Tense
Hi, I'm just wondering if there is a specific tense we should be using in this section of the paper. I'm seeing a mix of both present and past tense and I'm just wondering if there is a correct one. I think I've been doing past (and conditional) tense for my contributions so far - but in any case, if there's one that is preferred, I'll gladly make some edits to my contributions (and to others, where necessary!). I don't know how important this is but I just thought I'd just ask as I was finishing up some of my modifications.
Hi, according to the website provided by Dr. Veale (http://www.essex.ac.uk/psychology/department/A-Z_files/GUIDE%20TO%20WRITING%20RESEARCH%20REPORTS.pdf), here's the explanation of your concern:
2. Use of tenses
Tenses can be very difficult to use correctly. These guidelines can only be very general rules of thumb. Basically, anything that is history should be written in the past tense. When you write up your work, even your method and results will be history, and should be described in the past tense. The conclusions of previous workers are history, however yours are still current and should be described in the present tense. The theories and models that were derived from the results and conclusions still make predictions today (even if they are the wrong ones) and their predictions thus should be described using the present tense.
Thus, for a previous piece of work that you are describing:“Smith et al. (1970) found that… they concluded that…and developed the XYZ model. This predicts that…”
If you were discussing the results of your experiment: “It was found that… and thus we conclude that…. the ABC model predicts that…"
PS, I had made some corrections according to this.