Fatal and non-fatal flaws in early-career researchers’ conference abstracts

Submitting papers to conferences can be an effective way for early career researchers (ECRs) to gain exposure, receive feedback, create collaborations, and advance their careers in their field. However, top venues are extremely competitive, and require the submission of a high-quality abstract to be accepted to the conference. For instance, the conference of the European Second Language Association (EuroSLA) has an acceptance rate of around 50%, while its doctoral workshops (aimed specifically at ECRs undertaking doctoral research) have an acceptance rate of about 43%. This study sets out to facilitate early-career researchers’ journey to conference acceptance and to increase the quality of the submitted abstracts. We analysed 315 reviewer comments and identified fatal and non-fatal flaws. The results showed that 35% of variance in the rejection of abstracts was explained by flaws in such abstract sections as novelty, insufficient description of study design for its comprehension, clarity and style, research rationale, literature review, and feasibility and focus. This study provides implications and offers suggestions not only for ECRs wanting to apply for the EuroSLA doctoral workshops, but also for ECRs submitting abstracts to conferences more widely.