title: Higher acceptance rates for abstracts written in English at a national research student meeting in a non-English speaking country.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The rate of English-written submissions is increasing in local meetings of non-English speaking countries. However, it seems that the quality of research and methodology of the studies has not progressed. This study aimed to evaluate the association of English writing and the acceptance for presentation following the peer-review process in the 13th Annual Research Congress of Iran's Medical Sciences Students (ARCIMSS).
  
  
  METHODS
  All 1817 complete abstracts submitted to the meeting were included in this cross-sectional study. Each was evaluated for the language of the text (English or Persian), final decision after peer review (accepted vs. rejected), presentation type (oral, poster discussion and poster) and the scores of reviewing process.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There were 395 (21.7%) abstracts written in English and 1422 (78.3%) in Persian. The acceptance rate for English abstracts was 33.7% and for Persian 24.6% (OR = 1.56, 95% CI: 1.22-1.98). The rate of abstracts' acceptance for presentation in oral panels was significantly higher for English abstracts than for those in Persian (25.6% versus 15.7%, OR = 1.84, 95% CI: 1.14-2.99). By contrast, Persian abstracts were more likely to be accepted as poster panels than were English abstracts (74.9% versus 63.9%, OR = 1.68, 95% CI: 1.10-2.58).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  English-written abstracts have higher chance of acceptation in a non-English speaker country like Iran.
authors.affiliation: Student Research Committee, Babol University of Medical Sciences, Babol, Mazandaran, Iran.
authors.forename: Afshin
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Khani
authors.forename: Amin
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Zarghami
authors.forename: Fatemeh
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Izadpanah
authors.forename: Hamid
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Mahdizadeh
authors.forename: Leila
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Golestanifar
mesh_terms: D035843:Biomedical Research / Q000592:standards* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D003226:Congresses as Topic / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000592:standards / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D006801:Humans; D007492:Iran; D007802:Language; D010380:Peer Review / Q000592:standards*; D013337:Students, Medical; D014956:Writing / Q000592:standards*