Academic Paper Writing

Tense Rules

• Use simple present and present perfect throughout (except Related Work)
• Related Work: use past tense when describing previous work
• Only experimental section may occasionally use past tense

Common Language Mistakes

DO NOT USE:

• "can be", "may be" in abstract/contribution/conclusion when describing what you did
  • Use "is", "are" instead - you've done it, so state it directly
• "We believe", "We think" - data/theory/experiments matter, not beliefs
• "And" at the beginning of sentences (colloquial)
• "very important" - use "vital", "fundamental", "paramount", "core issue"

USE CORRECTLY:

• "cannot" (one word, NOT "can not")
• "such as" (NOT "like" for examples)
• "different from" (NOT "unlike")
• "i.e." (NOT "namely", "aka")
• "find" (NOT "find out")
• "attempt to" (variation with "try to")
• "that" in object clauses (don't omit it)
• "as follows" (NOT "as following" or "as followed")

Punctuation and Formatting

• NO Chinese punctuation: No book title marks (《》), no long dashes (——), no enumeration commas (、)
• In LaTeX: quotes are `` '' (two backticks, two apostrophes)
• Space after periods and commas: . Word NOT .Word
• Space around parentheses: (word) NOT (word ) or ( word)
• Sentences should be 20-30 words maximum for beginners
• Split 50-word sentences into two 25-word sentences

Grammar Issues

• Subject-verb agreement: check singular/plural
• "Let something do" (NOT "does")
• "training set", "test set" (NOT "testing set")
• "prove" → use "verify" or "testify" instead (few things can be truly proven)
• Avoid "mainly include", "mainly contain" - just list what's included
• "if XXX, then XXX" - the "then" is unnecessary

Model Description Guidelines

Avoid subjective language in model descriptions

• Do NOT use phrases like "we are interested in", "we focus on"
• These add unnecessary subjectivity to technical descriptions
• Example:
  • WRONG: "The distribution we are interested in is a conditional language model based on the input statement x."
  • RIGHT: "The distribution is a conditional language model based on the input statement x."

Subject Matching Errors

CRITICAL: Watch for dangling participles

• WRONG: "When using XXXX to deal with the problem, the following steps are required."
  • "using" is done by humans, not by "the following steps"
• RIGHT: "When XXXX is used to deal with the problem, the following steps are required."

Pronoun and Article Usage

• In Related Work, referring to authors: use "authors" (plural), NOT "author" (singular)
  • Computer science papers typically have multiple authors
• Generic references: use "users" or "a user" (NOT "the user" for generic reference)
• Avoid redundant: "the two both datasets" → either "the two datasets" OR "both datasets"
  • Same for "the total number of the whole bikes" → "the total number of bikes"

Word Choice Precision

• "including" vs "such as":
  • "such as" = giving examples (not exhaustive)
  • "including" = enumeration/containing (suggests completeness)
• After "using XXXX and XXXX": both MUST be nouns
  • RIGHT: "using information fusion and a collaborative approach"
  • WRONG: "using information fusion and collaboratively"
• Before using a new term:
  • Check if the term has been used by previous researchers
  • Make sure to explain what it means in your paper

Style Guidelines

Formal Academic Writing Rules

ABSOLUTELY FORBIDDEN:

• Colloquialisms: "OK", "fine", "Of course"
• Slang of any kind
• Famous quotes/proverbs
• Contractions: "don't", "can't", "it's" (use "do not", "cannot", "it is")
• "and so on", "etc." in formal writing
• Inverted structures: "not only...but also"
• "the more...the more" patterns
• Abbreviations in references (like [C][J][D] - these are Chinese format)

Word Choice Guidelines

Use PRECISE SINGLE words:

• Instead of vague multi-word phrases like "take on", "put up", "get on", "make up"
• Exception: phrases with single clear meanings like "take advantage of"

AVOID:

• Overly obscure words (check if commonly used in search engines)
• Uncertain words that reduce credibility: "sometimes", "perhaps" → use "is likely to", "probably"
• Very general words: "information", "process" (unless in established phrases)
• "about" when meaning "approximately" - it's too informal

Consistency Requirements

CRITICAL: Maintain consistency throughout:

• Same concept = same terminology throughout entire paper
  • Example: "similarity computation" NOT sometimes "similarity calculation", "similar relation computation"
  • Example: "document summarization" NOT alternating with "document digest"
• Abbreviations: write full form on first use, then abbreviation consistently
  • Format: "Neural Collaborative Filtering (NCF)"
  • Use full form once per paper (may repeat in abstract since it's separate)
• Section/Figure/Table references: capitalize consistently
  • Either "Section 2.3" throughout OR "section 2.3" throughout (not mixed)

