introduction in paper presentation

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How to Introduce Yourself in a Presentation [with Examples]

In this post, we are going to cover the best way, a very simple three-step process that will help you introduce yourself in a presentation. A summary of the steps is below.

• Start with your name and company (or organization or school).
• Tell your audience what problem you can solve for them.
• Share some type of proof (social proof works best) that you can solve this problem.

I will break down each step into a simple-to-follow process. But first… a little background.

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First, Identify What Your Audience Wants from Your Presentation

So, before you design your introduction, think about what your audience wants from your presentation. Why do they want to spend their valuable time listening to you? Are going to waste their time? Or, are you going to provide them with something valuable?

For instance, I have expertise in a number of different areas. I’m a public speaking coach, a keynote speaker, a best-selling author, a search engine optimization specialist, and a popular podcaster. However, if I delivered that sentence to any audience, the most likely reaction would be, “So what?” That sentence doesn’t answer any of the above questions. The statement is also really “me-focused” not “audience-focused.”

So, when I start to design my self-introduction, I want to focus just on the area of expertise related to my topic. I’m then going to answer the questions above about that particular topic. Once you have these answers, set them aside for a second. They will be important later.

How to Introduce Yourself in a Presentation in Class.

Instead, you probably want to add in a fun way to start a speech . For example, instead of introducing yourself in your class speech and starting in an awkward way, start with a startling statistic. Or start with a summary of your conclusion. Or, you could start the presentation with an inspirational quote.

Each of these presentation starters will help you lower your nervousness and decrease your awkwardness.

If you are delivering a speech in a speech competition or to an audience who doesn’t know you try this technique. Just introduce yourself by saying your name , the school you represent , and your topic . Make it easy. This way you get to your content more quickly and lower your nervousness.

Typically, after you get the first few sentences out of the way, your nervousness will drop dramatically. Since your name, school, and topic should be very easy to remember, this takes the pressure off you during the most nervous moments.

Obviously, follow the guidelines that your teacher or coach gives you. (The competition may have specific ways they want you to introduce yourself.)

How to Introduce Yourself in a Business Presentation — A Step-by-Step Guide.

In a professional setting, when new people walk into a meeting and don’t know what to expect, they will feel uncomfortable. The easiest way to ease some of that tension is to chat with your audience as they come into the room.

By the way, if you are looking for a template for an Elevator Speech , make sure to click this link.

Step #1: Start with your name and company name (or organization).

This one is easy. Just tell your audience your name and the organization that you are representing. If your organization is not a well-known brand name, you might add a short clarifying description. For instance, most people outside of the training industry have never heard of The Leader’s Institute ®. So, my step #1 might sound something like…

Hi, I’m Doug Staneart with The Leader’s Institute ®, an international leadership development company…

Still short and sweet, but a little more clear to someone who has never heard of my company.

Should you give your job title? Well… Maybe and sometimes. Add your title into the introduction only if your title adds to your credibility.

For example, if you are delivering a financial presentation and you are the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of your company, you might mention that. Your title adds to your credibility. However, if the CFO is delivering a presentation about the value of joining a trade association, the CFO title adds little credibility. So, there is very little value in adding the title.

Step #2: Tell your audience what problem you can solve for them.

For instance, if my topic is how to deliver presentations, I have to determine why the audience would care. What problem will they have that I can help them with? For my audiences, the problem that I most often help people with is how to eliminate public speaking fear. Once I have the problem, I add that to my introduction by using the words, “I help people…”

Hi, I’m Doug Staneart with The Leader’s Institute ®, an international leadership development company, and I help people eliminate public speaking fear.

However, if my topic is How to Close a Higher Percentage of Sales Presentations , I’d likely want to alter my introduction a little. I might say something like…

Hi, I’m Doug Staneart with The Leader’s Institute ®, an international leadership development company, and I help people design more persuasive sales presentations.

I have expertise in both areas. However, I focus my introduction on just the expertise that is applicable to this audience. If I gave the first introduction to the second audience, they will likely respond by thinking, well, I don’t really get nervous speaking, so I guess I can tune out of this speech .

So, create a problem statement starting with, “I help people…” Make the statement apply to what your audience really wants.

Step #3: Share some type of proof (social proof works best) that you can solve this problem.

By the way, if you just do steps #1 and #2, your introduction will be better than most that you will hear. However, if you add Step #3, you will gain more respect (and attention) from your audience. Without adding some type of proof that you can solve this problem, you are just giving your opinion that you are an expert. However, if you can prove it, you are also proving that you are an expert.

This is the tricky part. For some reason, most people who get to this part feel like they haven’t accomplished great things, so they diminish the great accomplishments that they do have.

For instance, an easy way to offer proof is with a personal story of how you have solved that problem in the past.

A Few Examples of How to Introduce Yourself Before a Presentation.

For instance, one of my early clients was a young accountant. When I was working with him, he came up with the following introduction, “I’m Gary Gorman with Gorman and Associates CPA’s, and I help small businesses avoid IRS audits.” It was a great, audience-focused attention-getter. (No one wants to get audited.) However, as an accountant, it wasn’t like his company was getting a lot of five-star reviews on Yelp! So, he was kind of struggling with his social proof. So, I asked him a series of questions.

Me, “How many clients do you have?”

Gary, “Over 300.”

Me, “How many small business tax returns have you processed?”

Gary, “Well, at least a couple hundred a year for 15 years.”

Me, “So, at least 3000?” He nodded. “How many of your 300 clients have been audited since you have been representing them?”

He looked at me and said, “Well, none.”

So, we just added that piece of proof to his talk of introduction.

I’m Gary Gorman with Gorman and Associates CPA’s, and I help small businesses avoid IRS audits. In fact, in my career, I’ve helped clients complete over 3000 tax returns, and not a single one has ever been audited.

Here Is How I Adjust My Introduction Based on What I Want the Audience to Do.

For my proof, I have a number of options. Just like Gary, I have had a lot of clients who have had great successes. In addition, I have published two best-selling books about public speaking. I also have hundreds of thousands of people who listen to my podcast each week. So, I can pick my evidence based on what I want my audience to do.

For instance, if I’m speaking at a convention, and I want the audience to come by my booth to purchase my books, my introduction might sound like this.

Hi, I’m Doug Staneart with The Leader’s Institute ®, an international leadership development company, and I help people eliminate public speaking fear. One of the things that I’m most know for is being the author of two best-selling books, Fearless Presentations and Mastering Presentations.

However, if I’m leading a webinar, I may want the audience to purchase a seat in one of my classes. In that case, my introduction might sound like this.

Hi, I’m Doug Staneart with The Leader’s Institute ®, an international leadership development company, and I help people eliminate public speaking fear. For instance, for the last 20 years, I’ve taught public speaking classes to over 20,000 people, and I haven’t had a single person fail to reduce their nervousness significantly in just two days.

If my goal is to get the audience to subscribe to my podcast, my intro might sound like…

Hi, I’m Doug Staneart with The Leader’s Institute ®, an international leadership development company, and I help people eliminate public speaking fear. One of the ways that I do this is with my weekly podcast called, Fearless Presentations, which has over one million downloads, so far.

Use the Form Below to Organize How to Introduce Yourself in a Presentation.

The point is that you want to design your introduction in a way that makes people pause and think, “Really? That sounds pretty good.” You want to avoid introductions that make your audience think, “So what?”

If you have a speech coming up and need a good introduction, complete the form below. We will send you your answers via email!

Can You Replace Your Introduction with a PowerPoint Slide?

Is it okay to make your first slide (or second slide) in your presentation slides an introduction? Sure. A good public speaker will often add an introduction slide with a biography, portrait, and maybe even contact information. I sometimes do this myself.

However, I NEVER read the slide to my audience. I often just have it showing while I deliver the short introduction using the guide above. This is a great way to share more of your work experience without sounding like you are bragging.

For tips about how many powerpoint slides to use in a presentation , click here.

Remember that There Is a Big Difference Between Your Introduction in a Presentation and Your Presentation Starter.

When you introduce yourself in a presentation, you will often just use a single sentence to tell the audience who you are. You only use this intro if the audience doesn’t know who you are. Your presentation starter, though, is quite different. Your presentation starter should be a brief introduction with relevant details about what you will cover in your presentation.

For details, see Great Ways to Start a Presentation . In that post, we show ways to get the attention of the audience. We also give examples of how to use an interesting hook, personal stories, and how to use humor to start a presentation.

Podcasts , presentation skills

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How to Organize Your Introduction for a Presentation [+ FREE Presentation Checklist]

May 1, 2018 | Business Professional English , Free Resource , Public Speaking & Presentations

This lesson on how to organize your introduction for a presentation in English has been updated since its original posting in 2016 and a video has been added.

Getting ready to present in English? Here’s how to make sure your introduction for a presentation in English is successful.

But first… When you think about a presentation, I know you’re thinking about something like a TED video or a presentation at a conference. You’re thinking about a speech, with PowerPoint slides and a big audience.

But did you know we use the same skills when we share new information or ideas with our work colleagues? Or when we tell stories to our friends and family? The situation or speaking task may be different but we still use the same skills.

When presenting information or telling stories, we need to:

• Capture a listener’s attention
• Share information, ideas, or opinions
• Give the important details
• Make your information memorable
• Get your audience (family, friends, colleagues or strangers) to agree, to take action, to change their mind, etc.

So today you’re going to learn how to take the first big step in your English presentation: how to start with a great introduction.

The introduction is the most important part of your presentation. It is the first impression you’ll make on your audience. It’s your first opportunity to get their attention. You want them to trust you and listen to you right away.

However, that first moment when you start to speak is often the hardest. Knowing how to best prepare and knowing what to say will help you feel confident and ready to say that first word and start your presentation in English.

Be sure to include these 5 things in your inroduction.

Lesson by Annemarie

How to Organize Your Introduction for a Presentation in English and Key Phrases to Use

Organize Your Introduction Correctly

Okay, first let’s focus on what you need to include in your English introduction. Think of this as your formula for a good introduction. Using this general outline for your introduction will help you prepare. It will also help your audience know who you are, why you’re an expert, and what to expect from your presentation.

Use this general outline for your next presentation:

• Welcome your audience and introduce yourself
• Capture their attention
• Identify your number one goal or topic of presentation
• Give a quick outline of your presentation
• Provide instructions for how to ask questions (if appropriate for your situation)

Use Common Language to Make Your Introduction Easy to Understand

Great, now you have the general outline of an introduction for a speech or presentation in English. So let’s focus on some of the key expressions you can use for each step. This will help you think about what to say and how to say it so you can sound confident and prepared in your English presentation.

“The introduction is the most important part of your presentation. It is the first impression you’ll make on your audience. It’s your first opportunity to get their attention. You want them to trust you and listen to you right away.”

Welcome Your Audience & Introduction

It is polite to start with a warm welcome and to introduce yourself. Everyone in the audience will want to know who you are. Your introduction should include your name and job position or the reason you are an expert on your topic. The more the audience trusts you, the more they listen.

• Welcome to [name of company or event]. My name is [name] and I am the [job title or background information].
• Thank you for coming today. I’m [name] and I’m looking forward to talking with you today about [your topic].
• Good morning/afternoon ladies and gentlemen. I’d like to quickly introduce myself. I am [name] from [company or position]. (formal)
• On behalf of [name of company], I’d like to welcome you today. For those of you who don’t already know me, my name is [name] and I am [job title or background]. (formal)
• Hi everyone. I’m [name and background]. I’m glad to be here with you today. Now let’s get started. (informal)

Capture Their Attention

For more information about how to best capture your audience’s attention and why, please see the next session below. However, here are a few good phrases to get you started.

• Did you know that [insert an interesting fact or shocking statement]?
• Have you ever heard that [insert interesting fact or shocking statement]?
• Before I start, I’d like to share a quick story about [tell your story]…
• I remember [tell your story, experience or memory]…
• When I started preparing for this talk, I was reminded of [tell your story, share your quote or experience]…

Identify Your Goal or Topic of Presentation

At this stage, you want to be clear with your audience about your primary topic or goal. Do you want your audience to take action after your talk? Is it a topic everyone is curious about (or should be curious about)? This should be just one or two sentences and it should be very clear.

• This morning I’d like to present our new [product or service].
• Today I’d like to discuss…
• Today I’d like to share with you…
• What I want to share with you is…
• My goal today is to help you understand…
• During my talk this morning/afternoon, I’ll provide you with some background on [main topic] and why it is important to you.
• I will present my findings on…
• By the end of my presentation, I’d like for you to know…
• I aim to prove to you / change your mind about…
• I’d like to take this opportunity to talk about…
• As you know, this morning/afternoon I’ll be discussing…

Outline Your Presentation

You may have heard this about presentations in English before:

First, tell me what you’re going to tell me. Then tell me. And finally, tell me what you told me.

It sounds crazy and weird, but it’s true. This is how we structure presentations in English. So today we’re focusing on the “First, tell me what you’re going to tell me” for your introduction. This means you should outline the key points or highlights of your topic.

This prepares your listens and helps to get their attention. It will also help them follow your presentation and stay focused. Here are some great phrases to help you do that.

• First, I’m going to present… Then I’ll share with you… Finally, I’ll ask you to…
• The next thing I’ll share with you is…
• In the next section, I’ll show you…
• Today I will be covering these 3 (or 5) key points…
• In this presentation, we will discuss/evaluate…
• By the end of this presentation, you’ll be able to…
• My talk this morning is divided into [number] main sections… First, second, third… Finally…

On Asking Questions

You want to be sure to let you audience know when and how it is appropriate for them to ask you questions. For example, is the presentation informal and is it okay for someone to interrupt you with a question? Or do you prefer for everyone to wait until the end of the presentation to ask questions?

• If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to interrupt me. I’m happy to answer any questions as we go along.
• Feel free to ask any questions, however, I do ask that you wait until the end of the presentation to ask.
• There will be plenty of time for questions at the end.
• Are there any questions at this point? If not, we’ll keep going.
• I would be happy to answer any questions you may have now.

Capture Your Audience’s Attention

Do you feel unsure about how to capture the attention of your audience? Don’t worry! Here are some common examples used in English-speaking culture for doing it perfectly!

Two of the most famous speakers in the English-speaking world are Steve Jobs and Oprah Winfrey. While Steve Jobs is no longer living, people still love to watch his speeches and presentations online. Oprah is so famous that no matter what she does, people are excited to see her and listen to her.

BUT, if you listen to a speech by Steve Jobs or Oprah Winfrey,  they still  work  to get your attention!

The don’t start with a list of numbers or data. They don’t begin with a common fact or with the title of the presentation. No – they do much more.

From the moment they start their speech, they want you to listen. And they find interesting ways to get your attention. In his most famous speeches, Steve Jobs often started with a personal story. And Oprah often starts with an inspiring quote, a motivational part of a poem, or a personal story.

These are all great ways to help your audience to listen to you immediately – whether your presentation is 3 minutes or 20 minutes.

Here’s how you can do it.

Like Steve Jobs or Oprah Winfrey, start with a:

• Personal story or experience
• Motivational quote or line from a poem or book
• Joke (be careful with this – make sure it translates easily to everyone in the audience!)
• Shocking, bold statement (Think of Steve Jobs’ quote: “ Stay hungry. Stay Foolish .”)
• Rhetorical question ( =a question that you don’t want an answer to; the focus is to make someone think)

And finally, consider audience participation. Ask a question and get your audience to respond by raising hands.

Get the complete Presentations in English Series:

Part 1: How to Prepare for Your Presentation in English

Part 2: How to Start with a Great Introduction in Your Presentation

Part 3:  How to Organize Your Presentation in English

Part 4:  How to End Your Presentation Powerfully

As I mentioned in the video, I have two question for you today:

• What is the best introduction you’ve ever heard? Have you watched a TED Talk or a presentation on YouTube with a great introduction? Tell me about it. What do you think was great about the introduction?
• What frightens you the most about preparing your introduction in a presentation? Share your concerns with me so I can help you overcome any challenges you have.

Be sure to share in the comments below to get feedback from me and to learn from others in the Confident English Community.

Have a great week! ~ Annemarie

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Good day Annemarie! you are truly a God sent, because I believe communication is your God giving gift. Your tone, facial expression and gesture is what capture my attention. I learn a lot with ease as I watch your videos each time. Keep it up! God bless.

Thank you so much for your kind comment. I’m glad to know my lessons are helpful.

Thank you, Annemarie. thanks for the generosity of sharing useful and systemative information and content.

This is really a very informative message thank you.. And it’s help me a lot

hi thank you for this It was helpful. You used simple english that i understood well.

How to start with a great presentation on composition

Thankyou for the information . It was much helpful . I will definitely use this information in my presentation 🤗

Hi, I am Thang Sok Do you have a Sample presentation?

This was helpful but can you please tell me how to start a presentation in college because this is for work in a company. My presentation is on laboratory skills and all that

Its informative

Thank you for this video! I’ve learned quite a lot and will want to use all these knowledge in presenting my thesis proposal in 2 months. About your question no. 2, I’d just like to share that the mere fact of presenting in front of many respected professionals makes me already nervous and shaky even if i have studied everything about my presentation. What do you think should i do to deal with my concern?

Could you give me advise, how to start learning English for beginner.How to prepare presentation on any topic and how to make interesting..

Thank u so much for valuable advice. Definitely I will used this in my presentation!!

Thank you very much for these kind of useful advice. I hope my first presentation will be exciting for the audience.Your video is helping me again thanks a lot 😊

hi, i’m B.COM student and I have to prepare presentation about identifying business opportunities. How to start and an attractive attention to my audience.. Please Help me…

very nise and educative piece of information thank you nancy nairobi kenya

i am starting a video speech shooting in night about a famouse person how do i start my speech with a good intro.

Hi again how do you do a introduction goodbye

Hi i do not know what you are talking about

Hi Kate, I’m sorry to hear you’re not sure about the content. I recommend reviewing the video carefully if you haven’t already. Is there something specific you have a question about?

thanks a lot for guiding in such an easier way.

Your write-up on introduction helped a lot, thank you Annemarie. I work for cross-geography team and greetings get lengthy as timezones are different e.g. “Good evening to those joining from US office and good morning to colleagues from India office”. I replaced that with “Thank you everyone for joining”. Is it okay?

Hi Amit, I’m so glad it was helpful. As for your greeting, both of your options are perfectly appropriate and friendly.

How to introduce group members in online presentation?

Great question! I’d love to use that for a future Confident English lesson.

its amazing. i can’t explain in wording. this material helping me a lot. i am so happy after use this website . its make easy for me preparing my presentation more interesting. i am thankful too u.

thanks! i use your materials to teach my students(clinets) how to prepare a presentation. is it ok to use them on my materials?

Hi! I am a student from the USP from Tuvaluan and i take CEE45 so our assessment 2 is to prepared a group presentation and we presented in school. so need your help for how to start an attractive introduction to my teacher and my fellow students, they already kwow me.

Thank you.. very helpful

Very useful

It was very use Gul for or presentations

Hi. I am a 1st year BIT student and I have to prepare a presentation on 3D Printing. how to start an attractive introduction to my teachers, when they already know about me? Can you please help me out? Thank you.

I just took 1st place for my paper that I presented at an international students conference. I used a lot of your techniques to improve my speech and I have no words to say how grateful I am to you. Keep up the good work!

😲WOW!! That’s awesome, Andrew. 🙌Congratulations on your presentation. What a wonderful response to your hard work. I’d love to know what you presentation was about. And thank you for sharing your new here. I’m thrilled to know that my techniques were helpful to you.

The title of the presentation was “Handling burnout: A study regarding the the influence of job stressors over military and civilian personel”. I can sent you my paper through email if you would like to see it.

Hi Andrew, what a fascinating topic. And it’s interesting because I just had a newspaper reporter interview me about burnout as a small business owner. Must be a hot topic. 🙂 And sure, I’d love to see it.

🔥❤ too goodd

Hello Annemarie, Thank you so much for one of the best content on the English presentation, I’ve seen. I have a question: Is it impolite or informal to start the presentation without a greeting? I’m asking this question because I’ve seen a lot of TEDTalks and in only a few of them, they greet the audience and in most of it, they quickly go to the “CAPTURING the ATTENTION” with numbers and pictures. I would be so thankful if you could answer this question as soon as possible, my presentation is so close. Best regards, Helia

Hi Helia, What a great question. It has definitely become more common to skip the greeting and go straight to capturing the attention of the audience and you’re right that we often see this in TED talks. I would say it’s best to know your audience and what might be expected. For example, at more formal, traditional conferences or lecture, it might be more appropriate to start with a welcome. I prefer to welcome/thank my audience quickly at the start when I give presentations. A welcome can be very brief, just one sentence, and then you can quickly go into …  Read more »

Hi Annemarie I would like to thank you for giving such types of presentation skills but I have a question can you give me some idea about vote of thinks.

I’m glad the lessons are helpful to you. Could you clarify what you mean by ‘vote of thinks?’ I’m not sure I understand that.

Please can you give me some idea about vote of thanks

Could you clarify what you’re asking for, Bello?

Thanks a lot

Glad it was helpful!

it is agood i learn alot from this english class

Hello.i would like to thank you for giving these beautiful tips to start a presentation.This article helped me a lot.

That’s great, Radha. Glad to hear it.

Thanks for your article. It’s simply for interpersonal skill development.

You’re welcome, Mithun. Glad to know it was helpful.

Hi Annemarie . Thank you so much for giving such helpful guildelines it’s really gonna help me

I’m glad it’s helpful, Swetha! 🙂

thank you for help me

You’re very welcome!

Hi Anne Marie, i ‘m from Catalonia and i came across with your site only by chance and i think it’gonna be so helpful for me to pass the next test for c1 level. Several weeks ago i did some rehersals with my presentation and i was so nervous and terrified about what was expected from me.

Some tips in your youtube channel are so cool !!! Thank you.

Hi Tom, I’m thrilled you’ve found this site in your preparations for your English exam and am glad to know it’s helpful! Best of luck as you continue to prepare.

Hi Annemarie Thanks it’s so useful to develop presentation skill. Fatima

You’re very welcome, Fatima! I’m glad it was helpful.

Awesome, especially this simple and clear motto: “First, tell me what you’re going to tell me. Then tell me. And finally, tell me what you told me.” This three sentences exactly explain the content you need to create a memorable presentation.

Hi Dzmitry,

Yes, I’ve always loved that simple motto on how to do a presentation. 🙂 It’s so easy to remember and tells you exactly what to do.

hello I need to introduce myself to language center. i am going to learn Danish Language and i want to introduce myself to them and i am little bit nervous because my grammar is not good at that level.so will you please guide me how to introduce myself to them with an example. i did go through your examples but that is for professionals and i am just a student (Graduate). I don’t have any experience . Please guide me how to do it.

I was in a confused state about starting a conversation and proceeding in it but when I read the guidelines you mentioned above I became confident. thank you for your innumerable ………….

Thank you so much…… it’s an excellent topic, and it helped me a lot

I’m so glad this was helpful to you! Thank you for sharing.

hi annemarie i have a few questions about a speech i have to make a englishi speech of what i want to become can you help me?

Hi Rebecca,

Thank you for the question. I have several lessons on the topic of presentations in English . However, for personal assistance with English or presentations, I only do that through my one-on-one classes .

thank you so much…… it’s really helpful for me….

You’re very welcome, Shalini.

Thanks its really nice to develop the presentation skills

Awesome. I’m glad it was helpful to you, Mohammed.

I have to give a demo on one of your programs next week. I would like you to check my self introduction – Good afternoon everyone and thank you for all of your presence. Before we get into the session I would like to quickly introduce myself. My name is Dinesh . I am working as a Pharmaceutical sale and promotion of the brands for Arrient Healthcare. I am in this filed for the past ten years. Before becoming trainer I worked as a medical representatives for different pharma company . I am highly interested in learning from people and …  Read more »

Please ignore my previous comment. Yea the demo was a success. So hereafter I will say”I have been in this field for the past four years. Actually I worked for different consultancies so I didn’t include an article there.

I have to give a demo on one of your programs next week. I would like you to check my self introduction – Good afternoon everyone and thank you for all of your presence. Before we get into the session I would like to quickly introduce myself. My name is Monica. I am working as a Soft Skill Trainer at Synergy School of Business Skills. I am in this filed for the past four years. Before becoming trainer I worked as a Recruiter for different job consultancy. I am highly interested in learning from people and I think teaching/training is …  Read more »

Thank you for sharing your example! One note: “I am in this field for the past four years.” –> Don’t forget, when we’re talking about something that started in the past and continues to now, we use the present perfect. How might you change this sentence to fix the grammar?

Also, we want to add an article to, “… I worked as a recruiter for [a] different job consultancy.”

I wish you much success in your demo this week! Best, Annemarie

Yea the demo was a success! So hereafter I will say”I have been for the past four years. Actually I worked for different consultancies.

📣 Fluency School is now open! Available for a limited time.

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How to Start a Presentation: 5 Templates and 90 Example Phrases

By Status.net Editorial Team on February 27, 2024 — 11 minutes to read

Starting a presentation effectively means capturing your audience’s attention from the very beginning. It’s important because it sets the tone for the entire presentation and establishes your credibility as a speaker.

Effective Openers: 5 Templates

Your presentation’s beginning sets the stage for everything that follows. So, it’s important to capture your audience’s attention right from the start. Here are some tried-and-true techniques to do just that.

1. Storytelling Approach

When you start with a story, you tap into the natural human love for narratives. It can be a personal experience, a historical event, or a fictional tale that ties back to your main point.

Example Introduction Template 1:

“Let me tell you a story about…”

Example : “Let me tell you a story about how a small idea in a garage blossomed into the global brand we know today.”

2. Quotation Strategy

Using a relevant quote can lend authority and thematic flavor to your presentation. Choose a quote that is provocative, enlightening, or humorous to resonate with your audience.

Example Introduction Template 2:

“As [Famous Person] once said…”

Example : “As Steve Jobs once said, ‘Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.'”

3. Questioning Technique

Engage your audience directly by opening with a thoughtful question. This encourages them to think and become active participants.

Example Introduction Template 3:

“Have you ever wondered…”

Example : “Have you ever wondered what it would take to reduce your carbon footprint to zero?”

4. Statistical Hook

Kick off with a startling statistic that presents a fresh perspective or underscores the importance of your topic.

Example Introduction Template 4:

“Did you know that…”

Example : “Did you know that 90% of the world’s data was generated in the last two years alone?”

5. Anecdotal Method

Share a brief, relatable incident that highlights the human aspect of your topic. It paves the way for empathy and connection.

Example Introduction Template 5:

“I want to share a quick anecdote…”

Example : “I want to share a quick anecdote about a time I experienced the customer service that went above and beyond what anyone would expect.”

How to Start a Powerpoint Presentation: 45 Example Phrases

Starting a PowerPoint presentation effectively can captivate your audience and set the tone for your message. The opening phrases you choose are important in establishing rapport and commanding attention. Whether you’re presenting to colleagues, at a conference, or in an academic setting, these phrases will help you begin with confidence and poise:

• 1. “Good morning/afternoon/evening, everyone. Thank you for joining me today.”
• 2. “Welcome, and thank you for being here. Let’s dive into our topic.”
• 3. “I’m excited to have the opportunity to present to you all about…”
• 4. “Thank you all for coming. Today, we’re going to explore…”
• 5. “Let’s begin by looking at the most important question: Why are we here today?”
• 6. “I appreciate your time today, and I promise it will be well spent as we discuss…”
• 7. “Before we get started, I want to express my gratitude for your presence here today.”
• 8. “It’s a pleasure to see so many familiar faces as we gather to talk about…”
• 9. “I’m thrilled to kick off today’s presentation on a topic that I am passionate about—…”
• 10. “Welcome to our session. I’m confident you’ll find the next few minutes informative as we cover…”
• 11. “Let’s embark on a journey through our discussion on…”
• 12. “I’m delighted to have the chance to share my insights on…”
• 13. “Thank you for the opportunity to present to such an esteemed audience on…”
• 14. “Let’s set the stage for an engaging discussion about…”
• 15. “As we begin, I’d like you to consider this:…”
• 16. “Today marks an important discussion on a subject that affects us all:…”
• 17. “Good day, and welcome to what promises to be an enlightening presentation on…”
• 18. “Hello and welcome! We’re here to delve into something truly exciting today…”
• 19. “I’m honored to present to you this comprehensive look into…”
• 20. “Without further ado, let’s get started on a journey through…”
• 21. “Thank you for carving time out of your day to join me for this presentation on…”
• 22. “It’s wonderful to see such an engaged audience ready to tackle the topic of…”
• 23. “I invite you to join me as we unpack the complexities of…”
• 24. “Today’s presentation will take us through some groundbreaking ideas about…”
• 25. “Welcome aboard! Prepare to set sail into the vast sea of knowledge on…”
• 26. “I’d like to extend a warm welcome to everyone as we focus our attention on…”
• 27. “Let’s ignite our curiosity as we begin to explore…”
• 28. “Thank you for your interest and attention as we dive into the heart of…”
• 29. “As we look ahead to the next hour, we’ll uncover the secrets of…”
• 30. “I’m eager to share with you some fascinating insights on…”
• 31. “Welcome to what I believe will be a transformative discussion on…”
• 32. “This morning/afternoon, we’ll be venturing into the world of…”
• 33. “Thank you for joining me on this exploration of…”
• 34. “I’m delighted by the turnout today as we embark on this exploration of…”
• 35. “Together, let’s navigate the intricacies of…”
• 36. “I’m looking forward to engaging with you all on the subject of…”
• 37. “Let’s kick things off with a critical look at…”
• 38. “Thank you for your presence today as we shine a light on…”
• 39. “Welcome to a comprehensive overview of…”
• 40. “It’s a privilege to discuss with you the impact of…”
• 41. “I’m glad you could join us for what promises to be a thought-provoking presentation on…”
• 42. “Today, we’re going to break down the concept of…”
• 43. “As we get started, let’s consider the significance of our topic:…”
• 44. “I’m thrilled to lead you through today’s discussion, which centers around…”
• 45. “Let’s launch into our session with an eye-opening look at…”

Starting a Presentation: 45 Examples

Connecting with the audience.

When starting a presentation, making a genuine connection with your audience sets the stage for a successful exchange of ideas. Examples:

• “I promise, by the end of this presentation, you’ll be as enthusiastic about this as I am because…”
• “The moment I learned about this, I knew it would be a game-changer and I’m thrilled to present it to you…”
• “There’s something special about this topic that I find incredibly invigorating, and I hope you will too…”
• “I get a rush every time I work on this, and I hope to transmit that energy to you today…”
• “I’m thrilled to discuss this breakthrough that could revolutionize…”
• “This project has been a labor of love, and I’m eager to walk you through…”
• “When I first encountered this challenge, I was captivated by the possibilities it presented…”
• “I can’t wait to dive into the details of this innovative approach with you today…”
• “It’s genuinely exhilarating to be at the edge of what’s possible in…”
• “My fascination with [topic] drove me to explore it further, and I’m excited to share…”
• “Nothing excites me more than talking about the future of…”
• “Seeing your faces, I know we’re going to have a lively discussion about…”
• “The potential here is incredible, and I’m looking forward to discussing it with you…”
• “Let’s embark on this journey together and explore why this is such a pivotal moment for…”
• “Your engagement in this discussion is going to make this even more exciting because…”

Building Credibility

You present with credibility when you establish your expertise and experience on the subject matter. Here’s what you can say to accomplish that:

• “With a decade of experience in this field, I’ve come to understand the intricacies of…”
• “Having led multiple successful projects, I’m excited to share my insights on…”
• “Over the years, working closely with industry experts, I’ve gleaned…”
• “I hold a degree in [your field], which has equipped me with a foundation for…”
• “I’m a certified professional in [your certification], which means I bring a certain level of expertise…”
• “Having published research on this topic, my perspective is grounded in…”
• “I’ve been a keynote speaker at several conferences, discussing…”
• “Throughout my career, I’ve contributed to groundbreaking work in…”
• “My experience as a [your previous role] has given me a unique outlook on…”
• “Endorsed by [an authority in your field], I’m here to share what we’ve achieved…”
• “The program I developed was recognized by [award], highlighting its impact in…”
• “I’ve trained professionals nationwide on this subject and witnessed…”
• “Collaborating with renowned teams, we’ve tackled challenges like…”
• “I’ve been at the forefront of this industry, navigating through…”
• “As a panelist, I’ve debated this topic with some of the brightest minds in…”

Projecting Confidence

• “I stand before you today with a deep understanding of…”
• “You can rely on the information I’m about to share, backed by thorough research and analysis…”
• “Rest assured, the strategies we’ll discuss have been tested and proven effective in…”
• “I’m certain you’ll find the data I’ll present both compelling and relevant because…”
• “I’m fully confident in the recommendations I’m providing today due to…”
• “The results speak for themselves, and I’m here to outline them clearly for you…”
• “I invite you to consider the evidence I’ll present; it’s both robust and persuasive…”
• “You’re in good hands today; I’ve navigated these waters many times and have the insights to prove it…”
• “I assure you, the journey we’ll take during this presentation will be enlightening because…”
• “Your success is important to me, which is why I’ve prepared diligently for our time together…”
• “Let’s look at the facts; they’ll show you why this approach is solid and dependable…”
• “Today, I present to you a clear path forward, grounded in solid experience and knowledge…”
• “I’m confident that what we’ll uncover today will not only inform but also inspire you because…”
• “You’ll leave here equipped with practical, proven solutions that you can trust because…”
• “The solution I’m proposing has been embraced industry-wide, and for good reason…”

Organizational Preview

Starting your presentation with a clear organizational preview can effectively guide your audience through the content. This section helps you prepare to communicate the roadmap of your presentation.

