The abstract sections of each of the articles were about a paragraph long. The textbook writes that the overall structure of the abstract should conform to the following outline: “content: question/purpose, experimental approach, results, interpretation/answer, significance” (pg 115). Considering that both of the abstracts are only a paragraph long compared to the other sections (the introductions are several paragraphs long), it seems kind of impossible to accomplish this. Yet, the writers of both articles were able to provide a thorough paragraph with all essential parts included. The article from the Ecology Letters journal contains the topic sentence as the first sentence and there is a logical flow of ideas. It is organized by giving the background sentence first (the known), the two sides of argument. Then, what the researchers are trying to accomplish (the unknown), their approach, the conclusion they came to and last but not least, their interpretation of their results. The other article’s abstract is somewhat different since it is not necessarily an experiment but rather just an interpretation of several other experiments in order to answer their hypothesis. There is no topic sentence, but the first 4 sentences provide the reader with a background that gives the purpose and of their research so, they could be seen as topic sentences of significancy. There is no experimental approach because this is not an experiment but they do state that they are going to approach their hypothesis by reviewing (comparing and contrasting possibly) the invasion histories of several species. There is a logical flow of ideas and overall, the abstract is well organized.
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