For EMBA/EDBA (Executive Master of Business Administration/PhD) graduate students at University Montpellier III, completing a graduation thesis is an important part of their studies. Even if you cannot complete an excellent paper, you should at least complete a standard paper. How does
achieve "standardization"?
will take you to find out today.
1. The cover and title of the paper
Remember: The cover of the paper absolutely does not allow any errors, even a punctuation mark.
There must be no mistakes in the title of the paper and the translation of the title, even if it is a capital case. Any mistakes on the paper cover are unforgivable.
A paper has tens of thousands of words, but even if there are a few typos, experts and teachers can understand it. But if there are obvious mistakes on the cover of the paper, it is really unforgivable and can only prove that it is a problem with the student's attitude. Even experts and teachers can understand if the student's level is a little low, but if there is a problem with the attitude, it will be unforgivable. You may be taken down during the defense. You must pay attention to this.
[Case]
Past experience has revealed that the most common English translation error in the cover title is the company name.
If you look at this question, the first letter of the last English word is not capitalized. In the English translation of the thesis title, the first letter of every word, except adverbs and prepositions, should be capitalized. This first letter is not capitalized. So, your company is a limited liability company, should you use the word company? Company is a general term, and most branches are generally limited liability companies, Co. Ltd., but many of our graduate students directly translate company into company. This kind of mistake should not be made.
2. Abstract and keywords
The abstract is an expansion of the title. The title of the paper is expanded into the abstract, and the abstract is expanded into the entire paper.
The abstract is the abbreviation of the full text of the paper. It should reflect all the content of the entire paper, so it should be concise, comprehensive, accurate and comprehensive. Make the paper smaller so that readers will know what the paper is about after reading the abstract.
Moreover, paper review experts usually look at the cover and title first, and then the abstract. You must read the abstract carefully and only then read the paper.
Sometimes I read papers quickly, and I don’t necessarily read them word for word, but I must read the abstract carefully. If there are obvious errors in the abstract of the paper, and the review experts will get a bad impression from the beginning, it will be more troublesome. It will be difficult to get good grades, and there may be a risk of failing the defense.
Therefore, the abstract needs to be concise and comprehensive, accurately and comprehensively reflecting the overall situation of the paper.
Generally speaking, the abstract is written after the full text is finalized, that is, the article is completely finalized, the content is complete, and the conclusions are drawn, and then the abstract is written in a condensed manner.
The abstract should not only tell the background and significance of the research, but also the research questions, the research theory, methods, and tools, and finally the plan for the research conclusion to fully reflect the situation of the paper.
There must be no text or punctuation errors in the abstract, nor any detail errors; there should be no charts, lengthy mathematical formulas, and non-public symbols and abbreviations. Generally, 500-800 words are appropriate.
There is an English abstract after the Chinese abstract. The translation quality of the English abstract is crucial. It must not be translated directly by machine. It must be checked by yourself, and it must not be written in "Chinglish".
Keywords should be given after the abstract. What does the
keyword mean? That is, if others want to search for your article, they can search it with just a few keywords. Therefore, the core concepts and high-frequency words in the paper are generally used to reflect the research content, methods used, and conclusions drawn. Uncommon words and English abbreviations should be avoided.
3. Labels, titles and punctuation
Labels and titles in papers must be standardized.
The general paper is like this:
Title: "1"
The second level title "1.1"
The third level title "1.1.1"
Some papers are:
Title: 1.
Sub-title: (1)
Third-level title: 1.
Fourth-level title: (1)
Which labeling system is used when writing a paper, then the title of the paper must be based on this labeling. There can be no chaos.
So, what does the title mean?
What is the relationship between the main title, subtitle and the title of the paper?
Remember, the relationship is decomposed layer by layer!
Several major titles in the paper are the decomposition of the paper title. Take out any big title, and the following sub-headings are the decomposition of this big title. Finally, it is decomposed layer by layer to form a system, with text and diagrams added to prove it.
Therefore, the content of the paper title should reflect the author’s layer-by-layer decomposition of the topic.
Note that the name of the subtitle cannot be the same as the name of the upper level title, otherwise it will not have a decomposition relationship.
The title should not be too long and should be a single sentence within 20 words.
There should be no punctuation marks in the middle or after the title. There is no need to put a comma in the middle of the title, and then a sentence after it; or a period after the title, it is not necessary. Titles generally do not require punctuation.
In addition, there are some contents in the article that need to be divided into hierarchies: first,...; secondly,...; thirdly,...; then you need to use "1, 2, 3, 4" to hierarchize and add numbers. For example,
has reached 5.2.2. It would be too troublesome for you to build 5.2.2.1 in this place. There are too many levels. Generally, it is enough to reach the third level. If there are more, just use "①" or "1." will do.
Another thing to note is that if a title, no matter which level the title is, has only one sentence below it, it means that the title is not needed, so just delete it, or merge it and use a small title. .
4. Documentation and annotation
Documentation and annotation are more of a matter of format. References and citations are in accordance with academic standards.
All figures and tables must be labeled with accurate and verifiable sources.
You can see the picture for the standard format of references and the types of general documents.
Document type identification:
J - Journal article
M - Monograph
N - Newspaper article
C - Proceedings
D - Dissertation
R - Report
S - standard
P - patent
A - extracted documents
DB (database), CP (program), EB (electronic bulletin) - electronic documents
Z - other undefined types of documents
Please note that there cannot be any in the document mistake.
Don't underestimate this small point, every point is necessary, and missing this point is a mistake. If you are always missing a dot, a parenthesis, or something, if you need to mark the address, you will not mark the address, and if you need to mark the page number, you will not mark the page number. When it comes to your graduation defense, let the expert teacher look at it, you still have a chance. Not passed.
Reference examples:
[1] Liu Guojun, Chen Shaoye, Library Catalog [M]. Beijing: Higher Education Press, 1957:15-18.
[2] Zhang Zhusheng. Invariant Sets of Differential Semidynamic Systems [D] 】.Beijing: Institute of Mathematics, Department of Mathematics, Peking University, 1983
【3】He Ling Repair. Read Gu Cheng's "History of the Southern Ming Dynasty" [J]. Chinese History Research, 1998, (3): 167-173
[4] Zhao Wei. Operations Research Theory and Application - Proceedings of the Fifth Congress of the Chinese Operations Research Society [C 】.Xi'an: Xi'an University of Electronic Science and Technology Press, 1996:468-471
So everyone must know that the process of writing a paper is actually to help everyone improve their abilities. To a certain extent, when making references, it improves your ability to work carefully and allows you to master some academic norms.
What is the general number of documents? Generally, excellent master's thesis has an average of more than 20 Chinese references and more than 6 English references; doctoral dissertations generally have between 60-100 references, with at least 60 references. Both Chinese and English literature must be available.
Charts must also be noted. All charts must be labeled with the source of the information. Which book is this picture based on, and which website is this table based on. For example, based on the website of the National Bureau of Statistics, you need to mark the website address and the source of each chart. These are academic standards.
