What is a lab report?

Lab reports are written to describe and analyse a laboratory experiment

that explores a scientific concept.
They are typically assigned to enable you to:

 Conduct scientific research.

 Formulate a hypothesis(es) about a particular stimulus, event, and/or behaviour.

 Review relevant literature to justify your hypothesis.

 Allow someone to replicate your study by providing precise details.

 Apply statistics to test your hypothesis.

 Explore theoretical explanations.

 Evaluate research objectively and methodically.

 Communicate concisely and precisely.

Remember that with lab reports it may be impossible to rely on a single

explanation for your findings. Therefore, it is vital that you provide as
many potential and relevant interpretations as possible.
Even if your findings do not support your hypothesis, they are still
valuable because you can then demonstrate that within the contextual
constraints of your study, your argument was not reliable, and you can
then move on to consider other areas for research, without having to do
down the same path.
Further, this may open up avenues for others to investigate your
hypothesis under different conditions. Nevertheless, there may have
been unforeseen circumstances or conditions that were not possible to
isolate and control, which you can use to help justify your results.
It is also important to be clear about the voice or grammatical style in
which you write your report. For instance, traditionally, lab reports have
been written in the passive voice, and used the third person pronoun, as
in “The study was conducted by Smith and Jones (1996)” and “It was
hypothesised that…”. However, more recently, it has become acceptable
to use the active voice, as in “Smith and Jones (1996) conducted the
study”, as well as make reference to yourself where relevant, as in “I
hypothesised that…”. Check your assignment instructions for
clarification, and keep the voice consistent throughout the report. See
the section on introduction to academic writing for more.
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 Lab report structure
Lab reports typically adopt the sections listed below.
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Abstract [hide]
The abstract functions as a short, yet detailed, summary of the whole report. Hence, it is far easier to write at the
very end, once you have completed the report. Ideally, you may be able to extract a sentence or two from each
main section of the report to build your abstract. In creating your summary, it is important to include a sentence or
two about each of the following:

 A statement about the topic, which demonstrates some reasoning for formulating the hypothesis.
 The hypothesis

 Brief details about how the study was conducted, including:

 Number of participants.

 Participant characteristics, such as gender.

 How they were recruited, and assigned to experimental conditions where appropriate.

 Any special equipment used to carry out the research.

 The main findings and whether they supported or disconfirmed the hypothesis.

 Identify theoretical explanations for the findings, as well as any major inconsistencies and / or alternative

explanations, where word space permits.

 Research avenues for the future or implications of the research.

The abstract can vary in word length from a minimum of 120 words through to 250 words. However, always check
the assignment instructions to be sure of the limit required for your report.

Introduction [hide]
This is the first main section of the report and may be easiest to write in conjunction with the discussion section
because it is often important to follow-up, in your discussion, on at least one or two of the studies you mentioned in
your introduction.

The central purpose of the introduction is to justify your hypothesis. However, to begin the introduction, you need to
start back at a more general area of interest that is relevant to your study. From there, you move rapidly into any
major theories or models, as well as studies that have been conducted, which relate to the focus of your hypothesis.

When considering what studies to include, it is always useful to mention an original, pioneering study that may have
been carried out many years ago, in the 60s or 70s, which led the research path. In some instances, the topic area
may be an emerging one, and the original study or several pioneering works may have occurred in more recent
times.
Then from here, you have a range of options. It may be the case that the research findings in the topic area have
been fairly consistent, except for one or two outcomes. In that case, it would probably be helpful to include the
inconsistent studies to at least highlight the lack of consistency and hence the need to continue the investigation. In
other cases, it may be more difficult, in that there may be a range of studies which all highlight diverse aspects of
the study you have conducted. Here, you will need to prioritise which studies are most relevant to the current one –
whether it be the particular technique used or the actual findings and type of research question.

The introduction can be one of the most difficult sections of a report to write because it is difficult to develop a sense
of direction about where to start and how much to include at the beginning. Write the introduction in pieces by
summarising one study at a time, or one theoretical framework at a time. Then return as appropriate to shaping
these pieces together to get a sense of the order in which these items can be best placed to most convincingly lead
up to the reasoning for your hypothesis. Do not forget to also include definitions of any relevant terms and concepts,
including the use of acronyms throughout your report.