Capitalization Rules

• First word after "Abstract.", "Section X.X" must be capitalized
• First word of EVERY LINE must be capitalized (after line breaks)
• Proper nouns, acronyms: ACM, IEEE, IET (all caps, NOT Acm, Ieee)
• Model/framework names must be consistent: "AB-CD" not "ab-cd" sometimes
• DO NOT capitalize terms mid-sentence for emphasis
  • WRONG: "The whole architecture of Attention mechanism"
  • RIGHT: "The whole architecture of attention mechanism"
• Check publisher guidelines for proper noun and abbreviation capitalization preferences
  • Different publishers may have different rules
  • Example: "Deep Learning" vs "deep learning" - follow your target venue's style

Font Consistency

• CRITICAL: Entire body text must use consistent font
  • ACM/IEEE/ACL/Springer templates: typically Times New Roman
  • NO other fonts in body text (except image labels)
  • Headings: follow template specifications

LaTeX Indentation

• Do NOT write flush left from first line to last line
• Follow section hierarchy with proper indentation
• Every line should respect section-level indentation
• This includes formulas, tables, and all content

Sentence Structure

• Every sentence must have clear subject, verb, object
• NO sentences without subjects (common in non-native speakers)
  • WRONG: "Then select the words according to the importance."
  • RIGHT: "We then select the words according to the importance."
• Between independent sentences: use conjunctions (and, but, or)
• Limit use of "Moreover", "Additionally", "Furthermore" - can use simple "Also"
• Use "First", "Second", "Third" (NOT "Firstly", "Secondly", "Thirdly")
• Avoid scattering sentences with too many commas
  • Three short parallel items: add one comma between second and third
  • Two short parallel items: NO comma needed between them

Grammar Clauses

Restrictive vs Non-restrictive Relative Clauses:

• Restrictive clauses: use "that" (defines/limits the noun)
  • Example: "The model that uses attention performs better."
• Non-restrictive clauses: use "which" (adds extra information)
  • Example: "Transformer models, which use attention, have achieved success."
• CRITICAL: Do NOT use "which" for restrictive clauses
  • This creates unnecessary ambiguity about clause nature
  • Academic writing prioritizes precision over grammatical permissiveness

Semicolon Usage

• Semicolons (;) ARE acceptable in academic papers
• Use to connect closely related independent clauses
• Use in complex lists with internal commas
• Example: "The model has three advantages: it is fast; it is accurate; and it is scalable."

Citation Guidelines

• In Related Work, cite by author's last name only
  • One or two authors: list all
  • Three or more: "Xu et al." (NOT "Y. Xu et al.")
  • NO first name initials
• Multiple citations: sort chronologically \cite{Lee2000,GouvertOF2020,XuWGSYX21}
• Conference papers: "In Proceedings of XXX" (proceedings contain the papers)
• References should include all authors (no "et al." in reference list)
• Reference format must be consistent throughout

Authoritative Citation Sources:

• DO NOT cite: Wikipedia, Baidu Baike, or other encyclopedias
• DO cite: peer-reviewed conference papers, journals, books, monographs
• Avoid arXiv papers IF published version exists (cite the published version)
• Acceptable: websites for dataset sources or software repositories

Reference Formatting:

• Journal papers: include volume, number, pages, year
• Conference papers: generally no volume/number (unless published by journal)
• Format: "In Proceedings of XXX" (papers are contained in proceedings)
• Do NOT use [C][J][D] markers (these are Chinese format, NOT English)

Organization and Structure

Section Guidelines

Introduction:

• Use "First", "Second", "Third" for enumeration
• Clearly distinguish your method from baselines
• Emphasize "the proposed method", "our proposed model"
• Use correct verbs: "propose", "design", "develop", "study", "explore", "investigate"

Related Work:

• Should have at least 20 references for full papers
• Use past tense when describing previous work
• Once you use past tense for a work, continue with past tense
• Write everything in your own words - NO copying from cited papers

  • 2/3 consecutive words repeated = plagiarism

  • 1/2 words (not necessarily consecutive) = flagged as possible duplication

The Proposed Method:

• Explain baselines appropriately, NOT in great detail
• Don't derive standard formulas for baselines
• Focus on YOUR contribution

Experiments:

• Avoid "we can see XXX" for non-obvious phenomena
• Use objective: "Figure 5 shows..."
• Don't just describe trends - explain WHY trends occur
  • WRONG: "The accuracy first increases and then decreases."
  • RIGHT: "The accuracy increases from 70% to 85% as training epochs grow from 1 to 50, likely because the model learns more representative features. However, after 50 epochs, accuracy declines to 82%, suggesting overfitting on the training data."
• For evaluation metrics: give full form if abbreviation used

Conclusion:

• NOT a copy of Abstract
• Write what you proposed, results obtained, what this demonstrates
• Shows your hypothesis/design approach is correct

Visual Elements

Figures:

• Must be clear, properly sized, correctly positioned
• Labels should be readable
• Use Python/Matlab/Mathematica (NOT Excel when possible)
• Figure captions go BELOW the figure
• Use vector formats (.pdf, .eps) for LaTeX (NOT .jpg, .png)

Tables:

• Table captions go ABOVE the table
• Font size should be one size smaller than body text

Formulas:

• MUST have preceding explanation before presenting
• MUST have following explanation after presenting
• "where" is lowercase (NOT "Where" - it's part of the same paragraph)
• Use standard mathematical notation
• Use × or · for multiplication (NOT asterisk/snowflake)
• Equation numbering: either all numbered or none numbered (be consistent)
• Mathematical symbols (m, n, d, etc.) should be italicized in LaTeX

Titles and Headings

• Use noun phrases or gerund phrases
• Can include modifying adjectives/verbs
• DO NOT start with verbs or adjectives
• Level 1 and level 2 headings: format consistently
  • Either "Introduction" or "INTRODUCTION" throughout (not mixed)
  • Same for "The Proposed Method", "Experiments", etc.
  • Do NOT mix: "Introduction" then "RELATED WORK" then "Conclusion"

Document Layout

• NO large whitespace gaps (5+ consecutive blank lines)
• Paper folder naming: use meaningful names
  • BAD: "1", "paper", "doc"
  • GOOD: "The manuscript", "paper for AAAI", "ICML submission"

Mathematical Notation

• Matrices: UPPERCASE (A, B, X)
• Scalars: regular font
• Vectors: lowercase (traditional ML: bold or subscript; neural networks: not strictly enforced)
• Sets: UPPERCASE
• Mathematical symbols must be italicized in LaTeX:
  • Variables like $m, n, d, i, j$
  • Example: "for $m$ users and $n$ items" (not "for m users")
  • Note: brackets, numbers, subscripts that are NOT variables should NOT be italic

Common Technical Mistakes

Common Confusions

• "denote" vs "donate" (completely different meanings)
• "the same as" NOT "the same with"
• "compared to" NOT "compared with"
• "because" or "as" NOT "since" (since means "now that" in modern English)
• "XXX-based YYY" with hyphen (NOT "XXX based YYY")
• "identical to" is a good alternative to "the same as"

Common Expression Errors

WRONG expressions to avoid:

• "As can be seen from the results" → Use "As it can be seen from the results" OR "From the results, we can observe that"
• "find out" → Use "find" alone (no need for "out")
• "the two both datasets" → Use "the two datasets" OR "both datasets" (redundant)
• "the total number of the whole bikes" → Use "the total number of bikes"
• "Of course" → Too colloquial for academic writing
• "and so on" → Use "etc." is also colloquial; use formal alternatives or list explicitly
• "capture" → Overused; prefer "learn", "mine", "compute", "extract"
• "obtain" → Not very professional; use "achieve", "produce", "generate", "yield", "form"

Verb Forms

• Prefer present participle (-ing) over infinitive (to ...) in abstract and conclusion
• This creates more flowing, active prose
• Example: "Our method achieving state-of-the-art results..." vs "to achieve..."

Word Position Issues

• "in each iteration" more common than "at each iteration"
• "in the first dataset" more common than "on the first dataset"
• "impact" is a COUNTABLE noun: "a large impact", NOT "large impact"

Bibliography File (.bib) Guidelines

Standard order (this reduces errors):

author
title
booktitle or journal
vol
no
pages
year

Why follow this order?

