Understanding & Writing Reports II: Formal & Lab Reports

Intended learning outcomes. Students should be able to:

Describe the organisational structure of long, more formal reports
Describe various front sections
Describe various back sections
Construct end-text citations from various sources

Contextual Factors in Report Writing

There are a number of differences between the types of short report studied so far and the long investigative reports we are going to look at now. Basically, short reports deal primarily with facts. They are reports in which the writer identifies the relevant details and presents them briefly and succinctly, leaving out any unnecessary embellishments to the text. On the other hand, long investigative reports, including lab reports, frequently also deal with less tangible evidence. These reports are documents in which the writer analyses a situation in depth before drawing one or more conclusions, sometimes also making recommendations.

These long reports may:

describe extensive research, or an investigation of a problem or unsatisfactory condition,
evaluate alternatives to improve a situation,
study and determine the feasibility of taking certain actions,
propose making a change in methods or procedures.

Long, formal reports are written in a fluent narrative style that is both persuasive and convincing. Their writers have concepts or new ideas to present and they want their readers to understand their chain of reasoning. The term investigative report covers any report in which the writer describes how (s)he:

performed tests,
examined data, or
conducted an investigation using real evidence.

Basically, the writer starts with known data and then analyses and examines it so that the reader can see how the investigation was conducted and the final results were reached. These long formal reports require careful preparation and editing. Because they will possibly be distributed outside the company/institution, their writers may need to consider the impression the report will convey of the entire company/institution, as well as the level of subject knowledge the intended audience might have. Formal reports are generally made up of several standard parts, although not all of these need to be present in every report. Each writer uses the parts that best suit the particular subject and the intended method of presentation. Different organisations may have different requirements as well.

Which of the following factors would you associate with formal reports and which with informal reports? long;intended primarily for colleagues; involve detailed and in-depth analysis; involve detailed and in-depth analysis; less detailed; describe an investigation of a problem; present the facts briefly and directly; short; evaluate alternatives; study and determine the feasibility of taking certain actions; propose changes to methods and procedures; may use email or memo format Drag-and-drop each matching ‘factor’ to the correct type of report. Can you justify your response?

Informal Reports	Formal Reports

Elements of Formal Reports

Formal reports are often accompanied by a transmittal letter, which is a separate document that is included before the report. We will talk more about transmittal letters in Unit 10.

The formal report itself can be divided into three consecutive main sections:

front matter

body of report

back matter.

Essentially, the front matter contains everything up to the beginning of the main text (body), and the back matter everything that follows it. Both front and back matter essentially contain meta-information, i.e. information about the main text, rather than constituting the main text itself. We’ll discuss the individual parts of the front and back matter, as well as the purposes behind them, in the following subsections.

The Front Matter

The front matter consists of a title page, table of contents, list of figures, list of tables, and may also contain an executive summary.

The Title Page

Unless the report is accompanied by a transmittal letter or other form of memo, the title page provides the first point of contact of the reader with the document. It therefore needs to provide all the most important information about the report at a single glance, and make it possible to identify what its purpose and approximate content are, who is responsible for creating it, how up-to-date it is, etc. The exact format for the title page for a formal report may of course vary according to the exact purpose or target audience. However, it should normally include the following information:

the full title of the report,
the name(s) and job title(s) of the writer, group or department,
the date of the report,
the name of the organisation for which the writer(s) work(s),
the name of the organisation or person to which the report is submitted.

Below, you can look at a number of different title pages to get a feel for what they may look like.

Can you identify different elements of the title pages above? What is the variation between the different samples shown? Do they all have the elements as described above?

Sample 1	Sample 2

Sample 3	Sample 4

Why do you think there is such variation?

The Table of Contents (TOC)

A table of contents lists all the headings (down to a certain level, usually 2 or 3) of the report in their order of appearance, along with their page numbers. It includes a listing of all front matter and back matter of the report, except for the title page and the table of contents itself.

