On Scientific Writing in the Information Era: Tailoring Papers for Internet Searching and Other 21st Century Realities

Objective: There are many domains of scientific expertise that are seldom documented. It is the objective of this paper to provide more advanced guidance on scientific writing for those who are already familiar with the basic elements of American Psychological Association (APA) style. This paper also discusses the impact of the information revolution on the consumption of scientific knowledge and makes recommendations for adapting scientific writing in light of the dominance of search engines and Internet publication. Approach: Communication strategies are presented for each section of an APA paper. Recommendations include: recognizing the importance of the abstract and searchable keywords; recognizing that many readers will be skimming papers for specific information and making better use of the formal structure of scientific papers to communicate to “skimmers”; recognizing that technology has reduced obstacles to incorporating tables and figures; and making more use of nontextual presentation of data. Conclusion: Scientific communication is changing rapidly, and we must do more to help researchers attain science communication skills as quickly as possible.