The list below are some of the common types of errors writers make when writing an academic text.
Benjamin L. Stewart
- AGREE↔ Subject-verb agreement
- AP↔Apostrophe missing or unnecessary
- APA↔APA issues (See Plagiarism, UAA Plagiarism Policy ELT 2023 & APA Guide.)
- ART↔Article (determiner) is missing, unnecessary, or incorrect
- BH→either boosting or hedging too much – Refer to Boosting vs. Hedging.
- CA↔Capitalization either necessary or missing
- CN↔Poor Text Cohesion vs. Text Coherence – See Written Discourse.
- CR↔Poor Text Cohesion vs. Text Coherence – See Written Discourse.
- CS↔ Comma Splice
- FRAG↔ Sentence Fragment
- GS↔ misuse of Gender-specific (or bias) language.
- MEAL↔Improper body paragraph development (See MEAL Plan.)
- MO↔Overuse of Modal verbs (e.g., “can”)
- MW↔Missing word(s)
- OW↔Overuse of direct repetition of word(s) – See Written Discourse.
- PREP↔Wrong Preposition
- PRO↔Pronouns are incorrect (gender-based or overused), not necessary, or antecedent is unclear – See Written Discourse.
- RO↔Run-on sentence
- SP↔Spelling error – See Common Spelling Mistakes in English.
- SS↔Sentence structure error – See Common Sentence Patterns in English and Sentence Types.
- TP↔Stay in the third person. – See First, second, and third person.
- UN↔Improper paragraph alignment or main idea is unclear – – See Written Discourse.
- VT↔verb tense (time) is incorrect – See Written Discourse.
- VF↔verb phrase formation is incorrect
- WF↔word form (part of speech) is incorrect
- WO↔Word order in sentence is incorrect
- WC↔Word choice – meaning is intelligible but awkward, unconventional, or atypical
- WW↔Wrong word(s) – meaning is incorrect or unintelligible
- WP↔Wrong or missing Punctuation
