Notes

Appendix - B
The way I think about introductions (which is not to say they are GOOD introductions) is that they tell the story of the paper in brief. Every paper has a story to tell, starting with
• Here's a fascinating question
• Here's what people have tried to do (in brief: not a full related work section, but a high level assessment)
• here's the key challenge preventing further progress
• Voila: here's our complete/partial/intermediate/awesome solution
• (additionally) and here's how it works.
The intro is typically the "hook" to read the rest of the paper, so you have to provide a birds-eye view that draws the reader in without drowning them in details.
The thing that separates a good intro from a bad one is knowing where that right level of detail is, so you're not either totally vacuous or mired in details. Getting this right is an art and depends on your field, your results, the problem, and your understanding of the target audience.



These are general phases associated with writing an introduction:

1. Establish an area to research by:
• Highlighting the importance of the topic, and/or
• Making general statements about the topic, and/or
• Presenting an overview on current research on the subject.
2. Identify a research niche by:
• Opposing an existing assumption, and/or
• Revealing a gap in existing research, and/or
• Formulating a research question or problem, and/or
• Continuing a disciplinary tradition.
3. Place your research within the research niche by:
• Stating the intent of your study,
• Outlining the key characteristics of your study,
• Describing important results, and
• Giving a brief overview of the structure of the paper.