Outlining the Main Points

You should begin by briefly listing the main points you’ll cover. This lets your audience know what to expect and helps them follow along. For example, if you’re presenting on healthy eating, you might say, “Today, I’ll cover the benefits of healthy eating, essential nutrients in your diet, and simple strategies for making healthier choices.”

Setting the Tone

Your introduction sets the tone for the entire presentation. A way to do this is through a relevant story or anecdote that engages the audience. Suppose you’re talking about innovation; you might start with, “When I was a child, I was fascinated by how simple Legos could build complex structures, which is much like the innovation process.”

Explaining the Structure

Explain the structure of your presentation so that your audience can anticipate how you’ll transition from one section to the next. For instance, if your presentation includes an interactive portion, you might say, “I’ll begin with a 15-minute overview, followed by a hands-on demonstration, and we’ll wrap up with a Q&A session, where you can ask any questions.”

Practice and Preparation

Before you step onto the stage, it’s important that your preparation includes not just content research, but also rigorous practice and strategy for dealing with nerves. This approach ensures you present with confidence and clarity.

Rehearsing the Opening

Practicing your introduction aloud gives you the opportunity to refine your opening remarks. You might start by greeting the audience and sharing an interesting quote or a surprising statistic related to your topic. For example, if your presentation is about the importance of renewable energy, you could begin with a recent statistic about the growth in solar energy adoption. Record yourself and listen to the playback, focusing on your tone, pace, and clarity.

Memorizing Key Points

While you don’t need to memorize your entire presentation word for word, you should know the key points by heart. This includes main arguments, data, and any conclusions you’ll be drawing. You can use techniques such as mnemonics or the method of loci, which means associating each key point with a specific location in your mind, to help remember these details. Having them at your fingertips will make you feel more prepared and confident.

Managing Presentation Jitters

Feeling nervous before a presentation is natural, but you can manage these jitters with a few techniques. Practice deep breathing exercises or mindful meditation to calm your mind before going on stage. You can also perform a mock presentation to a group of friends or colleagues to simulate the experience and receive feedback. This will not only help you get used to speaking in front of others but also in adjusting your material based on their reactions.

Engagement Strategies

Starting a presentation on the right foot often depends on how engaged your audience is. Using certain strategies, you can grab their attention early and maintain their interest throughout your talk:

1. Encouraging Audience Participation

Opening your presentation with a question to your audience is a great way to encourage participation. This invites them to think actively about the subject matter. For instance, you might ask, “By a show of hands, how many of you have experienced…?” Additionally, integrating interactive elements like quick polls or requesting volunteers for a demonstration can make the experience more dynamic and memorable.

Using direct questions throughout your presentation ensures the audience stays alert, as they might be called upon to share their views. For example, after covering a key point, you might engage your audience with, “Does anyone have an experience to share related to this?”

2. Utilizing Pacing and Pauses

Mastering the pace of your speech helps keep your presentation lively. Quickening the pace when discussing exciting developments or slowing down when explaining complex ideas can help maintain interest. For example, when introducing a new concept, slow your pace to allow the audience to absorb the information.

Pauses are equally powerful. A well-timed pause after a key point gives the audience a moment to ponder the significance of what you’ve just said. It might feel like this: “The results of this study were groundbreaking. (pause) They completely shifted our understanding of…”. Pauses also give you a moment to collect your thoughts, adding to your overall composure and control of the room.

How should one introduce their group during a presentation?

You might say something like, “Let me introduce my amazing team: Alex, our researcher, Jamie, our designer, and Sam, the developer. Together, we’ve spent the last few months creating something truly special for you.”

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Blog Marketing How To Start a Presentation: 15 Ways to Set the Stage

How To Start a Presentation: 15 Ways to Set the Stage

Written by: Krystle Wong Jul 25, 2023

The opening moments of your presentation hold immense power – it’s your opportunity to make a lasting impression and captivate your audience. 

A strong presentation start acts as a beacon, cutting through the noise and instantly capturing the attention of your listeners. With so much content vying for their focus, a captivating opening ensures that your message stands out and resonates with your audience.

Whether you’re a startup business owner pitching a brilliant idea, a seasoned presenter delivering a persuasive talk or an expert sharing your experience, the start of your presentation can make all the difference. But don’t fret — I’ve got you covered with 15 electrifying ways to kickstart your presentation. 

The presentation introduction examples in this article cover everything from self-introduction to how to start a group presentation, building anticipation that leaves the audience eager to delve into the depths of your topic.

Click to jump ahead:

How to start a presentation introduction

15 ways to start a presentation and captivate your audience, common mistakes to avoid in the opening of a presentation, faqs on how to start a presentation, captivate the audience from the get-go.

Presentations can be scary, I know. But even if stage fright hits, you can always fall back on a simple strategy.

Just take a deep breath, introduce yourself and briefly explain the topic of your presentation.

To grab attention at the start, try this opening line: Hello everyone. I am so glad you could join me today. I’m very excited about today’s topic. I’m [Your Name] and I’ll be talking about [Presentation Topic]. Raise your hand if you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by [Challenge related to your topic]. Many of us might have faced challenges with [Challenge related to your topic]. Today, we’ll explore some strategies that’ll help us [Solution that you’re presenting].

Regardless of your mode of presentation , crafting an engaging introduction sets the stage for a memorable presentation.

Let’s dive into some key tips for how to start a presentation speech to help you nail the art of starting with a bang:

Understand your audience

The key to an engaging introduction is to know your audience inside out and give your audience what they want. Tailor your opening to resonate with their specific interests, needs and expectations. Consider what will captivate them and how you can make your presentation relevant to their lives or work.

Use a compelling hook

Grab the audience’s attention from the get-go with a compelling hook. Whether it’s a thought-provoking question, a surprising fact or a gripping story, a powerful opening will immediately pique their curiosity and keep them invested in what you have to say.

State your purpose

Be crystal clear about your subject matter and the purpose of your presentation. In just a few sentences, communicate the main objectives and the value your audience will gain from listening to you. Let them know upfront what to expect and they’ll be more likely to stay engaged throughout.

Introduce yourself and your team

Give a self introduction about who you are such as your job title to establish credibility and rapport with the audience.

Some creative ways to introduce yourself in a presentation would be by sharing a brief and engaging personal story that connects to your topic or the theme of your presentation. This approach instantly makes you relatable and captures the audience’s attention.

Now, let’s talk about — how to introduce team members in a presentation. Before introducing each team member, briefly explain their role or contribution to the project or presentation. This gives the audience an understanding of their relevance and expertise.

Group presentations are also a breeze with the help of Venngage. Our in-editor collaboration tools allow you to edit presentations side by side in real-time. That way, you can seamlessly hare your design with the team for input and make sure everyone is on track. 

Maintain enthusiasm

Enthusiasm is contagious! Keep the energy levels up throughout your introduction, conveying a positive and upbeat tone. A vibrant and welcoming atmosphere sets the stage for an exciting presentation and keeps the audience eager to hear more.

Before you think about how to present a topic, think about how to design impactful slides that can leave a lasting impression on the audience. Here are 120+ presentation ideas , design tips, and examples to help you create an awesome slide deck for your next presentation.

Captivating your audience from the get-go is the key to a successful presentation. Whether you’re a seasoned speaker or a novice taking the stage for the first time, the opening of your presentation sets the tone for the entire talk. 

So, let’s get ready to dive into the 15 most creative ways to start a presentation. I promise you these presentation introduction ideas will captivate your audience, leaving them hanging on your every word.

Grab-attention immediately

Ask a thought-provoking question.

Get the audience’s wheels turning by throwing them a thought-provoking question right out of the gate. Make them ponder, wonder and engage their critical thinking muscles from the very start.

Share a surprising statistic or fact

Brace yourself for some wide eyes and dropped jaws! Open your presentation with a jaw-dropping statistic or a mind-blowing fact that’s directly related to your topic. Nothing captures attention like a good ol’ dose of shock and awe.

State a bold statement or challenge

Ready to shake things up? Kick off with a bold and daring statement that sets the stage for your presentation’s epic journey. Boldness has a way of making ears perk up and eyes widen in anticipation!

Engage with a poll or interactive activity

Turn the audience from passive listeners to active participants by kicking off with a fun poll or interactive activity. Get them on their feet, or rather — their fingertips, right from the start!

Venngage’s user-friendly drag-and-drop editor allows you to easily transform your slides into an interactive presentation . Create clickable buttons or navigation elements within your presentation to guide your audience to different sections or external resources. 

Enhance engagement by incorporating videos or audio clips directly into your presentation. Venngage supports video and audio embedding, which can add depth to your content.

Begin with an opening phrase that captures attention

Use opening phrases that can help you create a strong connection with your audience and make them eager to hear more about what you have to say. Remember to be confident, enthusiastic and authentic in your delivery to maximize the impact of your presentation.

Here are some effective presentation starting words and phrases that can help you grab your audience’s attention and set the stage for a captivating presentation:

• “Imagine…”
• “Picture this…”
• “Did you know that…”
• “Have you ever wondered…”
• “In this presentation, we’ll explore…”
• “Let’s dive right in and discover…”
• “I’m excited to share with you…”
• “I have a confession to make…”
• “I want to start by telling you a story…”
• “Before we begin, let’s consider…”
• “Have you ever faced the challenge of…”
• “We all know that…”
• “This is a topic close to my heart because…”
• “Over the next [minutes/hours], we’ll cover…”
• “I invite you to journey with me through…”

Build connection and credibility

Begin with a personal connection .

Share a real-life experience or a special connection to the topic at hand. This simple act of opening up creates an instant bond with the audience, turning them into your biggest cheerleaders.

Having the team share their personal experiences is also a good group presentation introduction approach. Team members can share their own stories that are related to the topic to create an emotional connection with your audience. 

Tell a relevant story

Start your presentation with a riveting story that hooks your audience and relates to your main message. Stories have a magical way of captivating hearts and minds. Organize your slides in a clear and sequential manner and use visuals that complement your narrative and evoke emotions to engage the audience.

With Venngage, you have access to a vast library of high-quality and captivating stock photography, offering thousands of options to enrich your presentations. The best part? It’s entirely free! Elevate your visual storytelling with stunning images that complement your content, captivate your audience and add a professional touch to your presentation. 

Use a powerful quote

Sometimes, all you need is some wise words to work wonders. Begin with a powerful quote from a legendary figure that perfectly fits your presentation’s theme — a dose of inspiration sets the stage for an epic journey.

Build anticipation

Provide a brief outline.

Here’s a good introduction for presentation example if you’re giving a speech at a conference. For longer presentations or conferences with multiple speakers especially, providing an outline helps the audience stay focused on the key takeaways. That way, you can better manage your time and ensure that you cover all the key points without rushing or running out of time.

Pose a problem and offer a solution

A great idea on how to start a business presentation is to start by presenting a problem and offering a well-thought-out solution. By addressing their pain points and showcasing your solution, you’ll capture their interest and set the stage for a compelling and successful presentation.

Back up your solution with data, research, or case studies that demonstrate its effectiveness. This can also be a good reporting introduction example that adds credibility to your proposal.

Preparing a pitch deck can be a daunting task but fret not. This guide on the 30+ best pitch deck tips and examples has everything you need to bring on new business partners and win new client contracts. Alternatively, you can also get started by customizing one of our professional pitch deck templates for free. 

Incite curiosity in the audience

Utilize visuals or props.

Capture your audience’s gaze by whipping out captivating visuals or props that add an exciting touch to your subject. A well-placed prop or a stunning visual can make your presentation pop like a fireworks show!

That said, you maybe wondering — how can I make my presentation more attractive.  A well-designed presentation background instantly captures the audience’s attention and creates a positive first impression. Here are 15 presentation background examples to keep the audience awake to help you get inspired. 

Use humor or wit

Sprinkle some humor and wit to spice things up. Cracking a clever joke or throwing in a witty remark can break the ice and create a positively charged atmosphere. If you’re cracking your head on how to start a group presentation, humor is a great way to start a presentation speech. 

Get your team members involved in the fun to create a collaborative and enjoyable experience for everyone. Laughter is the perfect way to break the ice and set a positive tone for your presentation!

Invoke emotion

Get those heartstrings tugging! Start with a heartfelt story or example that stirs up emotions and connects with your audience on a personal level. Emotion is the secret sauce to a memorable presentation.

Aside from getting creative with your introduction, a well-crafted and creative presentation can boost your confidence as a presenter. Browse our catalog of creative presentation templates and get started right away!

Use a dramatic pause

A great group presentation example is to start with a powerful moment of silence, like a magician about to reveal their greatest trick. After introducing your team, allow a brief moment of silence. Hold the pause for a few seconds, making it feel deliberate and purposeful. This builds anticipation and curiosity among the audience.

Pique their interest

Share a fun fact or anecdote.

Time for a little fun and games! Kick-off with a lighthearted or fascinating fact that’ll make the audience go, “Wow, really? Tell me more!” A sprinkle of amusement sets the stage for an entertaining ride.

While an introduction for a presentation sets the tone for your speech, a good slide complements your spoken words, helping the audience better understand and remember your message. Check out these 12 best presentation software for 2023 that can aid your next presentation. 

The opening moments of a presentation can make or break your entire talk. It’s your chance to grab your audience’s attention, set the tone, and lay the foundation for a successful presentation. However, there are some common pitfalls that speakers often fall into when starting their presentations. 

Starting with Apologies

It might be tempting to start with a preemptive apology, especially if you’re feeling nervous or unsure about your presentation. However, beginning with unnecessary apologies or self-deprecating remarks sets a negative tone right from the start. Instead of exuding confidence and credibility, you’re unintentionally undermining yourself and your message. 

Reading from Slides

One of the most common blunders in the opening of a PowerPoint presentation is reading directly from your slides or script. While it’s crucial to have a well-structured outline, reciting word-for-word can lead to disengagement and boredom among your audience. Maintain eye contact and connect with your listeners as you speak. Your slides should complement your words, not replace them.

Overwhelming with Information

In the excitement to impress, some presenters bombard their audience with too much information right at the beginning.

Instead of overloading the audience with a sea of data, statistics or technical details that can quickly lead to confusion and disinterest, visualize your data with the help of Venngage. Choose an infographic template that best suits the type of data you want to visualize. Venngage offers a variety of pre-designed templates for charts, graphs, infographics and more.

Ignoring the Audience

It’s easy to get caught up in the content and forget about the people in front of you. Don’t overlook the importance of acknowledging the audience and building a connection with them. Greet them warmly, make eye contact and maintain body language to show genuine interest in their presence. Engage the audience early on by asking a show of hands question or encourage audience participation. 

Lack of Clarity

Your audience should know exactly what to expect from your presentation. Starting with a vague or unclear opening leaves them guessing about the purpose and direction of your talk. Clearly communicate the topic and objectives of your presentation right from the beginning. This sets the stage for a focused and coherent message that resonates with your audience.

Simplicity makes it easier for the audience to understand and retain the information presented. Check out our gallery of simple presentation templates to keep your opening concise and relevant. 

Skipping the Hook

The opening of your presentation is the perfect opportunity to hook your audience’s attention and keep them engaged. However, some presenters overlook this crucial aspect and dive straight into the content without any intrigue. Craft an attention-grabbing hook that sparks curiosity, poses a thought-provoking question or shares an interesting fact. A compelling opening is like the key that unlocks your audience’s receptivity to the rest of your presentation.

Now that you’ve got the gist of how to introduce a presentation, further brush up your speech with these tips on how to make a persuasive presentation and how to improve your presentation skills to create an engaging presentation . 

How can I overcome nervousness at the beginning of a presentation?

To overcome nervousness at the beginning of a presentation, take deep breaths, practice beforehand, and focus on connecting with your audience rather than worrying about yourself.

How long should the opening of a presentation be?

The opening of a presentation should typically be brief, lasting around 1 to 3 minutes, to grab the audience’s attention and set the tone for the rest of the talk.

Should I memorize my presentation’s opening lines?

While it’s helpful to know your opening lines, it’s better to understand the key points and flow naturally to maintain authenticity and flexibility during the presentation.

Should I use slides during the opening of my presentation?

Using slides sparingly during the opening can enhance the message, but avoid overwhelming the audience with too much information early on.

How do I transition smoothly from the opening to the main content of my presentation?

Transition smoothly from the opening to the main content by providing a clear and concise outline of what’s to come, signaling the shift and maintaining a logical flow between topics.

Just as a captivating opening draws your audience in, creating a well-crafted presentation closing has the power to leave a lasting impression. Wrap up in style with these 10 ways to end a presentation .

Presenting virtually? Check out these tips on how to ace your next online presentation . 

Captivating your audience from the very beginning is crucial for a successful presentation. The first few moments of your talk can set the tone and determine whether your audience remains engaged throughout or loses interest. 

Start with a compelling opening that grabs their attention. You can use a thought-provoking question, a surprising statistic or a powerful quote to pique their curiosity. Alternatively, storytelling can be a potent tool to draw them into your narrative. It’s essential to establish a personal connection early on, whether by sharing a relatable experience or expressing empathy towards their needs and interests.

Lastly, be mindful of your body language and vocal delivery. A confident and engaging speaker can captivate an audience, so make eye contact, use appropriate gestures and vary your tone to convey passion and sincerity.

In conclusion, captivating your audience from the very beginning requires thoughtful preparation, engaging content and a confident delivery. With Venngage’s customizable templates, you can adapt your presentation to suit the preferences and interests of your specific audience, ensuring maximum engagement. Go on and get started today!

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Home Blog Presentation Ideas How to Start a Presentation: 5 Strong Opening Slides and 12 Tricks To Test

How to Start a Presentation: 5 Strong Opening Slides and 12 Tricks To Test

Knowing how to start a presentation is crucial: if you fail to capture the audience’s attention right off the bat, your entire presentation will flop. Few listeners will stick with you to the end and retain what you have told.

That is mildly unpleasant when you are doing an in-house presentation in front of your colleagues. But it can become utterly embarrassing when you present in front of larger audiences (e.g., at a conference) or worse – delivering a sales presentation to prospective customers.

Here is how most of us begin a presentation: give an awkward greeting, thank everyone for coming, clear our throats, tap the mic, and humbly start to mumble about our subject. The problem with such an opening performance? It effectively kills and buries even the best messages.

Table of Contents

• The Classic Trick: Open a Presentation with an Introduction
• Open a Presentation with a Hook
• Begin with a Captivating Visual
• Ask a “What if…” Question
• Use the Word “Imagine”
• Leverage The Curiosity Gap
• The Power of Silence
• Facts as Weapons of Communication
• Fact vs. Myths
• The Power of Music
• Physical Activity
• Acknowledging a Person

How to Start a PowerPoint Presentation The Right Way

Let’s say you have all of your presentation slides polished up (in case you don’t, check our quick & effective PowerPoint presentation design tips first). Your presentation has a clear storyline and agenda. Main ideas are broken into bite-sized statements for your slides and complemented with visuals. All you have left is to figure out how you begin presenting.

The best way is to appeal to and invoke certain emotions in your audience – curiosity, surprise, fear, or good old amusements. Also, it is recommended to present your main idea in the first 30 seconds of the presentation. And here’s how it’s done.

1. The Classic Trick: Open a Presentation with an Introduction

When you don’t feel like reinventing the wheel, use a classic trick from the book – start with a quick personal introduction. Don’t want to sound as boring as everyone else with your humble “Hi, I’m John, the head of the Customer Support Department”? Great, because we are all about promoting effective presentation techniques (hint: using a dull welcome slide isn’t one of them).

Here’s how to introduce yourself in a presentation the right way.

a. Use a link-back memory formula

To ace a presentation, you need to connect with your audience. The best way to do so is by throwing in a simple story showing who you are, where you came from, and why your words matter.

The human brain loves a good story, and we are more inclined to listen and retain the information told this way. Besides, when we can relate to the narrator (or story hero), we create an emotional bond with them, and, again – become more receptive, and less skeptical of the information that is about to be delivered.

So here are your presentation introduction lines:

My name is Joanne, and I’m the Head of Marketing at company XYZ. Five years ago I was working as a waitress, earning $10/hour and collecting rejection letters from editors. About ten letters every week landed to my mailbox. You see, I love words, but decent publisher thought mine were good enough. Except for the restaurant owner. I was very good at up-selling and recommending dishes to the customers. My boss even bumped my salary to $15/hour as a token of appreciation for my skill. And this made me realize: I should ditch creative writing and focus on copywriting instead. After loads of trial and error back in the day, I learned how to write persuasive copy. I was no longer getting rejection letters. I was receiving thousands of emails saying that someone just bought another product from our company. My sales copy pages generated over $1,500,000 in revenue over last year. And I want to teach you how to do the same”

b. Test the Stereotype Formula

This one’s simple and effective as well. Introduce yourself by sharing an obvious stereotype about your profession. This cue will help you connect with your audience better, make them chuckle a bit, and set a lighter mood for the speech to follow.

Here’s how you can frame your intro:

“My name is ___, and I am a lead software engineer at our platform [Your Job Title]. And yes, I’m that nerdy type who never liked presenting in front of large groups of people. I would rather stay in my den and write code all day long. [Stereotype]. But hey, since I have mustered enough courage…let’s talk today about the new product features my team is about to release….”

After sharing a quick, self-deprecating line, you transition back to your topic, reinforcing the audience’s attention . Both of these formulas help you set the “mood” for your further presentation, so try using them interchangeably on different occasions.

2. Open a Presentation with a Hook

Wow your audience straight off the bat by sharing something they would not expect to hear. This may be one of the popular first-time presentation tips but don’t rush to discard it.

Because here’s the thing: psychologically , we are more inclined to pay attention whenever presented with an unexpected cue. When we know what will happen next – someone flips the switch, and lights turn on – we don’t really pay much attention to that action.

But when we don’t know what to expect next – e.g., someone flips the switch and a bell starts ringing – we are likely to pay more attention to what will happen next. The same goes for words: everyone loves stories with unpredictable twists. So begin your presentation with a PowerPoint introduction slide or a line that no one expects to hear.

Here are a few hook examples you can swipe:

a. Open with a provocative statement

It creates an instant jolt and makes the audience intrigued to hear what you are about to say next – pedal back, continue with the provocation, or do something else that they will not expect.

“You will live seven and a half minutes longer than you would have otherwise, just because you watched this talk.”

That’s how Jane McGonigal opens one of her TED talks . Shocking and intriguing, right?

b. Ask a rhetorical, thought-provoking question

Seasoned presenters know that one good practice is to ask a question at the beginning of a presentation to increase audience engagement. Rhetorical questions have a great persuasive effect – instead of answering aloud, your audience will silently start musing over it during your presentation. They aroused curiosity and motivated the audience to remain attentive, as they did want to learn your answer to this question.

To reinforce your message throughout the presentation, you can further use the Rhetorical Triangle Concept – a rhetorical approach to building a persuasive argument based on Aristotle’s teachings.

c. Use a bold number, factor stat

A clean slide with some mind-boggling stat makes an undeniably strong impact. Here are a few opening statement examples you can use along with your slide:

• Shock them: “We are effectively wasting over $1.2 billion per year on producing clothes no one will ever purchase”
• Create empathy: “Are you among the 20% of people with undiagnosed ADHD?”
• Call to arms: “58% of marketing budgets are wasted due to poor landing page design. Let’s change this!”
• Spark curiosity: “Did you know that companies who invested in speech recognition have seen a 13% increase in ROI within just 3 years?”

3. Begin with a Captivating Visual

Compelling visuals are the ABC of presentation design – use them strategically to make an interesting statement at the beginning and throughout your presentation. Your first presentation slide can be text-free. Communicate your idea with a visual instead – a photo, a chart, an infographic, or another graphics asset.

Visuals are a powerful medium for communication as our brain needs just 13 milliseconds to render what our eyes see, whereas text comprehension requires more cognitive effort.

Relevant images add additional aesthetic appeal to your deck, bolster the audience’s imagination, and make your key message instantly more memorable.

Here’s an intro slide example. You want to make a strong presentation introduction to global pollution.  Use the following slide to reinforce the statement you share:

“Seven of nine snow samples taken on land in Antarctica found chemicals known as PFAs, which are used in industrial products and can harm wildlife”

Source: Reuters

4. Ask a “What if…” Question

The “what if” combo carries massive power. It gives your audience a sense of what will happen if they choose to listen to you and follow your advice.  Here are a few presentations with starting sentences + slides to illustrate this option:

Alternatively, you can work your way to this point using different questions:

• Ask the audience about their “Why.” Why are they attending this event, or why do they find this topic relevant?
• Use “How” as your question hook if you plan to introduce a potential solution to a problem.
• If your presentation has a persuasion factor associated, use “When” as a question to trigger the interest of the audience on, for example, when they are planning to take action regarding the topic being presented (if we talk about an inspirational presentation).

5. Use the Word “Imagine”

“Imagine,” “Picture This,” and “Think of” are better word choices for when you plan to begin your presentation with a quick story.

Our brain loves interacting with stories. In fact, a captivating story makes us more collaborative. Scientists have discovered that stories with tension during narrative make us:

• Pay more attention,
• Share emotions with the characters and even mimic the feelings and behaviors of those characters afterward.

That’s why good action movies often feel empowering and make us want to change the world too. By incorporating a good, persuasive story with a relatable hero, you can also create that “bond” with your audience and make them more perceptive to your pitch – donate money to support the cause; explore the solution you are offering, and so on.

6. Leverage The Curiosity Gap

The curiosity gap is another psychological trick frequently used by marketers to solicit more clicks, reads, and other interactions from the audience. In essence, it’s the trick you see behind all those clickbait, Buzzfeed-style headlines:

Not everyone is a fan of such titles. But the truth is – they do the trick and instantly capture attention. The curiosity gap sparks our desire to dig deeper into the matter. We are explicitly told that we don’t know something important, and now we crave to change that. Curiosity is an incredibly strong driving force for action – think Eve, think Pandora’s Box.

So consider incorporating these attention grabbers for your presentation speech to shock the audience. You can open with one, or strategically weave them in the middle of your presentation when you feel like your audience is getting tired and may lose their focus.

Here’s how you can use the curiosity gap during your presentation:

• Start telling a story, pause in the middle, and delay the conclusion of it.
• Withhold the key information (e.g., the best solution to the problem you have described) for a bit – but not for too long, as this can reduce the initial curiosity.
• Introduce an idea or concept and link it with an unexpected outcome or subject – this is the best opening for a presentation tip.

7. The Power of Silence

What would you do if you attended a presentation in which the speaker remains silent for 30 seconds after the presentation starts? Just the presenter, standing in front of the audience, in absolute silence.

Most likely, your mind starts racing with thoughts, expecting something of vital importance to be disclosed. The surprise factor with this effect is for us to acknowledge things we tend to take for granted.

It is a powerful resource to introduce a product or to start an inspirational presentation if followed by a fact.

8. Facts as Weapons of Communication

In some niches, using statistics as the icebreaker is the best method to retain the audience’s interest.

Say your presentation is about climate change. Why not introduce a not-so-common fact, such as the amount of wool that can be produced out of oceanic plastic waste per month? And since you have to base your introduction on facts, research manufacturers that work with Oceanic fabrics from recycled plastic bottles .

Using facts helps to build a better narrative, and also gives leverage to your presentation as you are speaking not just from emotional elements but from actually recorded data backed up by research.

9. Fact vs. Myths

Related to our previous point, we make quite an interesting speech if we contrast a fact vs. a myth in a non-conventional way: using a myth to question a well-accepted fact, then introducing a new point of view or theory, backed on sufficient research, that proves the fact wrong. This technique, when used in niches related to academia, can significantly increase the audience’s interest, and it will highlight your presentation as innovative.

Another approach is to debunk a myth using a fact. This contrast immediately piques interest because it promises to overturn commonly held beliefs, and people naturally find it compelling when their existing knowledge is put to the test. An example of this is when a nutritionist wishes to speak about how to lose weight via diet, and debunks the myth that all carbohydrates are “bad”.

10. The Power of Music

Think about a presentation that discusses the benefits of using alternative therapies to treat anxiety, reducing the need to rely on benzodiazepines. Rather than going technical and introducing facts, the presenter can play a soothing tune and invite the audience to follow an exercise that teaches how to practice breathing meditation . Perhaps, in less than 2 minutes, the presenter can accomplish the goal of exposing the advantages of this practice with a live case study fueled by the proper ambiance (due to the music played in the beginning).

11. Physical Activity

Let’s picture ourselves in an in-company presentation about workspace wellness. For this company, the sedentary lifestyle their employees engage in is a worrying factor, so they brought a personal trainer to coach the employees on a basic flexibility routine they can practice in 5 minutes after a couple of hours of desk time.

“Before we dive in, let’s all stand up for a moment.” This simple instruction breaks the ice and creates a moment of shared experience among the attendees. You could then lead them through a brief stretching routine, saying something like, “Let’s reach up high, and stretch out those muscles that get so tight sitting at our desks all day.” With this action, you’re not just talking about workplace wellness, you’re giving them a direct, personal experience of it.

This approach has several advantages. Firstly, it infuses energy into the room and increases the oxygen flow to the brain, potentially boosting the audience’s concentration and retention. Secondly, it sets a precedent that your presentation is not going to be a standard lecture, but rather an interactive experience. This can raise the level of anticipation for what’s to come, and make the presentation a topic for future conversation between coworkers.

12. Acknowledging a Person

How many times have you heard the phrase: “Before we begin, I’d like to dedicate a few words to …” . The speaker could be referring to a mentor figure, a prominent person in the local community, or a group of people who performed charity work or obtained a prize for their hard work and dedication. Whichever is the reason behind this, acknowledgment is a powerful force to use as a method of starting a presentation. It builds a connection with the audience, it speaks about your values and who you admire, and it can transmit what the conversation is going to be about based on who the acknowledged person is.

Closing Thoughts

Now you know how to start your presentation – you have the opening lines, you have the slides to use, and you can browse even more attractive PowerPoint presentation slides and templates on our website. Also, we recommend you visit our article on how to make a PowerPoint Presentation to get familiarized with the best tactics for professional presentation design and delivery, or if you need to save time preparing your presentation, we highly recommend you check our AI Presentation Maker to pair these concepts with cutting-edge slide design powered by AI.

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How To Write A Presentation 101 | Step-by-Step Guides with Best Examples | 2024 Reveals

Jane Ng • 05 April, 2024 • 9 min read

Is it difficult to start of presentation? You're standing before a room full of eager listeners, ready to share your knowledge and captivate their attention. But where do you begin? How do you structure your ideas and convey them effectively?

Take a deep breath, and fear not! In this article, we'll provide a road map on how to write a presentation covering everything from crafting a script to creating an engaging introduction.

So, let's dive in!

Table of Contents

What is a presentation , what should be in a powerful presentation.

• How To Write A Presentation Script
• How to Write A Presentation Introduction 

Key Takeaways

Tips for better presentation.

• How to start a presentation
• How to introduce yourself

Start in seconds.

Get free templates for your next interactive presentation. Sign up for free and take what you want from the template library!

Presentations are all about connecting with your audience. 

Presenting is a fantastic way to share information, ideas, or arguments with your audience. Think of it as a structured approach to effectively convey your message. And you've got options such as slideshows, speeches, demos, videos, and even multimedia presentations!

The purpose of a presentation can vary depending on the situation and what the presenter wants to achieve. 

• In the business world, presentations are commonly used to pitch proposals, share reports, or make sales pitches. 
• In educational settings, presentations are a go-to for teaching or delivering engaging lectures. 
• For conferences, seminars, and public events—presentations are perfect for dishing out information, inspiring folks, or even persuading the audience.

That sounds brilliant. But, how to write a presentation?

• Clear and Engaging Introduction: Start your presentation with a bang! Hook your audience's attention right from the beginning by using a captivating story, a surprising fact, a thought-provoking question, or a powerful quote. Clearly state the purpose of your presentation and establish a connection with your listeners.
• Well-Structured Content: Organize your content logically and coherently. Divide your presentation into sections or main points and provide smooth transitions between them. Each section should flow seamlessly into the next, creating a cohesive narrative. Use clear headings and subheadings to guide your audience through the presentation.
• Compelling Visuals: Incorporate visual aids, such as images, graphs, or videos, to enhance your presentation. Make sure your visuals are visually appealing, relevant, and easy to understand. Use a clean and uncluttered design with legible fonts and appropriate color schemes. 
• Engaging Delivery: Pay attention to your delivery style and body language. You should maintain eye contact with your audience, use gestures to emphasize key points, and vary your tone of voice to keep the presentation dynamic. 
• Clear and Memorable Conclusion: Leave your audience with a lasting impression by providing a strong closing statement, a call to action, or a thought-provoking question. Make sure your conclusion ties back to your introduction and reinforces the core message of your presentation.

