1. Improving Your Writing Style: Clarity
Designed by
Duke University’s
Writing Studio
This wprkshop is one on a series offered by the Writing Studio to interested students. Clarity is the overarching principle of an effective writing style. This workshop uses examples from scientific writing to illustrate how to write more clearly. The same principles apply to writing in the humanities and the social sciences.
STUDENT’S OWN WRITING SAMPLE FOR PRACTICE EXERCISE AT END 1

2. Clarity clear, direct, concise vs
unclear, indirect, wordy, confusing, abstract, dense, complex

3. The Three Principles of Clarity
Express your actions in verbs.
Choose subjects with character.
Put your verbs right after your subjects.
To help make the concept of “character” clear, you might use this example: Rather than saying “I had to work hard to understand this book,” say “This book is unclear.” Rather than saying “When I look at that light, my eyes hurt,” you might say “That light is too bright.” All verbs have subjects, but not every subject has character. You can achieve clarity much more easily if you avoid weak subjects. 3

4. Which is the clearer sentence?
A. “The cause of our schools’ failure at teaching basic skills is not understanding the influence of cultural background on learning.”
B. “Our schools have failed to teach basic skills because they do not understand how cultural backgrounds influence the way children learn.”
The second quote is clearer because of three things:
Have failed is an action verb.
The subject has character.
The verbs are right after the subjects.
“Schools” is a stronger subject than “cause.” 4

5. The Clearer Sentence
Sentence B.

6. Which is the clearest sentence?
A. “This number provides a comparative measure of the effect of unequal weights on the precision of estimates produced from the final survey respondents.”
B. “This number comparatively measures how unequal weights affect the precision of estimates produced from the final survey respondents.”
C. “This number compares the effect of unequal weights on the precision of estimates produced from respondents to the final survey.”

7. Which is the clearest sentence?
A. “This number provides a comparative measure of the effect of unequal weights on the precision of estimates produced from the final survey respondents.”
B. “This number comparatively measures how unequal weights affect the precision of estimates produced from the final survey respondents.”
C. “This number compares the effect of unequal weights on the precision of estimates produced from respondents to the final survey.”
Notice how all three sentences contain the same ending object.
The third sentence is the clearest because a clear action-verb directly follows the subject of the sentence. 7

8. The Clearest Sentence
Sentence C.

9. Why are sentences unclear?
Not usually because of technical terminology
Not usually because of sentence length
Not usually because of the complexity of the topic

10. Sentences are unclear when …
We have to think about them.
This is a very important concept for writing with clarity. A reader should not have to think about the meaning of a sentence. Most clear sentences should require no re-reading. 10

11. How many actions?
“This number provides a comparative measure of the effect of unequal weights on the precision of estimates produced from the final survey respondents.”

12. How many actions?
“This number provides a comparative measure of the effect of unequal weights on the precision of estimates produced from the final survey respondents.”
6 actions, 2 verbs
5 prepositions
In your writing, where possible, try to eliminate unnecessary actions and prepositions. 12

13. Action and Clarity All sentences express an action.
All sentences have verbs.
We expect sentences to express the action in the verb and not elsewhere.
Where the action is distributed in other parts of the sentence, we perceive that sentence as unclear.

14. How many actions?
“This component will chiefly involve a description and qualitative evaluation of the study data collection process.”

15. How many actions?
“This component will chiefly involve a description and qualitative evaluation of the study data collection process.”
17 words, 6 actions, 1 verb.
There is only one active verb in this sentence: involve. We could rewrite it with stronger verbs and have a more concise and clearer sentence. 15

16. Revision
This component involves describing and evaluating the study data collection process.
11 words, 3 actions, 1 verb
Note how much more concise and active this revision is. 16

17. When is an action not an action?
When it is a nominalization
Nominalizations are noun or adjective forms of verbs (nominalization is a nominalization of the verb to nominalize).

18. Which example is more concrete?
A. There was an affirmative decision for program expansion.
B. The Director decided to expand the program.

19. Which example is more concise?
A. A revision of the program will result in increases in our efficiency in the servicing of our customers.
B. If we revise the program, we can serve our customers more efficiently.

20. Which example is more understandable?
A. “Decisions (4) in regard to administration (5) of medication despite inability (2) of irrational patients appearing (1) in a Trauma Center to provide legal consent (3) rest with the attending physician alone.”
B. “When patients appear (1) in a Trauma Center and behave (2) so irrationally that they cannot legally consent (3) to treatment, only the attending physician can decide (4) whether to administer (5) medication.”
The sequence of actions in a sentence is key to making the sentence more understandable. In the second sentence, each subject noun from the first has been turned into an active verb. As was discussed earlier, this greatly contributes to the clarity of the sentence. 20

21. Which example has clearer logic?
A. “Our more effective presentation of our study resulted in our success, despite an earlier start by others.”
B. “Although others started earlier, we succeeded because we presented our study more effectively.”

