Reducing Subordinate Clauses in the Interest of Journal Style

Abstract

Academic writing, particularly juried articles, often compresses information in noun phrases that 
might have otherwise been delivered through subordinate clause structure. Graduate students under 
increasing pressure to publish in refereed journals often require support drafting their writing in this 
way. The purpose of this paper is to report on a small study focusing on the development of skills that 
reduce subordinate clauses and expand noun phrases. Findings indicate that three one-hour 
interactive presentation-practice sessions produce significant results on immediate and delayed 
posttests. Moreover, preliminary analysis of reflections from participants was unanimously in support 
of learning the skill. Future research in this area might explore individual learner differences reflected 
in learner trajectories in a scaled-up study (i.e., longer in duration and including more participants).