Reddit Post in r/EnglishHelp:

u/GauchoEscargot
My English teacher just said that we should start including personal pronouns into our academic
writing, but it is very challenging to incorporate them correctly. IDK how to do this please
HELP! I’m not even sure if I should really follow her advice because all my teachers before her
told me to never use personal pronouns LOL.
Comments:
u/ramonthi
I have been helping people in this subreddit with similar questions for a long time, so don’t
worry you are not the first person to have this problem. That being said, your teacher is correct,
using PP(personal pronouns) can effectively improve your writing. She also is correct when
saying it is hard to use effectively. In order to understand the role of using “I” in your writing, it
is important to understand the different types of personal pronouns. Many students tend to use
the less powerful forms of “I”, which end up weakening the essay rather than strengthening it. If
all this is confusing at first, that is okay because many of us in this reddit have agreed to help out
students like you as often as we can.
u/TTeacher
As a community college teacher, I completely agree with this. I have experienced many
students using weaker forms of PP. Especially within biology and psychology papers. In
order to write more like a professional academic writer, it is important to use first person
POV, point of view, in order to be more authoritative to take credit for the work they have
done. (Thonney, 2013, p. 4)
u/NigelTheSigil
Typically social sciences and humanities tend to use PP in their writing, but there
is definitely a case to incorporate them into science writing as well. I’m a big
advocate of using “we” in order to engage the reader. (Harwood, 2005, p. 1226)
u/GauchoEscargot
Is there any way you can elaborate on the different forms of “I” and how they impact an
essay?
u/ramonthi
Yes of course I can. When “I” is the representative it just means that “I” or “we”
is used to represent a larger group of people. Guiding through the essay basically
means that PP helps direct the reader through the article. An example of this
would be “we note that the mixture turns green”. The next strongest one would be
the architect, which is usually in the first person POV. This one is when the writer
takes “the responsibility of organizing and outlining the material in the writing”
(Tang et al., 1999, p. 28). Recounter of the research process is when the writer
recalls the research process through active verbs, such as I washed the beaker. The
second strongest one is the opinion holder, which simply happens when the writer
holds an opinion. The strongest way a writer can incorporate personal pronouns is
 as an originator. To do this, the writer must advance the argument at hand with
new claims. Like I said earlier, you want to use more of the later ones because
they tend to strengthen an essay more than the first couple. (Tang et al., 1999, p.
27-29)
u/Ken_Hyland23
I noticed you didn’t go into detail on why these different forms are
stronger and weaker. It’s because the whole point of using them is to
develop the connection between the reader and the writer. The different
ways described above impact this writer-reader relationship in different
ways and, of course, some are more impactful than others. (Hyland, 2001,
p. 551)

u/Ken_Hyland23
The incorporation of personal pronouns are especially important in argumentative writing. The
incorporation of we can be very effective in pulling in the reader and creating a stronger
discourse community. I would use we as a guide in order to steer the reader in the direction you
want them to think. (Hyland, 2001, 571)
u/NigelTheSigil
Gaucho Escargot, you haven’t said what subject this paper is about. If it is in subjects
such as computer science, economics, and physics, the use of PP is very effective in
identifying the author as a part of the discourse community. Ken and I have talked a lot
about this subject and we agree with each other that using PP, such as we help create a
stronger paper if used right. They also help build up the credibility of the writer which
allows them, which will help convince the reader. We all know how important credibility
is in academic papers, so this is pretty important! (Harwood, 2005, 1211)
u/TTeacher
I have seen and read many of your other posts in this subreddit and I always enjoy
reading what you have to contribute. I have found that in statistics, which is a
subject similar to the ones you’re more interested in, students barely use these
different personal pronouns. Research articles from subjects like biology and
psychology ended up having way more PP. (Thonney, 2013, 6)
u/GauchoEscargot
Thank you so much for your help everyone :). Little update for you all, I put some personal
pronouns throughout my writing and my teacher loved it a lot. Keeping in mind the different
ways to use a personal pronoun helped out my writing tremendously. I looked in my past
writings where I used some personal pronouns and I noticed that I used many of the weaker
pronouns like you were describing. They did not develop the writer-reader relationship and did
not add much to the essays. It was a big change from how I normally would write, but using
stronger forms of personal pronouns added so much to my essay. This question was originally
meant for my English class paper, but you convinced me to use personal pronouns in my
scientific writing as well. I decided to use some in my STATS class and Bio class and both of the
teachers thought that they added a lot to the essays. I used personal pronouns in these classes in
order to make a stronger reader to writer connection and to build my credibility.
 Works Cited
Harwood, N. (2005). "Nowhere has anyone attempted ... In this article I aim to do just that": A
corpus- based study of self-promotional I and we in academic writing across four
disciplines. Journal of Pragmatics, 37(8), 1207-1231.
Hyland, K. (2001). Bringing in the reader: Addressee features in academic articles. Written
Communication, 18(4), 549-574.
Tang, R. & Suganthi, J. (1999). The 'I' in identity: Exploring writer identity in student academic
writing through the first person pronoun. English for Specific Purposes 18 Supplement,
S23-S40.
Thonney, T. (2013). "At first I thought...but then I don't know for sure": The Use of First Person
Pronouns in the Academic Writing of novices. Across the Disciplines, 10(1), 1-16.