How To Write A Cause And Effect Essay: A Comprehensive Guide

WHAT IS A CAUSE AND EFFECT ESSAY?

The core feature of a cause and effect essay is to explain the reasons why a given phenomenon occurs. This means that the thesis of a cause and effect essay is centered on explaining the causes of a given effect’s occurrence. Writing a cause and effect essay is deeply tied to the scientific method because the study of cause and effect is the main goal of science. Explaining why causes and effects are linked in producing an effect is thus one of the principal goals of writing a cause and effect essay.

Writing a cause and effect essay is thus focused on the process of causation that is associated with a given effect. Typically, you will either be assigned a given effect or asked to choose one and your task, in writing a cause and effect essay, will be to explain why the phenomenon you are writing about occurs. In writing a cause and effect essay, your goal is to succinctly and accurately describe why a given effect occurs when certain causes are present. When you write a cause and effect essay, either for an English class or in another discipline, it is important that the causes you identify are mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive.

In writing a cause and effect essay, it is important to differentiate between correlation and causation. Not all elements that are associated with a given effect are actually causes of it. You must consult the scholarly literature so as to examine those who have been determined to be causal in comparison to those which are associated with the effect but which are not causal in nature. In writing a cause and effect essay, you must only include documented causal forces as being related to an effect. While you can discuss correlated elements to show that they are not causes, one of the goals of writing a cause and effect essay is to distinguish between causation and correlation.

Ultimately, writing a cause and effect essay is something that you might have to do in any type of class in any major. Because science focuses on causality as the gold standard of its pursuits, cause and effect relationships are one of the things that science attempts to explain the most. Cause and effect essays are often assigned in low and mid-level English classes as short assignments but you might also write a more sophisticated cause and effect paper as a key assignment for a class within your major. This means that the subject areas in which you might write a cause and effect assignment are heavily varied.

HOW TO WRITE A CAUSE AND EFFECT ESSAY

The first step in writing a cause and effect essay is to choose the effect that you will be writing about. Choose an effect that you are familiar with in an area that is preferably within your major. This will help you write a cause and effect essay as it will allow you to use background knowledge about the subject to write a better cause and effect essay. This is especially true if you are writing a cause and effect essay for a higher level class in your major where the expectations will be higher in relation to your understanding of the cause and effect relationship you are writing about. For lower level cause and effect essays assigned in English classes, you are more likely to be judged on the quality of your writing and the organization of your cause and effect essay so understanding your effect remains important.

Once you have chosen your effect and begun researching it, it is best to work backwards in generating a thesis for your cause and effect essay. Examine the scholarly literature on the topic of your cause and effect relationship and find at least three sets of causes associated with your effect. In so doing, you can also find and use causes that have been rejected as being associated with the effect you are studying. Once you have found three or more different categories of causes or non-causal factors, you will write your body paragraphs on the basis of these. You should then derive the thesis of your cause and effect essay from commonalities which are present across these different areas of cause and effect. Because writing a cause and effect essay is research-driven, it is normal that you might come up with your thesis after your have researched your effect because you might not be aware of all potential causes before you begin writing a cause and effect essay.

Finally, providing an example of a cause and effect essay is relatively easy. One could focus on the causes of COVID-19 and argue that getting COVID-19 results from a combination of behavioral and environmental factors. The first paragraph would focus on the nature of COVID-19 and how it is transmissible through both droplets and airborne pathways. The second paragraph could focus on how not wearing a mask and entering crowded areas leads individuals to acquire COVID-19 through close contact with others. The third body paragraph could then focus on how fomites have been disproved as being an important cause of COVID-19 infection. The conclusion of the essay could then discuss ways that have been put into place so as to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and how they can move forward and be improved. While this is a simple example, it provides a cohesive demonstration of the logic associated with writing a cause and effect essay.

HOW TO FORMAT A CAUSE AND EFFECT ESSAY

When writing a cause and effect essay, you will almost certainly be using course-assigned or external sources. You professor will mandate that you use a specific style guide and referencing style to write your cause and effect essay. The most common style guides used to write cause and effect essays are MLA, APA, Chicago, Harvard, and Turabian. If your teacher does not provide you with a template for formatting and citations, you should use the relevant style and citation guide that you can find online via Purdue. Make sure to stick to this style guide so you are not docked points for minor stylistic errors.

Once you have formatted and referenced your cause and effect essay, it is time to look at how you have organized it. First, make sure that you are using appropriate headings or strong topic sentences to distinguish between the different elements of your cause and effect argument. Second, make sure that your different paragraphs or sections are truly distinct and that all of them tie back to the thesis that you are supporting. Finally, make sure that every piece of information that you have used that is not common knowledge is cited. Otherwise, you are likely to lose points for improper citations or even be accused of plagiarism.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A CAUSE AND EFFECT ESSAY AND A TRADITIONAL ESSAY?

The main difference between writing a cause and effect essay and a traditional academic essay is tied to the substance of what you are writing. While many academic essays are focused on cause and effect, writing a cause and effect essay means that you are only focusing on the linkages between the causes and a given effect of a relationship. This means that a cause and effect essay should not examine extraneous variables that are not associated with the cause and effect relationship as one might do when writing a traditional academic essay. Moreover, writing a cause and effect essay means staying closely bound to the effect you are studying and not deviating so as to examine other permutations of the causes as you might in a broader traditional academic essay.