Can I Use Pronouns in a Research Paper

If you are reading this article, you probably have something to do with preparing a research paper. Luckily, here you may find answers to the most frequent questions by students. It is no wonder that students want to find more details about how to prepare a research paper because this task may determine his or her academic performance.

A research paper requires lots of time to make it of the high quality. Structure, outline, references, the investigation process and lots of other stages of this work need precision and painstaking attention. One of such components is the word choice. It may determine a lot in your content. If you make lots of mistakes in the word choice, the paper will sound either ungrammatical or subjective.

The objective of the research paper is to show the writer’s ability to analyze critically using the arguments to prove the thesis statement. If the author relies too much on personal opinion, the entire will be subjective. However, even when using relevant arguments and examples, one may make mistakes in the word choice spoiling the content.

In this article, we are going to focus on the usage of pronouns in the research papers because lots of students ask: “Can you use pronouns in research papers?” Today we will clarify all the subtleties related to this question. We guarantee that after reading this article, you may not have more questions like that.

What is a pronoun in a research paper?

Before we get to the stage of using the pronoun in the research paper, it is vital to clarify the meaning and linguistic value of this part of speech.

A pronoun is an independent part of speech that summarizes the subject, sign, number, but does not name them. Consequently, from all parts of the speech, the pronoun is distinguished by way of representation (indication). In the speech, this notion duplicates nouns, adjectives, numerals. Relating to the named classes of words, the pronoun has its own semantic features and syntactic functions.

The specifics of the semantics of pronouns is the mediation of their lexical meaning, that is, they are only filled with specific content in the field of speech. In the view of this, pronouns are used only in the appropriate context, due to the specific situation that allows them to determine the scope of their values. The attachment of pronouns to the situational objective of speech determines their main functional purpose: text-editing. It means that pronouns can replace names of objects, sentences, even whole sentences and act as means of deployment and establish content links in the text.

For example, This city is amazing. It looks like a real paradise.

In this way, pronouns contribute to the reduction of the elements of the text, the condensation of the utterance. It helps the language to sound more harmoniously and dispose of tautology.

Can you use pronouns in a research paper?

When talking about pronouns in the research paper, it is significant to identify which class of them we mean.

Academic writers often ask whether personal pronouns can be used in any type of academic piece of writing. However, we want to say that the answer to the question “Can you use personal pronouns in research papers” is not definite. It means that you may say both “Yes” and “No.” Everything depends on the situation in most cases. And before you started to panic, we recommend going with us to the next tips. They will clarify everything. It is how you will learn when you may use the personal pronoun in the research paper so that it doesn’t sound subjective.

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Example of first-person pronouns

It is no wonder that people don’t know whether it is right to use personal pronouns because until the 1920s writing it is possible to find those words in academic texts. After that time the academic community started to use both passive-voice constructions and the third person more often to make the writing sound more scientifically. However, during the recent years, the use of active voice and in some cases the first person narration stated to be become more incorporated in writing.

Can research papers have personal pronouns

There are still several strict rules which limit the usage of the pronouns “I” and “We.” For instance, the first person pronouns can be used in the beginning: abstract, introductory part, discussions, and concluding sections of a research paper. The third person narration is more likely to appear in the main body with decided theoretical and practical parts, methodology description and the calculated results.

Rules when it is correct to use pronouns

1. The writers clarify the meaning of the sentence by avoiding the use of passive voice.
2. The writer establishes the credibility of the source.
3. The author shows the interest in the issue which is under investigation.
4. The writer wants to create a personal connection with the target audience.
5. The author uses anecdotes to refer to the everyday life situations as an argument to prove the idea, show the personal involvement, encourage the reader to think about real-life cases and picture up certain personal perspectives relates to the subject of discussion in the academic paper.
6. The writer was to put an emphasis on the exact perspective during the analysis of literature.
7. The author creates a friendly tone for the conversation, although it is used not often in the academic papers.

Rules when it is incorrect to use pronouns

1. The writer puts overwhelming and continuous emphasis on the subjective opinion instead of making the text object.
2. The author has a desire to use objective ideas to minimize the possible bias in what you discuss and analyze.
3. Using the personal pronouns will be perceived as your opinion while it should be clear that the idea is borrowed and should be cited instead.

Tips for using pronouns in the research paper

Try using less personal pronouns because it shows the reader that the paper is not analyzed properly but is based only on one’s thoughts. Pay attention to the way you begin the paper because if you state “I think” this deprives your sentences the unbiased message. If you want to preserve a serious tone, try to avoid using “I,” “We,” “You”.

Be attentive when you use the pronoun “We.” It shouldn’t refer to us as the writer and the readers because that text should preserve the objective tone. Sometimes readers may get confused because of such addressing them. Therefore, this pronoun should refer only to the certain group of authors, scientists that you were working together or share similar ideas. The readers shouldn’t be involved in the research paper because they didn’t take part in formulating the hypothesis and conducting the research at all. You never know their opinion and what they might think about the topic of discussion.

Although the purpose of the writing is to convince the reader of the thesis statement that you’ve used, the ideas presented should be the core of your argumentative persuasion. If you use the pronoun “We” you may clarify who is meant. For instance, “As academic researchers, we consider the following question to be irrelevant.” In this case, you show clearly who is meant in this pronoun.

The second person “You” is not acceptable in the academic writing because you can’t refer to the reader that directly.

Think about the tone and voice of your research paper. If you deviate from the standards, this may mean your lack of knowledge or ability to the writer as a researcher.