Summary Vs. Synthesis, Part I: The Dos and Don'ts of Summarizing

In academic writing, summarizing and synthesizing are distinct but similar skills. In this two-part series, the Graduate Writing Center defines these skills and offers insight into how and when to use them effectively.

So, you have to write a paper that asks for both summary and synthesis, but what does that even mean? What is the difference between the two? Synthesizing and summarizing can be daunting—or even frustrating! However, once you get the hang of it, your writing will have more focus, increased credibility, better organization, and a stronger authorial voice. While the two skills often go hand in hand, first let’s consider summarizing.

Summary

Summary takes the key pieces or main ideas from a source and puts them into your own words in a condensed form. A good summary can range from a few sentences to a few pages, depending on the length, topic, and the scope of the source you’re summarizing.

Generally speaking, you want a summary to be as short as possible. In an academic paper, a summary is recommended to be no more than 300-400 words—or 5%-10% of the length of the original source material. It should be long enough to give the reader adequate context to understand the topic but not so long that it detracts from the overall content or argument of your paper.

One good example of summary is found in an annotated bibliography, which is a list of sources that describes each entry with a brief but descriptive paragraph (i.e., an annotation). Going beyond a list of references, the annotated bibliography summarizes each of its sources by highlighting key points and explaining their relevance to the topic at hand.

In academic writing, the need to summarize appears often. A summary can be helpful when you want to tell the reader more about a source (or sources) in order to help familiarize them with the topic. Also, a summary works well when you’re introducing new information to the reader. Of course, there are other good reasons to summarize, but these are perhaps the most common.

What to Include in a Summary

What you include in a summary will largely depend on what kind of source you are using and what you need the reader to know about that source. However, a typical summary might include information about the characters, plot, and setting in a fictional source or information about how a study was conducted, who the participants were, and what the results showed in a nonfiction source (“ Summary, Synthesis, and Analysis of Sources,” n.d.).

How to Know if Your Summary Is Too Short or Too Long

Generally, a summary should be between one paragraph to one page long, depending on the text that is being summarized and your individual writing topic. While there are no specific rules about how long a summary should be, your summary should be long enough to cover the main ideas of the original source material without confusing the reader.

When writing a summary, it is important to know your audience and have an idea of what information they already know, what information they still need to know, and what the most important thing(s) you would like them to know is/are. If your summary is confusing to the reader and does not include all of the information that they need to know to understand the topic, your summary is not long enough.

However, your summary might be too long if it describes details that aren’t relevant to your overall point, if it repeats details, if it distracts the reader from the point you’re trying to make, or if it exceeds more than a few paragraphs.

For example, if you were writing a summary about the life cycle of a butterfly, you wouldn’t want to include long descriptive paragraphs about what they eat, where they live, or what predators they typically encounter. You would want to focus most of your writing on how the caterpillar transitions into a chrysalis and then into a butterfly and would only include brief explanations about diet and habitat. Your summary might also include a definition for the word “chrysalis” if you knew that your audience didn’t know what the word meant.

For more in-depth information on how to write a summary, see “ Academic Summary,” a chapter in the book First-Year Composition by Leslie Davis and Kiley Miller (n.d.).

Dos and Don’ts of Summarizing

Do…

• Select and restate the most important points and include any relevant information from the source
• Remember that finding the most important points depends on the source and how it relates to your individual topic, so a few things to look for when summarizing a source could include…
  • The main thesis or argument
  • Topic sentences that highlight the main idea in individual paragraphs
  • The strongest supporting evidence for the author’s claims
  • The main characters and plot points if summarizing a fictional piece
  • The takeaway or conclusion (the reason for why the source is important or relevant)
  • Relevant quotes if they are important to the summary

Don’t…

• Tell the reader what the information means or how to interpret it
• Include any personal opinions or unrelated information
• Overuse quotes, as most of the summary should be in your own words

References

• Davis, L., & Miller, K. (n.d.). Academic Summary. Colorado State University.
• Summary, synthesis, and analysis of sources. (n.d.). Brigham Young University Research and Writing Center.

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