How To Write A Presentation Script (With Examples)

To successfully convey your message to your audience, you must carefully craft and organize your presentation script. Here are steps on how to write a presentation script: 

1/ Understand Your Purpose and Audience

• Clarify the purpose of your presentation. Are you informing, persuading, or entertaining?
• Identify your target audience and their knowledge level, interests, and expectations.
• Define what presentation format you want to use

2/ Outline the Structure of Your Presentation

Strong opening.

Start with an engaging opening that grabs the audience's attention and introduces your topic. Some types of openings you can use are: 

• Start with a Thought-Provoking Question: "Have you ever...?"
• Begin with a Surprising Fact or Statistic: "Did you know that....?"
• Use a Powerful Quote: "As Maya Angelou once said,...."
• Tell a Compelling Story : "Picture this: You're standing at...."
• Start with a Bold Statement: "In the fast-paced digital age...."

Main Points

Clearly state your main points or key ideas that you will discuss throughout the presentation.

• Clearly State the Purpose and Main Points: Example: "In this presentation, we will delve into three key areas. First,... Next,... Finally,.... we'll discuss...."
• Provide Background and Context: Example: "Before we dive into the details, let's understand the basics of....."
• Present Supporting Information and Examples: Example: "To illustrate...., let's look at an example. In,....."
• Address Counterarguments or Potential Concerns: Example: "While..., we must also consider... ."
• Recap Key Points and Transition to the Next Section: Example: "To summarize, we've... Now, let's shift our focus to..."

Remember to organize your content logically and coherently, ensuring smooth transitions between sections.

You can conclude with a strong closing statement summarizing your main points and leaving a lasting impression. Example: "As we conclude our presentation, it's clear that... By...., we can...."

3/ Craft Clear and Concise Sentences

Once you've outlined your presentation, you need to edit your sentences. Use clear and straightforward language to ensure your message is easily understood.

Alternatively, you can break down complex ideas into simpler concepts and provide clear explanations or examples to aid comprehension.

4/ Use Visual Aids and Supporting Materials

Use supporting materials such as statistics, research findings, or real-life examples to back up your points and make them more compelling. 

• Example: "As you can see from this graph,... This demonstrates...."

5/ Include Engagement Techniques

Incorporate interactive elements to engage your audience, such as Q&A sessions , conducting live polls, or encouraging participation. You can also spin more funs into group, by randomly dividing people into different groups to get more diverse feedbacks!

6/ Rehearse and Revise

• Practice delivering your presentation script to familiarize yourself with the content and improve your delivery.
• Revise and edit your script as needed, removing any unnecessary information or repetitions.

7/ Seek Feedback

You can share your script or deliver a practice presentation to a trusted friend, colleague, or mentor to gather feedback on your script and make adjustments accordingly.

More on Script Presentation

How to Write A Presentation Introduction with Examples

How to write presentations that are engaging and visually appealing? Looking for introduction ideas for the presentation? As mentioned earlier, once you have completed your script, it's crucial to focus on editing and refining the most critical element—the opening of your presentation - the section that determines whether you can captivate and retain your audience's attention right from the start. 

Here is a guide on how to craft an opening that grabs your audience's attention from the very first minute: 

1/ Start with a Hook

To begin, you can choose from five different openings mentioned in the script based on your desired purpose and content. Alternatively, you can opt for the approach that resonates with you the most, and instills your confidence. Remember, the key is to choose a starting point that aligns with your objectives and allows you to deliver your message effectively.

2/ Establish Relevance and Context

Then you should establish the topic of your presentation and explain why it is important or relevant to your audience. Connect the topic to their interests, challenges, or aspirations to create a sense of relevance.

3/ State the Purpose

Clearly articulate the purpose or goal of your presentation. Let the audience know what they can expect to gain or achieve by listening to your presentation.

4/ Preview Your Main Points

Give a brief overview of the main points or sections you will cover in your presentation. It helps the audience understand the structure and flow of your presentation and creates anticipation.

5/ Establish Credibility

Share your expertise or credentials related to the topic to build trust with the audience, such as a brief personal story, relevant experience, or mentioning your professional background.

6/ Engage Emotionally

Connect emotional levels with your audience by appealing to their aspirations, fears, desires, or values. They help create a deeper connection and engagement from the very beginning.

Make sure your introduction is concise and to the point. Avoid unnecessary details or lengthy explanations. Aim for clarity and brevity to maintain the audience's attention.

For example, Topic: Work-life balance

"Good morning, everyone! Can you imagine waking up each day feeling energized and ready to conquer both your personal and professional pursuits? Well, that's exactly what we'll explore today – the wonderful world of work-life balance. In a fast-paced society where work seems to consume every waking hour, it's vital to find that spot where our careers and personal lives harmoniously coexist. Throughout this presentation, we'll dive into practical strategies that help us achieve that coveted balance, boost productivity, and nurture our overall well-being. 

But before we dive in, let me share a bit about my journey. As a working professional and a passionate advocate for work-life balance, I have spent years researching and implementing strategies that have transformed my own life. I am excited to share my knowledge and experiences with all of you today, with the hope of inspiring positive change and creating a more fulfilling work-life balance for everyone in this room. So, let's get started!"

🎉 Check out: How to Start a Presentation?

Whether you're a seasoned speaker or new to the stage, understanding how to write a presentation that conveys your message effectively is a valuable skill. By following the steps in this guide, you can become a captivating presenter and make your mark in every presentation you deliver.

Additionally, AhaSlides can significantly enhance your presentation's impact. With AhaSlides, you can use live polls , quizzes , and word cloud to turn your presentation into an engaging and interactive experience. Let's take a moment to explore our vast template library !

Frequently Asked Questions

How to write a presentation step by step .

You can refer to our step-by-step guide on How To Write A Presentation Script: Understand Your Purpose and Audience Outline the Structure of Your Presentation Craft Clear and Concise Sentences Use Visual Aids and Supporting Material Include Engagement Techniques Rehearse and Revise Seek Feedback

How do you start a presentation? 

You can start with an engaging opening that grabs the audience's attention and introduces your topic. Consider using one of the following approaches: Start with a Thought-Provoking Question: "Have you ever...?" Begin with a Surprising Fact or Statistic: "Did you know that....?" Use a Powerful Quote: "As Maya Angelou once said,...." Tell a Compelling Story : "Picture this: You're standing at...." Start with a Bold Statement: "In the fast-paced digital age...."

What are the five parts of a presentation?

When it comes to presentation writing, a typical presentation consists of the following five parts: Introduction: Capturing the audience's attention, introducing yourself, stating the purpose, and providing an overview. Main Body: Presenting main points, evidence, examples, and arguments. Visual Aids: Using visuals to enhance understanding and engage the audience. Conclusion: Summarizing main points, restating key message, and leaving a memorable takeaway or call to action. Q&A or Discussion: Optional part for addressing questions and encouraging audience participation.

A writer who wants to create practical and valuable content for the audience

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• How to present a research paper in PPT: best practices

A research paper presentation is frequently used at conferences and other events where you have a chance to share the results of your research and receive feedback from colleagues. Although it may appear as simple as summarizing the findings, successful examples of research paper presentations show that there is a little bit more to it.

In this article, we’ll walk you through the basic outline and steps to create a good research paper presentation. We’ll also explain what to include and what not to include in your presentation of research paper and share some of the most effective tips you can use to take your slides to the next level.

Research paper PowerPoint presentation outline

Creating a PowerPoint presentation for a research paper involves organizing and summarizing your key findings, methodology, and conclusions in a way that encourages your audience to interact with your work and share their interest in it with others. Here’s a basic research paper outline PowerPoint you can follow:

1. Title (1 slide)

Typically, your title slide should contain the following information:

• Title of the research paper
• Affiliation or institution
• Date of presentation

2. Introduction (1-3 slides)

On this slide of your presentation, briefly introduce the research topic and its significance and state the research question or objective.

3. Research questions or hypothesis (1 slide)

This slide should emphasize the objectives of your research or present the hypothesis.

4. Literature review (1 slide)

Your literature review has to provide context for your research by summarizing relevant literature. Additionally, it should highlight gaps or areas where your research contributes.

5. Methodology and data collection (1-2 slides)

This slide of your research paper PowerPoint has to explain the research design, methods, and procedures. It must also Include details about participants, materials, and data collection and emphasize special equipment you have used in your work.

6. Results (3-5 slides)

On this slide, you must present the results of your data analysis and discuss any trends, patterns, or significant findings. Moreover, you should use charts, graphs, and tables to illustrate data and highlight something novel in your results (if applicable).

7. Conclusion (1 slide)

Your conclusion slide has to summarize the main findings and their implications, as well as discuss the broader impact of your research. Usually, a single statement is enough.

8. Recommendations (1 slide)

If applicable, provide recommendations for future research or actions on this slide.

9. References (1-2 slides)

The references slide is where you list all the sources cited in your research paper.

10. Acknowledgments (1 slide)

On this presentation slide, acknowledge any individuals, organizations, or funding sources that contributed to your research.

11. Appendix (1 slide)

If applicable, include any supplementary materials, such as additional data or detailed charts, in your appendix slide.

The above outline is just a general guideline, so make sure to adjust it based on your specific research paper and the time allotted for the presentation.

Steps to creating a memorable research paper presentation

Creating a PowerPoint presentation for a research paper involves several critical steps needed to convey your findings and engage your audience effectively, and these steps are as follows:

Step 1. Understand your audience:

• Identify the audience for your presentation.
• Tailor your content and level of detail to match the audience’s background and knowledge.

Step 2. Define your key messages:

• Clearly articulate the main messages or findings of your research.
• Identify the key points you want your audience to remember.

Step 3. Design your research paper PPT presentation:

• Use a clean and professional design that complements your research topic.
• Choose readable fonts, consistent formatting, and a limited color palette.
• Opt for PowerPoint presentation services if slide design is not your strong side.

Step 4. Put content on slides:

• Follow the outline above to structure your presentation effectively; include key sections and topics.
• Organize your content logically, following the flow of your research paper.

Step 5. Final check:

• Proofread your slides for typos, errors, and inconsistencies.
• Ensure all visuals are clear, high-quality, and properly labeled.

Step 6. Save and share:

• Save your presentation and ensure compatibility with the equipment you’ll be using.
• If necessary, share a copy of your presentation with the audience.

By following these steps, you can create a well-organized and visually appealing research paper presentation PowerPoint that effectively conveys your research findings to the audience.

What to include and what not to include in your presentation

In addition to the must-know PowerPoint presentation recommendations, which we’ll cover later in this article, consider the following do’s and don’ts when you’re putting together your research paper presentation:

• Focus on the topic.
• Be brief and to the point.
• Attract the audience’s attention and highlight interesting details.
• Use only relevant visuals (maps, charts, pictures, graphs, etc.).
• Use numbers and bullet points to structure the content.
• Make clear statements regarding the essence and results of your research.

Don’ts:

• Don’t write down the whole outline of your paper and nothing else.
• Don’t put long, full sentences on your slides; split them into smaller ones.
• Don’t use distracting patterns, colors, pictures, and other visuals on your slides; the simpler, the better.
• Don’t use too complicated graphs or charts; only the ones that are easy to understand.
• Now that we’ve discussed the basics, let’s move on to the top tips for making a powerful presentation of your research paper.

8 tips on how to make research paper presentation that achieves its goals

You’ve probably been to a presentation where the presenter reads word for word from their PowerPoint outline. Or where the presentation is cluttered, chaotic, or contains too much data. The simple tips below will help you summarize a 10 to 15-page paper for a 15 to 20-minute talk and succeed, so read on!

Tip #1: Less is more

You want to provide enough information to make your audience want to know more. Including details but not too many and avoiding technical jargon, formulas, and long sentences are always good ways to achieve this.

Tip #2: Be professional

Avoid using too many colors, font changes, distracting backgrounds, animations, etc. Bullet points with a few words to highlight the important information are preferable to lengthy paragraphs. Additionally, include slide numbers on all PowerPoint slides except for the title slide, and make sure it is followed by a table of contents, offering a brief overview of the entire research paper.

Tip #3: Strive for balance

PowerPoint slides have limited space, so use it carefully. Typically, one to two points per slide or 5 lines for 5 words in a sentence are enough to present your ideas.

Tip #4: Use proper fonts and text size

The font you use should be easy to read and consistent throughout the slides. You can go with Arial, Times New Roman, Calibri, or a combination of these three. An ideal text size is 32 points, while a heading size is 44.

Tip #5: Concentrate on the visual side

A PowerPoint presentation is one of the best tools for presenting information visually. Use graphs instead of tables and topic-relevant illustrations instead of walls of text. Keep your visuals as clean and professional as the content of your presentation.

Tip #6: Practice your delivery

Always go through your presentation when you’re done to ensure a smooth and confident delivery and time yourself to stay within the allotted limit.

Tip #7: Get ready for questions

Anticipate potential questions from your audience and prepare thoughtful responses. Also, be ready to engage in discussions about your research.

Tip #8: Don’t be afraid to utilize professional help

If the mere thought of designing a presentation overwhelms you or you’re pressed for time, consider leveraging professional PowerPoint redesign services . A dedicated design team can transform your content or old presentation into effective slides, ensuring your message is communicated clearly and captivates your audience. This way, you can focus on refining your delivery and preparing for the presentation.

Lastly, remember that even experienced presenters get nervous before delivering research paper PowerPoint presentations in front of the audience. You cannot know everything; some things can be beyond your control, which is completely fine. You are at the event not only to share what you know but also to learn from others. So, no matter what, dress appropriately, look straight into the audience’s eyes, try to speak and move naturally, present your information enthusiastically, and have fun!

If you need help with slide design, get in touch with our dedicated design team and let qualified professionals turn your research findings into a visually appealing, polished presentation that leaves a lasting impression on your audience. Our experienced designers specialize in creating engaging layouts, incorporating compelling graphics, and ensuring a cohesive visual narrative that complements content on any subject.

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• Presenting techniques
• 50 tips on how to improve PowerPoint presentations in 2022-2023 [Updated]
• Present financial information visually in PowerPoint to drive results
• Keynote VS PowerPoint

• Design Tips

8 rules of effective presentation

• Business Slides

Employee training and onboarding presentation: why and how

How to structure, design, write, and finally present executive summary presentation?

SpeakUp resources

Starting a presentation in english: methods and examples.

• By Jake Pool

If you’re going to make it in the professional world, most likely you’ll have to give a presentation in English at some point. No reason to get nervous!

Most of the work involved lies in the introduction. You may or may not need an English presentation PPT file, your topic, audience, or time limit may vary, but a strong opening is a must no matter what! Everything that follows can build from the opening outline you present to your audience.

Let’s look at some guidelines for starting a presentation in English. If you can master this part, you’ll never have to worry about the rest!

Opening in a Presentation in English

While it’s important to have your entire presentation organized and outlined, planning and organization are especially important in the introduction. This is what will guide you through a clear and concise beginning. Let’s look at how to start a presentation with well-organized thoughts .

Introduction Outline

• Introduce yourself and welcome everyone.
• State the purpose of your presentation
• Give a short overview of the presentation

As we say, it’s as easy as 1-2-3. (No need for a more detailed English presentation script!) Let’s examine the first step.

1. Introduce Yourself & Welcome Everyone

The self-introduction is your opportunity to make a good first impression. Be sure to open with a warm welcome and use language that is familiar and natural. Based on your audience, there are a few different expressions you can use to start your presentation.

If you’re presenting to coworkers who may already know you:

• Hello, [name] here. I would like to thank you all for your time. As you may know, I [describe what you do/your job title] I look forward to discussing [topic] today.
• Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone. Thank you for being here. For those who don’t know me, my name is [name], and for those who know me, hello again.

If you’re presenting to people you’ve never met:

• Hello everyone, it’s nice to meet you all. My name is [name] and I am the [job/title].
• Hello. Welcome to [event]. My name is [name] and I am the [job/title]. I’m glad you’re all here.

There are certainly more ways to make an introduction. However, it’s generally best to follow this format:

• Start with a polite welcome and state your name.
• Follow with your job title and/or the reason you’re qualified to speak on the topic being discussed.

2. State the Purpose of Your Presentation

Now that your audience knows who you are and your qualifications, you can state the purpose of your presentation. This is where you clarify to your audience what you’ll be talking about.

So, ask yourself, “ What do I want my audience to get from this presentation? ”

• Do you want your audience to be informed?
• Do you need something from your audience?
• Do you want them to purchase a product?
• Do you want them to do something for the community or your company?

With your goal in mind, you can create the next couple of lines of your presentation. Below are some examples of how to start.

• Let me share with you…
• I’d like to introduce you to [product or service]
• Today I want to discuss…
• I want to breakdown for you [topic]
• Let’s discuss…
• Today I will present the results of my research on [topic]
• By the end of this presentation, you’ll understand [topic]
• My goal is to explain…
• As you know, we’ll be talking about…

When talking about the purpose of your presentation, stick to your goals. You purpose statement should be only one to three sentences. That way, you can give your audience a clear sense of purpose that sets them up for the rest of the presentation.

3. A Short Overview of the Presentation

The final step in starting your presentation is to give a short outline of what you’ll be presenting. People like a map of what to expect from a presentation.

It helps them organize their thoughts and gives a sense of order. Also, it lets the audience know why they’re listening to you. This is what you’ll use to grab their attention, and help them stay focused throughout the presentation.

Here are some examples of how you can outline your presentation:

• Today, I’m going to cover… Then we’ll talk about… Lastly, I’ll close on…
• We’re going to be covering some key information you need to know, including…
• My aim with this presentation is to get you to… To do that we’ll be talking about…
• I’ve divided my presentation into [number] sections… [List the sections]
• Over the next [length of your presentation] I’m going to discuss…

That’s it! It’s as simple as 1-2-3. If you have a fear of public speaking or are not confident about presenting to a group of people, follow these three steps. It’s a simple structure that can get you off to a good start. With that in mind, there are other ways to bring your introduction to the next level too! Read on for bonus tips on how to really engage your audience, beyond the basics.

For a Strong Presentation in English, Engage your Audience

Presentations aren’t everyone’s strongest ability, and that’s OK. If you’re newer to presenting in English, the steps above are the basics to getting started. Once you’re more comfortable with presenting, though, you can go a step further with some extra tricks that can really wow your audience.

Mastering the skill of engaging an audience will take experience. Fortunately, there are many famous speakers out there you can model for capturing attention. Also, there are some common techniques that English-speakers use to gain an audience’s attention.

*How and when you use these techniques in your introduction is at your discretion, as long as you cover the 3 steps of the introduction outline that we discussed earlier.*

Do or say something shocking.

The purpose of shocking your audience is to immediately engage them. You can make a loud noise and somehow relate the noise to your presentation. Or, you can say, “ Did you know that… ” and follow with a shocking story or statistic. Either way, the objective is to create surprise to draw their attention.

Tell a story

Telling a story related to your presentation is a great way to get the audience listening to you.

You can start by saying, “ On my way to [location] the other day… ” or “ On my way here, I was reminded of… ” and then follow with a story. A good story can make your presentation memorable.

Ask your audience to take part

Sometimes a good introduction that captures attention will involve asking for help from the audience. You can ask the audience to play a quick game or solve a puzzle that’s related to your presentation. Also, you could engage the audience with a group exercise. This is a great way to get people involved in your presentation.

There are many more ways to engage the audience, so get creative and see what you can think up! Here are some resources that will help you get started.

Also, if you want to get better at public speaking (and help your English speaking too!), a great organization to know about is the Toastmasters . The organization is dedicated to helping you be a better speaker, and there are many local groups in America. They offer free lessons and events to help you master your English speaking, and also offer additional help to paying members.

The Takeaway

A presentation in English? No problem, as long as your introduction sets you up for success . Admittedly, this can be easier said than done. Native speakers and non-native speakers alike sometimes struggle with getting a good start on their English presentation. But the advice above can help you get the confidence you need to lay a good foundation for your next speech !

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How to Structure your Presentation, with Examples

August 3, 2018 - Dom Barnard

For many people the thought of delivering a presentation is a daunting task and brings about a  great deal of nerves . However, if you take some time to understand how effective presentations are structured and then apply this structure to your own presentation, you’ll appear much more confident and relaxed.

Here is our complete guide for structuring your presentation, with examples at the end of the article to demonstrate these points.

Why is structuring a presentation so important?

If you’ve ever sat through a great presentation, you’ll have left feeling either inspired or informed on a given topic. This isn’t because the speaker was the most knowledgeable or motivating person in the world. Instead, it’s because they know how to structure presentations – they have crafted their message in a logical and simple way that has allowed the audience can keep up with them and take away key messages.

Research has supported this, with studies showing that audiences retain structured information  40% more accurately  than unstructured information.

In fact, not only is structuring a presentation important for the benefit of the audience’s understanding, it’s also important for you as the speaker. A good structure helps you remain calm, stay on topic, and avoid any awkward silences.

What will affect your presentation structure?

Generally speaking, there is a natural flow that any decent presentation will follow which we will go into shortly. However, you should be aware that all presentation structures will be different in their own unique way and this will be due to a number of factors, including:

• Whether you need to deliver any demonstrations
• How  knowledgeable the audience  already is on the given subject
• How much interaction you want from the audience
• Any time constraints there are for your talk
• What setting you are in
• Your ability to use any kinds of visual assistance

Before choosing the presentation’s structure answer these questions first:

• What is your presentation’s aim?
• Who are the audience?
• What are the main points your audience should remember afterwards?

When reading the points below, think critically about what things may cause your presentation structure to be slightly different. You can add in certain elements and add more focus to certain moments if that works better for your speech.

What is the typical presentation structure?

This is the usual flow of a presentation, which covers all the vital sections and is a good starting point for yours. It allows your audience to easily follow along and sets out a solid structure you can add your content to.

1. Greet the audience and introduce yourself

Before you start delivering your talk, introduce yourself to the audience and clarify who you are and your relevant expertise. This does not need to be long or incredibly detailed, but will help build an immediate relationship between you and the audience. It gives you the chance to briefly clarify your expertise and why you are worth listening to. This will help establish your ethos so the audience will trust you more and think you’re credible.

Read our tips on  How to Start a Presentation Effectively

2. Introduction

In the introduction you need to explain the subject and purpose of your presentation whilst gaining the audience’s interest and confidence. It’s sometimes helpful to think of your introduction as funnel-shaped to help filter down your topic:

• Introduce your general topic
• Explain your topic area
• State the issues/challenges in this area you will be exploring
• State your presentation’s purpose – this is the basis of your presentation so ensure that you provide a statement explaining how the topic will be treated, for example, “I will argue that…” or maybe you will “compare”, “analyse”, “evaluate”, “describe” etc.
• Provide a statement of what you’re hoping the outcome of the presentation will be, for example, “I’m hoping this will be provide you with…”
• Show a preview of the organisation of your presentation

In this section also explain:

• The length of the talk.
• Signal whether you want audience interaction – some presenters prefer the audience to ask questions throughout whereas others allocate a specific section for this.
• If it applies, inform the audience whether to take notes or whether you will be providing handouts.

The way you structure your introduction can depend on the amount of time you have been given to present: a  sales pitch  may consist of a quick presentation so you may begin with your conclusion and then provide the evidence. Conversely, a speaker presenting their idea for change in the world would be better suited to start with the evidence and then conclude what this means for the audience.

Keep in mind that the main aim of the introduction is to grab the audience’s attention and connect with them.

3. The main body of your talk

The main body of your talk needs to meet the promises you made in the introduction. Depending on the nature of your presentation, clearly segment the different topics you will be discussing, and then work your way through them one at a time – it’s important for everything to be organised logically for the audience to fully understand. There are many different ways to organise your main points, such as, by priority, theme, chronologically etc.

• Main points should be addressed one by one with supporting evidence and examples.
• Before moving on to the next point you should provide a mini-summary.
• Links should be clearly stated between ideas and you must make it clear when you’re moving onto the next point.
• Allow time for people to take relevant notes and stick to the topics you have prepared beforehand rather than straying too far off topic.

When planning your presentation write a list of main points you want to make and ask yourself “What I am telling the audience? What should they understand from this?” refining your answers this way will help you produce clear messages.

4. Conclusion

In presentations the conclusion is frequently underdeveloped and lacks purpose which is a shame as it’s the best place to reinforce your messages. Typically, your presentation has a specific goal – that could be to convert a number of the audience members into customers, lead to a certain number of enquiries to make people knowledgeable on specific key points, or to motivate them towards a shared goal.

Regardless of what that goal is, be sure to summarise your main points and their implications. This clarifies the overall purpose of your talk and reinforces your reason for being there.

Follow these steps:

• Signal that it’s nearly the end of your presentation, for example, “As we wrap up/as we wind down the talk…”
• Restate the topic and purpose of your presentation – “In this speech I wanted to compare…”
• Summarise the main points, including their implications and conclusions
• Indicate what is next/a call to action/a thought-provoking takeaway
• Move on to the last section

5. Thank the audience and invite questions

Conclude your talk by thanking the audience for their time and invite them to  ask any questions  they may have. As mentioned earlier, personal circumstances will affect the structure of your presentation.

Many presenters prefer to make the Q&A session the key part of their talk and try to speed through the main body of the presentation. This is totally fine, but it is still best to focus on delivering some sort of initial presentation to set the tone and topics for discussion in the Q&A.

Other common presentation structures

The above was a description of a basic presentation, here are some more specific presentation layouts:

Demonstration

Use the demonstration structure when you have something useful to show. This is usually used when you want to show how a product works. Steve Jobs frequently used this technique in his presentations.

• Explain why the product is valuable.
• Describe why the product is necessary.
• Explain what problems it can solve for the audience.
• Demonstrate the product  to support what you’ve been saying.
• Make suggestions of other things it can do to make the audience curious.

Problem-solution

This structure is particularly useful in persuading the audience.

• Briefly frame the issue.
• Go into the issue in detail showing why it ‘s such a problem. Use logos and pathos for this – the logical and emotional appeals.
• Provide the solution and explain why this would also help the audience.
• Call to action – something you want the audience to do which is straightforward and pertinent to the solution.

Storytelling

As well as incorporating  stories in your presentation , you can organise your whole presentation as a story. There are lots of different type of story structures you can use – a popular choice is the monomyth – the hero’s journey. In a monomyth, a hero goes on a difficult journey or takes on a challenge – they move from the familiar into the unknown. After facing obstacles and ultimately succeeding the hero returns home, transformed and with newfound wisdom.

Storytelling for Business Success  webinar , where well-know storyteller Javier Bernad shares strategies for crafting compelling narratives.

Another popular choice for using a story to structure your presentation is in media ras (in the middle of thing). In this type of story you launch right into the action by providing a snippet/teaser of what’s happening and then you start explaining the events that led to that event. This is engaging because you’re starting your story at the most exciting part which will make the audience curious – they’ll want to know how you got there.

• Great storytelling: Examples from Alibaba Founder, Jack Ma

Remaining method

The remaining method structure is good for situations where you’re presenting your perspective on a controversial topic which has split people’s opinions.

• Go into the issue in detail showing why it’s such a problem – use logos and pathos.
• Rebut your opponents’ solutions  – explain why their solutions could be useful because the audience will see this as fair and will therefore think you’re trustworthy, and then explain why you think these solutions are not valid.
• After you’ve presented all the alternatives provide your solution, the remaining solution. This is very persuasive because it looks like the winning idea, especially with the audience believing that you’re fair and trustworthy.

Transitions

When delivering presentations it’s important for your words and ideas to flow so your audience can understand how everything links together and why it’s all relevant. This can be done  using speech transitions  which are words and phrases that allow you to smoothly move from one point to another so that your speech flows and your presentation is unified.

Transitions can be one word, a phrase or a full sentence – there are many different forms, here are some examples:

Moving from the introduction to the first point

Signify to the audience that you will now begin discussing the first main point:

• Now that you’re aware of the overview, let’s begin with…
• First, let’s begin with…
• I will first cover…
• My first point covers…
• To get started, let’s look at…

Shifting between similar points

Move from one point to a similar one:

• In the same way…
• Likewise…
• Equally…
• This is similar to…
• Similarly…

Internal summaries

Internal summarising consists of summarising before moving on to the next point. You must inform the audience:

• What part of the presentation you covered – “In the first part of this speech we’ve covered…”
• What the key points were – “Precisely how…”
• How this links in with the overall presentation – “So that’s the context…”
• What you’re moving on to – “Now I’d like to move on to the second part of presentation which looks at…”

Physical movement

You can move your body and your standing location when you transition to another point. The audience find it easier to follow your presentation and movement will increase their interest.

A common technique for incorporating movement into your presentation is to:

• Start your introduction by standing in the centre of the stage.
• For your first point you stand on the left side of the stage.
• You discuss your second point from the centre again.
• You stand on the right side of the stage for your third point.
• The conclusion occurs in the centre.

Key slides for your presentation

Slides are a useful tool for most presentations: they can greatly assist in the delivery of your message and help the audience follow along with what you are saying. Key slides include:

• An intro slide outlining your ideas
• A  summary slide  with core points to remember
• High quality image slides to supplement what you are saying

There are some presenters who choose not to use slides at all, though this is more of a rarity. Slides can be a powerful tool if used properly, but the problem is that many fail to do just that. Here are some golden rules to follow when using slides in a presentation:

• Don’t over fill them  – your slides are there to assist your speech, rather than be the focal point. They should have as little information as possible, to avoid distracting people from your talk.
• A picture says a thousand words  – instead of filling a slide with text, instead, focus on one or two images or diagrams to help support and explain the point you are discussing at that time.
• Make them readable  – depending on the size of your audience, some may not be able to see small text or images, so make everything large enough to fill the space.
• Don’t rush through slides  – give the audience enough time to digest each slide.

Guy Kawasaki, an entrepreneur and author, suggests that slideshows should follow a  10-20-30 rule :

• There should be a maximum of 10 slides – people rarely remember more than one concept afterwards so there’s no point overwhelming them with unnecessary information.
• The presentation should last no longer than 20 minutes as this will leave time for questions and discussion.
• The font size should be a minimum of 30pt because the audience reads faster than you talk so less information on the slides means that there is less chance of the audience being distracted.

Here are some additional resources for slide design:

• 7 design tips for effective, beautiful PowerPoint presentations
• 11 design tips for beautiful presentations
• 10 tips on how to make slides that communicate your idea

Group Presentations

Group presentations are structured in the same way as presentations with one speaker but usually require more rehearsal and practices.  Clean transitioning between speakers  is very important in producing a presentation that flows well. One way of doing this consists of:

• Briefly recap on what you covered in your section: “So that was a brief introduction on what health anxiety is and how it can affect somebody”
• Introduce the next speaker in the team and explain what they will discuss: “Now Elnaz will talk about the prevalence of health anxiety.”
• Then end by looking at the next speaker, gesturing towards them and saying their name: “Elnaz”.
• The next speaker should acknowledge this with a quick: “Thank you Joe.”

From this example you can see how the different sections of the presentations link which makes it easier for the audience to follow and remain engaged.

Example of great presentation structure and delivery

Having examples of great presentations will help inspire your own structures, here are a few such examples, each unique and inspiring in their own way.

How Google Works – by Eric Schmidt

This presentation by ex-Google CEO  Eric Schmidt  demonstrates some of the most important lessons he and his team have learnt with regards to working with some of the most talented individuals they hired. The simplistic yet cohesive style of all of the slides is something to be appreciated. They are relatively straightforward, yet add power and clarity to the narrative of the presentation.

Start with why – by Simon Sinek

Since being released in 2009, this presentation has been viewed almost four million times all around the world. The message itself is very powerful, however, it’s not an idea that hasn’t been heard before. What makes this presentation so powerful is the simple message he is getting across, and the straightforward and understandable manner in which he delivers it. Also note that he doesn’t use any slides, just a whiteboard where he creates a simple diagram of his opinion.

The Wisdom of a Third Grade Dropout – by Rick Rigsby

Here’s an example of a presentation given by a relatively unknown individual looking to inspire the next generation of graduates. Rick’s presentation is unique in many ways compared to the two above. Notably, he uses no visual prompts and includes a great deal of humour.

However, what is similar is the structure he uses. He first introduces his message that the wisest man he knew was a third-grade dropout. He then proceeds to deliver his main body of argument, and in the end, concludes with his message. This powerful speech keeps the viewer engaged throughout, through a mixture of heart-warming sentiment, powerful life advice and engaging humour.

As you can see from the examples above, and as it has been expressed throughout, a great presentation structure means analysing the core message of your presentation. Decide on a key message you want to impart the audience with, and then craft an engaging way of delivering it.

By preparing a solid structure, and  practising your talk  beforehand, you can walk into the presentation with confidence and deliver a meaningful message to an interested audience.

It’s important for a presentation to be well-structured so it can have the most impact on your audience. An unstructured presentation can be difficult to follow and even frustrating to listen to. The heart of your speech are your main points supported by evidence and your transitions should assist the movement between points and clarify how everything is linked.

