A Strategy for Coherence: Reverse Outlining

“Any unit of composition, whether it is a whole essay [or article], or a paragraph, or a sentence, has a beginning, middle, and an end.”

--AWR Section C2-3

What is a Reverse Outline?

An outline of existing topics that you write after achieving a solid draft.

A reverse outline lists each paragraph’s current topic in order to:

See what your paragraphs topics really say (in the actual beginning, middle, and end)

Evaluate whether your paragraphs are effective in

what they contain where they are placed

Why Reverse Outline?Allows writer to see structure or

lack of structure (organization)Helps to show relationships

between ideas and topics (coherence)

Helps writer to decide what to add, move, delete (revision)

How do you do it?1. Number existing paragraphs.2. Make a list of current topics. Use only a phrase or

sentence to captures the topic of each paragraph3. Identify orphans. If your paragraphs are not “about” a

clear topic, one you can easily identify—that’s the point —write “ORPHAN” next to its place on your list.

4. Look for coherence. Ask questions about relationships: Between paragraphs: relational coherence Within paragraphs: internal coherence

5. Omit or Commit. Remove paragraphs that are off-topic Modify and move paragraphs and sentence content to

achieve coherence, unity, and focus.

Ask:Is each paragraph in the most effective place?

Is this paragraph relevant?Do the topics make sense?

Relational coherence:Do these paragraphs support the controlling idea?Does this paragraph relate to the one that precedes it?Does this paragraph relate to the one that follows it?

Internal coherence: Does the topic of this paragraph make sense across

sentences?Add or repeat topics (cohesion)Start sentences with main subjects; move subjects

close to main verbs.

Strong Coherence Example

“The Obesity Rate for Children Has Not Plummeted, Despite what the New York Times tells you.”

Photo. Fred Goldstein/Hemera/ThinstockSource: ”The Obesity Rate for Children Has Not Plummeted” Salon.com . 28 Feb 2014. http://www.slate.com/articles/life/family/2014/02/obesity_rate_for_children_has_not_plummeted_despite_that_43_percent_headline.html

Strong Coherence Example

Purpose of article: To refute child obesity findings in recent article in the NYT

and to encourage alert skepticism of media depictions of science

of writer: enhance his credibility; address a problem that engages the community of scholars; political interest in public health policy

Audience: Readers of Slate.com (an online magazine)Role: “Razib Khan is a blogger for the Unz Review at 

Gene Expression. He is currently a Ph.D. student studying the evolutionary genomics of the domestic cat.” http://www.slate.com/authors.razib_khan.html

Context: Brief, timely, blog article for an intelligent “lay person” audience of US citizens “we” in his article

Reverse Outline of Topics① The language of science sometimes distorts what

counts as “statistically significant” results that are in fact random outcomes.

② The astonishing finding-- 43% reduction of obesity-- in the title of a NYT article piqued the interest of this blog author and of many other readers.

③ The percentages were distorted by the NYT because of the difference between absolute versus relative numbers and a limited population group.

④ In the original report, researchers find the exact opposite: “no significant changes in obesity prevalence in youths or adults.”

Reverse Outline of Topics⑤ The public (we) should be skeptical of the NYT’s headlines about

this study which intentionally mislead readers with mistaken findings about obesity.

⑥ We should be skeptical of media depictions of scientific findings: Just because a title/headline is published—even by an accepted reliable source--doesn’t make it reliable.

⑦ Public health and policy discussions carry high-stakes because these discussions can lead to real policy decisions that are driven by media, and media often distorts what the actual science says.

⑧ The author believes the obesity findings cited in the NYT headline will be proven to be a statistical anomaly, even as this author wishes that child obesity were really on the decline.

Strong Coherence Example

1. Common sense tells you that if you run enough trials, by chance, you will occasionally get an unexpected outcome. When scientists deem a result “statistically significant,” they're just saying that given their default expectations (e.g. around 50/50 for a coin toss), the outcomes obtained are unlikely to have occurred by random chance. A fair coin is unlikely to land on heads nine out of 10 tosses, so such an outcome suggests the coin is probably not fair. Unlikely is not the same as impossible, and if you look long and hard you will inevitably stumble upon random events that seem novel but are just the outcome of chance.

Strong Coherence Example

1. Common sense tells you that if you run enough trials, by chance, you will occasionally get an unexpected outcome. When scientists deem a result “statistically significant,” they're just saying that given their default expectations (e.g. around 50/50 for a coin toss), the outcomes obtained are unlikely to have occurred by random chance. A fair coin is unlikely to land on heads nine out of 10 tosses, so such an outcome suggests the coin is probably not fair. Unlikely is not the same as impossible, and if you look long and hard you will inevitably stumble upon random events that seem novel but are just the outcome of chance.

Topic: The language of science sometimes distorts what counts as “statistically significant” results that are in fact random outcomes.

