Debrief on Applied Improv for Academic Surgeons: One Word at a Time Research Titles

Picture used with permission. Not all participants pictured.

This past month, I facilitated a series of workshops for the academic surgeons of the Surgical Outcomes & Quality Improvement Center (SOQIC) at Northwestern University.

I altered the one word at a time story improv exercise to a one word at a time research title. For a group whose focus is writing research papers and titles, I thought it would be worth playing with titles, saying “yes, and” to each other’s ideas.

The group gave themselves topics, both medical and general, and created the below made-up research titles:

A New Strategy for Determining Characteristics of Food-Related Risk for Patients Following Appendectomy

Novel Treatments for Patients With Extensive Cardiac Disease Including Cardiac Arrhythmia

Elephants: Trunk Length Effect on Preferences for Peanut Consumption

Association Between Sunshine and Happiness Following Farmers’ Consumption of Peanuts: Qualitative Study

The Weekend Effect: How Saturday Enhances Production in Efficiency

Stop Sleeping: Impact of Pillows On Restfulness

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In our debrief, we explored questions around:

The well-worn path versus the novel path. Can you be creative in research titles? Why do we think we can’t be creative in our technical writing?

And who the audience is matters. Some scientists prefer to read articles that have straightforward titles (“Don’t be cute,” said one doctor to another). Other scientists prefer to read research articles that have titles that are novel or arresting. Some content dictates that a title be unusual; some content dictates really long titles.

It’s helpful to know how to flex into all of those options and this #appliedimprov exercise helps academic writers feel that flexibility.

An exercise as deceptively simple as one word at a time research title created a lively discussion and discovery about the creative generative process for academic physicians.

Thank you SOQIC at Northwestern University for engaging these #appliedimprov exercises with gusto, thoughtfulness, flexibility, and creativity!