Introduction

The introduction answers two main questions for the reader:

• What experiment is being conducted?
• Why is this investigation being conducted?

To answer these questions, the Introduction contains the following content.

• It establishes the scientific need or rationale for the investigation.  The rationale is often established by discussing the relevant related literature from previous scientific investigations.  In most scientific manuscripts, the review of the relevant literature is not exhaustive, but includes ALL relevant, important sources that are need to firmly establish the need for the current experiment. 
  • For the purposes of the SPME 425 class project, the review of related literature will be expanded beyond the two or three paragraphs commonly found in most scientific papers.  For the SPME 425 project, the review of related literature should be thorough and it should include all relevant studies that have preceded your investigation.  This expanded review of literature should fully summarize the current scientific knowledge related to your research question and it should firmly establish the rationale for your experimental question.
  • As the Introduction will contain numerous references to prior works, students should fully understand the referencing style used by the APA.
  • Furthermore, be certain to use only primary sources in the Introduction.  Use of secondary sources should occur in only rare circumstances and the use of tertiary sources is strictly improper in scientific writing.
  • Finally, be certain to only reference sources that you have read.  For example, suppose an article by Smith (1983) has the following sentence, "Jones (1975) found that peak jump height was significantly related to first metatarsal length."  In your paper, you can only include the Jones source if you obtain and read the article.  You cannot base your understanding of Jones solely on the comments of Smith, nor can you state, "Smith (1983) reported that Jones (1975) found that peak jump height was significantly related to first metatarsal length."  The bottom line - obtain the primary source for all reference material and quote directly from primary sources.
•  A statement of purpose.  This statement often contains the research question.
• A formal statement of the experimental hypothesis(es). 

By highlighting what is known and what is not known about the problem, the Introduction should demonstrate the presence of a gap in the literature and recognize the manner in which the experimental questions and hypotheses proposed in the paper will fill the gap.  At the conclusion of the Introduction, the reader should know what experimental questions you are attempting to answer and they should clearly understand the need to answer these questions. 

Help on paraphrasing material from an article.