1TheMostCommonHabitsfrommorethan200EnglishPaperswrittenbyGraduateChineseEngineeringStudentsByFeliciaBrittmanThispaperpresentssomeofthemostcommonChinese-EnglishhabitsobservedfromovertwohundredEnglishtechnicalpapersbyChinesewriters.Thehabitsareexplainedandinmostcases,exampletextfromanactualpaperisgivenalongwithpreferredtext.Anattemptismadetoexplainhowtocorrectandpreventsuchmistakes.Insomecasesapossibleexplanationofwhythehabitoccursisalsogiven.ThispapercanserveasanindividualguidetoeditingtechnicalpapersespeciallywhenanativeEnglish-speakingeditorisunavailable.IntroductionMostChineseuniversitiesrequiretheirdoctoralandmastercandidatesintechnicalandscientificfieldstopublishatleastoneEnglishpaperinaninternationaljournalasadegreerequirement.However,manyfactorsmakethistaskdifficulttoaccomplish.First,previousEnglishstudiesmaynothavefocusedenoughonwriting,letalonetechnicalwriting.CurrentstudiesmaynotincludeEnglish,causingthewritersEnglishfluencyleveltodecline.Second,mostwritershaveneverlivedinanEnglish-speakingcountry.Third,duetothespecialaspectsoftechnicalwriting,evennativeEnglish-speakingengineeringstudentshaveatechnicalwritingcourseaspartoftheirstudy.Toooften,students’papersarereturnedunacceptedbecauseofpoorEnglish.Ifavailable,studentsmayhavetheirpaperseditedbyanativeEnglishspeaker.However,thiscangetexpensiveforadepartmentthathasmanystudentswitheachpapertypicallyneedingtobeeditedtwice.Hiringsomeonetoeditpapersisdifficult,costlyandonlyputsapatchovertheproblem.AnativeEnglishspeakercandoagoodjobatgettingridofmostofthegrammaticalmistakes.However,ifthispersondoesnothaveatechnicalbackground,particularlyintheareaofthepapersheisediting,heisunabletogetridofallofthemistakesandmakesurethatthemeaningisclear.Hecannotrecognizetheincorrecttranslationoftechnicaltermsforwhichthereisastandardword.Suchmistakeswillnotbepickedupbytheprocessor’sspellingandgrammarchecker.Inaddition,iftheyarenotfamiliarwiththetopicorfield,theymaynotgraspthemeaningoftheentirearticleandfailtomakecriticaledits.Hi...