Research suggests that the audience remember the first and last things you say so your introduction and conclusion are vital for reinforcing your points. Essentially, ensure you spend the time structuring your presentation and addressing all of the sections.

How to introduce yourself in a conference presentation (in six simple steps)

Academic conferences are great occasions for networking. Particularly the start of a conference presentation offers a unique opportunity to introduce yourself to the audience, concisely and effectively.

Why effective introductions during academic conference presentations matter

Thus, while the content of your presentation is certainly important, the networking aspect of academic conferences should not be underestimated.

A good introduction includes information on who you are, what your research is about, and how people can learn more about you. And of course how they can connect with you.

An effective introduction at the start of your conference presentation will help people remember you. Even more importantly, they should feel invited to get in touch with you. In-person, via email, or on social media. This is how networks are formed, which can have a lasting effect on your career.

Step 1: State your full name, position and your university affiliation

Don’t jump straight into the topic of your presentation! Instead, start with the basics. State your name, your position and the university affiliation you have.

Step 2: Explain your research area and focus in 2-3 sentences

Explaining your research area in a few sentences is challenging. However, it is essential to keep it short. Think of 2-3 sentences. You do not want to take away precious time from your actual presentation.

Step 3: Tell people where they can find out more about you online

Your online presence can consist, for instance, of your academic website , or your online university profile. Maybe you also work on a research project that has its own website with information. Whatever you decide to share with your conference audience, make sure that everything is up to date!

Step 4: Provide your professional social media handles

However, if you do, make sure to also point people to – for instance – your Twitter or LinkedIn account.

Step 5: Provide your email address and invite people to reach out

Step 6: emphasize that you are happy to connect and chat after your presentation.

Finally, point out that you are happy to connect and chat with people after your presentation. Then, transition to your presentation.

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How to Write an Introduction in PowerPoint: A Step-by-Step Guide

Writing an introduction in PowerPoint is all about grabbing your audience’s attention and giving them a preview of what they are about to learn. It sets the tone for the rest of the presentation and can make or break your audience’s engagement. By following a few simple steps, you can craft an introduction that will captivate your audience and get your presentation off to a strong start.

After you complete your introduction, your audience should feel intrigued and eager to hear more. A well-crafted introduction can help establish your credibility and make your audience more receptive to your message.

Introduction

When it comes to presenting information, the introduction is your first impression, and as we all know, first impressions can be everything. Whether you’re presenting to a group of business professionals, teaching a class, or speaking at a conference, knowing how to write an engaging introduction in PowerPoint is essential. It’s not just about the content, but also about how you present it.

An introduction sets the stage for what’s to come, grabs your audience’s attention, and prepares them for the information they are about to receive. So, why is this topic important? Anyone who uses PowerPoint as a tool for presenting information can benefit from mastering the art of the introduction.

Step by Step Tutorial on Writing an Introduction in PowerPoint

Before diving into the step-by-step process, let’s first understand what these steps will help us achieve. By following the outlined steps, you will be able to craft a compelling introduction to your PowerPoint presentation that will engage your audience from the get-go.

Step 1: Open PowerPoint and Select a Theme

Choose a theme that aligns with the topic of your presentation.

Selecting a theme is the first step because it sets the visual tone for your presentation. The theme should be professional yet engaging, and it should complement, not distract from, your introduction.

Step 2: Add a Title Slide

Insert a new slide and choose the ‘Title Slide’ layout.

Your title slide is where you’ll introduce the topic of your presentation. Make sure the title is clear, concise, and reflective of the content to follow.

Step 3: Craft a Catchy Title

Write a title that is both informative and attention-grabbing.

Your title is the first text your audience will read, so it needs to make an impact. Use compelling language that piques curiosity and encourages your audience to want to learn more.

Step 4: Add a Subtitle (If Applicable)

Include a subtitle that provides additional context or a preview of the presentation’s focus.

Not all presentations will require a subtitle, but if yours covers a broad topic or has a specific angle, a subtitle can provide clarity.

Step 5: Create an Agenda or Overview Slide

Design a slide that outlines the main points you will be covering in your presentation.

An agenda or overview slide lets your audience know what to expect and helps them follow along more easily. Keep it brief and to the point.

Additional Information

Creating an engaging introduction in PowerPoint requires more than just following steps; it’s about understanding your audience and crafting a message that resonates with them. Remember, the introduction is your chance to make a lasting impression, so take the time to develop a hook that will capture the audience’s interest. Consider opening with a relevant quote, a surprising statistic, or a compelling question.

Use visuals effectively by incorporating images or short videos that complement your message. Pay attention to the design elements, such as font size, color, and layout, to ensure readability and visual appeal. Lastly, practice delivering your introduction to ensure a smooth and confident start to your presentation.

• Open PowerPoint and select a theme.
• Add a title slide.
• Craft a catchy title.
• Add a subtitle (if applicable).
• Create an agenda or overview slide.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long should a powerpoint introduction be.

An introduction should be brief, ideally less than two minutes, to set the stage without losing your audience’s attention.

Can I use humor in my presentation’s introduction?

Yes, humor can be an effective way to engage your audience, but make sure it’s appropriate for the setting and your audience.

Is it necessary to have an overview slide?

While not mandatory, an overview slide can be helpful for providing structure and helping your audience follow along.

How many slides should the introduction consist of?

Typically, one to three slides are sufficient for an introduction, depending on the complexity and length of your presentation.

Should my introduction include a personal introduction?

If it’s relevant and adds credibility, including a brief personal introduction can be beneficial.

Writing an introduction in PowerPoint is a critical skill for anyone looking to present information effectively. By following the steps outlined above and keeping in mind the pros and cons, you can create an introduction that not only captures your audience’s attention but also sets the stage for a successful presentation.

Remember, the introduction is your chance to make a lasting impression, so put in the effort to make it count. Good luck, and happy presenting!

Matthew Burleigh has been writing tech tutorials since 2008. His writing has appeared on dozens of different websites and been read over 50 million times.

After receiving his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Computer Science he spent several years working in IT management for small businesses. However, he now works full time writing content online and creating websites.

His main writing topics include iPhones, Microsoft Office, Google Apps, Android, and Photoshop, but he has also written about many other tech topics as well.

Read his full bio here.

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10 Strong Opening Slides to Start A Presentation (With Examples!)

Hrideep barot.

• Presentation

It is weird how now that we all live on our laptops and depend on them for entertainment and livelihood, things that shock us aren’t that many. This is a big itchy spot when it comes to engaging audiences and having a killer opening.

Lets focus on getting that perfect first slide in your presentation to help you kick off on the right foot.

How to open presentations

Opening presentations is an extremely daunting task. The worry of putting your best foot forward but at the same time not coming across as arrogant and the whole issue with fanning your armpits just before you step on the stage.

Yeah, I know. I relate, I think most of us do. We have braved those sweat patches and we have conquered.

It is time to up our opening game and while I will be getting to the ways we can do that, you can also check out this video for a quick idea.

What should be the first slide of a presentation?

Your first slide, needs to be impactful, with minimal content. An extremely difficult balance to maintain, but! Not impossible.

Your first slide, traditionally, is your name, the topic you are going to speak on and maybe on or two other details with MAYBE an image or some other graphics.

Gone are the days when we open speeches or presentations the traditional way, nothing wrong with it, but doing something “not normal” often helps us get people’s attention and that is the easiest way to get your points across and have them received positively.

Let’s check out a few ways you can open slides for a strong opening!

Strong Opening Slide Ideas

We’ve got our thinking cap on, let’s get cracking!

There are so many ways we can have a strong opening, even when you think presentations limit you.

Think of it this way, because people know you’re going to presenting something, they are going to give you full control of a projector. A big ass screen for all to see. If that isn’t filled with potential, I don’t know what is.

Well, with great power comes great responsibility, so let’s check out a few ways we can have killer opening slides , while of course being responsible… ish.

Idea 1: Introduction

There is no better way to get the audience to remember you than putting a giant photo of yourself on the screen and going, this is me, – an extremely edited version of me, but still, me. 🙂

Buddy. No. That was an attempt at being the funny – clever person. Clearly it didn’t work.

Don’t get me wrong, talking about yourself is good, important even to some extent, but that is it you see, it isn’t the fact that you’re talking about yourself that is the problem but what are you talking about that is.

The usual go to is to list out your biodata for the audience to read on the screen, while you speak the exact same thing off of the presentation. This is where we go wrong, no one wants to know about all your seven Ph.Ds. Bruce. (get the reference please)

Be proud of your qualifications, you earned them, but know when and where which qualification might be useful.

For example, you are a certified chartered accountant and have written plays that were on Broadway. In a screenwriting workshop / panel / seminar, as great as getting your chartered accountancy is, your experience as a writer holds way more value and is what will help you get the audience’s attention.

Let’s create an opening slide with the above example.

I used these polaroid photo ideas because for a play on Broadway, we’d love to see pictures! You can use tasteful pictures and even stock photos to help your audience get the right idea of your background.

Of course, I used these random paper elements to give it a more “writer” feel and also because this is my aesthetic, but you need to remember that this is your presentation and no cookie cutter mould will work. Even templates are meant to be edited to suit your needs.

Idea 2: Quiz

Is this to make your audience feel dumb? As much as that chaotic evil side of you may want to. Never do that. Respect their experiences as much as you would want them to respect yours.

Starting off with a quiz is a great way to warm up the crowd and get them involved in your presentation. Give them something to think about and it honestly doesn’t matter if they get it right or wrong, what matters is that they are trying to answer and interact!

Quizzes are a great ice breaker and also a great tool to get the audience going, you can also try to have a one off question or a series of questions.

Lets take the slide as an example, it could be for a presentation on a film industry and the question could be, guess the film from these three pictures, or they could be three different questions.

Remember as an opening slide, it should neither be text nor image heavy, just the right amount.

You could even create a game out of those quizzes and have checked off your list and even use these as a starting off point and come back to the topics (which could be your answers) while using this quiz as a reference point. The possibilities are endless!

Idea 3: Stimulation of Imagination

It always great to know what your audience is thinking, or in the least get them thinking!

You see, once they start thinking, they begin forming an opinion about the topic, which gets them invested and since you are the person addressing the topic, they will begin comparing their point of view / opinion with what they are saying.

There will always be different perspectives, what matters here is that they are invested enough to pay attention to you.

A really easy way to help them get started with forming an opinion is, asking them to take a minute to think about something.

For example: Think about a dancing monkey.

Can some of you describe the monkey you imagined, in the comment section? Was it wearing tap shoes and a top hat? Was it wearing a marching band uniform? Did it have your best friend’s face on it? Mine did!

Each of you had your own Dancing Monkey, and if thinking about it for a few seconds made it your own, imagine the attachment you can build by just spending a few minutes or even the duration of a presentation on it!

For example, you’re taking a presentation on perspectives or psychology. You can display this image and ask them what they think of it. Some may think about freedom, some loneliness and some people’s thoughts may be so profound that we could’ve never thought of it!

Idea 4: Video

This could work just as marvellous as sharing an image and opening a short discussion on its interpretations. You could even start with a video and use it as a segue into your presentation.

For example this video could be used as a great example for a marketing strategy by the brand and could be a great way to get the audience interested given the emotional quotient and relatable sibling content.

Idea 5: Image

Using an image might not necessarily mean that you can only invite the audience to imagine and think on their own. You can use an image to start your presentation and help get your point across.

You see that how the image is the hero of the slide? There is text, definitely, but much smaller, it looks as a complementary to the image instead of the other way around.

In this slide for example, assume poverty is the topic, a very telling image of poverty could help get the conversation started and make the audience more receptive of the topic.

An image in a way helps them “put a face” to the issue and that makes is easier for you to hold their attention and keep it.

Idea 6: Quote

It is well known and understood how impactful the right quote at the right time can be.

Lets focus on some things that people can often get wrong when using quotes.

Firstly, using long quotes, this is a no no when it comes to presentations because, then the audience will be in a rush to read the whole quote and if your point is made before then, well, we won’t get the desired effect will we?

Another thing to keep in mind is to not have a quote just to use it as a quote, pretty cryptic, honestly it is simple, if you are giving a presentation on a person and using their quote or you are using a random quote, make sure to have something to add to it.

It could be something simple. For example when talking about a person’s life:

“When this person said this, they were on their death bed, but they had lead a vivacious life until then to say the least, let’s start at the very beginning…”

Notice how despite there being a background picture, a text box, a bird in the corner, and all that, the text is what is the hero of the slide. You could even add a picture of the person whom you are quoting if it seems relevant.

Remember to always give credit where it is due. It never hurts.

Idea 7: Story

Who doesn’t love a good story? Storytelling is a major part of public speaking where animation, emotion and gestures and tones play a huge role in delivering your point.

With presentations, you need to remember to not just select any story, you need find / write a story that connects well to your topic, for example, if we are speaking about technology, a story about Alice and her looking glass don’t really give you much room to work in a segue.

Storytelling is a whole other conversation, check out this article to learn more about public speaking and how storytelling factors into it: Public Speech Into Story: 3 Steps To Telling A Captivating Story

Here the pictures are the heroes, and while words are important, make them complementary to what you are speaking.

Starting off with a joke is also a very popular trick and I think why should it be this or that, why should it be a joke or a story, why can’t it be a humorous story?

Now don’t go fretting about because it doesn’t have to be fictional, it could even be an anecdote from your experiences or maybe one comic strip you found online.

When it comes to humorous speeches, it can be quite intimidating, but here is an article I think will help you wade through these waters: A Guide To Using Humour In Your Speech

Idea 8: Examples

This is a great way to introduce your topic to a crowd that doesn’t know your topic well. Create examples or situations to help your audience gain a smooth entry into your presentation.

It is like math, it is fun when you understand, and that means you care and give attention to it.

You can also use case studies or make your examples into stories to make it more subtle and seamless.

Here is where a traditional topic, sentence and image layout of an opening slide is best suggested. You can build this in any direction and still be able to relate to your slide.

Idea 9: Hard Facts

Facing facts instances that are always either pleasantly welcomed or hard to swallow. Hitting the audience with hard facts works really well, especially if what you are going to talk about is a difficult or sensitive issue.

An astonishing fact is bound to catch people’s attention and you can always use it to your advantage!

According to Femme International, over the last 20 years, the sanitary pad sector has bloomed and advanced; they have taken over the industry and 85% of menstruating women in the country use napkins. As society progressed and the taboo on periods were lifted from many regions, a new problem came up. One which is really harmful. We all know that the blood that comes out during our periods is harmful and full of bacteria. Now include this bacteria filled blood with a pad which takes 500-800 years to decompose. That’s right, 500-800 years of a used sanitary napkin breeding bacteria in rivers, drains, soil and the sea. A menstruating woman uses 15-20 pads for one cycle. Which sums up to 7,200-9,600 pads over an average period of 40 years. This is just for one woman. According to UNICEF roughly 26% of the world’s population are menstruating women. This means that 2.28 BILLION women are going to use over 9,000 pads EACH during their menstruating years.

Always try to not keep your introductory slides text heavy, but when starting with facts, try to highlight them, notice how the topic and the image are not very prominent but play their part in bringing together the entire slide while the first thing you read is the fact, underlined and set in the middle.

Try to play around with the layouts, figure out what suits your needs the best.

Idea 10: Controversial Statements

Who doesn’t love controversies?

Even if we know something is clickbait, it still catches our eye. Even if we know something to not be possible, when someone says it – with conviction, our ears do perk up.

It doesn’t have to be something extraordinary, just not ordinary enough that it catches people’s attention and in the end, you can always use it to connect your conclusion to your introduction.

Here is a great TEDTalk that would help you understand what I am talking about.

If you plan to use this method, it is easier to dive into your slides after you’ve made the statement and start elaborating on it instead of right at the beginning, it could start with your topic or some proof or where ever your presentation takes you!

Final Thoughts

A presentation carries as much personality as its maker, if you want the right impact you need to use the templates, infographics and tools available to you to the fullest, but remember, there is a thing called “too much” as well.

The easiest way to kill it with your presentations is to keep it neat, in your aesthetic and to the point. Make it engaging, make it colourful, make it black and white. It would work perfectly if it bounces off your personality on stage.

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Blog > English Presentation Structure (Introduction, Closing) & useful Phrases

English Presentation Structure (Introduction, Closing) & useful Phrases

02.21.20   •  #powerpoint #presentation #english.

When giving a presentation in english, there are certain guidelines you should follow. Maybe you haven't got a lot of experience presenting - or you would simply like to refresh your already existing knowledge - we're here to teach you the basics about presenting and provide you with a free list of useful phrases and the basic structure you can in your presentation!

1. Structure

The general structure of a presentation is the following:

• Introduction

It is up to you to design these three parts. Using videos or everyday-examples can be a great way to introduce the audience to the topic. The important thing is that you capture the audience's attention from the beginning by making an interesting introduction. The main part is where you present your topic, ideally divided into sections. You can be creative with it - incorporate images, videos, stories or interactive polls . We generally recommend using different kinds of elements, as that makes the presentation more lively. Make sure your main part is well structured, so your audience can follow. In the conclusion, you should give a short summary of the points you made without adding any new information. You can also make an appeal to your audience in the end.

2. Useful Phrases

Here you'll find several phrases that you'll need in every presentation. Of course, you should adapt them and use them in a context that is suitable for your setting. The phrases are divided into subcategories so you can find what you're looking for more easily.

Starting your Presentation

In your introduction, you should:

Welcome your audience

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone!

Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you to my presentation about...

Introduce yourself

I am ... (from company ...) and today I would like to introduce you to the topic of ...

My name is ... and I am going to talk about ... today.

Icebreakers (for audience engagement)

Icebreaker polls are an amazing way to engage your audience instantly. They function as a fun and playful element at the beginning, giving you the perfect start you need to give a successful presentation. Click here to read our detailed post about icebreaker polls!

Mention the presentation topic and the reason for giving the presentation

I am grateful to be here today and tell you you about...

I would like to take this opportunity to talk about ...

I am here today to talk to you about ...

The reason why I am here today to talk about ... is ...

The purpose of this presentation is to ...

My goal today is to ...

Hopefully, by the end of the presentation, you will all know more about ...

Give a short overview of the content

To make it as understandable as possible, I divided my presentation into ... parts. In the first part, I will concentrate on ..., the second part will be about ..., ...

First of all, I will give you a short introduction, then we will move on to ...

... and finally, I will give you some insights to ...

Here are a few phrases that you could use during the whole presentation, but especially in the main part.

Engage your audience

In order to raise the audience's attention and improve their engagement, it is extremely important to make contact with them. A great way to do so is by adding interactive elements such as polls. If you would like to know more about this topic, read our article on How To Boost Audience Engagement . You can also use a software like SlideLizard , which allows you to conduct live polls, do Q&A sessions with your audience, share your resources and many more benefits that take your presentation to the next level.

Please raise your hand if you ...

Have you ever thought about ... ?

I would like to do a poll about ...

Please ask any questions as soon as they arrive.

On one hand, … on the other hand…

Comparing … with …, we can see that…

Clearly, … makes more sense than …

Whereas Option A is …, Option B is …

Making new points

Firstly,… Secondly,…

What also has to be mentioned is…

Next, I would like to bring up the topic of…

That being said, now we are going to take a look at…

Let's move on to the next topic.

On the next slide,…

The last thing I would like to mention is…

We made a whole blog post about how to pose questions in your presentation: The Right Way to do a Question Slide .

Talking about images or videos

In this image you can clearly see that ...

We are now going to take a look at a picture/video of ...

I'm going to show you a video by ... about ... now.

I've prepared a video about ...

Talking about statistics and charts

I am now addressing this graph that refers to the results of study XY.

In the graph on this slide, you can see that ...

The average is at ...

This graph clearly shows that the majority ...

According to this graph, the focus should be on ...

What that study tells us for practice is that we should ...

Emphasizing

I would like to emphasize the importance of ...

Moreover, it has to be said that ...

I want to stress the importance of ...

We always have to remember that ...

This is of high significance because ...

That part is especially important because ...

When something goes wrong

I am sorry, but it seems like the projector isn't working.

Could someone please help me with ...?

Is anybody here who knows how to ...?

Could someone give me a hand with ...

I would like to apologize for ...

I apologize for the technical problems, we are going to continue in a minute.

I am sorry for the inconvenience.

End of Presentation

In the conclusion, you should...

Sum up the main points

In conclusion I can say that…

To sum up the main points,…

With all mentioned aspects taken into consideration, I can say that…

Make an appeal

So please, in the future, try to be conscious about...

Please take a moment to think about...

I would like to encourage you to...

Thank your audience and say goodbye

It was a pleasure being here today.

Thank you for listening and goodbye.

Thank you for being such a great, engaged audience. Goodbye.

Thank you so much for listening, see you next time.

What is the structure of a presentation?

Your presentations should always have an Introduction, a Main part and a Conclusion.

What is a good way to begin a presentation?

You can start by introducing yourself, giving an overview of your topic, telling a little story or showing the audience an introductory video or image.

What are good phrases to use in English presentations?

There are many phrases that will make your presentation a lot more professional. Our blog post gives you a detailed overview.

Related articles

About the author.

Pia Lehner-Mittermaier

Pia works in Marketing as a graphic designer and writer at SlideLizard. She uses her vivid imagination and creativity to produce good content.

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The big SlideLizard presentation glossary

Visual communication.

If there are used images or videos for communication, it is visual communication. Visual Communication is almost used everywhere like on television, posts on social media (Instagram, Facebook), advertisement.

To interview somebody means to ask a person different questions. An interview is often done by journalists.

Effect Options

In the effect options in PowerPoint, further details can be specified for the selected effect.

Horizontal Communication

Horizontal communication is the exchange of information between people, departments or units within the same level of an organisational hierarchy of a company.

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Princeton Correspondents on Undergraduate Research

How to Make a Successful Research Presentation

Turning a research paper into a visual presentation is difficult; there are pitfalls, and navigating the path to a brief, informative presentation takes time and practice. As a TA for  GEO/WRI 201: Methods in Data Analysis & Scientific Writing this past fall, I saw how this process works from an instructor’s standpoint. I’ve presented my own research before, but helping others present theirs taught me a bit more about the process. Here are some tips I learned that may help you with your next research presentation:

More is more

In general, your presentation will always benefit from more practice, more feedback, and more revision. By practicing in front of friends, you can get comfortable with presenting your work while receiving feedback. It is hard to know how to revise your presentation if you never practice. If you are presenting to a general audience, getting feedback from someone outside of your discipline is crucial. Terms and ideas that seem intuitive to you may be completely foreign to someone else, and your well-crafted presentation could fall flat.

Less is more

Limit the scope of your presentation, the number of slides, and the text on each slide. In my experience, text works well for organizing slides, orienting the audience to key terms, and annotating important figures–not for explaining complex ideas. Having fewer slides is usually better as well. In general, about one slide per minute of presentation is an appropriate budget. Too many slides is usually a sign that your topic is too broad.

Limit the scope of your presentation

Don’t present your paper. Presentations are usually around 10 min long. You will not have time to explain all of the research you did in a semester (or a year!) in such a short span of time. Instead, focus on the highlight(s). Identify a single compelling research question which your work addressed, and craft a succinct but complete narrative around it.

You will not have time to explain all of the research you did. Instead, focus on the highlights. Identify a single compelling research question which your work addressed, and craft a succinct but complete narrative around it.

Craft a compelling research narrative

After identifying the focused research question, walk your audience through your research as if it were a story. Presentations with strong narrative arcs are clear, captivating, and compelling.

• Introduction (exposition — rising action)

Orient the audience and draw them in by demonstrating the relevance and importance of your research story with strong global motive. Provide them with the necessary vocabulary and background knowledge to understand the plot of your story. Introduce the key studies (characters) relevant in your story and build tension and conflict with scholarly and data motive. By the end of your introduction, your audience should clearly understand your research question and be dying to know how you resolve the tension built through motive.

• Methods (rising action)

The methods section should transition smoothly and logically from the introduction. Beware of presenting your methods in a boring, arc-killing, ‘this is what I did.’ Focus on the details that set your story apart from the stories other people have already told. Keep the audience interested by clearly motivating your decisions based on your original research question or the tension built in your introduction.

• Results (climax)

Less is usually more here. Only present results which are clearly related to the focused research question you are presenting. Make sure you explain the results clearly so that your audience understands what your research found. This is the peak of tension in your narrative arc, so don’t undercut it by quickly clicking through to your discussion.

• Discussion (falling action)

By now your audience should be dying for a satisfying resolution. Here is where you contextualize your results and begin resolving the tension between past research. Be thorough. If you have too many conflicts left unresolved, or you don’t have enough time to present all of the resolutions, you probably need to further narrow the scope of your presentation.

• Conclusion (denouement)

Return back to your initial research question and motive, resolving any final conflicts and tying up loose ends. Leave the audience with a clear resolution of your focus research question, and use unresolved tension to set up potential sequels (i.e. further research).

Use your medium to enhance the narrative

Visual presentations should be dominated by clear, intentional graphics. Subtle animation in key moments (usually during the results or discussion) can add drama to the narrative arc and make conflict resolutions more satisfying. You are narrating a story written in images, videos, cartoons, and graphs. While your paper is mostly text, with graphics to highlight crucial points, your slides should be the opposite. Adapting to the new medium may require you to create or acquire far more graphics than you included in your paper, but it is necessary to create an engaging presentation.

The most important thing you can do for your presentation is to practice and revise. Bother your friends, your roommates, TAs–anybody who will sit down and listen to your work. Beyond that, think about presentations you have found compelling and try to incorporate some of those elements into your own. Remember you want your work to be comprehensible; you aren’t creating experts in 10 minutes. Above all, try to stay passionate about what you did and why. You put the time in, so show your audience that it’s worth it.

For more insight into research presentations, check out these past PCUR posts written by Emma and Ellie .

— Alec Getraer, Natural Sciences Correspondent

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• Research paper

Writing a Research Paper Introduction | Step-by-Step Guide

Published on September 24, 2022 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on September 5, 2024.

The introduction to a research paper is where you set up your topic and approach for the reader. It has several key goals:

• Present your topic and get the reader interested
• Provide background or summarize existing research
• Position your own approach
• Detail your specific research problem and problem statement
• Give an overview of the paper’s structure

The introduction looks slightly different depending on whether your paper presents the results of original empirical research or constructs an argument by engaging with a variety of sources.

The five steps in this article will help you put together an effective introduction for either type of research paper.

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Table of contents

Step 1: introduce your topic, step 2: describe the background, step 3: establish your research problem, step 4: specify your objective(s), step 5: map out your paper, research paper introduction examples, frequently asked questions about the research paper introduction.

The first job of the introduction is to tell the reader what your topic is and why it’s interesting or important. This is generally accomplished with a strong opening hook.

The hook is a striking opening sentence that clearly conveys the relevance of your topic. Think of an interesting fact or statistic, a strong statement, a question, or a brief anecdote that will get the reader wondering about your topic.

For example, the following could be an effective hook for an argumentative paper about the environmental impact of cattle farming:

A more empirical paper investigating the relationship of Instagram use with body image issues in adolescent girls might use the following hook:

Don’t feel that your hook necessarily has to be deeply impressive or creative. Clarity and relevance are still more important than catchiness. The key thing is to guide the reader into your topic and situate your ideas.

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This part of the introduction differs depending on what approach your paper is taking.

In a more argumentative paper, you’ll explore some general background here. In a more empirical paper, this is the place to review previous research and establish how yours fits in.

Argumentative paper: Background information

After you’ve caught your reader’s attention, specify a bit more, providing context and narrowing down your topic.

Provide only the most relevant background information. The introduction isn’t the place to get too in-depth; if more background is essential to your paper, it can appear in the body .

Empirical paper: Describing previous research

For a paper describing original research, you’ll instead provide an overview of the most relevant research that has already been conducted. This is a sort of miniature literature review —a sketch of the current state of research into your topic, boiled down to a few sentences.

This should be informed by genuine engagement with the literature. Your search can be less extensive than in a full literature review, but a clear sense of the relevant research is crucial to inform your own work.

Begin by establishing the kinds of research that have been done, and end with limitations or gaps in the research that you intend to respond to.

The next step is to clarify how your own research fits in and what problem it addresses.

Argumentative paper: Emphasize importance

In an argumentative research paper, you can simply state the problem you intend to discuss, and what is original or important about your argument.

Empirical paper: Relate to the literature

In an empirical research paper, try to lead into the problem on the basis of your discussion of the literature. Think in terms of these questions:

• What research gap is your work intended to fill?
• What limitations in previous work does it address?
• What contribution to knowledge does it make?

You can make the connection between your problem and the existing research using phrases like the following.

Now you’ll get into the specifics of what you intend to find out or express in your research paper.

The way you frame your research objectives varies. An argumentative paper presents a thesis statement, while an empirical paper generally poses a research question (sometimes with a hypothesis as to the answer).

Argumentative paper: Thesis statement

The thesis statement expresses the position that the rest of the paper will present evidence and arguments for. It can be presented in one or two sentences, and should state your position clearly and directly, without providing specific arguments for it at this point.

Empirical paper: Research question and hypothesis

The research question is the question you want to answer in an empirical research paper.

Present your research question clearly and directly, with a minimum of discussion at this point. The rest of the paper will be taken up with discussing and investigating this question; here you just need to express it.

A research question can be framed either directly or indirectly.

• This study set out to answer the following question: What effects does daily use of Instagram have on the prevalence of body image issues among adolescent girls?
• We investigated the effects of daily Instagram use on the prevalence of body image issues among adolescent girls.

If your research involved testing hypotheses , these should be stated along with your research question. They are usually presented in the past tense, since the hypothesis will already have been tested by the time you are writing up your paper.

For example, the following hypothesis might respond to the research question above:

The final part of the introduction is often dedicated to a brief overview of the rest of the paper.

In a paper structured using the standard scientific “introduction, methods, results, discussion” format, this isn’t always necessary. But if your paper is structured in a less predictable way, it’s important to describe the shape of it for the reader.

If included, the overview should be concise, direct, and written in the present tense.

• This paper will first discuss several examples of survey-based research into adolescent social media use, then will go on to …
• This paper first discusses several examples of survey-based research into adolescent social media use, then goes on to …

Scribbr’s paraphrasing tool can help you rephrase sentences to give a clear overview of your arguments.

Full examples of research paper introductions are shown in the tabs below: one for an argumentative paper, the other for an empirical paper.

• Argumentative paper
• Empirical paper

Are cows responsible for climate change? A recent study (RIVM, 2019) shows that cattle farmers account for two thirds of agricultural nitrogen emissions in the Netherlands. These emissions result from nitrogen in manure, which can degrade into ammonia and enter the atmosphere. The study’s calculations show that agriculture is the main source of nitrogen pollution, accounting for 46% of the country’s total emissions. By comparison, road traffic and households are responsible for 6.1% each, the industrial sector for 1%. While efforts are being made to mitigate these emissions, policymakers are reluctant to reckon with the scale of the problem. The approach presented here is a radical one, but commensurate with the issue. This paper argues that the Dutch government must stimulate and subsidize livestock farmers, especially cattle farmers, to transition to sustainable vegetable farming. It first establishes the inadequacy of current mitigation measures, then discusses the various advantages of the results proposed, and finally addresses potential objections to the plan on economic grounds.

The rise of social media has been accompanied by a sharp increase in the prevalence of body image issues among women and girls. This correlation has received significant academic attention: Various empirical studies have been conducted into Facebook usage among adolescent girls (Tiggermann & Slater, 2013; Meier & Gray, 2014). These studies have consistently found that the visual and interactive aspects of the platform have the greatest influence on body image issues. Despite this, highly visual social media (HVSM) such as Instagram have yet to be robustly researched. This paper sets out to address this research gap. We investigated the effects of daily Instagram use on the prevalence of body image issues among adolescent girls. It was hypothesized that daily Instagram use would be associated with an increase in body image concerns and a decrease in self-esteem ratings.

The introduction of a research paper includes several key elements:

• A hook to catch the reader’s interest
• Relevant background on the topic
• Details of your research problem

and your problem statement

• A thesis statement or research question
• Sometimes an overview of the paper

Don’t feel that you have to write the introduction first. The introduction is often one of the last parts of the research paper you’ll write, along with the conclusion.

This is because it can be easier to introduce your paper once you’ve already written the body ; you may not have the clearest idea of your arguments until you’ve written them, and things can change during the writing process .

The way you present your research problem in your introduction varies depending on the nature of your research paper . A research paper that presents a sustained argument will usually encapsulate this argument in a thesis statement .

A research paper designed to present the results of empirical research tends to present a research question that it seeks to answer. It may also include a hypothesis —a prediction that will be confirmed or disproved by your research.

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.

Caulfield, J. (2024, September 05). Writing a Research Paper Introduction | Step-by-Step Guide. Scribbr. Retrieved September 19, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/research-paper/research-paper-introduction/

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How to Introduce Yourself in a Presentation

Last Updated: October 4, 2023 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Patrick Muñoz . Patrick is an internationally recognized Voice & Speech Coach, focusing on public speaking, vocal power, accent and dialects, accent reduction, voiceover, acting and speech therapy. He has worked with clients such as Penelope Cruz, Eva Longoria, and Roselyn Sanchez. He was voted LA's Favorite Voice and Dialect Coach by BACKSTAGE, is the voice and speech coach for Disney and Turner Classic Movies, and is a member of Voice and Speech Trainers Association. There are 11 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 127,243 times.

