Competing For Eyeballs of Those Passing By
- You are competing with everyone for the attention of a few (1 minute of their time – MAX)
- Catchy titles! Lure in the reader with a title that stands out from the crowd
- E.g., One title I used was “The Panic Disorder Patient who Cried Wolf.” Clearly, this is not the title for the manuscript I eventually published (which was about information-processing biases and auditory perception in anxious individuals), but, it certainly piqued the curiosity of convention-goers.
- BIG PRETTY GRAPHS ROCK!!!
- Bullet-pointed text (similar to a talk). A few points of interest or “talking points,” but let the quality of your tables and graphs/images speak to the quality of your data!
- No one has the time to read tiny text boxes (if the reader has to squint…you lose)!
- Consider leaving out the abstract (so many words, and these words are redundant with what your poster will convey LOUDLY AND CLEARLY, also the abstract will be published in the Conference Proceedings anyway. On Cur?us, the title of your poster will be directly linked to your published abstract. In essence, your poster IS the abstract plus some cool graphic design effort!
- What to include?
- Background and Rationale
- Specific Aims and Hypotheses
- Methods/Design
- Results
- Graphs/Tables
- Summarize results in bullet pointed text
- Don’t add a single bullet under a point. What’s the point in the bullet if the bullet IS the point?
- Conclusions/Discussion
- Implications/Future Directions
Most of all, have fun with your work, have confidence in it, and BE CREATIVE!
Poster Sample (above): Spinal Chordoma by Stefan Norbert Zausinger
The Cureus Blog 