was by far one of the best paper's I read - it was full of useful bits of advice. The common reasons why articles get rejected was particularly useful.  This chapter also contained practical advice on writing an article, criteria for evaluating articles. Overall, it well worth a read. 

It can be obtained from:

http://www.parint.org/isajewebsite/bookimages/isaje_2nd_edition_chapter6.pdf

Starting to publish academic research as a doctoral student: this is useful as it is targeted at graduate students. It discusses the different types of articles that can be written including those based on theoretical perspectives and literature reviews. Uniquely it also discusses other ways to develop academic writing and publications, such as writing paper and book reviews. It was very useful for considering how I could develop a wider scope in my academic writing and publications -  I would add Blogging to the list

!

Stoilescu, D. and Mc Dougall, D. (2010). Starting to Publish Academic Research as a Doctoral Student. The international Journal of Doctoral Studies, 5 pp. 78-92. 

Available online at:

http://ijds.org/Volume5/IJDSv5p079-092Stoilescu299.pdf

Writing your first article: what editors really want: talks about all the stages involved in publishing, and for me this was particularly valuable because I have little experience with the publishing process. Whilst this is written for a particular journal, the advice provided could be taken further. 

Fields, A.J. (2009) Writing your first article: what the publisher's really want. New Zealand Library and Information Management Journal. 

Available online here:

http://conferences.alia.org.au/libtec2009/Documents%20for%20Links/FieldsALIA09.pdf

The Do's and Dont's of Journal Writing:  This paper also discusses some of the common reasons why articles do not get published, with a different section for Qualitative and Quantitative researches - this paper focuses on the difference between a PhD thesis and a journal article. Whilst it is written as a guideline for Journal of Workplace Learning the authors say the advice might  be relevant for publishing in other journals. 

Kekale, T., Weerd - Nederhof, P. Cervai, S. and Borelli, M. (2009). The Do's and Dont's of writing a journal article. Journal of Workplace Learning, 21 (1) pp. 71- 80.