Introducing yourself in a presentation is more than just saying your name. It’s an opportunity for you to share relevant details about yourself and connect with your audience. It also sets the tone for the rest of the talk. How you introduce yourself will influence how your audience receives the message you want to get across. Make your next introduction flawless by presenting the most engaging information about yourself. Be sure to prepare the introduction in advance and start with an attention-grabbing technique to connect to the audience.

Including Relevant Information in Your Introduction

• If you have an unusual or difficult to pronounce name, you may want to add a small remark to help your audience remember it. For example, you can say “My name is Jacob Misen, like ‘risen’ but with an M.”
• Try to make eye contact with parts of audience during your presentation as well. [1] X Research source

• If you are VP of Marketing at a large company, it can actually be much more effective to say something like “I have more than a decade of experience using Facebook marketing ads to target clients in the dance industry” rather than simply stating your job title.

• You can also specifically refer your audience to the handout or powerpoint for more information. For example, if you want to let them know that you have articles in many international newspapers but you don’t want to list them all out, simply say “I’ve written for a number of internationally recognized news organizations. You can find the full list on the first page of my handout.”

• For example, you could say “when I designed a website for Richard Branson last year …” to inform your audience that you have an impressive resume, without having to list it all for them in your introduction.

• Try concluding your introduction by mentioning a client or project you were working on that directly relates to the topic of your presentation. For example: “I’ve had the pleasure of working with NXP Semiconductors for the past three years. Just last week we encountered a problem with our logistical database...” and then lead into your presentation about a new software that will solve everyone’s logistical hiccups.

Grabbing Your Audience’s Attention Before Your Introduction

• If you don’t have music that can tie to your presentation, you can use a song with the theme of beginning. For example, if you are presenting at a sales meeting, play some soft jazz as participants enter. Then, when it’s time for you to start, play the Black Eyed Peas chorus of “Let’s Get it Started” to get your audience’s attention. You can then open with an energetic “Good morning!” or “Good Afternoon” as the music ends.
• Remember to choose music that’s appropriate to the event. An academic conference may not be the best place for pop music, for example (unless you are presenting research on pop music, of course).

• For example, if you are presenting on the design of a new user-friendly coffee machine, you may start your presentation by referencing Elon Musk: “Any product that needs a manual to work is broken,” and then go on to say “My name is Laurie Higgens, and my coffee machine doesn’t come with a manual.” Speak briefly about your relevant experience and qualifications, and then dive into presenting your design.
• Avoid cliche or overused motivational quotes the audience has probably already heard many times.
• Be sure to correctly cite your quote.

• For example, you might start with “According to Time magazine, Americans filled 4.3 billion prescriptions and doled out $374 billion on medicine in 2014.” Then, introduce yourself and your qualifications in medical research and transition into a presentation about how to prevent doctors from over prescribing medication to their patients.
• Remember to cite the source of your statistics. You will look more professional and reliable, and the audience will be able to follow up on the information if they wish.

• If you are giving a presentation about a new airport security-friendly travel bag, try starting your presentation with “How many of you have ever stood in line at airport security and nearly missed your flight?”
• You can also invite your audience to close their eyes and imagine something as you lead up to your question.
• Don’t be discouraged if your audience doesn’t raise their hands when you ask a question. Sometimes these questions seem more rhetorical to an audience, or maybe they are just shy. You can often see signs that they are still engaging with the question if people are nodding or smiling after you ask it.

• Try telling stories, showing pictures on a powerpoint, or using quotations.
• Being funny not only puts your audience at ease, but it also helps them remember you after the presentation. [10] X Research source

• For example, if you are making a presentation about a pizza delivery app, ask your audience members to tell their name, their favorite pizza topping, and a situation where they’ve had a particularly amazing or awful experience with food delivery.

Preparing Before Your Presentation

• When it’s time to present, it’s probably best to just write down a few notes or key words to remind you of what you want to say so you don’t just read off your note cards.
• Think about your overall intention as a speaker. Are you trying to educate, enlighten, or entertain the audience? Figure out the effect you want to have on the listener so your presentation is impactful.

• If you don’t have a friend to watch your presentation, record yourself on video and play it back later to refine your presentation skills. It can be uncomfortable to watch yourself on video, but it will help you nail your introduction. You can even record your whole presentation. Keep recording and re-recording until you are happy with it. Then you know the audience will be happy too.

• The best resource to learn about the local culture is the locals themselves. If you have a contact where you will be speaking, ask them about customs, dress code, and how humor is usually received. If you don’t know anyone personally, try searching in industry-specific online forums. Find YouTube videos of presentations given in the area that are relevant to your industry.

What Is The Best Way To Start a Presentation?

Expert Q&A

• Don’t spend too much time introducing yourself. Your introduction should be short and to the point so you can get on to your main presentation material. Depending on the length of your presentation, your introduction should be between 20 seconds and 2 minutes long. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0

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• ↑ https://www.canr.msu.edu/news/eye_contact_tips_to_make_your_presentations_stronger
• ↑ https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/introduce-yourself-professionally
• ↑ https://www.washington.edu/doit/presentation-tips-0
• ↑ https://www.gvsu.edu/ours/oral-presentation-tips-30.htm
• ↑ https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2018/09/27/15-hacks-for-making-your-presentation-more-creative-and-engaging/
• ↑ https://www.hamilton.edu/academics/centers/oralcommunication/guides/how-to-engage-your-audience-and-keep-them-with-you
• ↑ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/make-em-laugh-ten-tips-using-humor-presentations-judy-romano-mba?trk=portfolio_article-card_title
• ↑ https://www.ncsl.org/legislators-staff/legislative-staff/legislative-staff-coordinating-committee/tips-for-making-effective-powerpoint-presentations.aspx
• ↑ https://crln.acrl.org/index.php/crlnews/article/view/19102/22119
• ↑ https://www.forbes.com/sites/tjwalker/2011/06/07/should-i-rehearse-and-for-how-long-presentation-training/

About This Article

To introduce yourself at the start of your presentation, all you need to do is state your name and tell the audience any relevant experience or skills you have. For example, say something like, “My name is Jacob Misen, and I have over a decade of experience using Facebook marketing ads in the dance industry.” If you have a broad range of relevant experience, you can bullet point a few examples on your opening slide instead of reading them out. Once you’ve introduced yourself, smoothly transition into your presentation. For instance, you can mention a client or project you’ve recently worked on that relates to the topic of your presentation. For more tips, including how to practice your presentation, read on! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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How to Write a Research Paper Introduction (with Examples)

Table of Contents

The research paper introduction section, along with the Title and Abstract, can be considered the face of any research paper. The following article is intended to guide you in organizing and writing the research paper introduction for a quality academic article or dissertation.

The research paper introduction aims to present the topic to the reader. A study will only be accepted for publishing if you can ascertain that the available literature cannot answer your research question. So it is important to ensure that you have read important studies on that particular topic, especially those within the last five to ten years, and that they are properly referenced in this section. 1

What should be included in the research paper introduction is decided by what you want to tell readers about the reason behind the research and how you plan to fill the knowledge gap. The best research paper introduction provides a systemic review of existing work and demonstrates additional work that needs to be done. It needs to be brief, captivating, and well-referenced; a well-drafted research paper introduction will help the researcher win half the battle.

The introduction for a research paper is where you set up your topic and approach for the reader. It has several key goals:

• Present your research topic
• Capture reader interest
• Summarize existing research
• Position your own approach
• Define your specific research problem and problem statement
• Highlight the novelty and contributions of the study
• Give an overview of the paper’s structure

The research paper introduction can vary in size and structure depending on whether your paper presents the results of original empirical research or is a review paper. Some research paper introduction examples are only half a page while others are a few pages long. In many cases, the introduction will be shorter than all of the other sections of your paper; its length depends on the size of your paper as a whole.

What is the introduction for a research paper?

The introduction in a research paper is placed at the beginning to guide the reader from a broad subject area to the specific topic that your research addresses. They present the following information to the reader

• Scope: The topic covered in the research paper
• Context: Background of your topic
• Importance: Why your research matters in that particular area of research and the industry problem that can be targeted

Why is the introduction important in a research paper?

The research paper introduction conveys a lot of information and can be considered an essential roadmap for the rest of your paper. A good introduction for a research paper is important for the following reasons:

• It stimulates your reader’s interest: A good introduction section can make your readers want to read your paper by capturing their interest. It informs the reader what they are going to learn and helps determine if the topic is of interest to them.
• It helps the reader understand the research background: Without a clear introduction, your readers may feel confused and even struggle when reading your paper. A good research paper introduction will prepare them for the in-depth research to come. It provides you the opportunity to engage with the readers and demonstrate your knowledge and authority on the specific topic.
• It explains why your research paper is worth reading: Your introduction can convey a lot of information to your readers. It introduces the topic, why the topic is important, and how you plan to proceed with your research.
• It helps guide the reader through the rest of the paper: The research paper introduction gives the reader a sense of the nature of the information that will support your arguments and the general organization of the paragraphs that will follow.

What are the parts of introduction in the research?

A good research paper introduction section should comprise three main elements: 2

• What is known: This sets the stage for your research. It informs the readers of what is known on the subject.
• What is lacking: This is aimed at justifying the reason for carrying out your research. This could involve investigating a new concept or method or building upon previous research.
• What you aim to do: This part briefly states the objectives of your research and its major contributions. Your detailed hypothesis will also form a part of this section.

Check out how Peace Alemede uses Paperpal to write her research paper

Peace Alemede, Student, University of Ilorin

Paperpal has been an excellent and beneficial tool for editing my research work. With the help of Paperpal, I am now able to write and produce results at a much faster rate. For instance, I recently used Paperpal to edit a research article that is currently being considered for publication. The tool allowed me to align the language of my paragraph ideas to a more academic setting, thereby saving me both time and resources. As a result, my work was deemed accurate for use. I highly recommend this tool to anyone in need of efficient and effective research paper editing. Peace Alemede, Student, University of Ilorin, Nigeria

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How to write a research paper introduction?

The first step in writing the research paper introduction is to inform the reader what your topic is and why it’s interesting or important. This is generally accomplished with a strong opening statement. The second step involves establishing the kinds of research that have been done and ending with limitations or gaps in the research that you intend to address.

Finally, the research paper introduction clarifies how your own research fits in and what problem it addresses. If your research involved testing hypotheses, these should be stated along with your research question. The hypothesis should be presented in the past tense since it will have been tested by the time you are writing the research paper introduction.

The following key points, with examples, can guide you when writing the research paper introduction section:

1. Introduce the research topic:

• Highlight the importance of the research field or topic
• Describe the background of the topic
• Present an overview of current research on the topic

Example: The inclusion of experiential and competency-based learning has benefitted electronics engineering education. Industry partnerships provide an excellent alternative for students wanting to engage in solving real-world challenges. Industry-academia participation has grown in recent years due to the need for skilled engineers with practical training and specialized expertise. However, from the educational perspective, many activities are needed to incorporate sustainable development goals into the university curricula and consolidate learning innovation in universities.

2. Determine a research niche:

• Reveal a gap in existing research or oppose an existing assumption
• Formulate the research question

Example: There have been plausible efforts to integrate educational activities in higher education electronics engineering programs. However, very few studies have considered using educational research methods for performance evaluation of competency-based higher engineering education, with a focus on technical and or transversal skills. To remedy the current need for evaluating competencies in STEM fields and providing sustainable development goals in engineering education, in this study, a comparison was drawn between study groups without and with industry partners.

3. Place your research within the research niche:

• State the purpose of your study
• Highlight the key characteristics of your study
• Describe important results
• Highlight the novelty of the study.
• Offer a brief overview of the structure of the paper.

Example: The study evaluates the main competency needed in the applied electronics course, which is a fundamental core subject for many electronics engineering undergraduate programs. We compared two groups, without and with an industrial partner, that offered real-world projects to solve during the semester. This comparison can help determine significant differences in both groups in terms of developing subject competency and achieving sustainable development goals.

Write a Research Paper Introduction in Minutes with Paperpal

Paperpal is a generative AI-powered academic writing assistant. It’s trained on millions of published scholarly articles and over 20 years of STM experience. Paperpal helps authors write better and faster with:

• Real-time writing suggestions
• In-depth checks for language and grammar correction
• Paraphrasing to add variety, ensure academic tone, and trim text to meet journal limits

With Paperpal, create a research paper introduction effortlessly. In this step-by-step guide, we’ll walk you through how Paperpal transforms your initial ideas into a polished and publication-ready introduction.

How to use Paperpal to write the Introduction section

Step 1: Sign up on Paperpal and click on the Copilot feature, under this choose Outlines > Research Article > Introduction

Step 2: Add your unstructured notes or initial draft, whether in English or another language, to Paperpal, which is to be used as the base for your content.

Step 3: Fill in the specifics, such as your field of study, brief description or details you want to include, which will help the AI generate the outline for your Introduction.

Step 4: Use this outline and sentence suggestions to develop your content, adding citations where needed and modifying it to align with your specific research focus.

Step 5: Turn to Paperpal’s granular language checks to refine your content, tailor it to reflect your personal writing style, and ensure it effectively conveys your message.

You can use the same process to develop each section of your article, and finally your research paper in half the time and without any of the stress.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the purpose of the introduction in research papers.

The purpose of the research paper introduction is to introduce the reader to the problem definition, justify the need for the study, and describe the main theme of the study. The aim is to gain the reader’s attention by providing them with necessary background information and establishing the main purpose and direction of the research.

How long should the research paper introduction be?

The length of the research paper introduction can vary across journals and disciplines. While there are no strict word limits for writing the research paper introduction, an ideal length would be one page, with a maximum of 400 words over 1-4 paragraphs. Generally, it is one of the shorter sections of the paper as the reader is assumed to have at least a reasonable knowledge about the topic. 2

For example, for a study evaluating the role of building design in ensuring fire safety, there is no need to discuss definitions and nature of fire in the introduction; you could start by commenting upon the existing practices for fire safety and how your study will add to the existing knowledge and practice.

What should be included in the research paper introduction?

When deciding what to include in the research paper introduction, the rest of the paper should also be considered. The aim is to introduce the reader smoothly to the topic and facilitate an easy read without much dependency on external sources. 3

Below is a list of elements you can include to prepare a research paper introduction outline and follow it when you are writing the research paper introduction.

• Topic introduction: This can include key definitions and a brief history of the topic.
• Research context and background: Offer the readers some general information and then narrow it down to specific aspects.
• Details of the research you conducted: A brief literature review can be included to support your arguments or line of thought.
• Rationale for the study: This establishes the relevance of your study and establishes its importance.
• Importance of your research: The main contributions are highlighted to help establish the novelty of your study
• Research hypothesis: Introduce your research question and propose an expected outcome. Organization of the paper: Include a short paragraph of 3-4 sentences that highlights your plan for the entire paper

Should I include citations in the introduction for a research paper?

Cite only works that are most relevant to your topic; as a general rule, you can include one to three. Note that readers want to see evidence of original thinking. So it is better to avoid using too many references as it does not leave much room for your personal standpoint to shine through.

Citations in your research paper introduction support the key points, and the number of citations depend on the subject matter and the point discussed. If the research paper introduction is too long or overflowing with citations, it is better to cite a few review articles rather than the individual articles summarized in the review.

A good point to remember when citing research papers in the introduction section is to include at least one-third of the references in the introduction.

Should I provide a literature review in the research paper introduction?

The literature review plays a significant role in the research paper introduction section. A good literature review accomplishes the following:

• Introduces the topic
• Establishes the study’s significance
• Provides an overview of the relevant literature
• Provides context for the study using literature
• Identifies knowledge gaps

However, remember to avoid making the following mistakes when writing a research paper introduction:

• Do not use studies from the literature review to aggressively support your research
• Avoid direct quoting
• Do not allow literature review to be the focus of this section. Instead, the literature review should only aid in setting a foundation for the manuscript. 

Key points to remember

Remember the following key points for writing a good research paper introduction: 4

• Avoid stuffing too much general information: Avoid including what an average reader would know and include only that information related to the problem being addressed in the research paper introduction. For example, when describing a comparative study of non-traditional methods for mechanical design optimization, information related to the traditional methods and differences between traditional and non-traditional methods would not be relevant. In this case, the introduction for the research paper should begin with the state-of-the-art non-traditional methods and methods to evaluate the efficiency of newly developed algorithms.
• Avoid packing too many references: Cite only the required works in your research paper introduction. The other works can be included in the discussion section to strengthen your findings.
• Avoid extensive criticism of previous studies: Avoid being overly critical of earlier studies while setting the rationale for your study. A better place for this would be the Discussion section, where you can highlight the advantages of your method.
• Avoid describing conclusions of the study: When writing a research paper introduction remember not to include the findings of your study. The aim is to let the readers know what question is being answered. The actual answer should only be given in the Results and Discussion section.

To summarize, the research paper introduction section should be brief yet informative. It should convince the reader the need to conduct the study and motivate him to read further. If you’re feeling stuck or unsure, choose trusted AI academic writing assistants like Paperpal to effortlessly craft your research paper introduction and other sections of your research article.

• Jawaid, S. A., & Jawaid, M. (2019). How to write introduction and discussion. Saudi Journal of Anaesthesia, 13(Suppl 1), S18.
• Dewan, P., & Gupta, P. (2016). Writing the title, abstract and introduction: Looks matter!. Indian pediatrics, 53, 235-241.
• Cetin, S., & Hackam, D. J. (2005). An approach to the writing of a scientific Manuscript1. Journal of Surgical Research, 128(2), 165-167.
• Bavdekar, S. B. (2015). Writing introduction: Laying the foundations of a research paper. Journal of the Association of Physicians of India, 63(7), 44-6.

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Measuring Dimensions of Self-Presentation in Twitter Bios and their Links to Misinformation Sharing

Social media platforms provide users with a profile description field, commonly known as a “bio,” where they can present themselves to the world. A growing literature shows that text in these bios can improve our understanding of online self-presentation and behavior, but existing work relies exclusively on keyword-based approaches to do so. We here propose and evaluate a suite of simple, effective, and theoretically motivated approaches to embed bios in spaces that capture salient dimensions of social meaning, such as age and partisanship. We evaluate our methods on four tasks, showing that the strongest one out-performs several practical baselines. We then show the utility of our method in helping understand associations between self-presentation and the sharing of URLs from low-quality news sites on Twitter , with a particular focus on explore the interactions between age and partisanship, and exploring the effects of self-presentations of religiosity . Our work provides new tools to help computational social scientists make use of information in bios, and provides new insights into how misinformation sharing may be perceived on Twitter.

Introduction

On social media sites like Tumblr (Yoder et al. 2020 ) , Twitter (Li et al. 2020 ; Rogers and Jones 2021 ; Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ) , TikTok (Darvin 2022 ) , and Parler (Bär, Pröllochs, and Feuerriegel 2023a ) , the profile description field (or bio ) asks users to describe themselves in a single text box. Users commonly do so with a combination of delimited phrases, each of which can range from unigrams like “Republican” to more complex expressions like “2020 Election Truth Seeker” (Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ) .

In most social settings, people aim to present to others only a single social identity (MacKinnon and Heise 2010 ; Schröder, Hoey, and Rogers 2016 ) . Examples of identities include social roles, like “doctor” and “mother”, group memberships like “Democrat” and “Yankees fan”, and social categories like “black people” and “women” (Tajfel and Turner 1979 ) . Bios thus present a unique setting where we can observe individuals explicitly labeling themselves with multiple social identities (Marwick and boyd 2011 ) . 1 1 1 Bios really express phrases that signal identity , what Pathak, Madani, and Joseph ( 2021 ) call personal identifiers . Here, we retain the phrase (social) identity as a familiar and concise shorthand. With respect to the language of self-presentation (Johnstone 1996 ) , bios are therefore an important tool for social scientists for three reasons.

First, bios provide insight into patterns of shared identity. For example, bios have been used to show that people who label themselves coffee snobs tend to be the same that label themselves marketing gurus (Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ) . They have also been used to better understand the increasing entanglement of partisanship and culture in social identities in the United States (Essig and DellaPosta 2024 ; Phillips, Carley, and Joseph 2024 ) . Second, bios allow us to study links between the identities people select for themselves and behavior. Users’ choices on how to label themselves can be linked to, for example, decisions on who chooses to re-blog whom on Tumblr (Yoder et al. 2020 ) , or how people respond to marketing campaigns (Ng and Cruickshank 2023 ) . Finally, bios can help us identify people who share a certain characteristic. To this end, p rior work has also explored how bios can help identify individuals such as Qanon supporters (Bär, Pröllochs, and Feuerriegel 2023a ) and journalists (Zeng et al. 2019 ) , characterize the demographics associated with the self-presentation of particular identities (Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ) , and even reflect current social movements (Rogers and Jones 2021 ; Hare and Jones 2023 ) .

Existing quantitative work on bios has, however, has focused almost exclusively on characterizing bios via the presence of particular phrases, whether through dictionary-based methods ( Rogers and Jones 2021 ; Zeng et al. 2019 ; Bär, Pröllochs, and Feuerriegel 2023b ) or through analysis of patterns in phrases extracted with regular expressions ( Yoder et al. 2020 ; Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ; Essig and DellaPosta 2024 ; Ng and Cruickshank 2023 ) . While findings from these approaches can be illuminating, they also make it difficult to study how bios align with particular dimensions of importance to social scientists, such as partisanship (Kozlowski, Taddy, and Evans 2019 ) . Acknowledging these challenges and opportunties, Jiang, Ren, and Ferrara ( 2023 ) develop an approach that uses modern NLP methods to infer ideological leanings implied by bios. However, their work focuses only on learning political ideology and also requires data beyond the bio itself to perform estimation. There thus exists a need for a method that can help us to measure self-presentation in bios in ways that 1) let us move beyond keyword-based methods and 2) beyond political ideology, 3) without requiring additional data.

To this end, the goals of this paper are two-fold. The first goal of the present work is to develop and evaluate three methods to project English-language social media bios onto multiple dimensions of social meaning, without retraining a new embedding model for each new desired dimension . Our methods are technically straightforward, in that we extend existing work on how to scale text along dimensions of meaning like gender and race using projections of text embeddings (Wilkerson and Casas 2017 ) . However, we build on this work by developing approaches specifically for the study of social media bios. Our models are grounded in the relevant social science , in that each method we present draws on social identity theory (Tajfel and Turner 1979 ) to learn bio embeddings by making use of the fact that many bios consist of multiple, clearly delimited social identities (Marwick and boyd 2011 ; Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ) . As such, unlike in standard embedding models where we aim to embed words that mean the same thing closely together, our models aim to create embedding spaces (and projections of them) where phrases that are applied to the same people are close together in embedding space.

After describing our three approaches, we present an extensive validation across four tasks: 1) predicting which identities will appear in the same bio, 2) how projections of embeddings for specific identities within bios onto dimensions of age, gender, and partisanship correlate with human judgements, 3) whether projections using the embeddings of entire bios also correlate with human judgements, and 4) whether projections using the embeddings of entire bios correlate with other measures of user ideology, and show similar associations to behavior . Across all evaluation tasks, we find that the most effective model is an SBERT (Reimers and Gurevych 2019 ) model fine-tuned on bios . In Evaluation 1), we show that this model is best able to make predictions about identities the model has not seen, emphasizing its ability to generalize to new and unseen identities. Evaluations 2) and 3) show that this model effectively captures perceptions of how individuals present themselves, which is critical for understanding how other users interpret a particular bio (Heise 1987 ; Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ) . Finally, while our focus is on what is implied to others when a user self-presents, rather than inferring some “truth” about a user , we show that estimates of user ideology by our method correlate with other known approaches for doing so. Moreover, we show that associations with behavioral patterns (of misinformation sharing) using our method are consistent with other approaches.

Having identified a single model to embed bios, we continue to the second goal of our work, which is to explore associations between self-presentation in bios and the rate of low- (relative to high-) quality news shares on Twitter . Specifically, we focus on two research questions that have not been addressed in the existing literature. First, perhaps the most well-established finding in this literature is that misinformation sharing is more prevalent among older, right-leaning individuals (Grinberg et al. 2019 ; Guess, Nagler, and Tucker 2019 ; Brashier and Schacter 2020 ; Osmundsen et al. 2021 ; Nikolov, Flammini, and Menczer 2021 ) . However, due in part to sample size restrictions, existing work has theorized (Grinberg et al. 2019 ) but not tested empirically the existence of an interaction between age and partisanship. In the present work, using two different large datasets of Twitter users, we indeed show for the first time that such an interaction effect exists between self-presentation of age and partisanship, in that self-presenting as older and Republican has a multiplicative association with misinformation sharing. Second, while scholars have suggested that religiosity is a critical dimensions of the self associated with misinformation sharing online, no empirical work has addressed this point (Druckman et al. 2021 ) . To this end, we present 1) new and convincing evidence that on average, presenting as more religious is strongly associated with misinformation sharing.

In sum, the present work provides three contributions:

We propose, evaluate, and make public 2 2 2 The model is publicly available for use on https://github.com/navidmdn/identity˙embedding . a simple, effective, and theoretically motivated tool to embed English-language bios in socially meaningful latent spaces.

We show that our method 1) can be used to project both individual social identities and entire social media bios onto salient dimensions of social meaning, such as partisanship, gender, and age in ways that correlate with human judgements in two new survey datasets, and 2) correlates well with other measures of user ideology .

We use our model to extend our understanding of the relationship between how active news-sharing accounts on Twitter self-present and the proportion of news they share coming from low-quality news sites, particularly with respect to interactions between age and partisanship, and with respect to religiosity .

Measuring text on social dimensions of meaning

Social psychologists have developed a host of survey-based methods to measure associations between social identities and dimensions of social meaning. This estimation of identities on such dimensions is a core focus of social psychologists (Schröder, Hoey, and Rogers 2016 ; Fiske et al. 2002 ) , because connecting self-presentation along specific dimensions of social relevance to social behavior is important for developing and testing new theories (MacKinnon and Heise 2010 ) . Below, we leverage these established approaches to evaluate our methodology. However, survey data do not scale to the myriad ways people identify themselves (MacKinnon and Heise 2010 ) , are usually too small to capture differences across subgroups or contexts (Smith-Lovin and Douglas 1992 ) , and struggle to account for linguistically complex identities or situations where multiple identities are applied (Joseph and Morgan 2021 ) .

Most of the computational tools developed to address these challenges function by projecting embeddings from distributional semantic models ( DSM ), such as BERT, onto particular dimensions of meaning. The present work is most aligned with efforts that use contextualized embeddings (e.g. Kurita et al. 2019 ; Lucy, Tadimeti, and Bamman 2022 ; Field, Bhat, and Tsvetkov 2019 ) to do so. However, we expand on these methods in that we aim to focus not on linguistic similarity , but rather similarity in the types of people who use particular identities . More specifically, DSMs are based on the assumption that contextual similarity—similarity in where phrases appear in text—is a strong proxy for semantic similarity (roughly, synonomy). The idea behind this assumption is that phrases with high semantic similarity should have similar cognitive associations to other phrases, and thus high contextual similarity too (Miller and Charles 1991 ) . While deeply intertwined (Caliskan and Lewis 2020 ) , these linguistic associations and the socio-cultural associations of interest to us differ. Linguistic associations represent phrases with similar associations to similar other phrases ; what we desire are phrases with similar associations to similar kinds of people . While methodologically consistent with prior work, then, our work extends the existing literature by defining a different socio-theoretic goal that is consistent with the existing literature on self-presentation. We also provide several new evaluation datasets for future work.

In focusing on sets of identities applied to individuals, our work also relates to entity-centric text analysis (Field and Tsvetkov 2019 ) . Entity-centric work focuses on using phrases with known meanings (e.g. from surveys) to understand the portrayal of individuals (Antoniak, Mimno, and Levy 2019 ; Mendelsohn, Tsvetkov, and Jurafsky 2020 ) . Our method builds on a complementary idea, namely that we can use the fact that all identities in a bio refer to a single entity (a user) to create better embeddings. Similar in this vein is the work of Bamman and Smith ( 2014 ) , who use this idea to infer character personas in literature. The present work compliments these efforts by using entity-centric data to produce embeddings, rather than phrase clusters.

Our work also ties to the literature that explores the language associated with how people express misinformation (Mu and Aletras 2020 ; Shu et al. 2017 ; Rashkin et al. 2017 ) . More specifically, we complement these efforts to study how people express specific instances of misinformation by exploring how people who tend to spread misinformation present themselves via particular (sets of) social identities.

The Demographics (and Self-presentations) of Misinformation Sharing

The study of misinformation online has exploded in recent years (Lazer et al. 2018 ) . Within this literature, several papers have looked at associations between demographics and rates of misinformation sharing. Typically, they do so by gathering demographics either via survey (e.g. Grinberg et al. 2019 ) or using voter records (Guess, Nagler, and Tucker 2019 ; Mosleh, Pennycook, and Rand 2020 ) , and then associating contained demographic information with rates of misinformation sharing. Across studies, however, prior work has repeatedly found that the best predictors of misinformation exposure and sharing online are 1) old age (Brashier and Schacter 2020 ) , 2) alignment with the political right (Osmundsen et al. 2021 ; Nikolov, Flammini, and Menczer 2021 ) , and 3) overall levels of online activity (Grinberg et al. 2019 ) .

Our work compliments these existing efforts in a number of ways. First, these prior works tend to use small-N samples of misinformation sharers because of the challenges and biases associated with their recruitment methods (Hughes et al. 2021 ) . For example, Grinberg et al. ( 2019 ) and Guess, Nagler, and Tucker ( 2019 ) , analyze sharing patterns in settings where only 400 Twitter users and 101 Facebook users shared any misinformation, respectively. In contrast, we analyze two different and much larger datasets; in the larger one, 77,190 accounts share at least one low-quality news link.

Second, we focus here on demographics conveyed through self-presentation . These self-presented demographics are important in their own right for understanding who other Twitter users perceive to be sharing misinformation, perceptions that do not always align with a user’s “true demographics” (Nguyen et al. 2014 ) . Critically, then, we do not claim that our method infers demographics of users, nor do we believe it does so. Indeed, these self-presentations may vary from demographics in at least two ways. First, individuals may consciously choose not to convey certain demographic information online, such as gender (Buss, Le, and Haimson 2022 ) , and more generally choose which dimensions of the self are most important to present to their Twitter audience (Marwick and boyd 2011 ) . Second, non-human accounts, such as those run by Russia’s Internet Research Agency (IRA), may fabricate self-presentations to shape online discussion (Zhang et al. 2021 ) . Prior studies that link users to surveys or voter records rule out these latter accounts in their sampling approach. In contrast, we aim to focus on which dimensions of social meaning are salient, or cast as salient, by those sharing misinformation unknowingly or for manipulation. We thus study here how the misinformation shares present their identity .

These two distinctions shape the two novel research questions we study here. First, the larger size of our dataset lets us explore interactions between self-presentations of age and partisanship, as compared to prior work which analyzes only the main effects. Second, our focus on dimensions of self-presentation instead of traditional demographics lets us analyze a novel, although well-theorized (Druckman et al. 2021 ) , empirical question: how is (self-presented) religiosity associated with misinformation sharing?

Methods for Embedding Twitter Bios

We propose three models that leverage existing methods to project phrases onto dimensions of social meaning in different ways. Our first model uses data only from bios, whereas the latter two use fine-tuning to balance between meanings in bios and semantic information in large, pre-trained DSMs. In all cases, our models are trained by using patterns in the multiple identities that appear in many social media bios. Because of this, it is useful to introduce some limited notation. First, let X 𝑋 X italic_X denote a dataset of bios where identities have been extracted, e.g. by using a regular expression (Yoder et al. 2020 ; Pathak, Madani, and Joseph 2021 ) . We assume X i = { x 1 i , x 2 i , … , x k i } superscript 𝑋 𝑖 subscript superscript 𝑥 𝑖 1 subscript superscript 𝑥 𝑖 2 … subscript superscript 𝑥 𝑖 𝑘 X^{i}=\{x^{i}_{1},x^{i}_{2},...,x^{i}_{k}\} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT = { italic_x start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT 1 end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , italic_x start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT 2 end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , … , italic_x start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_k end_POSTSUBSCRIPT } represents a set of k 𝑘 k italic_k identities extracted from a single bio, and that V 𝑉 V italic_V is a vocabulary of all unique identities in the training portion of X 𝑋 X italic_X .

Bio-only model

Our Bio-only model is constructed by applying word2vec (Mikolov et al. 2013 ) to X 𝑋 X italic_X . In common terminology for word2vec , we treat identities as words and bios as a context. Our intuition is that if the word2vec model can leverage contextual similarity on the “word-to-linguistic context” matrix to identify words with shared semantic meanings, it may also be useful to leverage the “identity-to-person context” matrix to identify phrases with shared socio-cultural meanings. We use word2vec models with an embedding size of 768 to match the embedding size of the other models used below, and train for 300 epochs with a window size of 8 (only .01% of bios in our training data contain more than 8 identities). Additional minor details are provided in the appendix.

