TWBG_Materials/文档润色流和知识库构建流/claude-scholar-upstream/skills/nature-polishing/references/writing-strategy.md

Writing Strategy

Use this file when the user is not just asking for cleaner English, but for better scientific writing logic. This is the layer that should govern all paragraph- and section-level rewriting.

Core stance

Academic polishing is not only about style. It is also about making the reasoning legible. A polished paragraph that still performs the wrong rhetorical job is a failed edit.

Hourglass structure

Most strong research writing follows a broad -> narrow -> broad pattern:

• Introduction: open the territory, narrow to the gap, then state the study
• Discussion/Conclusion: start from the specific findings, then widen to implications and limits

Use this pattern when deciding paragraph order and section scope. If a draft jumps between background, results, and implications without control, rebuild the progression first.

Writing order is not reading order

The author may draft in one order and the reader may consume in another. A useful planning sequence is:

1. results
2. introduction and conclusion
3. title
4. discussion
5. methods
6. abstract

The practical rule for this skill is simple: organize around evidence and argumentative function, not around the chronology of the raw draft.

Claim, evidence, boundary

Every important scientific statement should have three parts:

1. claim: what is being said
2. evidence: what supports it
3. boundary: where the claim stops, or what uncertainty remains

Typical failures:

• claim without evidence
• data without an explicit point
• implication without a scope condition
• correlation rewritten as mechanism

When polishing, repair these failures before polishing rhythm.

Section responsibilities

Introduction

The Introduction should answer four questions:

1. What is already known?
2. What remains unresolved?
3. What exact question does this study ask?
4. How does the study address it?

Do not summarize results or conclusions here.

Results

Results state what was observed. They should provide:

• object or system
• condition
• quantitative support
• direct result

Do not turn Results into a Discussion section by adding long mechanistic interpretation.

Discussion

Discussion explains what the findings mean. It should address:

• how the work fits the broader field
• what has been added to understanding
• which earlier work is being supported, revised, or complicated
• which explanations are plausible
• which limitations constrain the interpretation

Discussion is the natural home for hedging.

Methods

Methods should pass a reproducibility test: could another group repeat the work from this description, or from this description plus a clearly cited prior protocol?

Reject vague writing such as:

• under standard conditions
• using routine methods
• data were analysed statistically

Conclusion

Conclusion is not a mini-discussion. A strong closing usually does three things:

1. restates the central contribution
2. identifies the decisive evidence
3. states the implication with a boundary

Do not introduce new data here.

Abstract

The abstract is a mini-paper:

1. context or problem
2. gap
3. approach
4. key result
5. implication

It should help the reader decide whether the paper is relevant, credible, and potentially important.

Citation as positioning

Citation is not just a formatting issue. It tells the reader how the current work stands relative to earlier work.

Useful categories:

• support: prior work supports the premise
• borrow: current work adopts a method, framework, or protocol
• contrast: current work differs in result, setting, or interpretation
• reuse/adaptation: material, data, code, or images come from elsewhere

Always cite the source actually read and verified. Do not cite a paper as direct support if you only know it through another paper's summary.

Fairness to earlier work

Do not manufacture novelty by flattening previous studies into a weak baseline. Prefer language like:

• Although previous studies showed ..., their performance in ... remains unclear.
• Earlier work established ..., but did not address ...

This preserves intellectual honesty while still making the gap explicit.

Overclaim control

Watch for:

• prove
• conclusively
• unprecedented
• best
• unqualified first

Replace or qualify them unless the evidence is unusually strong and the scope is tightly defined.