Formal reports target different audiences. When a formal report is read by your supervisor, he or she will have different interest from a technician reading the same report. As such, not every reader needs to/will necessarily have to read every section of your report. Furthermore, even readers who read the whole report may sometimes need to return to particular sections. This is why a table of contents represents an important navigational aid to the reader. In addition to this, and perhaps even more importantly, a TOC represents the overall logic of the organisation of your document, i.e. illustrates how you have chosen to break up your approach into manageable sub-parts. Of course, there may sometimes be only a limited degree of flexibility in this, particularly if the structure of your report is relatively fixed by convention. However, this conventional structure mainly reflects the top-level headings, and you will generally still have a certain degree of flexibility below that level. Exploiting this flexibility will allow you to demonstrate to the reader that you’ve understood the nature of your project well, so you should try to use explicit and precise sub-headings to ‘impress’, or rather convince, your audience of your in-depth understanding.

Below are a few samples of the table of contents.

How are the organisations of the above table of contents different from each other? Think in terms of the layout, as well as the information included. How are the front matter and back matter presented?

Sample 1	Sample 2

Sample 3

The table of contents is placed directly after the title page and before all other elements. It can, and should be, be generated automatically using modern word processors. If you are using Microsoft^® Word, in order to let the word processor know what to include in the table of contents, you first need to include proper headings and subheadings and apply the appropriate heading styles (Heading1, Heading2, ...) to them. Once you have your document with the correct hierarchy of headings, you can have the program generate a table of contents for you automatically via ‘References→Table of Contents’ in the latest version (2010). Other word processors provide similar features, but you need to consult their user manuals for details.

Lists of Figures/Tables

When a report contains more than five figures, list them along with their titles and page numbers in a separate section beginning on a new page. Figures include all illustrations – i.e. drawings, photographs, maps, charts, and graphs – contained in the report. This page, and any other page before the main report itself, should be numbered with small Roman numerals (e.g. i, ii, iii, ...). Anything that forms part of the main body should then be numbered with Arabic numerals (e.g. 1, 2, 3, ...). If you’ve inserted their captions through the ‘Insert Caption’ feature provided by your wordprocessor, this will also allow you to generate tables of tables and tables of figures automatically.

When a report contains more than five tables, list them along with their titles and page numbers in a separate section beginning on a new page. This page should also be numbered with a small Roman numeral.

Look at sample two of the Table of Contents above. How are the Lists of Figures/Tables presented? Is the style different from the one we have talked about just now? How can it be improved?

The Main Body

Elements in the Body of the Report

The body section of the formal report varies according to the subject. However, we can divide the body into some prototypical sub-sections:Introduction,Methods, Findings and Discussion, and Conclusion.

The purposes of different sections in the main body
Subsection	Purpose
Introduction	to provide the background and the scope of the report.
Methods/Methodologies	to describe the steps adopted in any empirical investigation and justify why these steps were adopted
Findings and Discussion	to display and provide a preliminary interpretation of data/results obtained through any empirical investigation to interpret the results of any empirical investigation and relate those results to the goals and aims of the project
Conclusions and/or Recommendations	depending on different needs and scenarios, some reports have both conclusions and recommendations, while others have only one or the other. In general: Conclusions contains a summary of the inferences you’ve made, based on your findings Recommendations are suggestions about what actions could or should be taken

Introduction

Your introduction should include the purpose and background of the report. The statement of purpose informs your readers why you are writing or what you are trying to achieve, whereas the background establishes a context for the reader to better understand your report. In the background section, you’re likely to highlight any problems or gaps in research that may exist, which justifies the need for the report you are writing.

Methods/Methodologies

Text A below is an excerpt of the Methods section of a formal report. Based on the text, answer the questions that follow:

Text A

The initial stage of this study involved a brainstorming and planning meeting to identify different areas of interest and plan the study. In order to gain an insight into the area of market-driven requirements engineering, we aimed at interviewing a large number of software-developing companies. However, it was concluded that this initial stage of the study would benefit from selecting a handful of companies before adjusting the interview instrument and carrying out the full study. Therefore seven interviewees within five Swedish software companies were asked to participate. The interviewees were selected among our industrial partners. The companies all have a market-driven development focus. They have had at least one market release of a software product or are just about to release their first.