Fine-tuned BERT

To fine-tune BERT, we use a masked language modeling (MLM) objective, randomly masking one of the identities in each bio. To prepare our dataset for training, we take each of the instances X i superscript 𝑋 𝑖 X^{i} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT and concatenate the phrases in it to form a full sentence. We then mask one of the identities and fine-tune a BERT-base model for 5 epochs while monitoring 10% of the training set as validation data. We used a learning rate of 2e-5 with a batch size of 64. Model training took approximately one day using a single A100 GPU. When bios are shorter than the context window size, padding is added; attention masking is used to ensure padding does not impact the embedding. We keep the embedding size of the BERT model at the default 768.

Fine-tuned SBERT

Finally, we construct a final model by fine-tuning Sentence-BERT (Reimers and Gurevych 2019 ) . Sentence-BERT uses contrastive learning , where the learning setup must be carefully constructed (Schroff, Kalenichenko, and Philbin 2015 ) . We develop an intuitive but effective approach here based on shared identities. In a contrastive learning framework, each data point is a triplet consisting of an anchor , a positive , and a negative sample. Our goal is to reshape the embedding space through fine-tuning such that for each triplet, the distance between anchor and positive samples, which co-occur within a bio in our setup, is minimized while the distance between anchor and negative samples, which do not, is maximized. As above, padding and attention masks are used when bios are shorter than the size of the context window. The embedding size of our selected sentence BERT model is 768 which matches the embedding size of all other proposed approaches for fair comparison.

We can frame this contrastive learning problem as a regression task: given a triplet of anchor ( X a subscript 𝑋 𝑎 X_{a} italic_X start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_a end_POSTSUBSCRIPT ), positive ( X p subscript 𝑋 𝑝 X_{p} italic_X start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_p end_POSTSUBSCRIPT ) and negative ( X n subscript 𝑋 𝑛 X_{n} italic_X start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_n end_POSTSUBSCRIPT ) samples and a similarity measure (here, cosine), our objective is for c ⁢ s ⁢ ( X a , X p ) = 1.0 𝑐 𝑠 subscript 𝑋 𝑎 subscript 𝑋 𝑝 1.0 cs(X_{a},X_{p})=1.0 italic_c italic_s ( italic_X start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_a end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , italic_X start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_p end_POSTSUBSCRIPT ) = 1.0 and c ⁢ s ⁢ ( X a , X n ) = 0.0 𝑐 𝑠 subscript 𝑋 𝑎 subscript 𝑋 𝑛 0.0 cs(X_{a},X_{n})=0.0 italic_c italic_s ( italic_X start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_a end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , italic_X start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_n end_POSTSUBSCRIPT ) = 0.0 for all training points, where c ⁢ s 𝑐 𝑠 cs italic_c italic_s stands for cosine similarity. We can then optimize this objective using mean squared error. The challenge is to construct an effective set of triplets to train on. To do so, we first take a bio X i superscript 𝑋 𝑖 X^{i} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT from the training set, and then randomly select an identity from X i superscript 𝑋 𝑖 X^{i} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT to be the positive sample. We name the remaining identities in X i superscript 𝑋 𝑖 X^{i} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT the anchor sample. Finally, we randomly select an identity that never co-occurs with the positive sample as the negative sample. As an example, from the bio [assistant professor, Bernie supporter, #blacklivesmatter] we set assistant professor, #blacklivesmatter as the anchor sample, Bernie supporter as the positive sample, and randomly select a negative sample that never co-occurred with Bernie supporter . We construct a triplet for each X i ∈ X superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑋 X^{i}\in X italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT ∈ italic_X using this method, and use these to fine-tune an mpnet-base Sentence-Bert model. Models were trained for 5 epochs for one day on a single A100 GPU.

Training Data

All models are trained on a sample of 3,534,903 bios from users who sent an English-language tweet captured in the Twitter Decahose 3 3 3 A sample of approximately 10% of all tweets. in 2020. We use the method from Pathak, Madani, and Joseph ( 2021 ) to extract identities from bios. Their extraction method consists of two steps, one where bios are split into chunks using a manually crafted regular expression, and a second cleaning step. For example, from the Twitter bio “Progressive Christian, wife, I am a proud Canadian,” their method extracts Progressive Christian , wife and proud Canadian . Given that our models learn from patterns in shared identity, we use only bios that contain at least two identities for training, with | V | 𝑉 |V| | italic_V | =22,516. A complete description of the dataset is available in the appendix.

We conduct four evaluations to assess model validity. The first is a prediction task, where we evaluate the full embedding space of each model and its ability to capture information that shapes users’ decisions on which sets of identities to place in their bio. The second connects our work to the existing literature on embedding and projecting individual social identities onto dimensions of social meaning. The third assesses our ability to project entire bios onto meaningful dimensions, with an eye towards validating our approach for our case study. Finally, the fourth task shows that our measures of partisanship correlate with other existing measures, and that our methods are associated with the behavior of interest (misinformation sharing) in the same way. Here, we describe each task and results for it in four separate subsections.

Can we Predict Held-out Identities?

Task description.

To perform this evaluation, we randomly sample another 1.5M Twitter bios from the Decahose using the same approach as above, creating an 80/20 train/test split between the two samples. For each observation in the test set, we ensure that at least one of the identities is in V 𝑉 V italic_V (which is defined using the training data). For the i 𝑖 i italic_i th sample, we then take one identity, X t i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑡 X^{i}_{t} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_t end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , as the hold-out target and call the rest of the bio X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT . We ensure X t i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑡 X^{i}_{t} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_t end_POSTSUBSCRIPT is in V 𝑉 V italic_V , i.e. in all cases the target is observed at least once in the training data. This task notably favors the three new models we present here, in that they are each trained in a manner similar to the prediction task. However, the comparison is still useful to 1) ensure that fine-tuning works as expected and 2) to compare between the three new models. With respect to the latter point, there is reason to believe that the word2vec model should outperform the Fine-tuned BERT or fine-tuned SBERT model, because the word2vec model is trained only on in-domain data relevant to the task.

To generate predictions, we first generate an embedding for X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , L r i = e ⁢ m ⁢ b ⁢ e ⁢ d ⁢ d ⁢ i ⁢ n ⁢ g ⁢ ( X r i ) subscript superscript 𝐿 𝑖 𝑟 𝑒 𝑚 𝑏 𝑒 𝑑 𝑑 𝑖 𝑛 𝑔 subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 L^{i}_{r}=embedding(X^{i}_{r}) italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT = italic_e italic_m italic_b italic_e italic_d italic_d italic_i italic_n italic_g ( italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT ) 4 4 4 Extended details on how embeddings are generated for each model are in the Appendix. . We then measure the cosine similarity of L r i subscript superscript 𝐿 𝑖 𝑟 L^{i}_{r} italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT with the embedding of all identities v ∈ V 𝑣 𝑉 v\in V italic_v ∈ italic_V , S ⁢ i ⁢ m ⁢ i ⁢ l ⁢ a ⁢ r ⁢ i ⁢ t ⁢ y ⁢ ( L r i , L v i ) 𝑆 𝑖 𝑚 𝑖 𝑙 𝑎 𝑟 𝑖 𝑡 𝑦 subscript superscript 𝐿 𝑖 𝑟 subscript superscript 𝐿 𝑖 𝑣 Similarity(L^{i}_{r},L^{i}_{v}) italic_S italic_i italic_m italic_i italic_l italic_a italic_r italic_i italic_t italic_y ( italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_v end_POSTSUBSCRIPT ) , leaving us with | V | 𝑉 |V| | italic_V | similarity scores to L r i subscript superscript 𝐿 𝑖 𝑟 L^{i}_{r} italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT .We evaluate similarity scores returned by each model using two evaluation metrics: average rank and log softmax score . Average rank is computed by, for each test point, finding the ranking of X t i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑡 X^{i}_{t} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_t end_POSTSUBSCRIPT in the scores produced by each model, and taking the average over all test points. The log softmax score draws on prior work (Joseph and Morgan 2021 ) and transforms similarity scores into a probability distribution using the softmax, and then takes the log of the result for X t i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑡 X^{i}_{t} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_t end_POSTSUBSCRIPT .

Finally, for evaluating the out-of-domain generalizability of our models, i.e. how well the model generalizes to unseen identities, we split our test data into two sets, a Main Evaluation set, where X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT also contains at least one identity observed in the training data, and a Generalizability set, in which no identities in X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT are seen in the training data. This is necessary to fairly evaluate our Bio-only model , which has a restricted vocabulary and does not generalize to out-of-domain phrases, to the other models, each of which are capable of handling out-of-domain text. 5 5 5 Note that X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT can still contain phrases that the Bio-only model does not recognize and replaces them with the 0-vector. It is also a useful test of the (in-domain) generalizability of the other models. We evaluate results separately for these two test datasets.

We compare our models to three baseline DSMs used frequently in prior work: BERT (Devlin et al. 2019 ) , RoBERTa (Liu et al. 2019 ) , and Sentence-BERT (Reimers and Gurevych 2019 ) (see appendix for details) . As in much of the prior work (Lucy, Tadimeti, and Bamman 2022 ) , these approaches are not fine-tuned on bios, giving a baseline for how important in-domain training is for our problem.

In contrast to our expectations, the Fine-tuned SBERT model consistently outperforms all other models on both evaluation metrics on the Main Test set. Figure  1 shows this, and also reveals that the next best model, in all cases, was the Bio-only model , and that the Fine-tuned BERT model does not show the same jump in performance relative to the baseline BERT model that the Fine-tuned SBERT model does. Finally, we see that the baseline SBERT model outperforms the baseline BERT model.

The fact that the fine-tuned SBERT model improves over the Bio-only model, but the Fine-tuned BERT model does not, is evidence that knowledge from the pre-trained SBERT model (but not BERT) is useful in our setting. It also shows that performance gains cannot only be attributed to fine-tuning on in-domain language, but instead that our contrastive learning setup was effective and that Sentence-BERT is indeed the more effective initial model for fine-tuning, at least on this evaluation task. The second column of Figure  1 shows that the Fine-tuned SBERT model also performs best on the Generalizability test set. Even when the Fine-tuned model is not exposed to any of the identities in X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT , it improves by nearly 100% over the standard SBERT model in terms of average rank. Figure  1 also makes clear that there is room for improvement. To this end, we conduct an error analysis ; see the appendix for details.

Do Projections of Single Identities Correlate with Human Judgements?

Following prior work (Joseph and Morgan 2020 ) , we assess how well our embeddings can be used to project identities onto dimensions of social meaning in ways that correlate with human judgements. As no prior work focuses on identities that are common in bios, however, we construct a novel survey dataset for this task. We provide brief details on the study here, full details can be found in the Appendix.

We asked 140 respondents on Prolific to rate 250 common identities in Twitter bios on three widely studied dimensions: gender, age, and partisanship. We use the mean of ratings for each identity on each dimension in our analysis. To select identities, we ranked identities in the Twitter dataset by frequency, and then manually selected the first 250 phrases that clearly signaled identity. For each identity on each dimension, respondents were asked to move a slider to represent their perception of where people who label themselves as that identity were likely to fall. For partisanship, for example, the slider ranged from “Always [a] Democrat” to “Always [a] Republican.” Figure  2 provides an example question. For gender and age, we followed the approach outlined by Joseph and Morgan ( 2020 ) exactly, using the same slider. Specifically, for age, participants were asked to rate identities on perceived age from 0-100, for gender, the question appears as in Figure  2 , replacing “Republican” with “Man” and “Democrat” with “Woman.”

To construct projections for each embedding model, for each identity, onto these dimensions, we follow the literature and 1) embed identities as defined above, 2) define a set of words and phrases that denotatively characterize each “end” of the dimension (e.g. “man” vs. “woman” for gender) and then 3) use these to project each identity onto a line in the embedding space defined by those two dimension ends, giving a single number. Several approaches exist to complete steps 2) and 3) ( Joseph and Morgan 2020 ) . We follow prior work where possible for 2), and for 3), i.e. to calculate similarity, we use RIPA, the method described by Ethayarajh, Duvenaud, and Hirst ( 2019 ) . Finally, for each embedding model on each dimension, we then compute the Spearman correlation between the projections and the survey data.

Figure  3 shows that our three models all perform at least as well—but not better than—the baselines for projections onto age, all significantly improve over baselines in measuring perceived partisanship, and significantly improve over the baselines, except for Fine-tuned BERT, on perceived gender. Our models’ improvements over baselines are particularly salient in comparison to the RoBERTa and BERT baselines. Notably, we also see that our Bio-only model, based on word2vec performs well compared to the more complex models on this task. This suggests that for phrases that are prominent in bios, this model (which trains only on the bios themselves) may be preferred. However, the Bio-only model cannot extend beyond the vocabulary, and thus (as we will see) struggles with generalizability. Finally, Figure  3 also shows that the greatest jumps in performance for our models, relative to the baseline, are clearly on the partisan dimension.

Do Projections of Entire Bios Correlate with Human Judgements?

Our third evaluation assess the question, can our model capture perceptions of self-presentation in entire bios? To address this, we conduct a similar analysis as above, comparing the Spearman correlation of projections of our embedding models to mean ratings by Prolific respondents on a survey task. There are, however, four primary differences between the evaluation of single identities and the one presented here for full bios.

First, of course, is that we ask respondents for their perceptions of entire bios, rather than individual identities within bios. More specifically, we randomly sample 1,300 bios of users in our case study data, described below. Second, because in our case study we are interested in religiosity as well as age, gender, and partisanship, we add a question regarding perceived level of religiosity to the survey. Third, as opposed to selecting only one approach for defining ends of the semantic axis onto which embeddings are projected, we consider two approaches. The first follows our second evaluation and uses a combination of prior work and author intuition to define the terms at each end of the axis. Motivated to ensure accurate measurements for our case study, the second considers whether or not we can improve correlations with human judgement by constructing lists of terms for dimension endpoints that are informed by a qualitative analysis of bios. More specifically, we manually explore bios from the case study data described below that are not included in the survey study and use them to define the list of terms. We compare performance using both approaches here, but ensure that we compute results only on bios that do not include terms that explicitly define our endpoints . Fourth, we opt to only compare performance of SBERT and Fine-tuned SBERT, as other models fared poorly on one or both of the prior evaluations.

All other details of our evaluation generally match those in our second evaluation, save for the sample of Prolific users; see the appendix for details on this.

Figure  4 shows that the Fine-tuned SBERT model has a significantly higher correlation with human judgements on dimensions of partisanship and religion, regardless of how endpoints of the dimensions are defined. For gender and age, Fine-tuned SBERT performance shows no significant improvement over a non-fine-tuned SBERT model, but is also not significantly impacted by how dimension endpoints are defined. In contrast, for the SBERT model, in one case (age) our use of qualitative exploration to find in-domain sets of phrases to define dimensions significantly increases correlations with human judgement, and in the other (gender) it significantly decreases correlations. These results suggest that the Fine-tuned SBERT model is therefore more robust to the known challenge of defining “good” sets of phrases to define endpoints (Joseph and Morgan 2020 ) .

How do our Projections Compare to Other Measures at the User Level?

In our final evaluation, we focus specifically on projections of bios onto partisanship and explore 1) how well these projections correlate with a different measure of user partisanship (evaluating convergent validity), and 2) whether or not our measure of partisanship correlates in expected ways—and in a similar way to the other measure of user partisanship— with misinformation sharing (evaluating hypothesis validity Jacobs and Wallach 2021 ) . To conduct these evaluations, we make use of a pre-existing dataset of 374,684 Twitter users 1) for whom prior work (McCabe et al. 2022 ) has computed a standard measure of user ideology using user follower networks, and 2) for whom we have data on the sharing of low-quality news sites.

With respect to the partisanship measure we compare to, McCabe et al. ( 2022 ) apply a method pioneered by Barberá et al. ( 2015 ) that uses a combination of information about the partisanship of elite Twitter users and follower relationships to compute an estimate of user partisan ideology. McCabe et al. ( 2022 ) adopt the same approach, but update information about elites from the 2012 data used by Barberá et al. ( 2015 ) to 2020 data, and apply the approach to a large set of Twitter users that they linked to voter registration records using established methods (Hughes et al. 2021 ) . The work from McCabe et al. ( 2022 ) presents full details on implementation and an extensive validation of the measure in comparison to voter registration data; we therefore refer the reader to their work these details and focus here only on a comparison between their updated version of Barberá et al. ’s 2015 method and our partisanship measure using bio data.

With respect to the sharing of low-quality news, we focus on the proportion of URLs to low- and high-quality news websites shared on Twitter by these users from July 1st, 2020 through May 31st, 2021. We determine whether a URL comes from a low- or high-quality news website by making use of 1) the list produced by Grinberg et al. ( 2019 ) (who categorize sites into a binary high or low-quality distinction) and 2) the NewsGuard domain rating list. NewsGuard is an organization that maintains a widely-used (e.g Altay, Nielsen, and Fletcher 2022 ; Horne, Nørregaard, and Adalı 2019 ) list of news websites that are rated on a scale of 0-100 for information quality. We follow prior work and dichotomize their ratings into a binary low- or high-quality value for each site. We use a score of 60 as the threshold, following prior work (Lin et al. 2022 ) . Further, while we opt for a particular definition across these two lists, we note that prior work (Lin et al. 2022 ) has shown that various lists of misinformation domains are highly correlated, and thus that results for the study of misinformation are unlikely to be sensitive to these types of changes. Using these binary domain scores, we define our outcome variable for an individual user as the percentage of all URLs the user shares that come from a low-quality news site, divided by the total number of URLs shared from a domain listed in NewsGuard. We refer to this outcome as the proportion of low-quality shares .

Finally, for our bio-based measure, we use user bios collected in July of 2020 (i.e. within the same timeframe of the following data and misinformation sharing data), and project bios onto partisanship using the methods detailed in our evaluation of full bio embeddings (our third evaluation).

We find a correlation of 0.39 [0.387,0.393] between the bio-based projection measure of partisanship using our fine-tuned SBERT model and the partisanship estimates from McCabe et al. ( 2022 ) . This correlation is nearly double the correlation we find between the bio-based projection measure computed using the non-fine-tuned SBERT model and the estimates from McCabe et al. ( 2022 ) (0.197 [0.193,0.201]), and even higher than the correlation between the fine-tuned SBERT model and the non-fine-tuned model (0.347 [0.343,0.35]). This strong correlation, even when compared to reasonable baselines, gives us further confidence in the convergent validity of our measure—while we should not expect a measure based on a more private behavior (following) to correlate exactly with one based on a more public behavior (text in bios), we do see, as expected, a reasonably strong relationship.

We also find that these two measures show consistent estimates of the relationship between partisanship and misinformation sharing. These estimates, moreover, conform with what we would expect from prior work (Grinberg et al. 2019 ; Guess, Nagler, and Tucker 2019 ) . More specifically, Figure  5 shows the estimated proportion of low-quality shares from a binomial regression model where the independent variables are indicators for partisanship after bucketing each variable into 10 separate bins of equal numbers of users, respectively. 6 6 6 Binning is done to avoid assumptions about the precision of these proxy variables and to ease interpretation; bin sizes selected here are for visual clarity. Results are not, however, sensitive to this decision. All main effects in the model used to estimate the proportions shown in Figure  5 are significant at p ≤ .001 𝑝 .001 p\leq.001 italic_p ≤ .001 , and trends between the two different measures are consistent in showing that those furthest to the partisan right are most likely to share low quality news.

Misinformation Case Study

The previous evaluations show that our Fine-tuned SBERT model can project bios onto social dimensions of meaning in ways that correlate with how those bios are likely to be perceived by humans , and that the approach has both convergent validity and hypothesis validity in comparison to a different measure of user partisanship. Our case study uses the same dataset, but leverages our methodology to explore the link between self-presentation in bios and the rate of low- versus high-quality news sharing in the context of our two research questions. First, we explore the interaction between self-presentations of age and partisanship and their association with low-quality new sharing. Second, we consider the association between self-presenting as religious and misinformation sharing.

We note that while it would be possible for McCabe et al. ( 2022 ) to make use of additional voter registration data to, e.g., control for age, our tool is still useful for two reasons. First, most existing social media datasets are not connected to voter registration data, nor are the aligned with follower network data that could be used to apply the method from Barberá et al. ( 2015 ) . To this end, we are able to use our methods to replicate our analysis on a new dataset from the Twitter Decahose, which we could not do otherwise (see appendix for details). Second, we note that an analysis of religiosity is in any case not possible with existing voter registration data, as religiosity does not exist within versions of these data that have been provided to researchers in the past.

With respect to our first research question on the interaction between age and partisan self-presentation, we find that the direction of effects for age and partisanship generally match prior work, but that interaction effects not observed in prior work on demographics appear in our analyses. Figure  6 more specifically shows that users who self-present as older and right leaning is associated with a superlinear increase in proportion of low-quality news shared relative to being old or right-leaning.

Addressing our second research question, and using the same binning approach with univariate statistical models, we observe in Figure  6 B) that self-presenting as being highly religious is also associated with statistically significant ( p < .001 𝑝 .001 p<.001 italic_p < .001 ) jumps in the proportion of low-quality shares. As in the real world (Druckman et al. 2021 ) , our measures of religiosity and partisanship are highly correlated (at 0.76) , and thus we do not attempt to tease out whether this effect is particularly salient conditioned on partisanship. More specifically, we avoid interpretation of coefficients in a model with both of these variables because interpretation of regression coefficients with strongly co-linear variables is prone to misidentification of effect size and statistical significance (Gregorich et al. 2021 ) .

We do find, however, that religiosity adds additional predictive power, in that adding religiosity as a predictor to a model with partisanship results in a statistically significant increase ( p < .001 𝑝 .001 p<.001 italic_p < .001 ) in predictive power. Descriptive statistics do, however, provide some evidence into a potential interactive relationship between partisanship, religiosity, and sharing content from low-quality sites. Specifically, Figure  9 in the appendix shows that partisanship and religiosity may have a multiplicative association with sharing content from low-quality news sites. Participants who present as both right-leaning and religious have, on average, higher odds of sharing low-quality news links than users who present as only right-leaning or only religious. Future experimental work targeting this specific interaction effect in ways that avoid endogeneity concerns might therefore be of interest.

Critically, all findings presented here extend beyond this particular dataset to a second large dataset of misinformation sharing drawn from a broader population in the Twitter Decahose. These replication results are presented in the appendix.

Discussion and Conclusion

We present, evaluate, make public, and make use of new methods to project Twitter bios onto meaningful social dimensions. Methodologically, our contribution is not innovation in algorithm development, but in the application of standard algorithms to carefully constructed training datasets and training set-ups to build entity-centric identity embedding spaces (where identities that are commonly presented for the same people are represented in a similar space). Notably, our estimates of self-presentation do not use other user behaviors (e.g. retweets).

After extensively validating our proposed methods, we present a case study on two open questions in the literature on misinformation sharing online. In response to our first question, we find an interaction effect between age and partisanship- that Twitter users presentinand Republican share a much higher proportion of low-quality news. With respect to our second research question, we similarly find that individuals who self-present as religious, perhaps especially on the political right, are much more likely to share a higher proportion of low-quality news. Our results have two important implications. With respect to combating misinformation online, while much work has considered interventions targeted along partisan (Martel et al. 2024 ) or age-based (Brashier and Schacter 2020 ) , our results provide evidence that we should be considering even more narrow interventions targeted at older and right-leaning Americans. With respect to better understanding the misinformation environment online in the U.S., our work provides critical empirical validation of theories that suggest religiosity is an important component of the quality of information consumed and spread online (Druckman et al. 2021 ) .

However, our work contains a number of limitations that should be considered. Specific to our case study, we follow previous work that uses a domain-based approach to identify misinformation sharing (Grinberg et al. 2019 ; Guess, Nagler, and Tucker 2019 ; Moore, Dahlke, and Hancock 2023 ) , which includes posts that share a URL with a negative annotation. However, like previous work, we find the number of such posts to be a small proportion of all shares. While other work referenced above suggests our efforts should extend to other social media sites, Twitter, like all sites, has particular elements that limit our ability to generalize claims about self-presentation elsewhere, in particular to “offline” behavior settings (DeVito, Walker, and Birnholtz 2018 ) . In particular, our models learn cultural associations from the majority white, male, younger, and left-leaning users of Twitter (Hughes et al. 2021 ) . Similarly, our survey evaluation data is largely drawn from white, American women, which limits their generalizability.

Our work is also contextualized in a particular period of time, and thus may not be responsive to significant shifts in social identity. All of these, and results described in the paper, emphasize the contextualized nature of our trained models and datasets. While we hope that future work might expand beyond them, others should consider using our publicly available code to fine-tune our models on their own data. Finally, our case study is necessarily terse, and does not explore a number of additional important and interesting questions. In particular, there may be other interesting dimensions of self-presentation that may be interesting to social scientists interested in misinformation sharing on social media. Our work also has ethical implications, which we discuss in more detail in the Ethics Statement below, as well as in the required paper checklist. Our hope, however, is that the proposed, and public, methods allow future efforts that explore new questions that link identity and behavior on Twitter and other sites with social media bios.

Acknowledgements

NM and KJ were supported by an ONR MURI N00014-20-S-F003 and by NSF IIS2145051. SM was supported by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation through a grant to the Institute for Data, Democracy, & Politics at the George Washington University. RB was supported by the MSCA Grant Agreement No. 101073351 at GESIS Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences.

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Paper Checklist

One can crudely separate the way that members of the NLP community acknowledge sociocultural associations embedded in language into three camps. In the first, acknowledgement is largely non-existent, with scholars either choosing to ignore the social implications of language or arguing that it is not within their purview to address them. In the second, scholars concerned with the potential that NLP tools might reify biases in language have sought to develop tools to reduce or remove the use of biased tools in production. Example efforts include the literature on “debiasing” embedding spaces—where scholars aim to remove meaning on “unwanted dimensions” (i.e. on social dimensions of meaning) and keep it only on “objective” dimensions (i.e. on more traditional semantic dimensions)— and work to carefully elaborate how problems can arise from NLP tools that do not critically engage with the social implications of language (Blodgett et al. 2020 ; Field et al. 2021 ) .

While we strongly support the latter line of critical scholarship, we fall into a third camp of NLP researchers, who see the potential for NLP methods that capture social meaning in language to help inform our understanding of society and its behaviors (Kozlowski, Taddy, and Evans 2019 ; Bailey, Williams, and Cimpian 2022 ; Garg et al. 2018 ) . As individuals who are supportive of existent critical literature, and who are still building methods that are inherently engaging in stereotyping, we must accept that our methods can be used not only to measure perceptions and self-presentations but also to apply them for nefarious purposes, such as racially-biased targeted advertising (Ali et al. 2019 ) . The ultimate ethical question that we must address, then, is whether we believe that our measurement strategies will ultimately do more harm than good.

Our decision to submit the present work for consideration reflects our belief, after deliberation, that the potential benefits of our work outweigh the potential dangers. From a benefits perspective, we show that our work can help us understand the (mis)information environment on Twitter, and hope in the future to use these methods to better understand 1) how hegemonic voices are often given outsized attention on social media platforms, and 2) how attacks on marginalized communities changed along with the political climate in the United States. From a misuse perspective, we do not believe that the methods we have developed here are more effective at targeting individuals based on stereotyped demographics than the tools already in existence elsewhere, tools which use orders of magnitude more compute data and power. As such, while there are real dangers with being misclassified in a particular way online, we 1) emphasize throughout the paper that we focus only on how someone is likely to be perceived based on what is in their bio, and do not claim to be able to classify some “true self” of users, and 2) expect that if one wanted to engage in such a prediction activity, it could be done better with methods that focus specifically on this task.

A similar value judgement was applied to the other ethical question in our work: whether or not to publicly release parts of our data. Ultimately, restrictions on the Decahose have made it challenging to share data. However, given recent literature in the ICWSM community (Assenmacher et al. 2020 ) , we believe the appropriate course of action is to release training data on a per-case basis, as potential dataset users contact the last author of this paper. However, we believe that the release of our (fully deidentified) survey data and basic case study data does not serve any inherent risks for users in our dataset, and thus have opted to do so in the Github repository for this work. We believe that the utility of these data to the scientific community, both for replicability and extension, outweigh the dangers of data release. Of course, in all cases, data and methods usage is a continually evolving process, and we will re-evaluate this value judgement as often as is needed.

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Would answering this research question advance science without violating social contracts, such as violating privacy norms, perpetuating unfair profiling, exacerbating the socio-economic divide, or implying disrespect to societies or cultures? As noted above, there are privacy concerns in our work that we have carefully considered and weighed relative to the benefits of our work.

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Did you include the code, data, and instructions needed to reproduce the main experimental results (either in the supplemental material or as a URL)? See the Github link in the first footnote

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Appendix A Appendix

Bios from the twitter decahose.

The center column of Table 1 provides summary statistics for the Twitter bio data we construct. We begin with a sample of 15,459,872 distinct Twitter bios from users who posted a tweet in 2020 that was found in the Decahose, and who are specified as English-language users by the Twitter API. In order to maintain a focus on culturally-salient identities, we limit the size of the vocabulary to identities used in at least 100 unique Twitter bios in the training set. Further, because we are interested in associations between identities, we further remove Twitter bios that contain less than 2 identities. After these cleaning steps, our training and test data consists of 3,534,903 and 1,546,001 distinct bios respectively with 22,516 unique identities in the vocabulary. We then follow the approach outlined in the main text to produce the main test dataset and the generalizability test set. Note that the size of each of these splits can be larger than the size of cleaned test dataset, because we can generate multiple instances from a given bio by randomly selecting different targets; i.e. we can generate multiple test instances out of each of profile description by selecting multiple pairs of X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT and X t i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑡 X^{i}_{t} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_t end_POSTSUBSCRIPT .

Finally, to provide further insight into the data, Table 2 showcases the top 7 identities in terms of overall frequency in the training data and 7 of the least frequent identities to show that the tail still contains meaningful phrases.

Single Identity Survey Data

A complete, aggregated copy of this data is provided in the Github for this paper. Our survey study was ruled exempt by the IRB at [REMOVED]. Each respondent rated between four and seven identities, and each identity was given to at least 3 respondents. Respondents were paid an average of $12/hour. Respondents are from a convenience sample, as recent work has suggested that the cost efficiency of convenience samples does not necessarily impact data quality (Coppock, Leeper, and Mullinix 2018 ) . The median age of our sample is 32. Of the 140 respondents, 88 reported their sex as female, 49 as male, and 4 noted other/did not provide. Our sample, like Twitter, was overwhelmingly White; 105 (75%) of the sample reported as White.

We here provide two minor additional details on our survey data. First, it is of note that in contrast to prior work, we focus explicitly on priming respondents to think of social media users, asking, for example, “If you saw [identity] in a social media biography, would you expect that individual to be” and then provided a Likert scale ranging from (e.g.) “Always [a] Democrat” to “Always [a] Republican.” Second, we emphasize that other procedures, including tutorial materials, task details, and attention checks, follow the publicly available materials from Joseph and Morgan ( 2020 ) .

Entire Bio Survey Data

A complete, aggregated copy of this data is provided in the Github for this paper.

We use responses from approximately 730 Prolific respondents. Because of a temporary issue with the survey, some respondents were approved for pay without taking the study, we report demographics here on all respondents here because of this issue. The median age of respondents was 37. Reported sex was more balanced than the sample for the single identity study, 51% and 44% of respondents reported a sex of female or male, respectively. As above, however, a majority of the sample (65%) reported as White. Respondents were paid an average of $12/hour. Full details are provided in the Appendix for the interested reader.

Two final notes are in order. First, with respect to the difference between the two surveys is that because we focus on individual user bios, we in this study ask respondents to assess the likelihood that the individual user who has this bio is, e.g., a Democrat or Republican, rather than asking (as above) about the probability that an individual who holds a given identity is, e.g., a Democrat or Republican. Second, we note that we drop the 5% of respondents whose responses were furthest from all other respondents, on average, across all identities and dimensions (after standardizing measures across dimensions). This results in a final sample of 1,273 bios analyzed here and provided in the Github repository.

Replication with Data from the Decahose

We replicate findings using the case study dataset analyzed in the main text with a different dataset, broader in scope, drawn from the Decahose. A complete, anonymized copy of this replication data is provided in the Github for this paper. For each user, it contains the number of URLs they shared that link to low- and high-quality domains, as identified by NewsGuard, and projections of their bios onto the four dimensions of interest to the case study.

We begin with a sample of roughly 290,000 users who tweeted at least one NewsGuard URL in the decahose in 2020. Of this sample, 143,883 users were 1) still active when we recollected tweets in 2022, and 2) had a non-empty English-language bio. It is possible that our use of langdetect could bias our sampling of what is considered English language (Blodgett, Green, and O’Connor 2016 ) ; as such, we manually evaluate it. To do so, we had three research assistants label 900 bios as English, not English, or Vague. The annotators had a Krippendorf’s alpha agreement score of 0.81 and agreed on 90% of the bios with the library. More specific to our case study, 93% of the bios that langdetect measured as English were also annotated as English by all the annotator. The main reason for mis-classification of the bio’s language was that some bios consisted of phrases from multiple languages. We therefore believe that this step did not bias our results in any obvious way.