• Properties scattered randomly make it difficult to spot errors
• Consistent format helps with manual verification
• Makes it easier to identify missing or incorrect information

DELETE these 5 items (they clutter your .bib file):

• editor = {xxx and xxx and xxx}
• timestamp = {Wed, 16 Oct 2019 14:14:55 +0200}
• keywords = {XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX}
• bibsource = {dblp computer science bibliography, https://dblp.org}
• abstract={xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx}

Create meaningful citation keys:

• Use "AuthorConferenceYear" format: ZhangICSE2022 NOT 60901175
• Citation key should let you identify the paper at a glance
• Add blank line between entries for readability

Tools Recommendations

LaTeX vs Word

STRONGLY RECOMMEND LaTeX:

• Easier to switch templates
• Better bibliography management with .bib and .bst files
• Standard skill for graduate students
• Professional typesetting

LaTeX Editors:

• Overleaf (online)
• TexStudio (lightweight)
• TexLive (comprehensive)
• WinEdt (slower updates)

If Using Word

• Enable ALL spell-checking options
• For equations: use "Insert → Formula" but change font to Times New Roman
  • Formula tools → abc text → select Times New Roman → italicize
  • Note: brackets, numbers, superscripts should NOT be italic
• Use "References → Insert Footnote" (don't create manually)
• Check that all references appear in text (delete unused ones)

Drawing Tools

• Preferred: Python (matplotlib), Matlab, Geometer's Sketchpad, Visio, PPT
• Export as .pdf or .eps (vector formats) for LaTeX
• DO NOT export as .jpg/.png (raster formats)
• Keep original files - don't discard after creating figures

Email Guidelines

• Use .edu email or Gmail/Hotmail/Foxmail
• DO NOT use QQ, 126, 163 emails

Quick Checklist

Before Submission:

• Spell check enabled and run
• All Chinese punctuation removed
• "we" usage appropriate (active in abstract/contributions)
• Tenses correct (past in Related Work, present elsewhere)
• No contractions (don't, can't, it's)
• All abbreviations defined on first use
• Terminology consistent throughout
• Reference format consistent
• All figures/tables have explanation before and after
• Figure/table captions in correct position
• Equations use "where" (lowercase)
• .bib file cleaned (removed 5 unnecessary items)
• No "can be"/"may be" in abstract/conclusions
• All citations in text appear in references
• All references in text are cited
• Sentence length reasonable (20-30 words average)
• No dangling participles (subject matching)
• Font consistency (Times New Roman for body)
• LaTeX indentation follows section hierarchy
• No large whitespace gaps (5+ lines)
• Mathematical symbols italicized in LaTeX
• References authoritative (no Wikipedia/Baidu Baike)
• Paper folder has meaningful name

Common Issues and Solutions

Issue: Skill not triggering

Solution: Check your description field includes specific trigger phrases like "academic writing", "paper format", "LaTeX", "abstract", "introduction"

Issue: Punctuation confusion

Solution:

• English: . space (period then space)
• Chinese: . (no space after)
• English quotes: ``text''
• Chinese quotes: "text"

Issue: "we" overuse

Solution: Use "we" for author actions, NOT for model behavior

• RIGHT: "We propose a novel framework."
• WRONG: "The framework uses X, so we can achieve Y." → "The framework uses X to achieve Y."

Issue: Uncertain language

Solution:

• Avoid: "maybe", "perhaps", "sometimes" (reduces credibility)
• Use: "may", "usually", "often", "is likely to", "probably"
• In abstract/conclusion: Use "is", "are" (NOT "can be", "may be")

First Principles

The First Principle: "Write Correctly"

Before worrying about style, length, sophistication, or elegance:

1. Write what you actually did - express your thoughts and methods clearly
2. Write what you actually want to say - be direct and honest
3. Get it down first - refinement and polishing come SECOND

Do NOT worry about:

• "Is this too long?"
• "Is this too simple?"
• "Is this too Chinese-style?"
• "Is this too wordy?"

Common anxiety that holds writers back:

• Fear of imperfect English
• Over-thinking sentence structure
• Premature polishing before content is complete

Remember:

• You can always improve a complete draft
• You cannot improve a blank page
• Clarity of expression beats stylistic flourishes
• Content is king; presentation is queen

When in doubt:

• Choose clarity over complexity
• Choose consistency over variety
• Choose directness over circumlocution
• Academic writing prioritizes precision and readability

Summary

This guide provides comprehensive coverage of academic writing pitfalls identified across 100+ papers. Use it as a reference before submission, but remember: the first principle is to write correctly and express your ideas clearly. Refinement comes second.

Key takeaways:

• Use active voice and "we" in abstract/contributions
• Eliminate Chinese punctuation and colloquialisms
• Maintain consistency in terminology, formatting, and style
• Focus on clarity over complexity
• Write for the reader, not for yourself
• Cite authoritative sources (peer-reviewed, not encyclopedias)
• Follow LaTeX/Word best practices for academic templates