Tone and Style in Academic Writing

Tone refers to the writer’s voice in his/her work. It is what the readers might
perceive as the reflection of the writer’s attitude towards what he/she is talking about
in the text. Hence, writers should know how to use tone properly in order to convey the
right ideas to the readers.

Walden University (2017) specified that objectiveness is what defines the tone
of academic writing. Objectivity can be achieved by ensuring that your content is
unbiased, scholarly and supported by evidence.

APA (2010) indicated that all of the following should be avoided so as to ensure
objectivity:

Generalizations (using words such as ‘always’ and ‘never’

Over-sweeping objectiveness (using words such as “excellent’ or ‘perfect’)
Adverbs (‘really’, ‘very’)
Qualifiers (‘a little’, ‘some’)
Emotional Language (‘It is heartbreaking’)

Formality refers to a language style that does not have a personal or

conversational tone to it. According to Purdue Owl (2018), you can determine the level
of formality you need to use in your paper by two things: your purpose in writing and
your reader’s expectations.

To ensure a formal tone, the following should be avoided:

 Addressing readers especially by using second person pronouns

Ex. You will find the graph in appendices

 Contractions
Ex. The document doesn’t indicate the said data…

 Questions (unless in the statement of the problem of a research paper)

Ex. How does the process work?

 Exclamations
Ex. Evidence is needed!

 Two-word verbs
Ex. The proficiency levels went down
  Run of expressions
Ex. Some of these are tablets, smart phones, etc.
 Coordinating conjunctions at the beginning of sentences
Ex. So the evidence indicates…

 Passive Voice (unless the agent of the action is unimportant)

Ex. The data was provided by the 300 respondents…

Citing and Referencing in Academic Writing

Academic writing involves sources of information from authorities of
published materials (books, journal articles and published reports). These sources are
used to support the ideas you present. They are classified as primary and secondary.

Primary: publicly available data (historical documents, interview data), raw data from
experiments and demographic records.
Secondary: data that were also based on primary data and have been produced for
public consumption in journal articles or chapters in edited books.

1. Citation Style Types

There are many types of citations styles used in academic writing and they depend
on the type of paper you are doing. Generally, students do not choose, they simply
comply with the referencing style guidelines provided by the school or department
they belong to. The following are the citation style types commonly used in
academic writing:

a. APA (American Psychological Association): this is used within the social

sciences and sometimes in other related fields. It is an author-date format by
which in-text references are given within parentheses.

In-text referencing:
Ex. Diaz (2010) suggested that…
Recommendations suggested that… (Diaz, 2010)

Reference list:

1. Book: Author’s last name, Initials. (Year Published). Title of the book.
Place of publication. Publisher.

Ex. Walklate, S. (2017). Criminology: The Basics (2nd ed.). London,

United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis Ltd.

2. Journal article: Last name, Initials. (Year Published). Title of the article.
Title of Journal, Volume number. Page numbers.
 Ex. Sorensen, J., Snell, C., & Rodriguez, J.J. (2006). An Assessment
of Criminal Justice and Criminology Journal Prestige*. Journal
of Criminal Justice Education, 17(2), 297-322.

3. Webpage: Author’s last name, Initials. (Year Published). Title of

webpage. Retrieved from [URL here].

Ex. Muirehead, R. (2016). Components of the

Criminal Justice System | Goodwin College.
Retrieved from https://www.goodwin.edu/enews/components
-criminal-justice/

Notes: If there is no author, begin with the title and then the publication
date
If there is no publication date, write n.d. (no date) within the
parentheses instead.

b. MLA (Modern Language Association): this is used within the fields of

literature and language. In-text referencing is also done within parentheses at
the end of the sentence.
In-text Referencing: In MLA, the last name of the author and the page number
are cited.
Ex. Diaz suggested that… (11)
Recommendations suggested that… (Diaz 11)
Reference list:
1. Book: Author’s last name, First Name. Book Title. Place of publication.
Publisher, Publication year.

Ex. Walklate, Sandra. Criminology: The Basics. 2nd ed.

London, United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis Ltd, 2017.

2. Journal article: Author’s last name, First name. “Title of the Article.”
Journal Title. Volume. Issue Publication Year. Inclusive page numbers.

Ex. Sorensen, John et al. “An Assessment of Criminal Justice

and Criminology Journal Prestige*.” Journal of Criminal
Justice Education, vol. 17, no. 2, 2006. Pp. 297-322.

3. Webpage: Author’s last name, Frist name. “Title of Work” Title of

Overall Website. Version. Publisher. Publication Year. Date of access.

Ex. Muirehead, Roger. “Components of the Criminal Justice

System.” Goodwin College. Wordpress, 2016,
www.goodwin.edu/enews/components -criminal-
justice/. Accessed 11