Of these remaining 143,883 users who matched our initial sampling criteria, a remaining 108,554, or 75.4%, had at least 5 shares of URLs in NewsGuard, which we considered a minimum for estimating proportions. The median user had 49 shares of high quality news website URLs and 3 shares of low quality news website URLs. In total, these users shared 11,735,521 links to NewsGuard domains we assess in our study.

Figure  7 replicates findings from Figure  6 A) in the main text, namely, observe a similar increase in the association between self-presented (older) age and misinformation sharing as we see an increase in right-leaning self-presentation. Figure  8 replicates Figure  6 B).

Descriptive Statistics Partisanship and Religiosity

Figure  9 shows a descriptive statistic that provides some evidence that religiosity and partisanship have an interactive effect on misinformation sharing. However, as noted in the main text, correlations between these variables make it challenging to assess the statistical significance of these variables relative to each other; in particular, there are few left-leaning accounts that also present as religious.

Distributional Semantic Models (Baselines)

For all DSM baseline models except Sentence Bert, including BERT-base, RoBERTa-base and BerTweet-base we experimented using open-source implementations on Hugging Face transformers library 7 7 7 https://huggingface.co/docs/transformers/ . For the Sentence-Bert baseline, we used the mpnet-base pre-trained model and the implementation given by open-source Sentence Transformers library. 8 8 8 https://github.com/UKPLab/sentence-transformers

Bio-only Model

To select hyperparameters, we use 10% of the training data as a validation dataset. The primary hyperparameter we tuned was whether to use a Skip-Gram or C-BOW model. We ultimately chose a Skip-Gram model for Twitter and a C-BOW model for Wikipedia, with the other hyperparameters as specified in the main text. Model training took under an hour on a personal laptop. We used the open-source implementation of word2vec in gensim 9 9 9 https://radimrehurek.com/gensim/ for our experiments.

We here briefly provide additional intuition for our Fine-tuned SBERT model. Given a dataset of pairs of identity phrases with a label denoting the anchor-positive pair or anchor-negative pairs, we input the pair into the pipeline shown in Figure 10 and extract the latent embeddings of each of the identities. Then we calculate the cosine similarity of the embeddings and backpropagate the mean squared error loss with the label through the network. In this work we fine-tuned a mpnet-base Sentence Bert model since it had the same model size as a BERT-base and the pre-trained model was available online.

Further details on Baseline Models

For all DSM baseline models except Sentence Bert, including BERT-base, RoBERTa-base and BerTweet-base we experimented using open-source implementations on Hugging Face transformers library 10 10 10 https://huggingface.co/docs/transformers/ . For the Sentence-Bert baseline, we used the mpnet-base pre-trained model and the implementation given by open-source Sentence Transformers library. 11 11 11 https://github.com/UKPLab/sentence-transformers .

Other Baseline Models Considered

In addition to the three baseline models discussed in the text, we also experimented with a pair of other sensible options.

First, we expected that a DSM pretrained on Twitter would be a strong baseline to compare to, and thus experimented with additional models pre-trained specifically on Twitter data (Nguyen, Vu, and Tuan Nguyen 2020 ) . We use the fine-tuned BERT model on Twitter data proposed by (Nguyen, Vu, and Tuan Nguyen 2020 ) . They propose a BERT-base model fine-tuned using a corpus of 850M English Tweets. However, we find that model performance was no better than the other, more widely used baseline DSMs we proposed in the main experiments.

Second, it seemed reasonable that by first restricting a baseline DSM to known dimensions of social meaning, we could improve their performance. Consequently, we considered baselines where we first projected down all baseline models into the core dimensions of meaning noted by Joseph and Morgan ( 2020 ) before the evaluation tasks. In both cases, however, our intuitions did not match empirical reality. These models failed to outperform the baselines used in the main text, and thus we restrict our analysis to the baselines discussed in the main text.

Generating Embeddings for the Predictive Experiment

In order to build inputs to the network, since X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT is a list of personal identifiers, to calculate the latent embedding L r i subscript superscript 𝐿 𝑖 𝑟 L^{i}_{r} italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT for it, depending on the model, we follow different procedures. For the Bio-only model, we simply measure the average latent vector of all phrases in X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT according to ( 1 ). For the Fine-tuned models, as well as the baseline contextualized language models discussed below, we stitch the words in X r i subscript superscript 𝑋 𝑖 𝑟 X^{i}_{r} italic_X start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT together with comma and create a sentence S r i subscript superscript 𝑆 𝑖 𝑟 S^{i}_{r} italic_S start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT . We then measure L r i subscript superscript 𝐿 𝑖 𝑟 L^{i}_{r} italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_r end_POSTSUBSCRIPT according to Equation ( 2 ). Equivalently, this means that for the BERT based models we take the embedding of [CLS] token for pooling and for the Sentence Bert based models we follow the original work and take the average of all token embeddings.

Projection to Social Dimensions

In order to project a piece of text (either a full bio or a single identity) onto a specific dimension, we have to first define the end-points of that dimension. Table 3 and 4 outline the original and in-domain dimension end-points that we talk about in this paper, in particular in our Entire bio projection evaluation. To generate embeddings for an end-point, we assume each end-point is an instance in X 𝑋 X italic_X and follow the approach outlined above to generate embeddings for each end-point of the dimension d 𝑑 d italic_d and call them E d 1 superscript subscript 𝐸 𝑑 1 E_{d}^{1} italic_E start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_d end_POSTSUBSCRIPT start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT 1 end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT and E d 2 superscript subscript 𝐸 𝑑 2 E_{d}^{2} italic_E start_POSTSUBSCRIPT italic_d end_POSTSUBSCRIPT start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT 2 end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT respectively. Having the embedding of both poles of the dimension, we calculate the difference vector according to Equation 3 , and calculate the embedding of the target text using the same approach to a vector L i superscript 𝐿 𝑖 L^{i} italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT . Then we follow the projection approach outlined in (Ethayarajh, Duvenaud, and Hirst 2019 ) to normalize all vectors and then calculate the projection value of L i superscript 𝐿 𝑖 L^{i} italic_L start_POSTSUPERSCRIPT italic_i end_POSTSUPERSCRIPT onto dimension d 𝑑 d italic_d according to equation 4 .

Error Analysis of The Predictive Task

Our understanding of the proposed models is improved by studying where errors occur. Here, we briefly present both quantitative and qualitative reflections on the major sources of error for the Bio-Only and Fine-tuned SBERT models. At a high level, we find that pre-training helps the Fine-tuned SBERT model on predictions requiring knowledge of phrase composition (e.g. that “mother” and “mother of two” convey similar meanings), but appear to cause it to struggle on infrequent identities, which the Bio-only model is better able to capture meanings of from the bio data alone.

Quantitatively, Figure  11 shows that both models performed best, and roughly equally well, on the most frequent identities, but that differences appeared in how the models fared elsewhere. The Bio-only model’s ranking distribution (the marginal density plot on the right-hand side of Figure  11 ) was bimodal, with a large number of high (poor performance) and low (strong performance) ranks for test points. Perhaps unsurprisingly, we find qualitatively that the poor performance of the Bio-only model relative to the Fine-tuned SBERT model largely came from an inability 1) to learn from compositional identities or 2) to leverage relevant external knowledge. These issues seemed to impact the model most for moderately frequent target identities, those appearing between 300-10,000 times in the training data. With respect to 1), for example, when provided the Twitter bio “mother of two, restaurant owner, partly retired, hockey coach” 12 12 12 This bio has been modified to protect user privacy , the Bio-only model ranks the correct held-out identity, “wife,” among the least likely. In contrast, the Fine-tuned SBERT model correctly ranks “wife” in the Top 1%. The core difference is that the Fine-tuned SBERT model, but not the Bio-only model, leverages the gender stereotype implied by the “mother” portion of the phrase “mother of two.” With respect to 2), there were several cases where external knowledge from the pre-trained model benefited the Fine-tuned models. For example, the Fine-tuned models, but not the Bio-only models, were able to recognize the similarity between the identities “follower of ISKSON” (a Hindu religious organization) and “proud Hindu.” Both of these were relatively infrequently used.

In contrast, relative to the Bio-only model, Fine-tuned models struggled with the most infrequent identities, in particular the roughly 18% of identifiers in the test set that occurred fewer than 300 times in the training data. In these cases, as in prior work entity-centric domain adaptive work (Field and Tsvetkov 2019 ) , the Fine-tuned models seemed to rely too heavily on knowledge from the pre-trained model and not enough to domain-relevant context. In contrast, the identity-centric model seemed to benefit on the prediction task from overfitting to stereotypical knowledge for these rarer phrases. The Fine-tuned models also struggled when presented with identities, such as Twitter-specific acronyms, that were likely rare in the DSM data, but more frequent on Twitter. Here, pre-training seemed to induce noise, leading the Fine-tuned models to predict somewhat randomly.

Beliefs of Undergraduate Mathematics Education Students in a Teacher Education Program about Visual Programming in Mathematics Classes

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• Published: 18 September 2024

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• Frederik Dilling   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-5902-4275 1 ,
• Jacqueline Köster 1 &
• Amelie Vogler 2  

In the digital age, the range of digital technologies used in mathematics education grows. Since beliefs are affective-cognitive elements that significantly determine teachers' behavior in the classroom, they are an interesting field of research in mathematics education. A review of previous research has identified different groups of beliefs about the use of digital technologies in mathematics classes. These studies are not focused on specific digital technologies. In an empirical case study that is presented in this paper, the aim was to figure out how beliefs that can be described specifically about the use of visual programming relate to general beliefs about the use of digital technologies in mathematics education. A qualitative content analysis of the reflection journals of seven undergraduate mathematics education students on their work with Scratch, a visual programming environment, in a university seminar led to the formation of ten belief categories about the use of visual programming in mathematics classes. Most of the beliefs are associated with a positive attitude towards visual programming in mathematics education. However, some beliefs could also be identified that refer to the limits and challenges of using visual programming and thus demonstrate rather negative associations. Only a few of the categories identified match the list of belief groups about digital technologies in mathematics education identified in previous research. Some possible reasons for these results are discussed and further research interests in the field of beliefs about the use of digital technologies are suggested.

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Introduction

In many countries, the development of algorithmic thinking is emerging as an important goal of mathematics education in school. Definitions of algorithmic thinking usually describe it as a general skill that enables the use of (mathematical) algorithms by recognizing patterns and structures (e.g., Blannin & Symons, 2020 ; Hsu & Wang, 2018 ). Algorithms represent an important aspect of mathematics (cf. Weber et al., 2022 ) and therefore constitute a fundamental idea of mathematics (Winter, 2001 ).

Programming, which is the development of a program that a computer can execute automatically, offers a possibility to foster algorithmic thinking (cf. among others Futschek & Moschitz, 2010 ; Kolovou et al., 2008 ; Dilling & Vogler, 2022a ). A popular way of programming that is specifically developed for educational purposes is the so-called visual programming, which is a method in which code blocks are predefined and used for programming (Dilling & Vogler, 2022b ). While some empirical studies on the fostering of algorithmic thinking through visual programming by students in school already exist, there is a clear need for research on how mathematics teachers perceive this issue. Therefore, this article addresses the beliefs (Schoenfeld, 1985 , 1992 ) of undergraduate pre-service teachers about visual programming in mathematics classes. Beliefs represent an essential part of teachers' professional digital competencies (e.g., Dilling et al., 2024 ). In addition to general beliefs regarding the topic of digitization (e.g., Thurm & Barzel, 2022 ), specific beliefs emerge. These refer to individual technologies and influence their adequate use in the classroom (Dilling & Vogler, 2022c ) – in this case, domain-specific beliefs related to visual programming.

This article first presents an overview of research and defines these key concepts: mathematics-related beliefs, algorithmic thinking and visual programming in mathematics education. Then, a case study (Yin, 2013 ) examining a group of undergraduate students at a university in North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany) is presented. The undergraduate students were studying mathematics with a focus on mathematics education to become teachers for middle and high school. They participated in a university seminar on the use of digital technologies in mathematics classes. In the seminar, the students worked on various mathematical problem solving tasks with the use of visual programming and developed their own tasks (Dilling & Vogler, 2022d ). They recorded their results in a question-guided reflection journal, which forms the data basis for the empirical investigation. The students' documents are analyzed with a qualitative content analysis (Mayring, 2000 , 2010 ). In a conclusion, the empirically obtained findings are compared to the theoretical considerations and the current state of research, and an outlook will be given.

Teachers' Beliefs and the Use of Digital Technologies in the Classroom

Beliefs are psychological concepts that have been discussed in mathematics education research for many years. They are considered to be highly relevant for mathematical teaching–learning processes as emphasized by Goldin et al. ( 2009 ) in their well-known quote:

“To sum up, beliefs matter. Their influence ranges from the individual mathematical learner and problem solver and the classroom teacher, to the success or failure of massive curricular reform efforts across entire countries.“ (p. 14)

Despite the many publications in this area, there is no standard definition of the term belief, leading Pajares ( 1992 ) to speak of a messy construct. The common ground of the different definition approaches is that they attribute both an affective and a cognitive component to beliefs (Dilling, 2022 ; Furinghetti & Pehkonen, 2002 ). For this article, we use Schoenfeld's ( 1992 ) approach, who defines beliefs as "an individual's understandings and feelings that shape the ways that the individual conceptualizes and engages in mathematical behavior" (p. 358). Beliefs, along with other factors (knowledge, heuristic strategies, control decisions), guide a person's behavior in mathematical situations: "Beliefs establish the context within which resources, heuristics and control operate" (Schoenfeld, 1985 , p. 45).

Frank ( 1985 ) elaborates on the guiding role of beliefs described by Schoenfeld by explaining that a person's mathematical beliefs act as a kind of filter. Previous experience and knowledge can only influence behavior through beliefs. In addition, motivation and needs are often related to the beliefs. Thus, beliefs serve to structure perception and guide behavior (cf. Törner, 2002 ). The experiences of a person and the developed beliefs form a reciprocal relationship. On the one hand, experiences cause and form beliefs. On the other hand, the developed beliefs serve to structure the experiences and thus to guide the behavior (cf. Spangler, 1992 ).

A person's beliefs are not isolated mental components. Instead, it is assumed that beliefs are structured in so-called belief systems. This term was introduced by Thomas F. Green in his book The Activities of Teaching (Green, 1971 ). He distinguishes between three dimensions of belief systems.

The first dimension is the "quasi-logical structure" (p. 44), which is the arrangement of beliefs in a belief system in the sense that some beliefs depend on other beliefs. Green makes a distinction between primary and derived beliefs. The derivation of one belief from another does not follow an objective logical structure but is determined by the individual's belief system.

The second dimension according to Green is given by the "psychological centrality". According to this, some beliefs are more important for a person than others, although the person does not have to be aware of this. Beliefs within a belief system can therefore have different strengths. Green distinguishes between "core beliefs" and "peripheral beliefs" (p. 46). This classification is independent of their quasi-logical structure—accordingly, there does not have to be a correspondence between central and primary beliefs.

In the third dimension, Green describes the cluster structure of belief systems. According to this, beliefs in the belief system are organized in clusters isolated from each other, within which the beliefs are interconnected according to the quasi-logical structure: „[…] we tend to order our beliefs in little clusters encrusted about, as it were, with a protective shield that prevents any cross-fertilization among them or any confrontation between them “ (Green, 1971 , S. 47).

The cluster structure of beliefs helps to explain, why a person may has different contradictory beliefs (cf. Green, 1971 ). Inconsistencies between reconstructed beliefs of individual persons have been found in various empirical studies (e.g., Hoyles, 1992 ; Skott, 2001 ). Hoyles ( 1992 ) explains her findings in terms of the context-bound nature of beliefs, explaining that a person’s beliefs may differ and even contradict depending on the situation. In addition to inconsistencies between beliefs observed in different situations, the literature also widely reports inconsistencies between beliefs explicitly stated by a person, e.g. in an interview situation, and beliefs reconstructed from observations of behavior in practice (e.g., Goldin et al., 2016 ; Philipp, 2007 ). Goldin et al. ( 2016 ) refer to the "dialectic relationship between […] professed beliefs and beliefs inferred by the observed practice". Since both consistencies and inconsistencies were found, the authors assume a connection between explicitly held beliefs and beliefs reconstructed from practice. However, this connection does not have to be linear. This result can be attributed to methodological reasons as well as explained with the help of Green's ( 1971 ) cluster structure.

This article focuses on pre-service mathematics teachers' beliefs about digital technologies using the example of visual programming. Several empirical studies have found that technology-related beliefs significantly influence both the frequency and the quality of the use of digital technologies in the classroom (see overview in Thurm, 2020 ). A major goal of research on beliefs about digital technologies is to identify typical beliefs or belief clusters that are found in a number of different individuals. These typical beliefs and belief clusters can then be used, for example, as a starting point for professional development programs (Thurm & Barzel, 2020 ).

A well-known list of beliefs related to digital technology in mathematics education comes from Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ). Based on a literature review with reference to various empirical studies (including Doerr & Zangor, 2000 ; Duncan, 2010 ; Fleener, 1995 ; Handal et al., 2011 ; Pierce & Ball, 2009 ), they distinguish six groups of beliefs referring to technology use (p. 45):

Beliefs about the role of technology to support discovery learning : “[…] Beliefs about the value of technology to support student exploration of mathematical concepts”

Beliefs about the role of technology to support multiple representations : “[…] Beliefs about the value of technology to dynamically link different forms of representations”

Beliefs about time needed to teach with technology : “[…] Beliefs that teaching with technology requires additional time”

Beliefs about the loss of by-hand skills : “[…] Beliefs about the consequences of technology use on students’ basic by-hand skills like graphing or solving linear or quadratic equations”

Beliefs about mindless working when teaching with technology : “[…] Beliefs that technology use will lead to mindless ‘button pushing’ and is rather a substitute for thinking than a support for understanding”

Beliefs about the time point of technology use : “[…] Beliefs about whether technology should only be used after students have achieved conceptual mastery of the mathematics without technology or whether technology should also be used, for example, at the beginning of the learning process”

While the first two belief groups tend to reflect positive attitudes toward technology in mathematics education, the third through fifth belief groups have more negative connotations (Klinger et al., 2018 ). The last one contains rather neutral beliefs. The individual beliefs are directly related to epistemological beliefs and self-efficacy beliefs. For example, a person who is rather a constructivist is also more likely to see the potential of digital technologies to enhance discovery learning (Thurm & Barzel, 2022 ). In an empirical study, Thurm ( 2020 ) found that technology-related beliefs are determined in particular by epistemological beliefs – an influence in the other direction could not be detected. Klinger et al. ( 2018 ) add two more belief groups:

Beliefs about the principle of shifting: Belief, that “technology is used to execute certain procedures in the mathematics classroom, so that they are not done by hand anymore” (p. 238)

General positive beliefs regarding technology: “[…] General positive beliefs regarding technology, which are not tied to a specific part of mathematical instruction” (p. 239)

In addition to these global beliefs about technology use, there are also empirical studies that survey and classify beliefs about specific types of technology in mathematics education. For example, a study by Dilling and Vogler ( 2022c ) investigated and established beliefs and related descriptors for the use of online platforms in mathematics education. In many cases, these domain-specific beliefs show clear connections to the global beliefs of Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ). For example, beliefs about the time required for teachers in preparation and for students in class can also be found here. At the same time, there are a variety of specific beliefs, for example, concerning a decentralization of instruction, changes in teacher and student roles, and the structured presentation of content.

To summarize this section, it can be stated that beliefs are structured in belief systems and, like other psychological concepts, can be described as situated. Beliefs can refer to different objects and situations of experience and can be formulated in different degrees of specification. This article addresses the beliefs of pre-service mathematics teachers about visual programming. While research on beliefs in the context of digital technology has already surveyed concrete beliefs and belief clusters, as well as produced overarching findings, the context of programming has not yet been empirically investigated. Regarding the clustering of beliefs, there is the question of how superordinate beliefs about digital technologies from previous research unfold in this context and which specific beliefs are added. Dilling and Vogler ( 2022c ) investigated this question for online learning platforms as a digital tool.

Visual Programming in Mathematics Education

The integration of programming into mathematics education has long been discussed in research. As early as 1967, Seymour Papert, Wally Feurzeig, and Cynthia Solomon developed the computer language LOGO and suggested using it as a programming environment for learning mathematics, mathematical problem solving and logical thinking in general (Refvik & Opsal, 2023 ; Solomon et al., 2020 ). The idea was to help students to do mathematics themselves in a constructivist sense and to experience it as a process. The leading paradigm was: “Teaching children to be mathematicians versus teaching about mathematics.” (Papert, 1972 ).

Many empirical studies have been conducted using the Logo programming environment. These have provided many interesting insights into children's mathematical learning and thinking and have shown that Logo can be a useful tool for mathematical education (Yelland, 1995 ). In the field of mathematical problem solving, the case studies by Lawler ( 1981 ), Solomon and Papert ( 1976 ), and Papert et al. ( 1979 ) have shown among others that working with Logo can enhance reasoning and problem-solving skills due to the deep engagement with mathematical problems and planning activities, which could afterwards be transferred to other problem contexts with positive results.

Förster ( 2011 ) also emphasizes the importance of problem solving skills in his remarks on the use of programming in mathematics education, but not with a focus on the logo programming language. He cites the frequently observed difficulties of students at school in solving mathematical problems as a central justification for the use of programming in class. Programming can help by providing a common language, enabling personal experiences, and making it easier to talk about structure, development, and relationships of programs. In addition, programming is also helpful in verifying and evaluating complex mathematical models and promotes the ability to critically examine results. Lehmann ( 2004 ) notes that working methods used in computer science education are often also suitable for mathematics education. In this context, Lehmann describes programming as a process of experimentation and searching for the optimal implementation, despite thorough planning. One works with a solution idea and adjusts it through variations and improvements. This approach also enables the solution of complex mathematical problems by applying experimentation, conjecture, reasoning, and proof.

Kortenkamp ( 2005 ) emphasizes that concepts such as loops, procedures, and especially variables are indispensable and offer some educational opportunities. He stresses that it is just as important to use a programming language to understand these concepts as it is necessary to learn written addition as a structured procedure in primary school. Kortenkamp suggests for programming in mathematics education, not to set the mastery of a specific programming language as the primary goal, but to focus rather on the use of this language to develop an adequate understanding of computer science concepts such as loops, procedures, and variables. Furthermore, he calls for programming to be integrated into the mathematics curriculum as a creative and structuring activity and should therefore also be learned by mathematics teachers.

In this sense, programming can be seen as an adequate way of fostering so-called algorithmic thinking. According to Blannin and Symons ( 2020 ), algorithmic thinking has become a new kind of language:

“Algorithmic thinking invites learners to engage in deep thinking, in rationale, sequential processes, and in solution-testing and review. Learners who develop these skills may have increased opportunities in a wide range of career fields beyond school.” (Blannin & Symons, 2020 , p. 5)

There are numerous definitions of algorithmic thinking. A common definition describes algorithmic thinking as a general ability to use (mathematical) algorithms by recognizing patterns and structures (e.g., Blannin & Symons, 2020 ; Hsu & Wang, 2018 ). Futschek ( 2006 ) describes algorithmic thinking as a pool of skills associated with the construction and understanding of algorithms, i.e., a method for problem solving consisting of precisely defined instructions. He refers, among other things, to the abilities to analyze, specify, and solve problems. For Futschek, algorithmic thinking has a strong creative aspect, namely the ability to construct new algorithms to solve existing problems.

Programming offers a possibility to foster algorithmic thinking (cf. among others Futschek & Moschitz, 2010 ; Kolovou et al., 2008 ; Dilling & Vogler, 2022a ). In this context, it is also common to use the term computational thinking (Fanchamps et al., 2021 ). Lagrange and Laval ( 2023 ) explain that there are different approaches to programming in education and the concept of computational thinking. They distinguish between: ‘(1) the conceptual foundations of programming; (2) the conditions needed for students to develop cognitive abilities through programming; and (3) the value of programming for learning mathematics’ (p. 226). The connection to algorithmic thinking is in the first field – the conceptual foundations of programming. Lagrange and Laval ( 2023 ) show that learning environments for programming can enable both algorithmic and advanced mathematical learning.

When examining the field of visual programming, the introduction of Scratch in 2007 by the MIT Media Lab is considered a milestone, especially for children and adolescents (Resnick et al., 2009 ). Even though there were already approaches to make access to programming and the use of algorithms more accessible (e.g. analogue programming), prior to the availability of tools like Scratch, integrating programming into mathematics education was quite challenging. Students were often required to learn a programming language in order to process mathematical tasks. This required a substantial effort, which could only be managed in conjunction with the (non-mandatory) computer science lessons, as the time required would have exceeded the capacities of the mathematics lessons. However, certain approaches, such as that of Logo, have enabled the syntax of the language to be learnt while working on mathematical tasks. When using visual programming, which is understood in the context of this paper as programming by means of graphical blocks with specific functions, learning a special programming language for mathematics instruction is not necessary. Predefined blocks with codes are arranged in a specific order to control the execution of a program. One example of the integration of visual programming into mathematics lessons is the ScratchMaths project (Noss et al., 2020 ). This project conducted a two-year intervention in English schools to enhance computational thinking among 9–11-year-old students, aligning it with mathematical thinking through carefully structured Scratch programming activities. An independent evaluation of the project, as described by Noss et al. ( 2020 ), has shown that it has a positive impact on the students' mathematical thinking skills. However, ongoing teacher support and professional development are crucial to the successful implementation of ScratchMaths. Many other studies considered Scratch as a tool in mathematics education, especially with a focus on primary education. The results of the studies are mainly positive, but also report some challenges: For example, Rodríguez-Martínez et al. ( 2019 ) found in an intervention study in a six-grade class, that the use of Scratch can enrich the students’ mathematical ideas and computational thinking. Sjöberg et al. ( 2018 ) attended two teachers as they systematically implemented Scratch in primary school maths lessons over a period of two years. The teachers reported that collaboration and verbalising the results in communication were particularly beneficial to the learning of the students, but the learning process with Scratch had to be observed and partly controlled by the teacher in order to elicit genuine mathematical activities. Similar results were also found in a study by Olsson and Granberg ( 2022 ), who examined 10- to 11-year-old students solving geometric problems with Scratch and found that well-prepared general and task-specific questions can help students to overcome complexities of learning mathematics with Scratch.

In a previous case study of the authors of this paper, Dilling et al. ( 2022 ) stated that “[c]oding 3D models using the software BlocksCAD provides an opportunity in math classrooms for students to engage with a wide range of mathematical topics while promoting problem solving skills and algorithmic thinking “ (p. 226). The study observed mathematical problem solving processes using visual programming interfaces for the development of 3D models. That case study looked at the specific task of creating a building block generator. Dilling et al. ( 2022 ) explain how mathematical and computer science skills can be fostered using visual block-based programming environments. Similar results could be generated by a case study of Sáez-López et. al. ( 2016 ) who stated that elementary school students are capable to independently develop and explain code when using visual programming.

Despite these positive developments, it should be noted that the integration of visual programming in the classroom can also entail challenges, as advocated by Kalaš et al. ( 2022 ). Particularly for teachers who are less familiar with both the conceptual foundations of mathematics and programming, implementing visual programming can be a complex task and may impair their ability to effectively design instruction. Therefore, further research and support are needed to ensure that all teachers have the necessary skills and resources to successfully integrate visual programming into their teaching practices (Kalaš et. al., 2022 ).

In this article, we refer to visual programming using Scratch (MIT, 2007 ). Figure  1 shows the user interface of Scratch 3.0. The left-hand pane shows the blocks which can be combined to form a block-based code in the script area in the center of the interface. The right-hand pane shows includes the program preview area. The code illustrated in Fig.  1 , for example, makes the orange cat ask what is 4 plus 2 . The potential user of the program can then type in the answer. Below the program preview, settings for the cat as the main character of the program and for the stage background can be configured.

Programming interface of Scratch

Förster ( 2011 , 2014 ) emphasizes that Scratch offers the advantage of self-explanatory commands, the avoidance of syntax errors, and the support of locating logical errors. Scratch helps to bridge the gap between programming in computer science classes and programming in math classes by using a visual block-based approach. Jatzlau and Romeike ( 2017 ) emphasize that visual block-based programming deviates not only in its user interface but also on a conceptual level from traditional text-based programming. Text-based programming languages, unlike block-based ones, require direct input of code in textual form, with each instruction defined by specific syntax rules. These languages demand a deeper understanding of programming concepts and precise formulation to avoid errors. However, text-based languages like Python or Java offer greater flexibility and allow for more advanced programming concepts. Nonetheless, block-based languages such as Scratch remain popular among beginners due to the possibilities for explorative working and reduction of syntax errors. Students at school or university are empowered to construct algorithms even if they have minimal programming experiences, utilizing graphical symbols (so-called blocks) that represent the essential elements of the programming language.

A previous study of the authors investigated mathematics problem solving in the context of visual programming using Scratch in teacher education at a university in Germany (Dilling & Vogler, 2022d ). This case study involves the analysis of two exemplary problem solving processes of university students. None of the students had any prior experience in visual programming using Scratch. The task was to develop a program that sets two numbers and then asks the user which of the two numbers is larger. Furthermore, feedback for the correctness of a user answer had to be provided automatically by the developed program. In addition, the students were given the task of adapting the program to automatically generate new numbers. In their case study, Dilling and Vogler ( 2022d ) state that the results with respect to Schoenfeld’s ( 1985 ) problem solving categories indicate that students use basic mathematical concepts, such as their knowledge of natural numbers, and at the same time also the required basic computer science skills, such as the understanding of loops, to solve the problems. It became clear that Scratch, the visual programming software used in this study, seemed to encourage a more exploratory approach to programming, as students go through steps to develop an algorithm and implement it in the program at the same time.

As seen in the literature review above, there are already several empirical studies on the fostering of algorithmic thinking through visual programming by students in school. There is also a huge amount of research on teachers’ beliefs about the use of digital technologies in general in mathematics classes. Since the beliefs of teachers can strongly depend on the context, in this case visual programming, there is a clear need for research on how mathematics teachers perceive this issue. Therefore, this article addresses the beliefs (Schoenfeld, 1985 , 1992 ) of undergraduate pre-service teachers about visual programming in mathematics classes. The research questions guiding this article is:

Which beliefs about visual programming in mathematics education can be identified among undergraduate mathematics students in a teacher education program? How can those beliefs be clustered and related to general beliefs about technology in mathematics education?

In the following, a case study, using Yin’s definition ( 2013 ), about the beliefs of undergraduate students at a university in North-Rhein-Westphalia (Germany) about visual programming in mathematics education is presented. The undergraduate students were studying mathematics with a focus on mathematics education to become teachers for middle and high school (for 11–18 year-old students) and were in the third year of their study. The mathematics teacher education program at a German university includes both mathematical and pedagogical seminars. Furthermore, German teachers are trained in two subjects, but none of the students studied computer science as a future teaching subject. The undergraduate students of this study participated in a university seminar on the use of digital technologies in math classes conducted by one of the authors (F. D.). In this seminar, they worked on several digital technologies like 3D printing, Computer-Algebra-Systems, GeoGebra – and also Scratch (MIT, 2007 ) that is focused in this paper. The work with Scratch was one of the main topics of the seminar and was studied in four seminar sessions in a blended-learning format. At the beginning of the unit on Scratch, the students were introduced to the software in detail and took their first steps under the guidance of the lecturer. Subsequently, the students investigated various mathematical problem solving tasks with the use of Scratch on their own. They also created their own programming tasks and discussed the possibility of using visual programming in mathematics classes (Dilling & Vogler, 2022d ). The students documented their task solutions and analyses in a question-guided reflection journal, which forms the data basis for the empirical investigation reported in this section. The students’ written documents are analyzed with a qualitative content analysis (Mayring, 2000 ) in order to answer the research question.

In 4.1, the method of qualitative content analysis according to Mayring ( 2000 , 2010 ) and its conditions are described in detail, in 4.2., the results of the content analysis are presented as a system of belief categories, and in 4.3, these results are discussed with reference to the typical belief systems and belief clusters about digital technology in mathematics education from previous research described in “ Teachers' Beliefs and the Use of Digital Technologies in the Classroom ”. A particular issue being considered in the discussion of the results is how these superordinate beliefs about digital technologies unfold in the specific context of visual programming and which beliefs can be added based on the results of this case study.

