VAGUE/GENERAL LANGUAGE

1)      Look at the following sentences and make them sound more academic. The highlighted phrases
indicate the problem in each sentence.


a)      Crash test dummies are really important for automotive crash tests.


b)      There has been a lot of interest in how background sounds such as music affect an
individual’s ability to concentrate.


c)       Nice results were obtained by using structural bamboo and not timber.


d)      According to a recent study just about 25% of all people using cell phones view texting as
an important source of entertainment.


e)      Consumer interest in electronic billing and payment is getting bigger and bigger.


f)       Good results were gotten from the initial test run; however, we need to do more tests to
find out the performance on a larger scale.



2)      The following text contains some too general vocabulary as well as unnecessary statements.
Rephrase it so that it sounds more academic and does not include unimportant information.

As it was said a few paragraphs above, different populations in a country have different demands
and so they might like to have different laws and policies. Because people would like to have
different rules, they vote for politicians with different opinions. This sort of behavior of people
voting then leads to politicians setting up different organizations – each based around certain
policies – known as political parties.


3)      The following sentences are too vague, ambiguous, or simply unnecessary. Rewrite them so
that you avoid these problems.

a)      Consumer demand is rising in the area of services.


b)      Strong reading skills are an important factor in students’ success at university.


c)       [On the rise of graphic photography during the Civil War] Photography took on new aspects
during the Civil War.


d)      The computations lasted approximately 48 to 51 minutes.


e)      The proposed solution is to use metric A and metric X, even though it is not without its
detriments.


f)       During the course of the test, the device malfunctioned prior to the event of test
completion.


g)      Regardless of the fact that the device malfunctioned, the test was completed with great
success.