Lab Report Analysis
Imon Singha
Professor Nancy Clark
Eng-21007
03/23/2018
What is a lab report? A lab report is when we analyze a laboratory experiment based on a scientific concept. The experiment could be about anything that makes you curious. Considering this in this assignment, I will compare and contrast 3 sample lab report and write and rhetorical analysis. The three report I will be analyzing is Perception of Different Sugar by Blowflies by Alexander Hamilton (Lab report 1), Food Selection in Beavers Based on Tree Species, Size and distance (Lab report 2), and Determination of specific nutrients in various food (Lab report 3). I picked these three report because once I read the titles it made me curious about the results and procedures lead to the results. In addition, they focus on different concepts.
Lab reports have seven different components first being the title, abstract, introduction, methods and materials, results, discussion, conclusion, acknowledgments, reference and last but not least appendix. Starting with the title, it should be informative enough to be interesting to the audience. It also should be clear enough for the audience to understand what the report will be about. It also should be on the cover page of your report. When I look at the ones I am analyzing, they all have informative and clear titles. However, Perception of Different Sugar by Blowflies is the only one that has a cover page. The cover page makes your report looks professional.
Moving on to the next step which is abstract. It is where you summarize all the other components. It is where the reader decides whether it’s interesting to them or not. It shouldn’t include words that your audience might not be familiar with. My sample reports #1 & #2 gave a really good abstract. While reading it, I wasn’t confused or bored, however, there were few vocabularies that stuck me. Overall, I think it was informative and easy to follow. Coming on to lab 3, I feel as if their abstract was limited in terms of summarizing the report. I feel like they are missing summary of few components such as the discussion.
Now, let’s talk about the part where everything begins, Introduction. Like every assignment you did in the past, you will also have an introduction here. This is where you introduce your hypothesis and questions you trying to answer. If possible state the result of your previous research related to whatever you are currently doing. If your audience is unaware of the situation, this is the perfect moment to make things clear to them. If failed to do so your audience could be confused throughout the report. All three of the samples gave a pretty good introduction. They successfully started the hypothesis and gave background information to make sure there’s no confusion. I think lab report 3 gave way too much information on introduction. Although their intro was too wordy, they were the only one who stated question the experiment will answer.
Stepping onto another important component of the lab report, materials, and method. This is where you make your audience believe that your procedure is credible. Show them that youdid you experiment with caution. Describe all the materials accurately, bring the actual material that was used, if not just present it with a picture. Related to all the other sections, this should be also clear enough so your audience can follow through and so that another scientist can execute the same experiment. Looking at the sample’s methods and materials, all three followed all the steps that were necessary for the part. While I was reading it made sense and nothing struck me. I think report 3 was the better one because they broke down the procedure into two parts. I assume it’s because they are trying to answer questions that require two different methods. Overall, I feel they had viable information.
Here comes the part everyone waits for after hearing the hypothesis and possibly even the title. The result, it’s the section where you compare present the data you got from conducting the experiment. Some might present the results with words, but from personal experience, it is best to include both the numbers and worded version. When you include graph or numbers, some people might grasp it quicker than the one with words. At the same time too many numbers can bore you audience some time, so you have to balance it out to please everyone. It is best not to discuss the data because there will be a discussion section. It seems as though lab report 3 and 2 are the ones who included both the worded and graphical version of the result. In addition, lab 1 had results that were really hard to follow. It included mathematical symbols that can make someone feel out of place. I really like how lab 3 had a note under the results to explain what each line on the table meant. If lab 1 took the similar approach it would make everything easy for everyone.
Now we move onto another section related to results. Discussions, it is where you explain your data and graphs. This is the section where you will compare the results with your hypothesis and answer questions you had in your introduction. You can also analyze anything you that might be hard to understand for the audience. If you did similar studies in the past and you got different outcomes now give an explanation of why it happened. Looking at the samples I think it’s the biggest section in the entire report. Based on the reading I can conclude that all three reports were successful in discussing the results. All three compared their hypothesis and went deeper to explain why certain outcomes occurred. For instance, lab 3 explained why the color of the food might have changed the results of the studies compared to the hypothesis. Contrasting it to the previous sections, I think they did an excellent job here.
Now we finally approaching to the end of the report. The conclusion, it is where you summarize all your main points. You don’t need to add anything new here. By looking at the example reports, lab 1 didn’t have any conclusion which is really bizarre because it’s a key component to any lab report. But report 1 and 2 followed all the necessary rules for a conclusion. They started by reviewing the hypothesis of their experiment, then they moved on by condensing the main points. In addition, they provided examples of similar experiments that had same results. So, we have talked about everything that a lab report needs and we compared three different reports to as examples. But, there are few more components should be included because without them your report won’t be credible. Those are references and appendix. In here, you list all the possible sites and all your citation. If you had a really long graph that you didn’t want to include in your report before, this is your time to do so. By observing the example reports, I can conclude they followed those rules properly. Even though my example lab reports missed a few components, I think it will give someone some ideas about ways to do lab reports.
Examples Lab Reports
Perception of Different Sugar by Blowflies by Alexander Hamilton (Lab report #1)
https://www.hamilton.edu/documents/Sample%20Bio%20Lab%20Report.pdf
Food Selection in Beavers Based on Tree Species, Size and distance (Lab report #2
https://labwrite.ncsu.edu/res/labreport/res-sample-labrep1.html
Determination of specific nutrients in various food (Lab report 3)
https://labwrite.ncsu.edu/res/labreport/food%20sample%20lab%20.pdf
Reflection of Lab Report Analysis
At first glance, I was really confused about how to do this assignment. Then after googling bunch of articles, which didn’t help whatsoever, I broke it down into components. Then I thought to myself why don’t I just compare each lab report in different sections. So, I started following that strategy. By doing this assignment I learned about lab reports and their key parts, which will definitely help me in the near future. I also got to explore lab report of different fields such as engineering, chemistry, biology, and physics. This didn’t only teach me about different lab reports but their uniqueness.
