Академический Документы
Профессиональный Документы
Культура Документы
Academic writing can be one of the hardest things to perfect in English. This advanced skill
requires perfect grammar, pin-point vocabulary usage and a deep understanding of the subject
you are writing about. What it also requires is a very specific register (level of formality) which
can be difficult to get right for non-native English speakers (and quite a few native speakers as
well!).
One way you can improve and transform your academic English writing is by learning some
useful collocations which will make you sound self-assured, knowledgeable and bring just the
right level of formality to your dissertation or thesis.
This guide will give you 50 of the most useful academic collocations as well as definitions and
some examples taken from genuine academic papers.
Study tip: Practice writing out your own sentences using each of the collocations listed here.
Does the structure make sense grammatically? Do you understand the concept? Check your
sentence against the example sentence for each collocation.
E.g. “Accurate assessment of head motion can be a useful tool in clinical studies”.
E.g. “To help address this issue, we have extended our previous study and examined in detail
the…”.
E.g. “They become apparent, however, when a new molecular species is introduced into the
atmosphere...”.
E.g. “This paper offers a brief but broad overview of the field of individual of language
learning”.
E.g. “The colour produced from this reaction is stable and increases in a proportional fashion
over a broad range of increasing protein concentrations”.
E.g. “A causal link between high need for achievement and small business ownership is not
found”.
E.g. “This book describes efforts to develop an approach to teaching and teacher education that
is deeply rooted in the study of practice”.
E.g. “The major difference between my book and others at this level is its coverage of the
detailed analysis of experiments”.
E.g. “We show here that these proteins are an essential component of the cell surface receptor”.
E.g. “Our aim was to establish the relationship between aortic stiffness and stroke death in
hypertensive patients”.
14. First impression - initial thought on a subject, prior to any detailed analysis
E.g. “Our first impression was strengthened by the fact that we were aware a condition existed
in Povoa de Varzim”.
E.g. “It should be recognized that other systems are frequently cited, particularly in engineering
literature”.
16. Fundamental principle - principle from which other principles can be derived
E.g. “The authors argue for the restoration of beneficence to its place as the fundamental
principle of medical ethics”.
E.g. “There is a general consensus that forward exchange rates have little, if any power as
forecasts of future spot exchange rates”.
19. Hierarchical structure - a system where elements are subordinate to other elements
E.g. “After reviewing their theoretical approach, the authors present four kinds of hierarchical
structure in music”.
E.g. “The reasons for this are not immediately apparent and deserve further investigation”.
E.g. “Numerous high school students engage in behaviours that increase their likelihood of
death from these four causes”.
E.g. “Provisional restorations represent a key element in the realization of extensive esthetic
rehabilitations”.
24. Largely confined - focussed in a particular area
E.g. “The metabolic syndrome is largely confined to overweight and obese adults”.
E.g. “In Experiment 2, targets were phrases that could be given either an idiomatic or a literal
interpretation”.
E.g. “Keeping up with the population increase is a major challenge for urban areas”.
E.g. “The spectrum of pyridine coordinately bonded to the surface is markedly different from
that of the pyridinium ion”.
E.g. “The label placebo was avoided because of its negative connotation”.
E.g. “This study reveals what those practices are and may offer insight for how
E.g. “This paper models the inner workings of relationship lending, the implications for bank
organisational structure, and the effects of shocks to the economic environment on the
availability of relationship credit to small businesses”.
E.g. “The first chapter, a review of some of the principal social surveys carried out in the last
half-century or so, with particular emphasis on British experience, has been entirely rewritten”.
33. Perceived importance - the opinion that something is particularly important or relevant
E.g. “We examined whether employees' perceived importance of the training program would be
one variable that mediates the relationship between training assignment and training
motivation”.
34. Pioneering work - work which explores previously uncharted territory
E.g. “The great chemical diversity is a positive feature in that it indicates the likelihood that a
variety of approaches can be made to prevention”.
E.g. “Current methods for generating qualitatively different plans are either based on simple
randomisation of planning decisions”.
E.g. “Qualitative and quantitative studies were performed on pulmonary blood vessels in lung
tissue obtained by biopsy, pneumonectomy, or autopsy”.
E.g. “At the same time, it also raises the question of whether a single reform can meet the very
different objectives of different supporters”.
E.g. “A consensus conference was organized to evaluate the data and reach a consensus on
optimal treatment protocols”.
E.g. “The aim of the present study is to examine the reciprocal relationship between parental
attachment and adolescent internalising and externalising problem behaviour”.
E.g. “Again, even though the results seem plausible, they are hard to interpret in the absence of
a theory”.
E.g. “The specific examples used are shown to have a substantial biasing effect on diagnostic
accuracy”.
E.g. “A typical example would be the design of a trial to evaluate the benefits of specialist stroke
units”.
E.g. “The idea of a biological root to human nature was almost universally accepted at the turn
of the century”.
E.g. “Although CNS depression and analgesia are well documented effects of the cannabinoids,
the mechanisms responsible for these and other cannabinoid-induced effects are so far known”