Hook your readers: Writing an engaging first page
To win over the reviewer, you need to capture their interest early on in the proposal.
An effective tool to achieve this, and at the same time convey the 'story' of your project, is the Problem-Gap-Hook model of writing (Lingard, 2015a).
According to this model, your introduction should do three things (also see example below):
1. Identify a problem in the field (or if possible, in the world), that relates to your project. Highlighting a problem in the field is a really good way to introduce your project with a a great sense of urgency.
2. Find a gap in the current knowledge on the problem. Briefly mention what is known (to show that you know your field), but emphasize what is not known and how this prevents us from moving forward to solve the identified problem. Make sure that there is a strong connection between the gap(s) and your purpose. Your purpose should fill the gaps and thus (in the short- or long run) enable a solution to the problem.
Further, make sure to return to the gaps in the State-of-the-art section. Contrary to the intuitive approach of writing this section, focusing on what is known, we recommend that you let the known facts constitute the background, allowing the unknown facts (i.e., the gaps that your project will fill) to stand out (Lingard & Watling, 2021).
3. Find a hook that convinces readers of the relevance to fill this gap. Here you need to motivate why it is important to solve the problem. What are the gains in the short- and long run, for science, patients, the public, and/or the society? Here is your chance to truly make the reviewer engaged in the subject (Varpio, 2018).
The Problem-Gap-Hook introduction should lead up to your specific purpose and aims statements. Define your purpose and aims as filling the gap/s. If you use this approach to writing the introduction, the reviewer will likely view your project as the next inevitable step to take.
Example of first page outline
Identify a problem in the field (and/or if possible, in the world).
Example: “Men live shorter and are more susceptible to disease at younger ages compared with women.”
Find a gap in the current knowledge on the problem.
Example: “The loss of chromosome Y (LOY) mutation could help explain this life expectancy difference. However, the causal relations between LOY and disease are yet to be discovered.”
Find a hook that convinces readers of the importance to fill the gap.
Example: “Screening for LOY and thus identifying individuals with increased risk could result in earlier diagnoses and treatment. The long-term goal is increased survival of men.
Purpose and aims
Example: “My proposal aims for comprehensive understanding of the cellular changes induced by LOY in immune cells and delineation of associated disease mechanisms that could explain why men with LOY in the immune cells of blood have a higher risk for disease in other organs.
More specifically, three overlapping and synergistic objectives will be pursued:
Objective 1 focuses on functional consequences of LOY in single cells and organisms, e.g. transcriptome and survival analyses of cell lines and mouse models induced with LOY using CRISPR/Cas9 as well as studies of in vivo collected immune cells from patients will be used to elucidate disease mechanisms.
Objective 2 is to explore new associations between LOY in blood cells and increased risk for human disease, with focus on risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD) including analyses of more than 570.000 participants from several well-characterized cohorts.
Objective 3 is to develop new methodology and tools for LOY-detection in blood samples that will be useful in research and clinical applications for improved diagnostics and treatment of disease.”
Examples are adapted from Lars A. Forsberg’s approved ERC-grant application.
Contact
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