In terms of how much word space to allocate to the introduction, it is probably the second most important section, so
assign words accordingly. For a 2000 word lab report, about 500 words would be a fair figure to aim for, depending
on how many words are required to adequately describe the method and results sections. If these take substantially
fewer words, you may be able to increase the introduction accordingly.

Method [hide]
This is a relatively formulaic section in that there is a clearly marked out structure to follow, namely, three sub-
sections: participants, materials or apparatus, procedure. The method section can be the easiest to write because it
follows a straight forward structure. Therefore, it is often the best section to start with when writing-up your report.

Participants
In this section, give enough details about the participants so that someone could repeat the study using people with
the same characteristics. Hence, you will need to mention the number of participants, their gender, whether they are
students, as well as how they were recruited. It's also important to mention whether participants volunteered and
whether they were randomly assigned to experimental conditions.

Materials or Apparatus
Here you need to give details about the equipment required to carry out the study. This may include a particular
type of technology, in which case you may need a model number and brand name. If you used a paper-pencil
survey, which was designed specifically for the study, then you need to provide enough details so that someone
could replicate it if they wanted to repeat the study. In such cases, it may be appropriate to attach a copy of the
survey in an appendix at the end of the report, and give general details in this section, but refer readers to the
appendix for a full copy. If a paper-pencil test is well-known, you may only need to mention its name.

Procedure
In this section, you need to repeat the exact instructions that were given to the participants. If it is important in
conducting the study to express instructions to participants using particular words and phrases, then mention these
exactly as they were stated in the study. You may also need to include activities and tasks undertaken by the
researcher.

Results [hide]
The results section is often a good section to write after the method because it can provide clarity on the findings,
before you embark on thinking about possible explanations for the findings in your discussion. The results provide
the reader with information about what you found. Consequently, one of the key features of the results section is to
ensure that you only mention the findings, and not what they mean in relation to the study.

It may be useful to begin by naming the type of analysis carried out on the data, and if the data had been changed
in any way from its raw form before you undertook the analysis. Then mention the difference or lack of difference
between groups with respect to the activity they participated in during the study. If relevant, you can express this
difference (or lack of) by including each group's score numerically in brackets. This then needs to be backed up with
statistical evidence to support the difference (or lack of). In this case, you will need to mention the name of the
statistical test using appropriate statistical symbols, such as t, F, M. With each test, include the degrees of freedom,
the value of the statistic, and the level of probability. For some tests, you may also need to provide the N value or
number of participants. Most importantly, you also need to state whether the difference was “significant” or “not
significant”.

When you have a lot of data, it may be convenient to display this in a table or graph and then summarise the main
features or patterns in words. However, remember not to duplicate information. So, if you have a table with data
contained within it, and then go on to repeat much of this data in the form of sentences, the written expression of the
data will be redundant. When using tables, the title appears at the top of the table; when using graphs, the title
appears below.

Discussion [hide]
This section is allocated the most marks, so it is well worth your investment in time to do it thoroughly. You typically
begin with a sentence or paragraph, summarising the results, including whether they support or disconfirm the
hypothesis. You can then choose to highlight the similarities in findings with the current study and previous ones. It
is then relevant to move on to the most challenging part of the Discussion: explaining your findings.

A good proportion of your discussion should be devoted to explaining, interpreting, and where relevant, justifying
your findings. This can involve repeating some of the theoretical frameworks or models mentioned in the
Introduction, but with a greater focus towards making sense of the outcomes in the current study. Beyond affirming
the theory, you should also consider any alternative explanations for the findings. These may be drawn from studies
that presented inconsistent findings with the theory. Additionally, you may also be able to draw on aspects of the
study which may have been left to chance, rather than being experimentally controlled.

