Whenever you write, it is important to remember that somebody will read your writing. This seems a very obvious point to make, but it is surprisingly easy to forget. And when you do forget, it is easy to write something that is really boring, and something that you would never say to another person if you were speaking to them.
This is especially important when you are writing the details part of a paragraph. On this page we will look at how you can write details that are interesting to your reader.
Let's first look at what might go wrong with writing details in a paragraph:
One: Not writing details at all
I have seen some students simply restate their supporting ideas when they should be writing details. Here's an example (underlined):
First, an ideal community should have safe streets. If the streets are safe, they community will be much better.
This is bad because it wastes the reader's time. The second sentence is just a repetition of the first one.
Two: Writing boring, general details
A more common problem is students thinking "Oh, I just need to write SOMETHING here. It doesn't really matter what it is." This often leads to writing details that the reader could easily think of themselves, which makes your writing rather boring to read. Here's an example on the same theme as the previous one (again underlined).
First, an ideal community should have safe streets. For example, the local government should install streetlights and CCTV cameras to reduce crime.
Again, the second sentence is a bit of a waste of the reader's (and writer's) time. While they are relevant examples of how to make streets safer, streetlights and CCTV were the first two examples that I could think of, and I'm sure the same is true for most of you. So nobody has really learned anything from this sentence that they didn't know already.
Now, let's look at how you can be more interesting.
We can break down what you need to do into two parts: narrating examples, and explaining.
For narrating examples, the best thing you can do is try to choose examples that reader can't easily imagine themselves. You can do this by using your own experiences, either direct (you were actually there) or indirect (you read or heard about it or watched it).
As you write it, remember that you have the experience in your head but the reader doesn't, so you need to tell them enough for them to recreate it in their imagination. And, you need to tell them the specifics of your experience, so that they don't just imagine a boring, generic experience.
Then, you need to show you can think about your examples by explaining how they connect to your ideas. Again, this will be much more interesting if you can discuss the specifics of your idea.
I wrote the paragraph below on the Summary-Response page. But now I look again, it is not very interesting. Read it first and see if you can see why.
In my life, I think I have too much dopamine-driven happiness, and not enough serotonin-driven contentment. My phone causes me big problems with dopamine. I have read a lot about how smartphone apps play on dopamine release, for example when one of my Instagram photos gets a lot of likes, or when I get a new achievement in a game. These are like the "accomplishments" mentioned in the article. However, this leads to my feeling very up-and-down all the time. When the opposite happens and there are not many likes or I am struggling with a game, I can feel very depressed. With this in mind, I think I need to work on my serotonin-driven happiness more. The article talks about it helping to "regulate our mood" which I can see is exactly what I need. So, this week, I am going to try to leave my phone at home and go out for a walk in nature for an hour a day. I hope that reducing my dopamine release and increasing my serotonin release will help me to feel a more stable kind of happiness.
Did you get it? Look at the examples I used. Instagram likes, game achievements, walk in nature. This could be anyone, not just me! And because my examples are boring, my explanations are short and rather boring too. Let's try to improve things. I have underlined what I changed.
In my life, I think I have too much dopamine-driven happiness, and not enough serotonin-driven contentment. My phone causes me big problems with dopamine. I often post photos on Instagram for my friends and strangers to see. Once, I tried a new hair spray and my hair looked great, so I went to the park where I live and took a photo sitting on the swing in front of the sunset. I got over 100 likes and I was on a high for several days afterwards. But then I posted another similar photo hoping to get more likes, and only a few of my friends liked it. I got really down and didn't want to leave the house the next day. After reading the article, I can see that the lots of likes causes a huge dopamine release, and then I get down if I can't recreate it all the time. With this in mind, I think I need to work on my serotonin-driven happiness more. The article talks about it helping to "regulate our mood" which I can see is exactly what I need. So, this week, I am going to try to leave my phone at home and go out for a walk in the same park. I promise that I will not take any selfies. Instead, I will just try to enjoy the azaleas that are flowering right now, and the sound of the running water in the fountains. I think this will make me happy in a less intense, serotonin kind of way, so that when it goes away, I won't be seeking another hit of dopamine.
Now this is an experience specific to me, and the reader is much more engaged in imagining exactly what I went through. In addition, it gives me much more specific ways to explain about the links between my experiences and the dopamine and serotonin. I'm not sure how you felt reading it, but I feel it is now a much more satisfying paragraph.