Structuring and formatting documents, tables, and figures

Philippe Mongeon

Plan

  • Why structure matters
  • Tools to structure your text
  • Heading levels
  • Word styles
  • Word templates
  • Zotero
  • Formatting tables
  • Formatting figures

Why structure matters

  • Your documents typically have readers, help them read and understand your work!
  • A cluttered text without structure can reflect or be interpreted as a lack of understanding.
  • Do it for you!

Tools to structure your text

  • A title is essential!
  • Headings are almost unavoidable!
    • Example: Introduction, Method, Results and Discussion (IMRaD).
  • Subheadings are generally recommended!
  • Paragraphs are essential!
    • One paragraph per idea
    • Topic sentence, supporting sentences, concluding sentence.
  • Bullet points and numbered lists are recommended when appropriate!

Demo

Word styles, Word templates, Zotero.

Tables and figures

Formatting tables

Basic rules from Wilke (2019):

  • Avoid vertical lines
  • Avoid horizontal lines between data rows.
    • Use them at the top and bottom of the table and to separate column headers from the content of the table.
  • Text is left-aligned.
  • Numbers are right-aligned and use the same number of decimals (not more than necessary) throughout.
  • Columns containing single characters are centred.
  • The header fields are aligned with their data

Example

Tip

In some cases, you may find it easier to

  • create your table in Excel
  • Copy it in Word (as a table, not as an image)
  • Then use word to format the table.

Formatting figures

  • All axes should be labelled
  • Principle of proportional ink (generally means the y-axis should start at 0).
  • Use a colour palette only if it conveys information (not usually relevant unless more than two variables are used for the figure).
  • No border, no shade, no 3D!
  • For guidance on selecting appropriate graph types, see MGMT2505 - Working with data course (ch. 10 to 12).

Table and figure captions in Word

  • Necessary to automatically generate lists of tables and figures.
  • Particularly useful for longer documents (e.g., dissertations and theses).

Things to remember

  • Good writing is difficult.
  • Good writing takes time.
  • The first draft is never (or should probably never be) the final draft.
  • Practice makes… better.

References

Wilke, C. 2019. Fundamentals of Data Visualization: A Primer on Making Informative and Compelling Figures. First edition. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media.