Written on February 27, 2025

Since I have not had much practice writing lab reports, I found this assignment a valuable exercise. However, because of my lack of experience, the process took me quite some time.  

General 

The report contains all the required sections: 

• Abstract 
• Introduction and Hypothesis 
• Materials and Methods (written in the report as “Methods and Materials” instead) 
• Results 
• Discussion 
• Conclusion 
• Works Cited 

It is formal and written in the 3^rd person, conforming to the MLA style guide with in-text citations and a Works Cited. It leverages active and passive voice to selectively switch emphasis between the author (and their potential bias/fallibility) and the experiment. Organization within each section is clear and the writing is easy to understand. The report was submitted on time. The title page contains the necessary information, and the title itself is descriptive and informative. 

I chose to follow the formatting used in one of the sample reports I annotated.   

Description of Revisions 

I performed substantive revisions between the initial and final drafts. I… 

• …added the hypothesis to the Abstract. 
• …rewrote the introduction with the help of excellent feedback from you and my reviewers. Rather than including a literature review, I decided to focus on making a case for the experiment’s significance with a focus on its relevance to people’s lives. I chose not to go into specific details regarding the experimental procedure to avoid redundancy within the report, as details are included in the Abstract, Methods and Material, and Conclusion. 
• … made a few clarifications about how real-time discomfort measurements were made in Methods and Materials. I did not use a list to enumerate the experiment’s materials, taking inspiration from the style of the sample lab reports I came across for the annotation assignment. 
• …refactored Discussion to address the hypothesis and limitations and better explain the connection between all the concepts introduced. 
• …appended a new paragraph to the conclusion exploring further research directions. 

Section by Section Evaluation 

Abstract: The Abstract is composed of three sentences, concisely summarizing the method and materials, hypothesis, results, and discussion. Including the 58% statistic in the last sentence is a minor improvement that would elevate this section. 

Introduction and Hypothesis: The Introduction establishes the significance of the experiment. It includes a useful definition, clearly states the hypothesis, and provides a general overview of the method. 

Methods and Materials: This section clearly describes the materials, setup, and procedure.  It does an adequate job of convincing the reader of the validity of the method by explaining how randomization was used to protect the integrity of the results.  

Results: This is a simple, short section that presents all relevant quantitative findings without interpretation. 

Discussion: It explores multiple important concepts and uses them to build an explanation for the results. This section also directly addresses the fact that the results are inconsistent with the findings and comments on why, ending with a brief note about a limitation of the experiment.  

Conclusion: The conclusion is robust and contains three main sections that summarize the experiment, discuss the implications and relevance of the findings, and provide suggestions for further research. 

Each section satisfactorily fulfills its appropriate role in the report. 

Final Evaluation 

The report contains the required sections, and each section carries out its purpose. A few refinements could be made. There is always room for improvement when it comes to elegant prose, but the main goal of a lab report is not beautiful but clear, concise writing. The report accomplishes that objective. Considering these factors, I would give myself a 98/100.