Writing groups offer their members a wealth of benefits. In fact, studies indicate that membership in a writing group can actually help boost your publication rate. In an examination of the publication rate of 48 female medical school faculty before and after participating in a writing group, Sonnad et al. found that the professors’ average publication rate increased from 1.5 papers per year to 4.5 papers per year after joining the writing group. Cumbie et al. also describe increases in productivity among writing group members, reporting “significant and positive writing outcomes in the form of manuscripts submitted for publication, abstracts submitted for conference presentations, [and] grant proposals developed.”
Subconscious productivity: Accessing your inner self
As a writer, I battle with procrastination, always have. At times I also find it strangely hard to revise my work. But in graduate school I hit upon a way of using my procrastination to produce nearly final copy the first time. The “method” was suggested to me by reading the Autobiography of Bertrand Russell.
Tips for putting words on the page
Excerpted from an article that originally appeared in The Chronicle of Higher Education by Rachel Toor.
“Frequently I talk with academics who feel they don’t write enough. Even people with a tenure blade dangling over their cervical vertebrae don’t usually have to reach far to find justifications for not getting stuff done. I don’t want to use the word ‘excuses,’ because they are often valid and real problems, and I don’t want to minimize how hard it is to have something to say and find the right way to say it.
WEBINAR: Confronting the Anxiety of Academic Writing
Becoming an effective academic writer is one of the key challenges facing doctoral students and early career researchers. Despite the centrality of writing, few writers feel comfortable with the process or confident about their product. Rachael Cayley, author of the blog, Explorations of Style, discusses the anxiety that attends academic writing.
I Don’t Write Enough Because…
I don’t write enough because…
I have a day job—teaching.
I have no unscheduled time.
8 Strategies for writing group success
Writing groups provide an opportunity for you to connect with your peers, create a sense of community, and find collaborators for joint projects. By meeting regularly as a group, you can provide one another with peer support and accountability while sharing advice that can help improve writing skills and lead to greater publication success.