Use these prompts to decide who (or what) a sentence makes responsible. Each item is a voice problem you can transplant into a lab report, literature essay, policy brief, or audit memo—swap the setting for your course and keep the grammar question. Active is not always better; the goal is a defensible choice.

48 topics organized by theme, with difficulty levels and suggested sources.

Methods, procedures, and protocols

When process should be the subject, and when the actor should stay visible.

Write a methods step so the reader can repeat it

Argue that an imperative or a we-plus-past-tense verb is clearer than it was done for a protocol.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: a methods appendix, a lab or studio handbook

Keep the instrument as subject without erasing the operator

Claim that The spectrometer recorded is fine for a machine output, but not for a sampling decision you made.

Intermediate · Analytical — Sources: instrument log, methods section

Revise a survey-methods paragraph that hides who recruited participants

Show that passive recruitment sentences can conceal consent and sampling bias.

Intermediate · Argumentative — Sources: ethics application, survey protocol

Describe a legal filing process without fake agency

Argue that the court issued is more accurate than we issued if you are summarizing a docket.

Intermediate · Case-Study — Sources: the judgment, a docket sheet

Choose voice for a cooking, welding, or studio procedure in a technical report

Claim that consistent imperatives beat a mix of the mixture is heated and you should heat.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: workshop manual, assignment rubric

Report a software pipeline without making the script the only actor

Argue that We filtered the log file names a decision; The file was filtered does not.

Intermediate · How-to — Sources: notebook or README, methods paragraph

Write an architecture site-visit method so the team’s choices are auditable

Show that photographs were taken hides who stood where and why those views were chosen.

Advanced · Analytical — Sources: site notes, drawing set

Decide whether a nursing or clinical note should name the clinician

Argue that local policy, not a blanket ban on I, should govern voice in care records used as coursework.

Advanced · Argumentative — Sources: placement handbook, professional-writing guide

Results, findings, and claims of credit

Owning an interpretation without overstating what the data can do.

Move from results were obtained to a sentence that names the pattern

Argue that dummy-subject passives delay the finding and weaken the topic sentence.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: a results table, a model results paragraph

Claim a finding in active voice without implying causation you did not test

Show that We found an association is safer than X caused Y in a cross-section.

Intermediate · Analytical — Sources: results section, limitations paragraph

Give credit to a teammate’s analysis in a group report

Argue that the regression was run can hide who did the work when assessment is individual.

Intermediate · Argumentative — Sources: group-work policy, your contribution log

Report a null result without burying it in passive hedges

Claim that We did not detect is clearer than no effect was observed if you have the power numbers.

Intermediate · How-to — Sources: output table, a statistics handbook

Write a findings sentence for a qualitative theme

Show that Participants described is more honest than it was found that when the evidence is interview talk.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: interview transcript, coding memo

Separate the machine output from your interpretation in two sentences

Argue that one active results sentence plus one interpretive sentence beats a fused passive.

Advanced · Compare-Contrast — Sources: software output, discussion draft

Revise a discussion that uses passive to dodge a limitation

Claim that it can be argued often means you do not want to own the hedge.

Advanced · Argumentative — Sources: your discussion, a reviewer checklist

Attribute a replication failure without blaming an unnamed they

Show that naming the protocol difference is fairer than the experiment could not be reproduced.

Advanced · Case-Study — Sources: original paper, your lab notes

Abstracts, literature reviews, and hedging

Voice in compressed academic genres where every verb is expensive.

Rewrite an abstract so the aim is an active verb

Argue that This paper examines beats It is examined in this paper for most course abstracts.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: your abstract, journal or module abstract guide

Keep hedged claims without defaulting to it is believed

Show that a modal (may, might) plus an active verb is cleaner than dummy-subject passives.

Intermediate · How-to — Sources: a hedging handout, your draft

Summarize prior work without making every scholar a passive victim

Claim that Smith argues is usually better than it has been argued that if you know the source.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: a literature-review paragraph, the cited paper

Use passive in a lit review when the finding matters more than the author

Argue that a pattern across six studies can take a passive if you then cite the cluster.

Intermediate · Analytical — Sources: six papers, your synthesis paragraph

Tighten a 150-word abstract that stacks passives

Show how converting three dummy subjects recovers words for a result and a limitation.

Intermediate · How-to — Sources: your abstract, a word-count rubric

Write a research-question sentence that names you as the asker

Claim that We ask whether is more honest in a thesis proposal than it will be investigated whether.

Beginner · Expository — Sources: proposal template, supervisor comments

Hedge a causal story in a policy brief without vanishing the actor

Argue that Ministers may have shifted funding is sharper than funding was shifted.

Advanced · Argumentative — Sources: budget papers, the brief

Review a field’s consensus in passive, then break it in active

Show a two-sentence pattern: consensus is usually stated as… / We show instead that…

Advanced · Analytical — Sources: a review article, your thesis paragraph

Law, policy, and who is responsible

Voice as an ethical choice when sentences can hide agents.