Methodology and Conditions

The case study examines the beliefs of undergraduate pre-service teachers about visual programming in mathematics classes. Therefore, written reflection journals of seven undergraduate mathematics students who participated in the seminar described above were analyzed using the method of qualitative content analysis (Mayring, 2000 , 2010 ). In general, this is an interpretative analysis of larger text sets, distinguishing between three basic techniques: summarizing by inductive categorization to arrive at core statements of the text, explicating to clarify unclear passages by referring to the context of the passage, and structuring through deductive categorization to make transverse interpretations in the text material to highlight certain aspects (Mayring, 2010 ). The case study presented in this article aims to structure the undergraduate students’ written reflection journals (research data) and identify their beliefs about the use of visual programming environments in math classes. Since there has been no research on these beliefs of pre-service teachers, as mentioned in “ Teachers' Beliefs and the Use of Digital Technologies in the Classroom ”, the content analysis follows mainly an inductive category formation procedure, a combination of summarizing and structuring the text material. For this purpose, the process model illustrated in Fig.  2 was developed.

Process model of inductive category formation

To describe the type of research data in more detail, an exemplary task that the students worked on and the guiding questions of the reflection journal are presented. In the seminar sessions dealing with Scratch as a visual programming environment, the students worked on problems relating to basic operations in arithmetic, the comparison of two natural numbers, and other problems such as determining the sum of the digits of a natural number, distinguishing between even and odd numbers, and rounding decimal numbers. In addition to these rather simple mathematical tasks as a starting point for mathematical problem solving with Scratch, more complex tasks that focused on undergraduate mathematics were developed by the students. Figure  3 shows an excerpt from a program that was created by a participant in the study. It uses knowledge from the field of number theory. The specific task was as follows:

Create a program that displays an arbitrary natural number larger than one, asks whether it is a prime number or not and returns a response with “correct” or “incorrect”. After each task, a new task should be generated automatically with a different number. Think about different feedback depending on the way in which the wrong answer was given.

Excerpt of a code of a program which uses aspects from number theory to detect, if a given natural number is prime

In order to accomplish this task, a variable ‘x’ is first defined as a random number between 2 and 20. The range of the numbers under consideration can be increased without effort. The program then asks the user whether this number is a prime number. The user should answer with ‘P’ for yes and ‘N’ for no. The variable ‘answer’ is set accordingly as ‘P’ or ‘N’. The program then uses an algorithm to determine whether the number set for ‘x’ is a prime number. For this purpose, a variable ‘i’ is introduced, which is defined as half of ‘x’ rounded down to the next lower natural number. This is followed by a loop in which the variable ‘I’ decreases by one in each iteration. The loop should be executed until “x mod i = 0” applies, i.e. ‘i’ is a divisor of ‘x’. If this applies to a number greater than 1, ‘x’ is not a prime number. However, if the loop only terminates at “i = 1”, ‘x’ has no divisor other than 1 and is therefore a prime number. Depending on the user’s input, i.e. the value of the variable ‘answer’, a suitable response is given by distinguishing between four cases (two possible inputs and two ‘ossibl’ results), whereby only one of these cases can be seen in the excerpt in Fig.  3 . It is interesting that the student inserted the variable ‘i’ in his solution and did not test all numbers smaller than ‘x’ as divisors. With the knowledge that the largest divisor is at most half as large as the number he can roughly reduce the runtime of his program by half. This is particularly interesting when considering very large numbers.

Many of the tasks completed by the students, as shown in the example above, had the aim of creating a program that interacts with the user and provides randomly generated exercises. The idea behind this approach was that the students, in addition to their mathematical knowledge, could also contribute their pedagogical knowledge of assessment and feedback to the task solution. After each task performed with Scratch, the students documented their approach guided by questions in the reflection journal. At the end of the Scratch unit, a written overall reflection was carried out in the journal. The following open questions were to be answered:

In your opinion, which process-related mathematical competencies can be fostered with Scratch? Explain your answer!

What strategies did you use to solve the tasks when you got stuck?

How did you check your developed solutions and how did you check during the solution process whether you were on the “right track”?

Was content-related mathematical knowledge applied to solve the tasks? If yes, which knowledge did you apply?

What connection do you see between computer science and mathematics? In your answer, please refer to visual, block-based programming with Scratch!

A final conclusion: What opportunities and challenges do you see in the use of Scratch in mathematics classes?

The overall reflections in the written journals of the seven undergraduate mathematics students from the seminar constitute the data material for the qualitative content analysis. This selection was performed by taking into account the content richness of the documents. In addition, previous experience with programming should be explained on the first page of the reflection journal. Four students stated that they gained experience with the programming language Python in a previous university seminar. Three students mentioned that they acquired basic programming skills in computer science at school. Except for one student, the students had no experience with Scratch as a visual programming language. Only one of the seven students reported having no prior experience with programming at all.

The inductive category formation was established and the students’ statements of the written reflection journals were defined as the units of analysis. The minimum programming unit is a single formulated sentence (see step 3 in Fig.  2 ). In step 4, the categories were defined as follows: a category describes a belief about the use of Scratch in mathematics classes which can be reconstructed for the student(s) being investigated . As a condition for the formation of a category (see step 5 in Fig.  2 ), there have to be at least two different students holding this belief in order to restrict the number of categories. While steps 2 to 5 (see Fig.  2 ) were conducted by one author, the reanalysis of the data with the developed system of categories (see step 6 in Fig.  2 ) was conducted by each of the three authors. This subsequently provided the opportunity to compare analysis results and make possible revisions of this system of categories.

The results of the qualitative content analysis is presented in the following section by describing the category system that has been developed. In addition, the individual categories are analyzed in more detail, based on interpretations of exemplary students’ statements of the written reflection journals translated by the authors.

Presentation of the Results

The qualitative content analysis described in 4.2 produced the following ten categories:

Increasing importance of algorithms and programming

Challenges associated with the required technological resources

Challenges associated with the time needed to introduce the program interface and its functions

Visual programming offers an introduction to computer science and programming concepts

Visual programming demonstrates relations between mathematics and computer science

Visual programming fosters mathematical competencies of middle and high school students

Visual programming fosters digital competencies of students

Visual programming can request the application of mathematical knowledge

Visual programming enables individual, explorative, and creative working

Sophisticated mathematical topics cannot be treated with visual programming

Each category is now explained with one to three sample statements to show the variety of perspectives of the different belief-categories. The selected individual statements are interpreted in-depth in relation to the category definition by referring to the broader context of the reflection journals of the students. All statements were written in German by the students and were translated into English by the authors of this article.

Increasing importance of algorithms and programming (Category 1)

This category describes the belief that in the context of the ongoing digitization and the increasing importance of algorithms and programming in society and in school, visual programming in mathematics classes is legitimized and important to learn by the students. This sample statement shows this belief in relation to the importance of programming in society:

“It certainly makes sense to familiarize students with programming at an early stage, as this topic is becoming increasingly important in our world.” [Nils]

The student Nils notes this as the last sentence in his reflection journal. It is remarkable that he also expresses some statements beforehand that can be assigned to rather negative beliefs about the use of visual programming in mathematics classes, such as the (potentially) time-consuming introduction of the program interface (see Category 3) and the aspect that not all areas of mathematics classes, esp. more complex mathematical topics, can be treated with Scratch (see Category 10).

The next statement shows this belief with a focus on the importance of algorithms in school:

“Especially in times in which the graphing calculator and dynamic geometry software offer more and more possibilities and classical calculations and algorithms of calculus lessons lose their justification of existence [in the curriculum], the development of algorithms should be in the focus of the lessons instead of the application, as e.g., Danckwerts and Vogel demand it.” [Manuel]

The student Manuel expresses this belief about the increasing importance of learning how to develop algorithms due to the increasing opportunities of software used in mathematics classes, e.g., graphing calculators with integrated Computer-Algebra-Systems. He later also points out that algorithms are relevant in both subjects, mathematics and computer science. He explains this with reference to mathematical calculations that have an algorithmic character, like determination of extreme values of a function, and also with reference to the role of algorithm in computer programs. In the quote above, he also mentions two German mathematics educators who have been particularly engaged in teaching and learning of calculus at high school level.

Challenges associated with the required technological resources (Category 2)

Category 2 comprises the belief that required technological resources can be seen as a challenge for the implementation of visual programming in mathematics classes. Two sample statements for this category are the following:

“In addition, there may be technical difficulties or a lack of technical capabilities.” [Henri]

This statement comes from the student Henri who also holds the belief that the implementation of visual programming in mathematics classes is time-consuming (Category 3). He also claims that a large proportion of the students has no previous experience with programming. The lack of technical possibilities or difficulties would be added to this, although he does not explain these technical difficulties in more detail. Henri describes himself as a beginner in programming, he has no previous experience with it. At the end of his journal, he states that he does not want to draw a final conclusion about the use of Scratch in mathematics classes because he has too little experience of Scratch and its uses in mathematics classes.

“Challenges to Scratch, on one hand, is that the necessary hardware and software must be available for its use in the classroom, which is not always the case.” [Jens]

Jens notes this challenge in combination with the challenge to provide appropriate tasks for the opportunities that Scratch offers. In his journal, he continues with the simplicity of the visual programming language Scratch and its suitability for interdisciplinary lessons since students can use Scratch to represent mathematical problems. In his opinion, they do not need much prior knowledge from the field of computer science to be able to develop their own programs, but he emphasizes the use of appropriate tasks which provides many opportunities for visual programming in mathematics classes. Thus, it can be assumed that the belief about required technical resources expressed in this category plays a minor role in the belief-system of Jens.

Challenges associated with the time needed to introduce the program interface and its functions (Category 3)

This category is about time needed to introduce the program interface and its functions. Some students in this study see this as a challenge for the use of visual programming in mathematics classes. Two sample statements that underline this belief are the following:

“However, I see more difficulties, which is why I find it very difficult to imagine a meaningful use. It is nearly impossible to introduce the use of Scratch without spending a lot of time, but this time is usually not provided in the curriculum.” [Henri]

This is a statement of the student Henri, who characterizes himself as a beginner in programming as mentioned above. It is interesting that he writes, prior to this statement, that the use of Scratch in mathematics classes allows an alternative approach to mathematical problems and thus offers the possibility to make mathematics classes more varied. He adds that the students develop competencies that are fundamentally important and helpful in mathematics classes. He then comes up with the almost contradictory belief, which emphasizes the time required to introduce Scratch in class, which is not provided in the curriculum. He also claims in the same section that the mathematical learning progress is too small because the mathematical level of the tasks has to be adapted to a lower level, since the majority of the students have no previous experience in programming and can therefore only write simple programs.

“A crucial disadvantage of block-based programming with Scratch is the time required. Introducing students to Scratch’s programming interface might take too much time to illustrate the actual mathematical concepts.” [Nils]

Nils who also holds the belief that in the context of the ongoing digitization and the increasing importance of algorithms and programming in society and in school, visual programming in mathematics classes is legitimized (Category 1) and many other rather positive belief (Categories 4 to 9) holds the presented belief, which he explicates with emphasis – a crucial disadvantage is the time required. He continues that although Scratch is intuitive, it is still a programming language that students need to understand before they can work with it, so experimenting freely with Scratch would not achieve the intended learning outcome in mathematics classes.

Visual programming offers an introduction to computer science and programming concepts (Category 4)

Category 4 concerns the belief that visual programming offers as an introduction to computer science and programming concepts. This sample statement illustrates this category:

“Scratch is more or less simple due to its blocks, neither teachers nor the students need to know a programming language. So, it can be learned, taught, and used in a relatively simple way. As a teacher it is possible to provide the students with various tasks in a simple way. In addition, one can also give the student the task to develop their own programs and suitable tasks, since they do not need to know programming language as well, neither if they should write a program themselves nor if they are to examine a program for its correctness.” [Jens]

The student Jens holds this rather positive belief. He emphasizes in this statement that Scratch due to its block-based language is easy to learn for both teachers and students. He explains that it is easy for the teacher to give the student various tasks to complete. He mentions these two task variants: the development of one’s own program and the examination of a given program for correctness.

“Furthermore, I would like to state that this program shows large potential particularly for younger grades. It concerns namely a child-oriented programming language, which gets along without the memorization of commands and structures. The simple combination of blocks is already possible for younger students, so that they can also quickly achieve their first successes. This is also an advantage in that mathematics can […] inspire students for computer science.” [Benjamin]

This statement is mentioned by Benjamin who emphasizes the potential of Scratch to introduce younger students to programming and computer science. He describes the simple combination of blocks instead of complex written commands and structures which would be necessary for text-based programming. He notes that younger students can quickly succeed in creating a program and thus get excited about computer science.

“Scratch is a simple form of programming. Through the blocks it is […] as a start very nicely usable, because it shows the functionality, especially of the ’if, else’ blocks nicely, which play a huge role in programming.” [Larissa]

Larissa emphasizes the block-based language which can be used to introduce students to computer science and programming. It should be mentioned that this student also holds the belief that is assigned to category 1 because she says that she considers the development of simple programs and algorithms to be very important in the mathematics education of students, especially regarding digitization.

Visual programming demonstrates relations between mathematics and computer science (Category 5)

This category describes the belief that visual programming demonstrates relations between mathematics and computer science. For example, students in this case study stated:

“Above all, the logical structure is a similarity between computer science and mathematics. The individual blocks must follow one another in Scratch in a meaningful way so that the algorithm works and the program produces the correct output. In mathematics, logical reasoning is also used. Here, too, you must proceed step by step, for example when doing proofs, to be able to achieve results or to derive tasks. The structure of a working program runs thus similarly to the deduction of mathematical conclusions.” [Nils]

This is noted by Nils who was quoted in the description of category 1 as well. In the quote above, he explains the logical structure as a similarity between computer science and mathematics which becomes recognizable through the work with Scratch. He reports that blocks in Scratch must be arranged in a meaningful way so that the algorithm works, and the program produces the correct output. He also refers to the role of logical reasoning in mathematics. He compares the structure of a working program in computer science with the structure of a proof – a deduction of mathematical conclusions. He emphasizes the steps that must logically follow each other, which is important in both disciplines – in a mathematical proof and in a working program in computer science. However, it should be critically noted that an axiomatic approach and logical deductive proofs for the development of a mathematical theory cannot be regarded as equivalent to a sequence within an algorithm.

“In programming, many mathematical operators are used. Many blocks in Scratch are based on operators like = , < , > , … that compare values of variables. These variables are often defined numbers. This can be used, for example, to code how often a loop should be run.” [Nils]

In this statement, Nils explains that many blocks in Scratch are based on mathematical operators and that variables are used in programming. It is evident that the belief that visual programming demonstrates relation between mathematics and computer science is a very elaborated belief of Nils.

Visual programming fosters mathematical competencies of students (Category 6)

Category 6 covers the belief that the use of visual programming in mathematics classes fosters mathematical competencies of students. Process related competencies – modelling, problem solving, reasoning, and representing/communicating – are addressed by the undergraduate mathematics students investigated in this study. Here, the undergraduate students mostly refer to the core competencies listed in the German educational standards for mathematics (KMK, 2022 ). The following sample statements show this belief regarding problem solving, communicating, and reasoning:

“Mathematical problems can be worked on and solved by developing programs. A program must be created in small steps. This leads to the fact that the students must get involved exactly in the mathematical problem and have to think about it to the smallest detail. A programming interface also allows for systematic trial and error. By simply running the algorithm you have created, you can see how far you have progressed and how changes to the algorithm effect the output value or result. By reflecting on the output values, insights into mathematical relationships can be gained.” [Nils]

This statement as well as the following one describing the belief that visual programming fosters mathematical competencies is written by the student Nils who was already mentioned in the categories 1 and 5. He describes that creating programs with Scratch fosters solving mathematical problems. This belief does not seem to be independent of the procedure in the seminar, in which the students, as explained in 4.1, were supposed to create programs for different mathematical problems. In the following statement, he explicitly addresses the point that the programs represent his own process of thinking:

“A program is a great way to illustrate your own processes of thinking. By sharing their code with each other, students can meaningfully report on their procedures. This also promotes the use of technical, subject-specific language used in mathematics and computer science.” [Nils]

Nils considers the sharing and discussion of programs in mathematics classes with other students and the reporting on their own approaches and procedures as fostering communication and the use of technical, subject-specific language.

“If the students find a problem in their calculation through Scratch, they have to find the problem in their solution and solve it. Or, if they do not find an error in their calculation, they have to find the problem in the program code. Even if this is not easy, depending on the program code, the students learn to argue why their solution is correct. Their task is to justify why their solution must be correct and therefore the program’s solution must be wrong. So, they learn to reason mathematically, to justify, and to solve problems. From this point of view, it might even be conceivable to include an extra error I ’the program code to challenge the students in these competencies.” [Jens]

The student Jens expresses the belief that reasoning and problem solving as mathematical competencies can be fostered with the use of Scratch in mathematics classes by explaining that the students learn to argue, e.g. in situations in which they calculated a different solution or output value than the program and they have to justify why their program includes an error and not their calculation without the computer. To challenge the students’ competency of reasoning, Jens supposes the idea to include extra errors in the program code.

Visual programming fosters digital competencies of students (Category 7)

This category contains the belief that the implementation of visual programming in mathematics classes fosters digital competencies of students like analyzing programs and their possibilities of application and using digital tools efficiently. These two sample statements highlight this category:

“The Media Literacy Guidelines of North Rhine-Westphalia demand precisely this characteristic, that digital tools are not only used, but also reflected critically. In my opinion, this skill can also be learned and developed with such Scratch algorithms. In this way, one can evaluate the quality of different programs and derive the relevance of the application. This can then be transferred to digital technology in general in a subsequent step.” [Benjamin]

Benjamin refers to a guideline of the government of a German state which emphasizes that digital tools should not simply be used by students in class, but that their functionality should also be discussed critically and explored in detail. Benjamin believes that this can be achieved by developing algorithms with Scratch, e.g., students can evaluate the quality of different programs.

“Another competency of the students is that they learn how to use tools. This primarily involves the use of digital tools. The students can learn to use digital resources or tools efficiently with the right tasks in the right context. So, in terms of the question, what do I calculate in my head, what do I have to calculate digitally? Or also, does the solution of the digital calculator fit to the task or can I already determine that this solution can’t be correct by estimating. If it is not correct, were my inputs correct? With Scratch, the students can also learn how to use tools – in this case digital tools.” [Jens]

Jens also refers to the reflective use of digital tools that can be learned through the implementation of Scratch in mathematics classes. He mentions that students learn to evaluate for which tasks (in mathematics classes) the use of digital tools is appropriate.

Visual programming can request the application of mathematical knowledge (Category 8)

Category 8 outlines the belief that the use of visual programming in mathematics classes can request the application of mathematical knowledge. The following two statements are written by Benjamin. He describes a program solution to the problem of multiplication and a program solution to the comparison of two natural numbers.

“[…] the product of two numbers is to be formed. The first variant was on the one hand not mathematically demanding and on the other hand the multiplication function in Scratch could be used directly. For this part, the same evaluation applies as for the previous task. The second variant of this task is different. In this case, the multiplication function should be omitted. This then already requires a little mathematical knowledge. This is due to the fact that one must consider how to carry out the multiplication differently. This is not a big mathematical hurdle, but the idea that multiplication can also be expressed by addition must first be found. Thus, there is definitely a mathematical claim here.” [Benjamin]

In this description of the program that forms the product of two numbers, he explains that for some steps of programming there are blocks given in Scratch, which directly fulfill the intended function of the program to be created. But when, for example, one should modify the program so that one special block is not used, the user is encouraged to think about how the multiplication can be expressed differently in mathematics.

“Comparing two numbers is easy and does not require great mathematical skills. It is the same with the implementation. Since again only pre-installed functions are used, the mathematical requirement is limited. It is different again with the second subtask. Here a method must be developed how to compare three numbers with each other. This is an easy difference to calculate, but the idea requires a little mathematical understanding.” [Benjamin]

According to Benjamin’s second statement, these different levels of the application of mathematical knowledge that is required can also be transferred to the task in which at first a program is to be developed that compares two numbers regarding their size. Afterwards, one should develope a program that compares three numbers with each other. For this second task, the user must change the procedure and will need a mathematical understanding of the topic.

“Furthermore, the knowledge of the arrangement of the natural numbers was important. On the one hand, this was necessary in task 2 to write the required program. On the other hand, I could create the ≠ relation with the help of the = , < and > relations. For this I needed the knowledge of the trichotomy, which results from the order of the natural numbers.” [Nils]

Nils explicitly lists the mathematical knowledge required for the development of the programs with Scratch that is demanded by the tasks from the seminar. For example, he mentions knowledge about the trichotomy which is required to create the ≠ relation with the blocks in Scratch.

Visual programming enables individual, explorative, and creative working (Category 9)

This category describes the belief that the implementation of visual programming in mathematics classes enables individual, explorative, and creative working of the students. This sample statement demonstrates this category:

“Block-based programming offers the chance to foster the mathematical creativity of the students. By creating their own programs, students can create something new.” [Nils]

Nils writes in this statement that visual programming fosters the mathematical creativity of the students, he emphasizes that they can create something new by developing their own programs. He is referring to the individual and creative work that in his opinion is enabled by using Scratch.

“I would like to take a look at the independent development of such algorithms. In my opinion, there is also an immense potential. It must be considered that the creation of such ideas and the occupation with it usually let one think deeply. You deal with the content in more detail than when solving normal tasks. This is the largest potential of the creation of new Scratch-algorithms.” [Benjamin]

This is written by the student Benjamin. He points out that the creation of algorithms and the occupation with them leads to very in-depth thinking. In his opinion, the students would deal with the (mathematical) content in class in more detail in comparison to solving regular tasks of mathematics classes. It is to be mentioned that a view into the programs Benjamin developed in the seminar and his comments on his development processes show that he has dealt with the contents of the tasks and possible solution approaches in Scratch particularly in-depth.

“The programmer is enabled to realize and modify his own ideas. Even if programming is not yet so well-known [by the students], Scratch offers the possibility to test and experiment through the various given blocks.” [Jana]

The belief that visual programming enables individual, explorative, and creative working can also be reconstructed for Jana. She especially addresses the experimental approach made possible by the program interface of Scratch. The programmer, in her opinion, is enabled to realize and modify his own ideas of algorithms.

Sophisticated mathematical content cannot be treated with visual programming (Category 10)

This last category covers the belief that sophisticated mathematical content cannot be treated with Scratch. The belief is illustrated by the following two statements of the students:

“Especially for more difficult mathematical tasks such as more complicated calculations, tasks from geometry or graphical function investigations, there are better programs that can perform these tasks more efficiently (GeoGebra, Sage etc.).” [Jens]

This statement is written by Jens. He sees a clear limitation to the use of Scratch in mathematics classes and addresses programs such as GeoGebra and Sage, which could be used to perform complex calculations more efficiently. He emphasizes that Scratch is especially suitable for simpler (mathematical) tasks.

“[...] for more complex topics, I think the use of Scratch is inappropriate. Middle school students might benefit from block-based programming in some topics. High school students, however, take more complex material that is not easy to code.” [Nils]

In this statement, Nils also addresses more complex (mathematical) topics for which he does not consider the use of Scratch to be appropriate. He emphasizes that middle school students might benefit from visual programming.

Discussion of the Results

As described in the previous section, ten different belief categories were identified by applying the qualitative content analysis according to Mayring ( 2000 , 2010 ), which were expressed by the investigated seven university students of mathematics education in their reflection journals. Most of the beliefs are associated with a positive attitude towards visual programming in mathematics education. For example, category 1 emphasizes the importance of algorithms and programming for the digital society but also specifically for teaching and learning in the digital age. Other more positive beliefs refer to computer science, including category 4 on the introduction to computer science concepts and category 5 on the illustration of productive relationships between mathematics and computer science through visual programming. Another three positive groups of beliefs refer to fostering students’ competencies in process related mathematical skills such as problem solving (category 6), digital literacy (category 7), and to the application of mathematical content knowledge (category 8) when working with visual programming environments such as Scratch. Finally, category 9 refers to the specific way of working with visual programming and the associated methodological possibilities for teaching and learning mathematics.

In addition to these rather positive beliefs or groups of beliefs, it is also possible to find beliefs that refer to the limits and challenges of using visual programming in mathematics classes and thus have more negative associations. A challenge is seen in the required technical resources, which are not sufficiently available at every school (category 2). In addition, the time needed to introduce visual programming in the classroom is seen as a problem and is perceived as too long (category 3). Finally, the students identify limitations of visual programming when it comes to the representation of more complex mathematical topics. They see the use of Scratch rather for simpler mathematical content like mathematics in middle school (category 10). Although more categories could be identified in the analysis which describe positive statements towards visual programming in mathematics classes, this does not mean that in general more positive attitudes to the topic were held by the students. Certain beliefs such as the problems due to a large time requirement were held with particular emphasis by some students. According to Green ( 1971 ), these beliefs represent core beliefs held by the students while other categories represent more peripheral beliefs.

In general, the students' beliefs are in line with the overall positive picture from the research literature on Scratch in mathematics education, for example with regard to the parallel fostering of mathematical and algorithmic thinking (e.g. Noss et al., 2020 ; Rodríguez-Martínez et al., 2019 ), which is reflected in categories 6 and 7. At the same time, challenges are identified, as in the studies by Sjöberg et al. ( 2018 ) and Olsson and Granberg ( 2022 ).

The different groups of beliefs identified in the context of visual programming have a varying relationship to the general belief clusters about digital technology in mathematics education described in Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ). Three general beliefs could be found in the data material with reference to visual programming. For example, category 3 on ‘Time-consuming introduction of the program interface and functions as a challenge’ largely corresponds to the group ‘Beliefs about time needed to teach with technology’ according to Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ). The group ‘Beliefs about the time point of technology use’ (Thurm & Barzel, 2022 ) can be associated with category 8 ‘Visual programming can request the application of mathematical knowledge’. This category 8 suggests that students working in visual programming environments tend to focus on the application of mathematical knowledge and therefore the practice rather than the introduction of new mathematical topics and concepts. In addition, a connection can be made between category 9 ‘Visual programming enables individual, explorative, and creative working’ and the group ‘Beliefs about the role of technology to support discovery learning’ (Thurm & Barzel, 2022 ), since in both cases student-centered education and an explorative approach to learning are emphasized.

The remaining mathematics related categories highlighting the relevance of algorithms and programming (category 1), the relation to computer science (categories 4, 5), and the opportunities and limitations of fostering students’ competencies (categories 6, 7, 10) are not found in the list of general groups of beliefs established by Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ). However, the rather general group ‘General positive beliefs regarding technology’ according to Klinger et al. ( 2018 ) could be taken as a subordinate category for the programming-specific beliefs. A transfer to other mathematics teaching technologies is conceivable, particularly for the fostering of mathematical and digital competences (categories 6, 7).

Finally, in the qualitative content analysis of the reflection journals, a very general and non-mathematics-specific belief could be identified. This belief emphasizes the required technological resources as a challenge (category 2). Such a general belief was presumably not the focus of the studies examined in Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ). Therefore, it is not found in their listing of belief groups. Thus, several of the belief groups from the meta-study could not be found in this study on beliefs about visual programming, including the beliefs related to the principle of shifting, the loss of by-hand skills, mindless working when teaching with technology, and the role of technology to support multiple representations. An overview of the comparison with general beliefs about digital technologies in mathematics education can be seen in Fig.  4 .

Classification of the categories according to: general beliefs about digital technologies in mathematics education (blue), non-mathematics-specific beliefs about digital technologies in education (yellow) and beliefs specific to (visual) programming or Scratch in mathematics education (green)

In addition to the comparison with the general beliefs about digital technologies in mathematics education, the extent to which the identified belief categories can be transferred to programming in general, in particular to text-based programming, should also be discussed. As the students' in the reflection journals only rarely made comparisons with text-based programming, only hypotheses can be formulated in this regard. The classification is based in particular on the distinction made by Lagrange and Laval ( 2023 ), who distinguish conceptual aspects (e.g. programming and algorithms) from environmental aspects (e.g. a specific programming language or environment). Conceptual aspects occur in particular in the following categories and are therefore possibly transferable to other forms of programming: It can be assumed that the increasing importance of algorithms and programming (category 1), the demonstration of the relations between mathematics and programming (category 5) and the fostering of mathematical and digital competences (categories 6, 7) could also occur in relation to text-based programming or other forms of implementation. On the other side, the following categories reflect more the environmental aspects and might be specific for visual programming or more concrete Scratch: The presentation of sophisticated mathematical topics (category 10) is easier to implement with other programming environments, especially those more aligned to mathematics, such as LOGO or Maple. Therefore, depending on the programming environment used, this category could be omitted. Similarly, the possibility of an introduction to computer science (category 4) is presumably specific to visual programming and does not occur with text-based programming, as these are not specifically designed for educational purposes, as described above and also reflected by the students. The transferability of the results to other block-based programming environments depends on the respective range of functions and the suitability for mathematics, but might be higher than for textual programming.

Conclusion and Outlook

This article focused on the beliefs of undergraduate mathematics education students about visual programming in mathematics classes. Beliefs are affective-cognitive elements that significantly determine the behavior of teachers in the classroom. In relation to the use of digital technologies in mathematics education, different groups of beliefs have already been identified, which are clustered in Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ). In the empirical study of the present article, the aim was to figure out how the beliefs that can be described specifically about the use of visual programming relate to the general beliefs about the use of digital technologies in mathematics education.

For this purpose, a qualitative case study was conducted with seven selected undergraduate mathematics students. The participants of the study participated in a university seminar about the use of digital technologies with a blended-learning unit on the use of Scratch in mathematics over several weeks. Each student wrote a reflection journal on his or her experiences which were analyzed in this study using the method of structuring qualitative content analysis according to Mayring ( 2000 , 2010 ). The following research questions guided this qualitative analysis:

Regarding the first research question, it can be noted that a total of ten categories could be formed that represent beliefs or groups of beliefs referring to the use of visual programming in the mathematics classes. Each of these groups of beliefs was shared by at least two of the students studied, many of the belief categories could be identified for more than two participants. The results of this qualitative study regarding the second research question are more interesting. Only three of the categories identified in this study matched the list of belief groups about digital technologies in mathematics education identified in previous research. While another category had only a marginal connection to visual programming (‘Required technological resources as a challenge’, category 2), the remaining six categories refer specifically to the use of visual programming or Scratch. Five of the belief groups mentioned by Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ) could not be assigned to any of the categories of this study. Therefore, the question arises how such large differences in the identified beliefs can arise.

This question cannot be answered entirely based on the qualitative data from this empirical study. We can only make hypotheses about how this result occurred. One reasonable hypothesis might be the focus of mathematics education research in the past decades on traditional mathematics specific tools such as graphing calculators, computer algebra systems, dynamic geometry software, or spreadsheets. The belief clusters of Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ) apply well to these specific technologies, and it is obvious that they emerged from research on this type of technologies. However, the range of digital technologies used in mathematics education has grown rapidly in recent years. In addition to traditional tools, new mathematics specific digital technologies and learning environments as well as general subject-independent learning technologies are coming to the center of attention. The visual programming discussed in this article using the example of Scratch does not belong to traditional mathematical tools, even though it is an established software in the field of computer science. Thus, it is also not surprising that the belief groups established in previous research are not easily transferable to the use of this digital tool. Furthermore, the results show how a specific learning environment influences the beliefs of teachers: while some of the beliefs expressed by the pre-service teachers concern conceptual aspects of programming, others clearly relate to visual programming and, more specifically, to Scratch (cf. Lagrange & Laval, 2023 ). Another reason for the differences could be the sample group. While the studies by Thurm and Barzel ( 2022 ) and Klinger et al. ( 2018 ) looked at in-service teachers, the participants in this article are pre-service teachers. In-service teachers probably have different beliefs about the opportunities and challenges of visual coding and technology in general due to their school-based practical experience.

The results of the case study can be understood as an impulse for mathematics education research on digital technologies not to focus only on traditional digital tools for mathematics education, but to include the changed conditions concerning the range of digital technologies. An example of such a switch to innovative digital technologies is shown in the dissertation of Saunders ( 2022 ), who investigates how to describe the knowledge of primary school teachers for teaching mathematics through programming.

The case study in this paper could only take a first step towards this goal, which was to highlight the relevance of different forms of digital technologies for mathematics education and to explicate the differences in undergraduate mathematics education students’ beliefs in the context of visual programming. However, the study has some limitations, so there is a strong need for further research in this area. The study was only able to examine seven participants due to the in-depth qualitative analysis. Considering this, it seems important to explore larger numbers of participants in further studies and possibly conduct a standardized quantitative survey of beliefs. For this purpose, the results of the present case study can form a useful basis. In addition, it would be interesting to shift the focus from undergraduate students as pre-service teachers to in-service teachers to be able to include the participants’ practical experiences to a greater extent. Furthermore, a longer intervention would be useful, including the actual use of Scratch in classroom practice. Another difficulty of the case study design lies in the dependency relationship between the students studied and the researchers conducted the study that might have led to socially desirable responses by the students. A final limitation is the use of Scratch as a programming environment. Scratch is very popular in the field of education, but it only allows limited mathematical operations, especially in the context of undergraduate mathematics. As can be read in the discussion section, the use of another mathematics-specific programming environment could also produce other belief categories. The results should therefore not be transferred directly to other areas in the context of programming in mathematics education.

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Dilling, F., Köster, J. & Vogler, A. Beliefs of Undergraduate Mathematics Education Students in a Teacher Education Program about Visual Programming in Mathematics Classes. Int. J. Res. Undergrad. Math. Ed. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40753-024-00248-0

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