Most Common Formal Grammatical Errors Committed by Authors

Abstract

Empirical evidence has been provided about the importance of avoiding American Psychological Association (APA) errors in the abstract, body, reference list, and table sections of empirical research articles. Specifically, authors are significantly more likely to have their manuscripts rejected for publication if they commit numerous APA violations-and, thus, do not write with discipline-in these sections. In addition to adhering to APA, writing with discipline also includes avoiding what I call formal grammatical errors. Thus, in this study, I analyzed formal grammatical errors committed in 117 manuscripts submitted to the journal Research in the Schools over a 6-year period. Among other results, I identified the 35 most common formal grammatical errors. The use of colloquial words/phrases (e.g., "the author did a good job") (76.1%) represented the most common grammatical error. Further, I identified a link between the number of grammatical errors and the subsequent disposition of a manuscript (i.e., accept vs. revise and resubmit vs. reject). Finally, I identified the formal grammatical errors that best predicted whether or not a manuscript was rejected by the editor. I contend that an efficient way for authors to learn how to write with discipline is to focus initially on these most common formal grammatical errors. Further, I contend that these errors provide useful starting points for persons who teach scholarly writing. Finally, authors of the APA Publication Manual might use this information to determine which grammatical rules and guidelines to emphasize.

Approaches and Strategies to Learn and Improve Writing APA Style

“…To deliver quality manuscript, grammatical errors, APA Style errors and citation errors are the error committed by authors mostly. It can be seen from recent studied (Onwuegbuzie, 2017;Mandernach, Zafonte and Taylor (2016). The inability to properly cite using APA format was noted in doctoral students as well.…”

“…Recent study by Onwuegbuzie (2017) he analyzed 117 sample submitted to journal repository of Research of the School (RITS) to find the most common grammatical APA errors committed. As a result, he identified 35 most frequent formal grammatical errors in the manuscripts.…”

The Applications of APA styles in African Academic publications: An Evidence from Bahir Dar Journal of Education

“…The third, recency of the references, refers to how many recently published articles were included into the reference list because scientific evidence indicates that a typical article with the acceptable standard should cite approximately 20-30 high-quality articles published in peer-reviewed journals (Masic, 2013). On the other hand, a poorly prepared article could approximately 12 times to be rejected by reviewers and examiners and leads to a question about the author's conscientiousness (Cash, 2009;Onwuegbuzie, 2017). When I begin with the lists of reference entries within the journal articles, missing corresponding references, poorly prepared writing styles and the use of digital object identifier (doi) were recognized as primarily important for quality articles.…”

“…BJE, as a peer-reviewed standardized journal of education, would publish highquality articles that could best meet all the basic criteria of up-to-date APA style. The frequent violation of the APA style within a given article can result in the rejection of the article even after the publication was issued (Onwuegbuzie, 2017). Therefore, in order to save the rejection of one or more of the BJE articles, it is worthwhile to uncover frequently committed errors that observed within the articles of BJE to enable the authors, the reviewer, and the editors conquer the unnoticed errors in instant accordingly.…”

“…A failure to acknowledge sources of citation properly cause plagiarisms, which can occur both intentionally and unintentionally, which less discouraged in developing countries (Balasubramanian, Bennett, & Pierce, 2017;Kauffman & Young, 2015). Particularly, academic plagiarism occurs extensively when the efforts to monitor a candidate reduced and opportunities to cheat increased (Etter, Cramer, & Finn, 2006;Lipson & Karthikeyan, 2016;Lucifora & Tonello, 2015;Onwuegbuzie, 2017). Hence, the lenience to stick strongly to APA style among the journal reviewers and editors can definitely cause the high level of plagiarism and improper use of APA style.…”