Abstract Art

Because it is one of the most commonly used and most influential factors in professional use today, writing abstracts is an important skill for all health education and promotion specialists. Abstracts are powerful 150to 250-word “short stories” that are used as part of complete articles, grant proposals, conference presentations (papers and posters), theses, and dissertations. Ironically, the abstract is often one of the most neglected activities of the manuscript or grant preparation process. It frequently ends up as that one last task to do before sending the work to some evaluator or reader. It is often written as an “afterthought.” This is unfortunate as the abstract, according to the American Psychological Association’s (APA) publication manual, “. . . can be the most important single paragraph in an article” (APA, 2009, p. 26). A single abstract, as a stand-alone response to a submission for a paper presentation or part of a full manuscript, may go through several review processes (to editor, to peer reviewers, back to editor, to copy editor, to publication) and publication’s many phases, including preonline, final hard copy, indexing, and so on. Given the ubiquity and power of these “short stories,” we are pleased to offer this Tool of the Trade article on the art and science of writing effective abstracts. Our goal is to describe, differentiate, and detail the components of an abstract, explain the various uses of the abstract in the health education field, and identify the “make or break” nuances involved in strategically crafting an abstract. The hope is by reading this tool closely, you will be writing better abstracts in no time. Abstract Art: How to Write Competitive Conference and Journal Abstracts