In the last part of the discussion, it is beneficial to mention any flaws in the study, such as a lack of diversity
amongst participants, sample size, and other characteristics of the sample population. If you can think of other
disadvantages associated with the design of the study, this will most certainly add bonus marks. In the final part,
before your concluding paragraph, it is a good idea to consider the future application of the findings in some way,
and even the need for further investigations to ascertain unexplained aspects of the research outcomes. This
particular part can also be included in the concluding paragraph, but will depend on your assignment instructions. In
closing the report, finish by reaffirming the findings and their significance to the research area.

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LAB REPORT
is an important part of all laboratory courses and you it explains what you did in experiment, what you learned,
and what the results meant. Lab report should demonstrate that the writer understands the concepts behind the
data. It identifies the reasons and the ways differences have occurred and explains their influence upon the
experiment. Finally, lab report shows that a person who conducted the experiment has a full comprehension of
the principles the experiment was designed to examine. A key element in such paper writing is careful
organization of ideas and their coherent expression.

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Writing Lab Reports or Research

Reports

A scientific research report is a primary means of communication among scientists and

researchers. It allows an individual researcher or team or researchers with similar interests to
share their findings and ideas with their peers in an organized and official manner. The formal
lab reports you will write as an undergraduate student are modelled on the reports written and
submitted by scientists, professors, and other researchers to professional and scientific
journals. These reports are peer-reviewed and, if accepted for publication, are published in
journals available globally. Scientists and researchers read these journal articles, and use the
information to further their own research or to collaborate with others. This is how the body of
knowledge in a certain discipline grows.

The format of the journal article is structured to allow readers to quickly identify what they are
looking for and to follow in a logical manner the work done by the author. Whether you are
writing a lab report for a course, a graduate thesis, or a paper for publication in a scholarly
research journal, the format is similar to the one described below. However, because some
 courses have special needs, always consult your instructor to find out the particular
requirements for your assignment.

Parts of a Lab or Research Report

Title

 The title of a report should indicate exactly what you have studied
Example:
The Effects of Light and Temperature on the Growth of the Bacterium, Escherichia coli.
This title explains the environmental factors manipulated (light and temperature), the
parameter measured (growth), and the specific organism used (E. coli).
 If a large number of variables or organisms were used, the title could say "Several Factors..." or
"Various Chemicals...."
 It is unnecessary to include words such as "Observations on the Effects of..." or "A Report on the
Effects of..." or "A Study on the Effects of...."

Other examples of titles could include the following:

 Morphological studies on the effect of methyl mercury on Black Duck liver (biology)
 Relationships between perceptual mechanisms for color and pattern in human vision
(psychology)
 Relationship between mineralogy and trace element chemistry in sediments from two fresh
water deltas and one marine delta within the Fraser River Basin (geology)

Abstract

The abstract is a condensed version of the entire lab report (approximately 250 words). A
reader uses the abstract to quickly understand the purpose, methods, results and significance
of your research without reading the entire paper.

Abstracts or papers published in scholarly journals are useful to you when you are conducting
library research, because you can quickly determine whether the research report will be relevant
to your topic.

The material in the abstract is written in the same order as that within the paper, and has the
same emphasis. An effective abstract should include a sentence or two summarizing the
highlights from each of the sections: introduction (including purpose), methods, results, and
discussion. To reflect the content (especially results and conclusions) of the paper accurately,
the abstract should be written after the final draft of your paper is complete, although it is
placed at the beginning of the paper.
 Begin the abstract with a brief, but specific, background statement to introduce your report
 State your main purpose or objective and hypothesis
 Describe the important points of your methodology (species/reagents/ingredients, the number
of subjects or samples, and techniques or instruments used to make measurements)
 Summarize the main results numerically and qualitatively (include standard errors and p values
as required)
 Summarize the major points from the discussion/conclusion. Focus on the points that directly
relate to your hypothesis/question
 For each type of information, use the same tense as in each corresponding section (i.e., past
tense for methods and results, present tense for theory and conclusions)

Introduction

Why did you study this problem?

