Word Choice
There are two main problems when it comes to word choice. Sometimes, students use a thesaurus to find long, complicated sounding words. While the student may think that this makes them sound intelligent, it often makes the paper harder to read. In addition, students may use a long word that does not have the same meaning as their original word choice. Due to this, students should just write naturally and stick to the vocabulary that they already know.
Other than choosing complicated words, students have another word choice pitfall to watch out for. Words like “well”, “you know”, “um” or other meaningless fillers have no place in academic writing. These meaningless fillers are useless for the student's argument and makes them appear less intelligent. In addition, students should watch out for overused words like “very”, “interesting” or “really”. It is always better to use a more exact description like “exceptional” than “very good”.