Strong Coherence Example

2. I bring this up because earlier this week the New York Times trumpeted:”Obesity Rate for Young Children Plummets 43% in a Decade.” A surprising discovery, and a pretty big deal, right? The article spread like wildfire on Twitter and Facebook. For once, some heartening news about the health of this nation! My immediate reaction, however, was that there must be something we don’t know about obesity to get such a massive change in such a short period of time. Then I started reading. From the perspective of the researchers themselves, the continuing obesity problem seems to be the most important finding.

Strong Coherence Example

2. I bring this up because earlier this week the New York Times trumpeted:”Obesity Rate for Young Children Plummets 43% in a Decade.” A surprising discovery, and a pretty big deal, right? The article spread like wildfire on Twitter and Facebook. For once, some heartening news about the health of this nation! My immediate reaction, however, was that there must be something we don’t know about obesity to get such a massive change in such a short period of time. Then I started reading. From the perspective of the researchers themselves, the continuing obesity problem seems to be the most important finding.Topic: The astonishing finding-- 43% reduction of obesity--

in the title of a NYT article piqued the interest of this blog author and of many other readers (who spread it on social media).

Strong Coherence Example

3. The warning signs are right there in the Times’ piece, where by the third paragraph the reporter, Sabrina Tavernise, reveals that “About 8 percent of 2- to 5-year-olds were obese in 2012, down from 14 percent in 2004.” The six-percentage-point difference in absolute terms results in the 43 percent relative difference. The Times’ headline blared the relative figure because the absolute drop is just not that impressive.

Strong Coherence Example

3. The warning signs are right there in the Times’ piece, where by the third paragraph the reporter, Sabrina Tavernise, reveals that “About 8 percent of 2- to 5-year-olds were obese in 2012, down from 14 percent in 2004.” The six-percentage-point difference in absolute terms results in the 43 percent relative difference. The Times’ headline blared the relative figure because the absolute drop is just not that impressive.

Topic: The percentages were distorted by the NYT because of the difference between absolute versus relative numeric differences and a limited population group.

Strong Coherence Example

4. My curiosity was piqued enough to look at the original report from which the Times (and theWashington Post, USA Today, and CNN, to name a few) drew the findings. It appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association and comes from a group of researchers with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention affiliations—both legitimate institutions. The report's closing two sentences are telling: “Overall, there have been no significant changes in obesity prevalence in youth or adults between 2003-2004 and 2011-2012. Obesity prevalence remains high and thus it is important to continue surveillance.” Would you have anticipated such a downbeat conclusion from the newspaper headlines? I doubt it. When evaluating the total sample across age groups, rather than just 2- to 5-year-olds, there hasn’t been any change at all. From the perspective of the researchers themselves, the continuing obesity problem seems to be the most important finding.

Strong Coherence Example

4. My curiosity was piqued enough to look at the original report from which the Times (and theWashington Post, USA Today, and CNN, to name a few) drew the findings. It appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association and comes from a group of researchers with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention affiliations—both legitimate institutions. The report's closing two sentences are telling: “Overall, there have been no significant changes in obesity prevalence in youth or adults between 2003-2004 and 2011-2012. Obesity prevalence remains high and thus it is important to continue surveillance.” Would you have anticipated such a downbeat conclusion from the newspaper headlines? I doubt it. When evaluating the total sample across age groups, rather than just 2- to 5-year-olds, there hasn’t been any change at all. From the perspective of the researchers themselves, the continuing obesity problem seems to be the most important finding.

Topic: In the original report, researchers find the exact opposite: “no significant changes in obesity prevalence in youths or adults.”

Strong Coherence Example

5. The study itself illuminates why we should be skeptical of the headlines about the study. Here is how its authors lay out exactly why one should be cautious about even the most optimistic findings, the 43 percent drop in obesity in the 2-to-5 age bracket:“In the current analysis, trend tests were conducted on different age groups. When multiple statistical tests are undertaken, by chance some tests will be statistically significant (eg, 5% of the time using α of .05). In some cases, adjustments are made to account for these multiple comparisons, and a P value lower than .05 is used to determine statistical significance. In the current analysis, adjustments were not made for multiple comparisons, but the P value is presented.”More plainly, the researchers are acknowledging that, yes, if you do enough comparisons and interpretations across various age cohorts, you're bound to turn up an exciting statistically significant result eventually. If you do 10 flips of enough coins, you will at some point flip one to land on heads 10 times. This isn’t fate—it’s probability, and it’s inevitable in the long run. In order to separate out the noise from the real significant results, the authors should have held themselves to a higher standard. Instead they repeatedly declare that they did not and admit that the significant decline in obesity in the age group in question should be treated with caution. In isolation, the result in the decline in obesity has a 1 in 33 chance of being due to random chance (P value: 0.03). But remember that they kept checking for changes in obesity over the years, so looking at the whole study, the random chance of getting these results is much higher than 1 out of 33.