Name the decision-maker in a policy critique

Argue that mistakes were made is a political passive and that your essay should say who made them.

Intermediate · Argumentative — Sources: a government press release, the underlying report

Describe harm in a human-rights case without erasing perpetrators

Claim that civilians were displaced is incomplete if the report names an armed actor.

Advanced · Analytical — Sources: inquiry report, news investigation

Write a risk paragraph for a business case that keeps accountability

Show that costs were underestimated hides the forecast owner.

Intermediate · Case-Study — Sources: annual report, board minutes if public

Summarize a statute in a voice that does not invent a speaker

Argue that The Act requires is more accurate than the government says if you are citing the text.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: the statute, a legal-writing guide

Revise a police-or-court summary so alleged stays attached to the right subject

Claim that voice and a reporting verb together control whether you assert guilt.

Advanced · How-to — Sources: the judgment, stylebook on allegations

Critique a company apology that uses passive to dodge liability

Argue that shortcomings were identified is not an admission of who failed.

Intermediate · Analytical — Sources: the apology letter, a prior inspection report

Write an ethics-committee outcome without fake institutional agency

Show when The committee approved is better than approval was granted.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: decision letter, ethics handbook

Claim that the trial was funded can bury a conflict that The sponsor funded would surface.

Advanced · Argumentative — Sources: funding statement, conflict-of-interest form

Humanities, narrative, and close reading

Voice when the subject is a text, an image, or a historical actor.

Keep the narrator and the critic in different voices

Argue that The speaker claims versus I argue stops you from treating a persona as the poet.

Intermediate · Analytical — Sources: the poem or story, a close-reading handbook

Describe a painting without making the canvas the only agent

Show when The painting shows is fine and when you need The painter places.

Beginner · Expository — Sources: the image, a museum catalog note

Write a history sentence that does not let events happen by themselves

Claim that war broke out can hide a vote, an order, or a miscalculation you should name.

Intermediate · Argumentative — Sources: a primary dispatch, a secondary monograph

Use free indirect style in a narrative essay without losing academic signposting

Argue that a short passive can mimic a character’s evasion, then an active sentence should comment.

Advanced · Narrative — Sources: your draft, a craft essay on voice

Quote a theorist in active voice, then answer in your own

Show that Foucault argues / I use that claim to… is cleaner than it has been suggested that.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: the theoretical chapter, your paragraph

Describe an archive visit so the finding aid is not the hero

Claim that I requested box 12 is more honest than documents were obtained.

Intermediate · Case-Study — Sources: finding aid, your research log

Analyze a film shot without defaulting to the camera as a person

Argue that The camera tracks is jargon unless you also name whose look it is.

Intermediate · Analytical — Sources: the scene, a film-studies glossary

Revise a literature review of criticism that stacks it has been noted

Show that naming critics in active voice makes the debate easier to map.

Advanced · How-to — Sources: three critical essays, your review draft

Professional reports, instructions, and user-facing prose

Voice outside the essay: memos, briefs, UX, and feedback.

Rewrite a user-instruction so the reader is the subject

Argue that Enter the code beats the code should be entered for a how-to audience.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: a software help page, a plain-language guide

Write a recommendation in a consulting memo in active voice

Claim that We recommend the board delay is stronger than it is recommended that delay occur.

Intermediate · How-to — Sources: memo template, a sample briefing

Soften a grade-feedback comment without hiding the problem

Show that This paragraph needs a warrant is fairer than it is unclear what is meant here.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: a marked draft, a feedback rubric

Keep passive in a safety notice when the hazard, not the worker, should lead

Argue that Acid is stored in cabinet B is the right emphasis for a warning label.

Intermediate · Compare-Contrast — Sources: lab or workshop safety sheet, plain-language guide

Convert a job-application bullet from duties were performed to a verb you own

Claim that Coordinated the rollout beats was responsible for coordination.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: your CV, a careers-service handout

Write an incident report that names actions without assigning unproven blame

Show a middle path between mistakes were made and a premature active accusation.

Advanced · Case-Study — Sources: incident form, professional code

Choose voice for an email to a supervisor requesting ethics approval

Argue that I am requesting is clearer than it is hoped that approval will be granted.

Beginner · How-to — Sources: email draft, school ethics page

Edit a public-facing web paragraph that overuses institutional we

Claim that naming the office (The registry publishes) can be more precise than We publish.

Advanced · Analytical — Sources: the web page, a style guide for government or university prose

Pro Tips for Choosing Your Topic

Ask who would be missing if you deleted the by-phrase; if that person matters, consider active voice.
Methods can stay process-first, but sampling, consent, and analysis choices usually need an actor.
Dummy subjects (it was found that) almost always hide a better noun and verb.
In policy and history, passive voice can erase responsibility; that may be a finding, not a style flourish.
Match house style: some journals want we; some workplace templates want imperative instructions.

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50 Active vs Passive Voice Topics for Academic Writing