22. Which example has clearer logic?
A. “Our more effective presentation of our study resulted in our success, despite an earlier start by others.”
B. “Although others started earlier, we succeeded because we presented our study more effectively.”

23. Grammar and Meaning Subject Verb ? Action
What is missing in the lower left-hand box? See below for the answer.
Character is missing. Talk about why you think character is important and what it contributes to your work. 23

24. The First Principle of Clarity
Express your actions in the verbs.

25. Clues to Revision Avoid excessive nominalization.
Avoid strings of prepositional phrases.
Avoid noun strings (e.g. “study data collection process”).

26. When We Need Nominalization
Science, for example, frequently nominalizes as it is about naming processes.
Many technical terms are nominalizations.
You can’t eliminate nominalization entirely, nor should you.

27. Is this sentence unclear?
“Most of the analysis in this area has already been done in the process of preparing this presentation.”

28. Is this better?
“We already performed most of the analysis as we prepared this presentation.”

29. What’s the difference?
“Most of the analysis in this area has already been done in the process of preparing this presentation.”
“We already performed most of the analysis as we prepared this presentation.”

30. Why Character Matters
The first sentence is about “Most of the analysis.”
The second sentence is about “We.”
If that is your intended meaning, the revision is acceptable.

31. The First Two Principles of Clarity
Express your actions in the verbs.
Put your main characters in the subject.

32. Character and Meaning Subject Verb Character Action
Here is the chart from earlier in the presentation, now with character included. As you view the following slides, try to relate this chart to what you learn. 32

33. Clear and Unclear Characters
People
Institutions
Events
Unclear
Abstractions
Processes

34. Why This Matters
“After her lecture, I spoke with Prof. Lakin regarding the possibility of a few of us from our program visiting her Center to discuss funding opportunities.”
Who is funding whom?
This example is abstract because it lacks a clear character as the subject of “to fund.” 34

35. An Abstract Character
“Therefore, the main comparisons desired consist of 5 specific a priori contrasts from a potential 33 contrasts that measure the main effects and interactions of the 2x3x2 factorial on the three response variables.”
This sentence is unclear because it uses an abstraction (“main comparisons”) as the character or subject. 35

36. Sentence Length
“The increase in the number of occupations being sampled for increases our chances of finding eligible employees in selected establishments which thereby gives the sample selection procedure greater ability to equalize the final weights.”
Often dividing a long sentence ( in this case 43 words) into two sentences increases clarity. 36

37. Possible Revision
“By increasing the number of occupations we sample for, we increase our chances of finding eligible employees in selected establishments. This further enables the sample selection procedure to equalize the final weights.”
Here the quote has been divided into two sentences rather than one. It is still dense, but now much more understandable. 37

38. Summary: The Three Principles of Clarity
Express your actions in verbs.
Put your characters in subjects.
Put your verbs right after your subjects.

39. Back to Our First Example
“This number provides a comparative measure of the effect of unequal weights on the precision of estimates produced from the final survey respondents.”
Think about this quote on the slides earlier in the presentation. Now that you’ve learned how to analyze sentence structure for clarity, count the number of words, verbs (specify whether it is a passive or active verb), and prepositions. What is the subject of produce at the end of the sentence? 39

40. Possible Revision
“This number measures how unequal weights affect the precision of estimates the final survey respondents produced.”
Now count the number of words, verbs and prepositions in this sentence. The numbers drastically increase. Also, all the verbs have character subjects and follow their respective subjects. 40

41. Possible Revision Illustrating Three Principles of Clarity
“This number <character in subject>measures <action in verb, verb right after subject> how unequal weights <character in subject>affect <action in verb, verb right after subject> the precision of estimates the final survey respondents < character in subject> produced <action in verb, verb right after subject>.”
Now count the number of words, verbs and prepositions in this sentence. The numbers drastically increase. Also, all the verbs have character subjects and follow their respective subjects. 41

42. Which example is more concise?
A. A revision of the program will result in increases in our efficiency in the servicing of our customers.
B. If we revise the program, we can serve our customers more efficiently.
Count the number of actions, verbs and prepositions. Clarity often goes hand-in-hand with conciseness. Here we have 12 words in the revision compared to 18 in the original. 42

43. Which example is more understandable?
A. “Decisions in regard to administration of medication despite inability of irrational patients appearing in a Trauma Center to provide legal consent rest with the attending physician alone.”
B. “When patients appear in a Trauma Center and behave so irrationally that they cannot legally consent to treatment, only the attending physician can decide whether to administer medication.”

44. Presented by the Writing Studio
Center for Teaching, Learning, and Writing

45. Lord of the Flies Essay Prompt:
William Golding’s novel, Lord of the Flies, is full of symbolism. Not only do several key objects in the novel represent something larger, all of the major characters serve as symbols, too. Over the course of the novel, these symbols evolve as the island society, itself, changes.
Choose a significant symbol from the book (seen so far in the novel). Explain the significance of the symbol, why it is symbolic and how the symbol has changed over the course of the novel. Use your conclusion to summarize how Golding’s use of symbols informs our interpretation of the novel.