The introduction should identify the problem or issue and provide the background information
(on previous work and/or theories) that the reader needs to understand your experiment. To do
this, the introduction contains a brief literature review to describe previous research conducted
on the problem, and to explain how the current experiment will help to clarify or expand the
knowledge. The introduction should end with a purpose statement (sometimes in the form of a
hypothesis or null hypothesis): one sentence which specifically states the question your
experiment was designed to answer.
Example:

The purpose of this investigation was to determine the effects of environmentally realistic
exposures of acid precipitation on productivity of field-grown and chamber-grown peanuts. (as
a purpose statement)

or

The hypothesis was that environmentally realistic exposures of acid precipitation would affect
the productivity of both field-grown and chamber-grown peanuts. (as a hypothesis)

or

The null hypothesis was that environmentally realistic exposures of acid precipitation would not
affect the productivity of either field-grown or chamber-grown peanuts. (as a null hypothesis)

Use resources such as your textbook, course notes, and journal articles to build the foundation,
and use examples of similar experiments/results that others have done that support your
hypothesis. Don't forget to document your sources using appropriate referencing style for your
discipline (see writing handouts on referencing).
 Use appropriate background information from the lab manual and the lectures
 Clearly state your purpose and hypothesis at the end
 Use the present tense for most of the information in the Introduction (for current or accepted
theory), but the present perfect and the past where logic demands (for specific results of
previous studies)

Materials and Methods

What did you do? How did you do it?

In this section you will describe how and when you did your work, including experimental
design, experimental apparatus, methods of gathering and analyzing data, and types of control.

 Include complete details and write this section clearly enough to allow readers to duplicate the
experiment if they so wish. (In writing lab reports for undergraduate courses, you may not
always be required to write a detailed materials and methods section because the methods are
already described in the laboratory manual; check with your instructors about how much
information to include in the written report)
 Write in past tense because you have already done the experiment. Use complete sentences,
and do not write in the form of instructions or as a list of materials as in a laboratory manual
 Use either first person active voice or in passive voice to describe what you did
Check whether your professors will accept the use of the first person in your report
Example:
(first person active voice) I filled six petri plates with agar
(passive voice) Six petri plates were filled with agar
 Methods adapted from other sources should be referenced
 Photographs, maps, and diagrams may be used to help describe the experimental setup
 Describe any procedures that you altered compared to the lab manual or published procedures.

Results

What did you find?

In the results, you present your observations and data with no interpretations or conclusions
about what they mean. A well-written and well-organized results section will provide the
framework for the discussion section.

 Record all your results, using complete sentences, usually in the order the observations were
made
 Tables and graphs should be used to supplement the text and to present the data in a more
understandable form (see Tables and Figures in this handout). Raw data will probably be most
effective in table format, with the highlights summarized in graph form
 The written text of the results section may be as short as one sentence summarizing the
highlights and directing the reader to specific tables and figures. • Include results that went
"wrong" or were unexpected. This may be useful information for someone trying to repeat the
experiment
 Use both words and numbers to describe your results, and use proper terminology
 Use past tense to describe your results
 Sample or detailed calculations for a lab report in a course may be included in a separate
section titled, Calculations, or in an Appendix at the end of the report.
Check with your course instructors for specific requirements in a particular course

Discussion

What does it mean? How does it relate to previous work in the field? Explain what you think your
data mean.

 Describe patterns and relationships that emerged

 Discuss why you observed what you did, how it happened (or the most likely reason), and how
it relates to the purpose of the experiment
 Compare these results to trends described in the literature and to theoretical behaviour
 Support your interpretations with references to course material, the lab manual, and comments
from the TA or instructor during the lab. You may also be asked to use other resources (peer
reviewed journal articles) for a more in-depth discussion; if you do, remember to reference
properly
 Continue to be descriptive; the readers may not read each result and jump to the discussion to
find out why it happened, so provide them with enough information to understand the
discussion. Remind the reader of your own results, when relevant, without repeating endless
details from Results
Example:
The temperature increased during the second phase because of the drug treatment. (Discussion
statement)
NOT
The temperature increased during the second phase. (repetition of Results statement)
 If your result section was well organized, you can follow it as a guide while you are writing the
discussion. You can refer to the same tables and figures to explain the
changes/trends/unexpected results
 Accept or reject your hypothesis and explain why. It is acceptable to reject your hypothesis as
long as you can prove it to be untrue and explain why the results did not turn out as you
predicated. You can't argue the results, but if something went wrong or was damaged,
disturbed, or contaminated; if there were changes to the experimental procedure; or if
equipment was faulty, you need to include this information and explain how it may have
affected the results
 If your lab manual includes questions to be answered in the Discussion, integrate your
responses into a logical discussion, rather than answering them one by one. And don't include
only the answers to the questions, use them as a guideline for supplementing your discussion,
not limiting it
 Your final paragraph is the conclusion. Include a brief restatement of the purpose and the main
results and how they are relevant to the field of study. Also include any future direction for your
results or changes you would make the next time to produce results that are more significant or
noteworthy
 This section will be written in the past tense when you are describing your experiment, and
present tense when comparing to current theory

