Lab report can be used to answer a research question with a hypothesis, or it can be a detail-oriented description of a procedure followed by the report of the results of that procedure. Lab reports demonstrate the purpose of the research, how they were conducted, why they were conducted and the outcomes of the experiments. This can help other researchers to conduct follow up research based on all the results that were acquired or simply to repeat the same experiment. There are mainly eight elements in a lab report. These elements include title, abstract, introduction, methods and materials, results, discussion, conclusion, and references. Some additional elements can be added such as acknowledgments and appendixes. This is considered the structure of a well-defined lab report in engineering field. These elements do not have to follow the order. It can be of a different order based on experiment or research. The following discussion will focus on two different lab reports that were taken from trusted database in order to analyze the above-mentioned elements and also compare and contrast between the two lab reports.

The very first element of the structure of a well-defined lab report is the title. Title is considered the heading of a research or experiment. It has to be informative enough for the reader to get the abstract or the whole idea of the experiment. It helps the reader to locate them effectively in a database or search engine. The title of the first lab report is “Investigation of current-voltage characteristics and current conduction mechanisms in composites of polyvinyl alcohol and bismuth oxide”. This title is informative and there is no abbreviation used where the reader may get confused. There are several keywords which have been used such as “current-voltage characteristics” and “polyvinyl alcohol”. These keywords can help the readers to locate this lab report most relevant for their needs. The second lab report is “An exact method to determine the conductivity of aqueous solutions in acid-base titrations”. In this title there is a little bit of ambiguity regarding the word “exact” as it does not mention any specific name for the method. Instead of using the word “exact”, the author should have mentioned the name of the method so that readers can easily locate the report in a database. This title also has some keywords such as “conductivity”, “aqueous solutions” and “acid-base titration” which can be helpful to locate the lab report using a search engine.

The second element of the structure is abstract. Abstract summarizes the lab report in a well informative manner. Readers use abstract to locate important findings or results of the research which can be the deciding factor for many readers if they want to go through the whole report. Abstract can be informative or descriptive. Readers prefer informative over descriptive because informative focuses on the major findings or results whereas descriptive abstract only focuses on the topics that were covered without any outcome or results. The abstract of the first lab report is an informative abstract. It includes the major results and also mentioned some of the methods that has been used. It mentioned all the changes of the temperatures and volts which is the results of the experiment and also included a conclusion based on the findings. The second lab report is more towards descriptive rather than informative as it mostly talks about other experiment and their findings which can be incorporated to the intended experiment. It also talks about the method that has been used and the outcome of the experiment. Both lab report abstractions are precise and not too overwhelming with information.

The third element of a lab report is the introduction. The introduction includes the description or the analysis of the theory or research question that has been addressed. It also includes important terms and glossaries that may be new to the reader which can help them to understand the significance of the research. It can also include any relevant research or experiment that lead to the current research. The first lab report has a decent size well detailed introduction. It includes previous experiments which lead to the current one with explanation of the significance of it. Although it mentioned mostly the previous experiments and its results, it is perhaps necessary to include all of them in order to establish further experiment and its outcome. The second lab report introduction is similar to the first lab report introduction as it includes all the past experiments and their results and how it can be related to the current experiment. It has some description of the theory that will be needed to understand the experiment better.

The fourth element of a lab report is materials and methods. This part is the most concise and detail-oriented throughout the entire lab report. Material is considered the actual tangible things that are used in the experiment such as thermometer, meter scale, test subject, chemical solutions etc. This also can include any drawing, sketch, diagram. The methods are the step by step procedures that has to be followed in order to achieve the similar result or conclusion of the experiment. Methods can include time, location, temperature condition or even particular configuration of a system. Methods and materials have to be full of detail so that another researcher can conduct the same experiment which is called “replicability”. The first lab report has all the details of the materials and methods in its experimental section. Although it has managed to mention the procedures, the materials that are used in this experiment are not well defined. It is all scattered in the description rather than a list where the reader can easily identify. The second lab also follows the similar pattern of the first lab report where the materials are not well organized in a list. In fact, it does not even mention any materials at all. In the section of materials and methods, we can only find the methods to achieve different titration using function and mathematical procedures. The methods are well defined in this section using numbers in ascending order in order to show step by step guidance.

The next element of a lab report is results. Results includes any time of raw data which can be used to support the argument of the hypothesis or the research question. It has to be persuasive enough to the readers so that the researcher can get credit for the work. This persuasion depends on the successful presentation of the data and their analysis. The data and findings have to be well organized with adequate supporting evidence for the claim that has been made. The first lab report has combined the results and discussion into one section. The results include figures, mathematical expression for calculation and a table of data to support the hypothesis. The second lab report also combines the results and discussion part like the first lab report. The results of the second lab report include some graphs and figures and mathematical expressions of chemical reaction to help explaining the procedures and the findings from the experiment. There are adequate amount of data and information in both lab reports in order to support their hypothesizes.

The sixth element of a lab report is discussion. Discussion includes analysis of the data and findings. Discussion carries the answer to all the questions in the hypothesis. It also includes the failures in the experiment for further investigation or perhaps a new experiment or research based on that. Discussion can compare and contrast any previous experiments that were done related to the current one. Both lab reports have combined the results and discussion part. In this way the researchers can discuss about the data from results and also includes major findings and compare with previous data.

The next element of a lab report is conclusion. Conclusion is the summary of the entire lab report. It mostly focuses on the hypothesis and the findings that support the hypothesis so that it can convince the reader once again. No new concept or analysis should be introduced in this section. The conclusion of the first lab report is very precise with minimal. It only talks about the important findings from the experiment such as the different characteristics of current and voltage associated with different temperature which is the title of the experiment. The conclusion of the second lab report restates the hypothesis and talks about all the different studies that were found and how it supports the hypothesis.

The last element of a lab report is reference. The purpose of reference is citation so that the actual author of any article or research that is used in the current research can be credited.

Both lab reports have a significant amount of citation for mostly some of the additional theories that are required in order to understand the hypothesis.

Lab report is a presentation of a hypothesis with all these eight elements in order to convince the reader to accept the conclusion or findings. The main reason we want to incorporate all the eight elements, is to help proving the hypothesis. The reader may not read the whole report, so we have to make sure every elements of the report support the hypothesis or the main idea.

Link

Sample lab report 1 : https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A377286684/AONE?u=cuny_ccny&sid=AONE&xid=f46f3e47

Sample lab report 2: https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A454429183/AONE?u=cuny_ccny&sid=AONE&xid=bb4f1b52

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