Writing about Causes and Effects

When writing about causes and effects…

Thursday, February 19, 2009

We lead cause-effect lives. One person shops for a new compact car (effect) because he can't afford the gas-guzzler he now owns (cause). Another person finally fits into her new swimsuit (effect) because she's been careful about her diet (cause). Someone else has to deal with the neighbor's barking dog (cause), which has him considering downsizing to a condo (effect).

The workplace is no different. Almost every part of your business life evolves around causes and effects. It is, essentially, what makes things go. Sales are down; you explore the causes and effects and act accordingly. Corporate may add two trainees to your branch; you consider how this might affect daily operations, and so on.

In the same vein, a good deal of business writing involves the analysis of causes and effects, or stated in another way, the analysis of the logical relationships between events and results. Proposals, sales reports, and incident reports, among other forms of writing, are all grounded in causes and effects. Writing of this type often follows one of these patterns:

Cause-Focused
With this pattern, you focus more attention on the causes of a particular situation than on its effect(s).

The following incident report (partial) focuses on the cause of a recent plant accident and then expands to address the potential causes of additional accidents:

During a routine inspection, Gwen Vos found undercoater Bob Irving struggling to breathe while underneath a truck (effect). While spraying sealant, he accidentally rolled his dolly over his air hose, cutting off his air supply (cause). Vos immediately pulled Irving out, untangled him, and took these immediate steps.…

Presently, undercoaters maneuver under trucks and spray liquid- rubber sealant on the undercarriage while lying on their backs. Maintainer (the company) provides oxygen suits to protect the skin and supply oxygen. This accident shows that our safeguards are inadequate:

• Ten-year-old oxygen-suit meters and air tubes frequently malfunction (potential cause).
• Masks and hoses are beginning to crack (potential cause).
• Lying on a dolly under a truck causes undercoaters to become tangled in cords and hoses (potential cause).
• Spraying from a prone position allows liquid to drip on the sprayers' masks (potential cause).

Effect-Focused
With this pattern, you focus more attention on the effects than on the cause(s) of a situation.

The following technical report (partial) focuses on the effects of water quality on ultraviolet disinfection:

The quality of water treated with UV radiation (cause) can have a significant effect on an untraviolet unit's performance. First, suspended solids can shield bacteria from ultraviolet light and should be removed by pre-filtration (effect). Second, chemicals such as iron, manganese, and sulfides can lead to coating of the lamp/sleeve (effect). This coating, which blocks UV light, can be addressed with a UV monitor plus regular cleaning. Optical clarity below 254 nm interferes with how deeply UV light penetrates (effect).…

Cause and Effects Together
With this pattern, you discuss the causes and effects together. You might use this pattern if there were multiple causes of a situation, each one with a unique effect.

In the following application letter (partial), the applicant discusses various causes and effects in her earlier years that led to her interest in serving others:

I grew up in a small town called Bunde, Minnesota, a cohesive community of people who looked after one another. When a farmer named Leo Folken severly injured his arm in a corn-picking accident (cause), the community finished his harvest and cared for his livestock (effect). When my neighbor Jean O'Malley returned to Bunde after a difficult marriage (cause), the community adopted her and her infant son (effect). On countless other occasions, this community showed similar compassion for those in need (cause), which instilled in me the importance of serving others (effect).…

Remember: These are general patterns to consider rather than rigid forms to follow. More than anything else, they provide you with initial templates for your business writing when causes and effects are involved (which is more often than you think). How you eventually shape your writing, of course, will depend on your thinking about the subject, and the needs and nature of your reader.

—Dave Kemper

Cause and Effect Paragraphs

Sometimes, assigned topics on the written portion of the TOEFL ask you to explain the reasons or causes of something. Other topics will ask you to discuss the results or effects of some cause. Here is an example of a writing topic asking for causes of a particular phenomenon (Note: this is not an actual TOEFL topic, but it is similar to one that may appear on a specific adminstration of the TOEFL):

In recent decades, cities have grown so large that now about 50% of the Earth's population lives in urban areas. Explain the causes of this phenomenon.Be sure to give specific details and reasons in your explanation.

Cause/effect paragraphs generally follow basic paragraph format. That is, they begin with a topic sentence and this sentence is followed by specific supporting details.   (Click here if you wish to review Lesson 1, "Basic Paragraph Structure.")   For example, if the topic sentence introduces an effect, the supporting sentences all describe causes. Here is an example:

In recent decades, cities have grown so large that now about 50% of the Earth's population lives in urban areas. There are several reasons for this occurrence. First, the increasing industrialization of the nineteenth century resulted in the creation of many factory jobs, which tended to be located in cities. These jobs, with their promise of a better material life, attracted many people from rural areas. Second, there were many schools established to educate the children of the new factory laborers. The promise of a better education persuaded many families to leave farming communities and move to the cities. Finally, as the cities grew, people established places of leisure, entertainment, and culture, such as sports stadiums, theaters, and museums. For many people, these facilities made city life appear more interesting than life on the farm, and therefore drew them away from rural communities.

Notice how each supporting sentence is a cause that explains the effect mentioned in the topic sentence. In the chart below are the main ideas of the above paragraph, to help you understand the relationships better:

EFFECT (Topic Sentence)	CAUSES (Supporting Sentences)
Cities have grown very large. [There are several reasons for this.]	Factory jobs attracted people.
(Cities have grown very large.)	Better schools attracted families to move    to the city.
(Cities have grown very large.)	Places of leisure, entertainment, and culture    made city life appear more interesting.

Notice also how the topic sentence is followed by the "focusing" or "prediction" sentence, There are several reasons for this. Such sentences help the reader anticipate the organization of the paragraph or essay.

Cause and Effect Conjunctions

Here are some common conjunctions that can be used to express cause and effect:

since	as a result	because of + noun phrase
because	therefore	due to + noun phrase
consequently	for this reason	so

There are two things you must be careful of when using these conjunctions. First, you must order the cause and the effect corerctly. For example, in the sentence

Sally closed the window because the weather outside was cold.
the CAUSE is the fact that the room was cold, and the EFFECT is Sally's closing the window. The conjunction because is placed in the correct position here, which is right before the cause. Similarly, in the sentence

Because the weather outside was cold, Sally closed the window.
the conjunction because is correctly placed before the part of the sentence that expresses the cause, even though the subordinate clause because the room was cold is now at the beginning of the sentence. (Note that the first letter of the conjunction is now capitalized.) However, in this sentence:

??The weather outside was cold because Sally closed the window.
even though it is grammatical, it does not make sense because a person's opening or closing a window does not influence the weather.

Second, you should be careful when using commas. Conjunctions such as therefore, consequently, as a result, and for this reason are usually followed by a comma, as in these examples:

The weather was cold;   therefore, Sally closed the window.The weather was cold.   Therefore, Sally put on her coat. The weather was cold.   Consequently, Sally put on her scarf.A blizzard hit the town.   As a result, the schools were closed.

The adverbial clause conjunctions since and because are exceptions. These are attached directly at the beginning of CAUSE-sentence without a comma, as in the example above,Because the weather outside was cold, Sally closed the window. The comma here is placed at the end of the subordinate clause.
The coordinating conjunction so is also different from the ones above. This conjunction has a comma before it, as in this sentence:

The weather was warm, so Jim turned on the air conditioner.
However, in formal academic writing, so may not be used at the beginning of a sentence (although you will often see it in informal writing):

The weather was warm.   So Jim turned on the air conditioner.
(too informal -- avoid this usage)