Colour-code the parts of text B which are justificatory and those that are procedural, using the buttons below. If you make a mistake, you can clear the colour-coding by clicking the ‘clear formatting’ button.

Text B

Write down some of the key phrases in Text B which are associated with the justificatory and procedural purposes. What do you notice about the grammar and vocabulary used?

In the methodology section, you typically evaluate different potential approaches to your analysis to identify the most appropriate one. Sometimes, a ready-made solution may already exist and can simply be replicated, but in most cases, you’ll probably have to combine and adjust aspects from different existing analysis methods or even come up with an entirely original one. The following are some major aspects you may need to consider when writing your methodology section:

Problem/needs analysis	problem analysis refers to the pre-design research done to identify the specific requirements or parameters of your solution. this may be an analysis of a real-world problem or a hypothetical problem/case or a hypothetical one that is representative of most real-world cases.
Theories	explain the theories, principles, or guidelines that have informed the design of your solution (if not already referred to in the Introduction or the Literature Review).
Algorithms	show your readers how you developed the algorithms for the solution (applicable to fields such as mathematics and computer science)
Technology & resources	describe the forms of technology, the programming language, and other types of resources used in the design or construction of your solution.
The solution	describe in detail the design of your solution (e.g. the architecture of a system, the interfaces of an application, the functionality, etc.)
Testing	report the actions that you took to test the performance of your solution. Your report should also include the materials and instruments involved in the testing, the locations and time of the tests, the number of trials/ tests performed, and the parameters you set for the tests (e.g. accuracy level, processing or response time, area coverage, volume of data handled, etc.)

Refer to TEXT B again. Do you think the text is a complete methods section? Is there any additional information you would expect to see in TEXT B?

Findings and Discussion

In the Findings and Discussion section, you need to report the results of your analysis, initially by stating the facts that you’ve observed (i.e. the findings), and then discussing these appropriately. This section represents the major portion of the long report.

The following four elements are the major constituents of the Findings and Discussion section:

A brief statement of a particular aim or function of the project/product or a brief mention of the methodology. (Optional)
Reporting of the results (testing results/design interface and performance, etc.)
Referencing figures (pictures, diagrams) and tables
Commenting on the results

Examine TEXT C below and answer the following questions:

In which line does the writer refer to the number(s)?
In which line does the writer provide a summary of key findings?
Why does the writer provide a summary of key findings? Do you think this is helpful for the reader?

Highlight the language items that are useful for displaying results.

Text C

Table 1. shows the experimental results for Tsg. It is measured with the latency time taken to make a complete connection between the control server and the vehicle gateway. The results show that the average communication latency when the control server requests a connection to the vehicle gateway using the cut and call back protocol is 10.302 sec and the standard deviation is 0.821 ms.

Table 1. Connection Time
Init.	Connection Delay(sec)
	min.	Ave.	Max.	std.-Dev
Server	8.76	10.302	12.023	0.821
Gateway	4.064	5.608	7.905	1.131

In the next few sub-sections, we’ll look at some descriptions of the major parts within the ‘Findings and Discussion’ section.

Re-stating Aims & Methodology

You can start the Findings section by briefly reminding the reader of the aims of the project and the main methods involved. Depending on the length of your formal report and the requirements of your supervisor, this may not be necessary.

Findings

A core part of your Findings and Discussion section is to report on the results of your analysis/research, i.e. the ‘facts’. Findings include concrete evidence, based on which you can establish the success or failure of your product/research.

Examples of results/proof can be presented in the form of:

numbers (e.g. number of hits, speed, frequency, percentages, etc.)
images (e.g. captured images, transformed images, modeled images, etc.)
photos (e.g. pictures of a place)
screen shots

References Made to Figures + Tables

When presenting non-text materials (e.g. images, photos, screen captures or tables of numbers), make sure you refer your reader to the materials and provide comments on them. In particular, make sure you:

Label each non-text item accurately. Give the figure a number and a clear and concise caption, ideally by using the ‘Insert Caption’ function of your word processor, e.g. Table 1: Statistics of office noise levels
Provide comments on the item or at least refer your reader to it
Place the item immediately after the comments or reference made to it
Place the item on the page following the comments or the reference if the item occupies a full page
Leave sufficient white space between the item and its preceding and subsequent texts

Comments

Comments express an interpretation of the results reported. We tend to make the following three types of comments:

judgments about the performance drawn based on the results reported (e.g. the numbers suggest that X works. As can be seen from the comparison of speeds of X and Y, Y is a more reliable algorithm. The accuracy of searches is very high.)
reasons for positive, negative, or unexpected results
comparisons between the results you have obtained on your own project and those obtained by in studies done by others.

