{"id":18445,"date":"2018-08-20T20:00:08","date_gmt":"2018-08-20T14:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/?p=18445"},"modified":"2021-11-12T16:35:36","modified_gmt":"2021-11-12T10:35:36","slug":"how-to-avoid-phrasal-verbs-in-academic-writing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/how-to-avoid-phrasal-verbs-in-academic-writing\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Avoid Phrasal Verbs in Academic Writing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>You use phrasal verbs daily while speaking. A phrasal verb is actually a verb made up of two or more words: the main verb with an adverb or preposition, or both. Using these words in combination gives them a meaning different from that of the individual words used. This makes them difficult for non-native English speakers to understand.<\/p>\n<p>For example, the word \u201ccarry\u201d means \u201cto take or bear something from one place to another.\u201d While the word \u201cout\u201d has multiple meanings including \u201cmoving away from a particular place; situated a particular distance from somewhere; revealed; finished.\u201d However, when <a href=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/make-subjects-verbs-agree\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">used in combination<\/a>, \u201ccarry out\u201d is a phrasal verb which means<strong> \u201c<\/strong>to perform or to accomplish.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/plagiarism-checker\/?utm_source=academy&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=banner&amp;utm_term=article\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-36233 lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/M3_inarticle-service-banner_900x270_1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"900\" height=\"270\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/M3_inarticle-service-banner_900x270_1.jpg 900w, https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/M3_inarticle-service-banner_900x270_1-470x141.jpg 470w, https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/M3_inarticle-service-banner_900x270_1-750x225.jpg 750w, https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/M3_inarticle-service-banner_900x270_1-768x230.jpg 768w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 900px) 100vw, 900px\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 900px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 900\/270;\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<h2><strong>Using Phrasal Verbs in Academic Writing<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Although phrasal verbs are acceptable in spoken English, they are frequently considered too informal for academic writing. Furthermore, phrasal verbs often have multiple meanings. Your aim is to write your paper in a simple language that makes your work clear and concise. It is therefore recommended that you <a href=\"https:\/\/en.oxforddictionaries.com\/grammar\/phrasal-verbs\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">replace phrasal verbs<\/a> with formal one-word alternatives.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>\u201cThe most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u2014Thomas Jefferson<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<h2><strong>Types of Phrasal Verb<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>A further distinction is made between intransitive phrasal verbs (they have no object) and transitive phrasal verbs (they do have an object). For example:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>intransitive:<\/em> They \u201cset out\u201d to prove that\u2026<\/li>\n<li><em>transitive:<\/em> This \u201csets off\u201d the reaction\u2026<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In contrast to intransitive verbs, the verb and adverb can be separated in the sentence when using transitive phrasal verbs, for example:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>This \u201csets\u201d the reaction \u201coff.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Also, if\u00a0(in the transitive form) the\u00a0object is a pronoun, then the pronoun MUST go before the particle:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>This \u201csets off\u201d the reaction.<\/li>\n<li>This \u201csets\u201d the reaction \u201coff.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>This \u201csets\u201d it \u201coff.\u201d (NEVER This \u201csets off it.\u201d)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div id=\"om-dqx4acd1ednpm2dtmovz-holder\"><\/div>\n<h2><strong>Multiple Meanings of Phrasal Verbs<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>As mentioned above, phrasal verbs can <a href=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/academic-cartoon-on-adverbs\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">have several meanings<\/a>. Therefore, using them in your academic writing may make the meaning of your sentence unclear. Look at the use of the phrasal verb \u201ccut out\u201d in this example:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>These results suggest that it would be best to <strong>cut out<\/strong> sugar from one\u2019s diet.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u201cCut out\u201d has many meanings depending on the context of the sentence in which it is used. Some of the meanings are as follows:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Delete or remove (e.g., The irrelevant paragraph was <strong>cut out<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>Shape by cutting (e.g., The DNA model was <strong>cut out<\/strong> using scissors)<\/li>\n<li>Suit or equip (e.g., She was not <strong>cut out<\/strong> for the task)<\/li>\n<li>Cease operating (e.g., The engine <strong>cut out<\/strong>)<\/li>\n<li>Exclude (e.g., Group 2 had sugar <strong>cut out<\/strong> of their diet)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Therefore, a one-word alternative is necessary to ensure the reader understands the true meaning of your sentence. The above sentence would be clearer and more formal if written as follows:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>These results suggest that it would be best to <strong>exclude<\/strong> sugar from one\u2019s diet.