Strong Coherence Example

5. The study itself illuminates why we should be skeptical of the headlines about the study. Here is how its authors lay out exactly why one should be cautious about even the most optimistic findings, the 43 percent drop in obesity in the 2-to-5 age bracket:“In the current analysis, trend tests were conducted on different age groups. When multiple statistical tests are undertaken, by chance some tests will be statistically significant (eg, 5% of the time using α of .05). In some cases, adjustments are made to account for these multiple comparisons, and a P value lower than .05 is used to determine statistical significance. In the current analysis, adjustments were not made for multiple comparisons, but the P value is presented.”More plainly, the researchers are acknowledging that, yes, if you do enough comparisons and interpretations across various age cohorts, you're bound to turn up an exciting statistically significant result eventually. If you do 10 flips of enough coins, you will at some point flip one to land on heads 10 times. This isn’t fate—it’s probability, and it’s inevitable in the long run. In order to separate out the noise from the real significant results, the authors should have held themselves to a higher standard. Instead they repeatedly declare that they did not and admit that the significant decline in obesity in the age group in question should be treated with caution. In isolation, the result in the decline in obesity has a 1 in 33 chance of being due to random chance (P value: 0.03). But remember that they kept checking for changes in obesity over the years, so looking at the whole study, the random chance of getting these results is much higher than 1 out of 33.

Topic The public (we) should be skeptical of the NYT’s headlines about this study which intentionally mislead readers with mistaken findings about obesity.

Strong Coherence Example

6. So, two primary takeaways. The first concerns how the sausage is made in modern science, and the question is: Why was this even published in the first place, with all the caveats? Because a great deal of research manages to get published. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. So when you read a headline that appears too good to be true, remember: Just because it appears in a reputable journal does not mean that a study has “proved” anything.

Strong Coherence Example

6. So, two primary takeaways. The first concerns how the sausage is made in modern science, and the question is: Why was this even published in the first place, with all the caveats? Because a great deal of research manages to get published. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. So when you read a headline that appears too good to be true, remember: Just because it appears in a reputable journal does not mean that a study has “proved” anything.

Topic: The public (we/you) should be skeptical of media depictions of scientific findings: Just because a title/headline is published—even by an accepted reliable source--doesn’t make it reliable. (implication dangerous).

Strong Coherence Example

7. A far bigger issue is that studies like these, and the headlines that result, drive the discussion about public health and policy in this country. The media seizes on sexy results, amplifies them without due skepticism, and the public is misled. This can impact billions of dollars allocated to campaigns meant to capitalize on the supposed implications of scientific studies. It's hardly an academic footnote in this case. Commentators are already attempting to adduce the reasons for the decline in obesity in this age, pointing to the dietary changes in preschool menus, awareness campaigns, and exercise programs that specifically target tots.

Strong Coherence Example

7. A far bigger issue is that studies like these, and the headlines that result, drive the discussion about public health and policy in this country. The media seizes on sexy results, amplifies them without due skepticism, and the public is misled. This can impact billions of dollars allocated to campaigns meant to capitalize on the supposed implications of scientific studies. It's hardly an academic footnote in this case. Commentators are already attempting to adduce the reasons for the decline in obesity in this age, pointing to the dietary changes in preschool menus, awareness campaigns, and exercise programs that specifically target tots.

Topic Discussions of public health and policy carry high-stakes because these discussions can lead to real policy decisions that are driven by media, and media often distorts what the actual science says.

Strong Coherence Example

8.  Let’s not congratulate these policies just yet, because the most likely upshot is that this finding won't be verified over time. In other words, it is probably a statistical fluke. I will be thrilled if studies with more methodological rigor prove me wrong.

Strong Coherence Example

8.  Let’s not congratulate these policies just yet, because the most likely upshot is that this finding won't be verified over time. In other words, it is probably a statistical fluke. I will be thrilled if studies with more methodological rigor prove me wrong.

Topic: In the case of obesity, the author believes the finding of the cited research that prompted the headline will be proven to be a statistical anomaly, even as this author wishes that child obesity were really on the decline.

Reverse Outline of Topics① The language of science sometimes distorts what

counts as “statistically significant” results that are in fact random outcomes.

② The astonishing finding-- 43% reduction of obesity-- in the title of a NYT article piqued the interest of this blog author and of many other readers.

③ The percentages were distorted by the NYT because of the difference between absolute versus relative numbers and a limited population group.

④ In the original report, researchers find the exact opposite: “no significant changes in obesity prevalence in youths or adults.”

Reverse Outline of Topics⑤ The public (we) should be skeptical of the NYT’s headlines about

this study which intentionally mislead readers with mistaken findings about obesity.

⑥ We should be skeptical of media depictions of scientific findings: Just because a title/headline is published—even by an accepted reliable source--doesn’t make it reliable.

⑦ Public health and policy discussions carry high-stakes because these discussions can lead to real policy decisions that are driven by media, and media often distorts what the actual science says.

⑧ The author believes the obesity findings cited in the NYT headline will be proven to be a statistical anomaly, even as this author wishes that child obesity were really on the decline.