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Prepositions

Collocations in academic writing

Prepositions connect nouns to other parts of a sentence. Unlike tenses, there are rarely strict logical rules—you must simply memorize standard academic pairings (collocations).

🧠 Core Principles

  • Pay special attention to verb-preposition pairs (e.g., participate in, focus on, depend on).
  • Task 1 writing heavily relies on data prepositions (e.g., an increase in, decreased by, peaked at).
  • Avoid translating prepositions directly from your native language.

🎯 In Practice (IELTS Context)

There was a significant rise of global temperatures in 2010.

There was a significant rise in global temperatures in 2010.

Why? When describing data changes, the noun "rise" is followed by the preposition "in" (a rise in temperatures).