WAMAAANG! (Why All Made-up Acronyms and Abbreviations Are Not Good)

This is quite a short post. But I could have made it even shorter by coining some new acronyms and abbreviations. By shrinking several words down into one (sort-of) word, I could have saved space and time while slowing the rate at which overuse is wearing the letters off my keyboard and – better yet – reducing my risk of repetitive-strain injury. Surely nothing there not to like?

Abbreviation or acronym?

First off, a very quick primer for the uninitiated and those who have never been sufficiently interested to ask Google. The terms ‘abbreviation’ and ‘acronym’ are quite often used interchangeably, but they actually have different (albeit related) meanings. Abbreviations in this context are contractions of multiple-word names, phrases or other terms, comprised of each word’s first letter. So MND is a commonly-used abbreviation of motor neurone disease. Acronyms are a special class of such abbreviations that can be – and normally are – spoken as words. Chat to someone about Donald Trump’s antipathy towards “en ay tee oh”, for example, and they’ll probably just stare at you blankly. But mention your worries about Trump’s lack of commitment to his NATO allies and they’ll at least understand what you’re on about, even if they’re at odds with your political stance.

Good writing style – conventions when abbreviating

First, consider only using an abbreviated form at all if you’re going to repeat the term three times or more. The accepted convention when using an abbreviation or acronym is to introduce it on first use by writing it out in full, followed by its abbreviated form in brackets. Thereafter, just use the abbreviated form. Decide whether the term and its abbreviation need to be introduced just once at the start of the document, or perhaps at the start of each new section.

The above holds true unless the name or term in question is better known and more frequently referred to in its abbreviated form – for example the BBC or the NHS. For abbreviations like these, just use them as they are from the outset.

To abbreviate or not?

If the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation can turn itself into a nice punchy acronym, why shouldn’t we get in on the action and come up with a few abbreviations of our own? After all, it gets so boring typing the same thing over again, and shortening it would make valuable savings to word-count and document length.

However, research proposals are generally not an easy read. Even for a subject expert, it’s likely that your proposal will introduce some new ideas or approaches that may take a bit of effort to get to grips with. For readers whose expertise lies in another area, the path to understanding will be even more of an uphill journey. And for the lay reader (who may also be involved in evaluating your proposal), it can be very heavy going. But it’s impossible for anyone to evaluate a proposal if they don’t understand it, so you must do everything in your power to make it as clear and easy to read as possible. It’s vital not to commit any crimes against readability that will annoy the reviewer, who may already be tired and a bit fed up with reading proposals.

So in a proposal whose main focus is motor neurone disease, for example, it’s probably not asking too much of the reader to switch to the abbreviated ‘MND’ once it has been introduced. They’re reasonably unlikely to forget what it means, even if they weren't previously familiar with it. But in a proposal on, say, eating-disorder behaviours which includes multiple references to ‘restrictions against whole categories of food’ and ‘new practices with food or fad diets’, I would strongly advise against minting a couple of new abbreviations – RAWCF (almost an acronym!) and NPFFD – just to save yourself a few words. Your reader, who may already be struggling with a complex topic, is highly unlikely to remember what each means and won’t thank you for having to scroll back up though your document repeatedly to remind themselves. Each time they’re forced to do this they’ll become a bit more distracted and a bit less patient. This won’t increase your chances of a favourable review.

There’s at least one other person out there who agrees with me on this. In 2010 Elon Musk, well known for his forthright all-company emails (among other things), wrote the following in an email titled ‘Acronyms Seriously Suck’ (see what he did there?):

“There is a creeping tendency to use made up acronyms at SpaceX. Excessive use of made up acronyms is a significant impediment to communication and keeping communication good as we grow is incredibly important.”

Succinctly put. Maybe my blog post only really needed to be a couple of lines long?

A few final thoughts

My aim here is not to put you off using shortened forms, just to plead for sanity in their use. But while I’m here, there are a couple of other things I need to get off my chest…

Some abbreviated terms are proper nouns – for example names of organisations. So of course use capitals when writing them out in full. But just because the abbreviated form is made up of capital letters, there’s no automatic requirement to use title case when writing out the long form. Motor neurone disease really doesn’t need caps, for example.

Steer clear of full stops after each letter. It’s something of an archaic practice and no one really does it any more. If you’re pluralising an abbreviation, use a lower case ‘s’ – and for the love of all that’s holy please don’t precede it with an apostrophe!

When deciding whether to use ‘a’ or ‘an’ before an abbreviation, go with your internal voice (or try reading it aloud). ‘Future Leaders Fellowship’ takes an ‘a’, but ‘an FLF’ is so much more comfortable than 'a FLF' when you read it either out loud or in your head.

Finally, don’t bother introducing an abbreviation or acronym at all if you’re not going to use it again – that just wastes space and the reader's time.

So if I’ve converted you to my cause and you want to find out more about best practice when using acronyms and abbreviations, then this blog post about the well-regarded the American Psychological Association style guide is a good starting point.

The views and opinions expressed in this blog are mine alone and are in no way endorsed by my employer. Factual information and guidance are provided on a 'best-endeavour' basis and may become out of date over time. No responsibility can be taken for any action or inaction taken or not in respect of the content of this blog.