Active and passive voice in writing
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Melisa Bestel
- August 25, 2023
Active voice and passive voice define how an action is told. While the subject is doing the action in active voice, the person or thing that receives the action comes before the verb in passive voice. You should use the correct verb tense to create a passive voice.
Active and passive voice examples
Active voice example
The woman kissed Active voice the cat.
Passive voice example
The cat is kissed Passive voice by the woman.
You don’t have to mention the subject at all in a passive construction:
Passive construction example
The cat is kissed. Passive construction
As there is more clarity in active voice, avoiding passive voice in academic writing is often advised. However, it is not grammatically wrong, and there may be some cases where you might use passive voice. Still, avoid using it too much, as clarity and concision are essential in essays and research papers.
Using the passive voice
There are specific cases in which the passive voice is acceptable in academic writing process:
- The reader already knows who the actor of your sentence is.
- The actor is less important than the action, and specifying the actor will not add any necessary information: The results were delivered to the participants.
- No particular actor is doing the action: Extensive research is needed to understand the subject (Verbs like need and require can fit into this category, as there may be a general necessity or obligation)
- You want to have various sentence structures in your paper.
- The academic style you are using does not allow first-person pronouns:
| Active voice with first-person pronouns | Passive voice version |
|---|---|
|
I surveyed thirty companies for the project.
|
Thirty companies were surveyed for the project.
|
|
We gathered the findings for the project.
|
The findings were gathered for the project.
|
- When you use the passive voice in a complex sentence, avoid dangling modifiers as the passive voice might encourage it.
Avoiding the passive voice
As you can see, there are certain situations in which you can use the passive voice. However, the active voice is strongly recommended in academic writing as it offers clarity and precision.
Passive voice example
The action was taken Passive voice to stop the legislation.
Above sentence lacks clarity, as it is vital to know the actor to know what happened.
Passive voice example
The action was taken by Passive voice the NGO to stop the legislation.
Although the actor is provided in the above sentence, try to construct an active sentence for concision and clarity.
Active voice example
The NGO took Active voice example action to stop the legislation.
When writing a passive sentence, determine whether the actor would help make your point clearer. Active constructions give essential credibility to your paragraphs and can make them more convincing.
- Significant data has been found on the subject.
- Johnson (2021) found significant data on the subject.
- Recent studies have found significant data on the subject.