Study the ‘Results’ section of a journal article below by Ur-Rehman et al. (2009) and highlight the hedged claims and interpretations of findings.

Dish antennas can be complicated by the fact that the illumination of the dish itself is intimately connected to the near vertical axis predicted with azimuth blocks indicates the presence of an ambiguity with this sampling pattern.
As explained in Section III-A, C = R2 × R2 × R3 × SO(3) (or similar) in this case, as shown in Figure 3. Unlike the case of phased arrays or horn antennas, no closed form solutions typically exist. Therefore, the computation of F in our algorithm will usually involve a computational electromagnetic engine. In any case, one needs to make at least 20 measurements to obtain an injective pattern map. To make this model concrete enough for a computer simulation, we represented the feed as an isotropic radiator. In this case, the SO(3) factor plays no role, and may be removed from C. Indeed, the radiation pattern of the resulting isotropic-fed dish can be found by ray-tracing from the feed to the receiver, reflecting off each of a dense set of points on the reflector. Specifically, the reflector is described by the equation of y = ax2 + bz2.
Our simulation tested dish antennas whose reflector radii were up to 6 wavelengths and feed was located within 6 wavelengths from the vertex of the reflector. The parameters a and b were chosen randomly between 0 and 6. The reflector was simulated with a grid with 20 axial points and 10 radial points. The typical results for 100 dish antennas (10 iterations used in the solver) are shown in Figure 10. Unlike both horn and rectangular arrays, the performance of dishes is essentially the same regardless of sampling pattern. In particular, random sampling does not outperform other sampling patterns. There are no obvious ambiguities, apparently as the model of the antenna has no symmetries that always are shared the sam- pling pattern. The model can be symmetric, but pairs typical antennas will not share axes of symmetry.

The Back Matter

The back matter of a formal report contains supplementary information, such as identification of the cited works (references), and more detailed, additional reference materials in the form of one or more appendices.

References

The ‘References’ section is a numerical (IEEE) or alphabetical (APA) listing of all the published sources you’ve consulted and cited in preparing your report. You need to have (precise) references to prove to the reader that your information and materials are i) genuine and ii) have not been invented by you.

Appendix (Appendices)

An appendix contains information that clarifies or supplements text. Materials placed in the appendix are typically long tables, charts, graphs, sample copies of questionnaires, pamphlets brochures, etc. The report may have one or more appendices. Generally, each appendix contains one type of material. For example, a report may have one appendix presenting a questionnaire and a second appendix presenting a detailed computer print-out tabulating questionnaire results.

Place the first appendix on a new page directly after the references. Each additional appendix also begins a new page. Identify each appendix with a title and a heading. Appendices are generally labelled Appendix A, Appendix B, etc.

Lab Reports

As an Applied Science student, experimental work is fundamental in developing your understanding of the theoretical knowledge learnt in your lectures. Through different experiments, you can develop practical experience in the use of equipment and the experimental techniques in your field.

