Why was my abstract not accepted?

New Zealand Society of Animal Production

Gonzo journalism (a.k.a. Hunter S. Thompson) has arrived to the NZSAP newsletter! The October committee meeting is in progress as this piece is being written. The reason? As newsletter editor I feel an insight to how the committee organizes the conference format would be useful to all those submitting conference abstracts. Currently abstracts for the 1996 conference are being considered. The time is 1 PM at the McMeekan Centre at Ruakura. The NZSAP committee members have just finished lunch. The formal meeting has occupied the morning and now it is time to consider the upcoming conference. Each member brings out his folder of abstracts submitted for the 1996 meeting, all 126 of them. Those members who haven't read them all in detail are quickly identified, because Wanda, NZSAPís executive secretary, has cunningly slipped a couple of duplicate abstracts into the bundle at random intervals!!! Overall, the committee are impressed with the quality of the abstracts, which they feel has improved markedly over the last few years. If there are any gripes they have to do with the number of abstracts submitted on last years application forms, or the "creative stretching" of the size of the abstract box.

Starting with the first abstract, each numbered in order of receipt by Wanda, they are considered in turn. It most cases they are quickly accepted. Often minor details are commented on. A new trend is quickly noted, a surprising number of authors having discovered a new level of significance (P>0.05)!! Suddenly there are loud hoots of laughter as a sentence is read out of one of the abstracts

"Similar results were observed on companion rotationally grazed swards (but the senior author disappeared to the International Herbivore Conference without leaving access to these data)"

The abstract is duly accepted and it is resolved that it should appear unchanged in the abstract booklet. The problems begin when an abstract is considered to have problems. Grant our president gets a hunted look in his eye, often disappearing for a nervous pee at the thought of having to write another letter explaining that an abstract wasnít accepted. Usually in such cases a frantic search fails to reveal any statement of means and standard errors or that the abstract has failed to have a clear statement of experimental objective, with results and a subsequent conclusion. In a minority of cases the conclusions do not support the data presented in the abstract. Such cases are decided by a majority vote. The positive side comes when a particularly good abstract reporting novel work is examined. There are a surprisingly large number such abstracts and Grant often allows a small diversion discussing its significance before moving on to the next in the list.

The committee members then learn all about paper shuffling as the accepted abstracts are sorted into topic groups. A break for dinner follows, and then under the skillful direction of Denis Elvidge, whiteboard marker in hand, the groups are first roughly fitted into conference slots and then ordered in appropriate sequence. Another break follows as we listen to the Hamilton Hair Razors exercising their vocal cords, marshaled by the societies previous executive secretary Jill Konlechner. We return for the final task, doubling checking and reconciling the order of the abstracts to ensure that none have been lost. Its finished! A quick glance at the clock shows the time is only 10:45 PM. This is followed by a beer (Speightís of course: thanks Steve) and tales of previous meetings that finished at 1:00 am or extended over several days.