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><strong>Phrasal Verbs You Should Avoid in Academic Writing<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Some phrasal verbs are too informal for your <a href=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/submission-preparation.htm\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"18\" title=\"Research paper\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">research paper<\/a> or report. Following are few examples of such\u00a0unsuitable phrasal verbs. The single verbs that can replace these phrasal verbs have been included within brackets:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>Lots of<\/em> (numerous)<\/p>\n<p><em>Get up<\/em> (rise or increase)<\/p>\n<p><em>Put into<\/em> (contribute)<\/p>\n<p><em>Find out<\/em> (discover)<\/p>\n<p><em>Looked at<\/em> (discovered)<\/p>\n<p><em>Got together<\/em> (merged)<\/p>\n<p><em>Accounted for<\/em> (explained)<\/p>\n<p><em>Brought about<\/em> (caused)<\/p>\n<p><em>Cut out<\/em> (deleted, cleaved, suited)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<h2><strong>Acceptable Phrasal Verbs in Academic Writing<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>As always, there are exceptions. There are some acceptable and <a href=\"https:\/\/dictionaryblog.cambridge.org\/2015\/08\/05\/they-carried-out-an-experiment-phrasal-verbs-in-formal-writing\/\">commonly used phrasal verbs<\/a> that you can use when writing your academic report. Some examples are given below in bold typeface:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>We <strong>carried out<\/strong> an experiment\u2026<\/li>\n<li>This experiment <strong>consists of<\/strong> three\u2026<\/li>\n<li>As <strong>discussed by<\/strong> Jones et al., \u2026<\/li>\n<li>These recommendations are <strong>based on<\/strong> \u2026<\/li>\n<li>Each test was <strong>subjected to<\/strong> \u2026<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Have you come across phrasal verbs while reading journal articles? Did they obscure the intended message of the author? Please tell us your thoughts in the comments section below.<\/p>\n<div style=\"display:flex; gap:10px;justify-content:\" class=\"wps-pgfw-pdf-generate-icon__wrapper-frontend\">\n\t\t<a  href=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18445?action=genpdf&amp;id=18445\" class=\"pgfw-single-pdf-download-button\" ><img data-src=\"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/plugins\/pdf-generator-for-wp\/admin\/src\/images\/PDF_Tray.svg\" title=\"Generate PDF\" style=\"width:auto; height:45px;\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\"><\/a>\n\t\t<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You use phrasal verbs daily while speaking. A phrasal verb is actually a verb made&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8169,"featured_media":18450,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,2],"tags":[1426],"ppma_author":[1908],"class_list":["post-18445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-language-grammar","category-academic-writing","tag-good-word-choice"],"better_featured_image":{"id":18450,"alt_text":"Phrasal verbs","caption":"","description":"Phrasal verbs are commonly used while speaking but must not be used in academic writing. The phrasal verbs have multiple meanings and hence, the correct meaning of sentences may not be clear to the reader.","media_type":"image","media_details":{"width":750,"height":430,"file":"2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1.png","sizes":{"thumbnail":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-170x150.png","width":170,"height":150,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-170x150.png"},"medium":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-401x230.png","width":401,"height":230,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-401x230.png"},"better-amp-small":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-100x100.png","width":100,"height":100,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-100x100.png"},"better-amp-normal":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-260x200.png","width":260,"height":200,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-260x200.png"},"better-amp-large":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-450x300.png","width":450,"height":300,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-450x300.png"},"publisher-tb1":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-86x64.png","width":86,"height":64,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-86x64.png"},"publisher-sm":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-210x136.png","width":210,"height":136,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-210x136.png"},"publisher-mg2":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-279x220.png","width":279,"height":220,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-279x220.png"},"publisher-md":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-357x210.png","width":357,"height":210,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-357x210.png"},"publisher-tall-sm":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-180x217.png","width":180,"height":217,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-180x217.png"},"publisher-tall-lg":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-267x322.png","width":267,"height":322,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-267x322.png"},"publisher-tall-big":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-368x430.png","width":368,"height":430,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-368x430.png"},"Book Review":{"file":"Phrasal-verbs-1-320x430.png","width":320,"height":430,"mime-type":"image\/png","source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1-320x430.png"}},"image_meta":{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0","keywords":[]}},"post":18445,"source_url":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Phrasal-verbs-1.png"},"acf":{"faq_main_heading":"","faq_heading_one":"","faq_heading_two":"","faq_heading_three":"","faq_heading_four":"","faq_heading_five":"","faq_heading_six":"","faq_description_one":"","faq_description_two":"","faq_description_three":"","faq_description_four":"","faq_description_five":"","faq_description_six":""},"views":7642,"single_webinar_page_date":null,"single_webinar_page_time":null,"session_agenda":null,"who_should_attend_this_session":null,"about_the_speaker_field":null,"co-webinar-sec":null,"co_webinar_sec_one":null,"speaker-name":null,"webinar-date":null,"webinar-time":null,"webinar-s-image":null,"custum_webinar_category":null,"authors":[{"term_id":1908,"user_id":8169,"is_guest":0,"slug":"eneditor","display_name":"Enago Academy","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/046a0ceeb5c38172654db93f9919593bc2e4e1391702eb8b7248865941ddbe18?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","author_category":"","user_url":"","last_name":"Academy","first_name":"Enago","job_title":"","description":"Enago Academy, the knowledge arm of Enago, offers comprehensive and up-to-date resources on academic research and scholarly publishing to all levels of scholarly professionals: students, researchers, editors, publishers, and academic societies. It is also a popular platform for networking, allowing researchers to learn, share, and discuss their experiences within their network and community. The team, which comprises subject matter experts, academicians, trainers, and technical project managers, are passionate about helping researchers at all levels establish a successful career, both within and outside academia."}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8169"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18445\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18445"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enago.com\/academy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=18445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}