Lab work is conducted in 3 different stages:

Preliminary work: this includes any prepartory steps that need to be completed before the beginning of the lab, e.g. questions asked by your supervisor to check if you have understood the theory behind the experiment you are about to carry out.
The experiment itself
Writing the lab report

The Structure of a Lab Report

Lab reports should follow a set format and use appropriate language. In terms of report structure, a lab report is very similar to the formal reports that we have been talking about so far in that it contains:

Title Page	Depending on the nature of the experiment and the requirement(s) of your department the requirement for the title page (or the cover sheet) may vary, but in general, the following information needs to be provided. You should consult your supervisor when you are in doubt. the name of the unit the name of the experiment the date you did the experimental work the names and ID numbers of students in the group, if it is group work the name (location) of the lab
Introduction	The introduction should provide a basic review of the theory and background information relevant to the experiment. You may need to include the relevant algorithms, equations and theorems you’ll be using or investigating, and you need to explain the different types of analyses used. When you write the definitions for different concepts/terms, remember to use the language features/constructions you have learnt about in previous units in this course. Also, you need to use proper referencing if you have cited others’ work.
Aims	The aims of the experiment. This can be listed in bullet point form, or written in complete sentences
Methodology	In the methodology section, the key steps taken to conduct the experiment are summarised. Note that you should not copy exactly what the lab notes have provided. In particular, the lab notes are likely to be in present tense and in imperative mood, but in your lab report, you should convert them to past tense and (probably) passive voice.
Results and Discussion	In this section, you present your findings, and compare them with the literature and your preliminary calculations. If there are discrepancies, you should state these clearly and provide your explanations.
Conclusion	State whether the experiment has successfully achieved the aims, summarise the key findings and reasons for the findings.

Introducing Aims and Objectives

You can use the following action verbs to introduce your aims/objective of your experiment.

investigate
determine
measure
plot
etc.

Introducing Graphs, Tables, and Equations

As for the other types of reports, all tables, graphs and equations should be properly introduced in a lab report. Each item should have a caption, which is often located beneath the item concerned. The formatting of the captions should be consistent throughout the report and you should ideally again use the ‘Insert Caption’ feature provided by your wordprocessor to insert them.

You should never include figures or equations without providing further elaborations or explanations. By providing a written explanation/discussion of a figure/diagram, you not only ensure that the information can be correctly interpreted by the reader, but also demonstrate your understanding of the procedures and theoretical basis of your experiment, as well as its results.

Below is an example of the language features for introducing a table, from Guan and H. Kennedy (2000): A performance evaluation of internal linings for municipal pipe. How is the table introduced? What different tenses are used in description? Where is the caption located?

Table 5a shows the average values of the adhesion of the lining systems in steel and ductile iron. Samples were prepared according to specifications given by the coating supplier. Clearly, the polyethylene materials showed the best adhesion compared with the other coating systems.

Metal	PUR WW	PUR PW	Ceramic Epoxy	Polyethylene
Steal(S)	2000 p.s.i. (glue failure)	2200 p.s.i. (glue failure)	150 p.s.i.	700 p.s.i.
Ductile Iron (DI)	2601 p.s.i. (cohesive failure, no failure of adhesion to DI)	3300 p.s.i. (cohesive failure, no failure of adhesion to DI)	200 p.s.i.	800 p.s.i.

Table 5a: Results of Adhesion Test

Use of Passive Voice

Generally, passive voice is used when writing lab reports. While active and passive voice may represent the same propositional content, they provide different perspectives on the same thing. We select one over another depending on which part(s) of the message we wish to give prominence to, on what we regard the message as being primarily about, on what parts of it we assume the audience/reader already knows, on what contrasts, if any, we wish to make, and so on.

For instance, consider the the following sentences:

The researcher tested the specimen. (Active)
The specimen was tested (by the researcher). (Passive)

I measured the voltage. (Active)
The voltage was measured (by me) (Passive)

In sentence 1 in both cases, the subjects (The researcher/I) are the actor of the actions (testing/measuring). By changing the sentences to their passives (sentence 2), the subjects become the specimen and the voltage. As you can see, the actors in both cases in sentence 2 have become optional. One reason for choosing a passive, therefore, is that it enables us to omit the actor. There are a number of reasons for doing this. First of all, the identity of the actor of the action might not be relevant. As seen in the above examples, it doesn’t really matter, or perhaps it’s already understood, who actually tested the specimen, or measured the voltage. What matters the most are the actions themselves. Furthermore, sometimes using a passive allows us to make the writing more compact, focussiong only on the relevant facts, provided that no personal involvement/responsibility needs to be expressed.