User talk:ChrCc/sandbox

Hi Chiara, Andy has asked me to have a look at your draft article and give you some feedback. So here goes:

Where there is a relevant policy that you might like to check against, I've given it for your reference.

I assume the article is to be titled something like "Public attitudes to chemistry in the UK", in which case those words need to be bold, not italic (MOS:BOLD). The word "public", even though referring to a title is used in the sentence as a common noun, so it must not be capitalised (MOS:CAPS) - if you had written "the RSC published research in a document called Public attitudes to chemistry in the UK", then the capitalisation would be correct. Can you see the difference?
Be sure that you need what we call "scare quotes" around "chemicals" - we use those sort of quotes normally only when we are referring to the word itself, as a word, rather than its meaning (Scare quotes).
Beware of over-quotation. We should, as far as possible, summarise the points made in our own words for use in Wikipedia. The large quotation in the first paragraph is, in my humble opinion too big and really would benefit from you outlining the main points: attitude; understanding; associations; impact on society. Anyone wishing to read the full report has only to follow the reference.
The research isn't strong enough to draw a broad generalisation that "This research shows that most people demonstrate cognitive polyphasia" - it's a bio-medical claim of sorts and really should be subject to WP:MEDRS. I'd tone it down to "This research indicates that ...", which is supportable.
Again, the second paragraph has too much quotation. The last sentence in that paragraph uses the quotes around 'chemical' properly, by the way. The quotation attributed to Mark Lorch would benefit from being in your words. It's not usual to insert a reference (http://www.nature.com/news/take-concepts-of-chemistry-out-of-the-classroom-1.17691) in the middle of a quotation. A reference is meant to support Wikipedia content, not to emphasise a point made within quoted text. If you could write the longer quotations in your own words, then the Nature reference would be a good addition at that point.
Which brings me to the references. Unless there is something very controversial, we normally leave the placement of references to the end of the sentence that they support (WP:CITEFOOT). We also place references immediately after punctuation (WP:REFPUNCT). As a guide, if you're placing a reference and there's no punctuation there, consider whether it ought to be placed a little later, at least at the end of the clause, if not the whole sentence.
You've made a good job of using citation templates to make your in-line references; my only comment would be that supplying the publisher of any document is a 'good thing', so this is probably better:
- {{Cite web |url = http://www.rsc.org/globalassets/04-campaigning-outreach/campaigning/public-attitudes-to-chemistry/public-attitudes-to-chemistry-research-report.pdf?id=8495 |title = Public attitudes to chemistry in the UK |year = 2015 |publisher = Royal Society of Chemistry}}
- "Public attitudes to chemistry in the UK" (PDF). Royal Society of Chemistry. 2015.
It also has greater data granularity, i.e. the year is a separate piece of metadata, as is the publisher. Elsewhere the value of the "website" parameter might be better as "Royal Society of Chemistry", rather than "www.rsc.org" - it's meant to be a readable piece of data, rather than a url in this context, as it's an alias for "work" (Template:Cite web #Description)
Finally, you have three references (currently 2, 4, 5) that are very similar. I can see the point in distinguishing between the two pdfs, but what is there on the webpage that isn't in one of the pdfs? My advice would be to ditch reference number 2 and use number 4 to support the opening text. By making it a named reference, you can re-use it without typing in the whole thing again (WP:NAMEDREFS).

That's the criticism done. The article, however, is well researched and to the point. It certainly covers numerous important issues and informs the reader. I would suggest you have a look at how the research was received by the popular press as that is often worth mentioning in an article - in particular it helps establish that the topic is notable, i.e. has has received significant coverage in multiple independent sources (WP:Notability). If you'd like me to lend a hand with reference formatting or placement, I'd be happy to help - as would Andy, I'm sure (if you'd prefer to keep me uninvolved in the writing of the article, so that we don't compromise my job as the reviewer). Cheers --RexxS (talk) 17:37, 31 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@RexxS: Hello Doug, thanks for your comments, very useful. I have made changes to the text following your indications. Just to clarify this text will not be a new article but a section in the article on chemophobia, I though the findings from the research and the comments to these would add to that article as at the moment it is mostly based on people's opinions and reactions rather than public opinion surveys. I will leave it in the sandbox still, because I want to improve it before I past it in the article. Thanks, Chiara ChrCc (talk) 10:39, 8 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]