What is the protocol block on a research poster?

What goes under each label

The labels follow the study, not a template. A trial typically uses design, participants, intervention, comparator and outcome. An observational study might use data source, population, exposure, outcome and analysis. A laboratory study might start with materials, then specimens, procedure, measurements and statistics. The ICMJE recommendations say the guiding principle of a methods section should be clarity about how and why a study was done in a particular way, and each entry should answer one part of that. A useful test is whether another researcher could list what they would need to repeat the study from the labels alone. Labels should be nouns a reader recognises from their field, not phrases invented for the board, so that the eye lands on them without having to interpret them.

Borrowing from reporting guidelines

Reporting guidelines already list what methods must contain, which makes them a good source for labels. The SPIRIT 2013 statement sets out the items a clinical trial protocol should include, such as eligibility criteria, interventions, outcomes, sample size, allocation, blinding and statistical methods. The CONSORT statement covers the same ground for reporting a completed trial. A poster cannot carry every item, but choosing the four or five that matter most for the study's credibility, and linking the full protocol or registry entry, respects the guideline without crowding the board.

Ordering the entries

Put first whatever a specialist in the field looks for first. A trialist looks for the design and randomisation, an epidemiologist for the data source and case definition, a metallurgist for the composition. The materials example on this site does exactly that, making the alloy composition the first protocol entry. Then follow the order the study happened: who or what was studied, what was done, what was measured and how the data were analysed. Keep numbers in the entries, such as sample sizes, doses and durations, since those are the details that make a methods block checkable. Keeping the same label order across a series of posters from one group also helps regular readers, who learn where to look.

When a protocol block is the wrong tool

It suits studies with distinct components. It fits less well where the method is the contribution and has a sequence worth showing, such as a quality improvement project with several cycles or an engineering build, which read better as a numbered process across the board. Qualitative and humanities work, where method is interpretive, may need a short paragraph that explains an approach rather than a set of labels. And if a study has more than five or six things to say about its methods, the extra detail usually belongs in the paper, with the board keeping only what a reader needs to trust the result.

Common mistakes

Writing each entry as a paragraph defeats the purpose. Labels that are too generic, such as Methods or Procedure for everything, give readers nothing to scan for. Leaving out the sample size or the analysis method is common and is exactly what a reviewer checks. Putting results, such as the number enrolled, into the participants entry mixes methods with findings. And copying a registered protocol's language without updating it for what actually happened hides deviations that should be reported. A last one is making the labels and entries the same size and weight, which removes the visual cue that makes the block scannable in the first place.

Where it shows up in the poster builder

The protocol block is on 38 of the forty poster layouts, and each holds at most five labelled entries, so the labels need choosing rather than listing. The two layouts without one, Method Flow and Wide Process Flow, run the procedure as a five stage process chain across the board, and a sixth stage is silently dropped rather than drawn. The generator writes entries from the brief, so name the labels you want and give each its numbers. In the materials study example the five entries are Composition, Casting, Tensile, Hardness and Microstructure, each carrying the settings a reader would need to repeat the test.

Questions people ask