Tables and Figures

Tables and figures are often used in a report to present complicated data. Use the following
guidelines to incorporate them effectively.

 Tables are referred to as tables, and all other items (graphs, photographs, drawings, diagrams,
maps, etc.) are referred to as figures
 Numbering: All tables and figures must be numbered. Tables and figures are assigned numbers
in the order they are mentioned in the text.
Tables and figures are numbered independently of each other (i.e., Table 1 and 2, and then
Figure 1 and 2 as well)
 All tables and figures must have self-explanatory titles so that the reader can understand their
content without the text
Example:
Table 1. Percent of soybean plants exhibiting visible injury after exposure to acid precipitation.
 Labeling: Tables are usually labeled at the top and figures at the bottom
 Each table or figure MUST be introduced within the text, with a comment that should point out
the highlight(s) or significant trend(s), not every piece of data that is shown
Do not write:
The plant was 4.0 cm on day 1, 4.2 cm on day 3, and 5.0 cm on day 4.
Simply state:
The plant increased in height over a 4-day period (Figure 1).
 Tables and figures may be placed at the end of the paper, or within the text as soon as possible
after they are mentioned without interrupting the text (i.e., at the end of a paragraph or
section). Check with your professors for their preference
 Avoid referring to the table below because you don't know exactly what the final placement of
the table will be.
Refer to the specific table or figure number, and the readers will always be able to find the
information
 The tables and figures should enhance the report, but the reader should be able to understand
and follow the results even if the tables/figures were removed
 References

Also called "Literature Cited" or "References Cited," this is a list only of papers and resources
actually mentioned (cited) within the report. (NOTE: A "Bibliography," on the other hand, refers
to a list of all materials used to get background knowledge on a subject; you will not usually be
required to include one in a scientific lab report.)

Scientific lab reports are written for the sole purpose of sharing information. If readers want
more information about something, they need to be able to find the exact place it was originally
written. References also give credit to the person who did the work and provide your work with
authority.

 The reference list is provided on a separate page at the end of the report
 Remember that ALL information within the report that is not your original work or ideas should
be referenced (even if not quoted directly, but paraphrased or summarized – quotations are
rare in scientific writing)
 Reference your lab manual, textbook, and any journal articles used
 In-text citations usually occur in one of two places in the sentence: Smith (1999) has also found
that E.coli is one of the only microbes to . . . . or E.coli is one of the only microbes to . . . (Smith
1999)
 There are several standard styles for documenting references. Check with your lab manual, your
professors, or your TA for their preference. You may be asked to follow the format of a
particular journal in your field. If so, follow that format exactly

General Tips about the Formal Lab Report

Lab reports are the foundation of scientific research. They allow scientists to share information
and lead to new discoveries. Consider your lab report to be a part of this body of knowledge
and write it effectively. Following are some general tips.

 A formal lab report may take several hours to write properly, so plan ahead
 The more depth and thought you put into the report, especially the discussion, the better it will
help you to understand the course material and improve your grade
 Do not copy from friends. This is a form of academic misconduct that is easily detected and is
subject to severe penalties
 Always check with your instructor or TA for detailed instructions about the format: for example,
you might ask if the tables and figures should be included in the Results section or at the end
of your report

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