Hamidreza Mahboobi1, Javad Golmirzaei, Hamzeh Seddigh, Tahereh Khorgoei. 1. Department of Psychiatric Diseases, Student Research Committee, Hormozgan, Iran E-mail: hamidrezamahboobi@yahoo.com ; Department of Psychology, Payame Noor University (PNU), Tehran, Iran E-mail: hamidrezamahboobi@yahoo.com.
Sir,We carefully read previously published papers on manuscript writing skills in Indian Journal of Psychiatry.[1] We discussed about these papers in our Research Mentorship Program,[2] and all medical students followed this educational paper with much interest. All medical students need to learn scientific writing skills.[3]Andrade mentioned some important issues regarding writing an abstract.[1] In this paper, we will briefly add information regarding title and key words which are two important sections in a scientific abstract.
Title
Title should be obvious, short and related to the other sections in the abstract. Some journals have some limitations to the maximum number of the characters or words in the title. If necessary, for example, in cross-sectional studies, the time and place of the study should be added to the title. Laboratory researches and some clinical researches such as randomized clinical trials (RCTs) do not need time and place in their titles. It is necessary in some studies that the study design be evident in the title.Do not forget that the title is the first part and usually the only part of your paper which readers will encounter. It should be interesting enough to obligate them to read the abstract or whole paper.
Key words
Another important issue in abstract writing is choosing good key words.The number of key words is usually between 3 and 10. But it depends on the journal or conference. It is not recommended to use the city names in the key words. It is highly recommended to check the words you want to choose for your key words in the MeSH database.Key words are usually used by Journals, Conferences, and indexing databases for searching the paper. Inappropriate key words or key words unrelated to your paper's content lead to some problems.For example, one who needs to reach it through your key words or one who reaches your paper using your keywords then finds them unrelated to his/her search.We presented some general information about key words and title here.Do not forget to read the “Instruction for authors” section in every journal or conference before you complete your abstract.