Cause and effect essays are ideal for research and building your skills for the same. The structure of these essays allows you to uncover the relations between different ideas, thoughts, and events. However, as it requires a lot of critical thinking skills, students usually wonder “how to write cause and effect essay?” You cannot write this essay without creating an effective outline with an introduction, different causes and their effects, and a conclusion. To write such a paper, you must first come up with a good topic and then establish a thesis statement. After that, you can arrange the different points in your body sections. In this article, you’ll find precisely how to write a convincing essay of this style.

What Is a Cause and Effect Essay and Why You Need It?

A cause and effect essay is a kind of writing wherein you find the reasons or causes of a specific problem and its effects or consequences. Often, this type of essay resembles an argumentative essay. In simple words, through this writing, you show how one event, idea, thing, or person directly impacts another thing, idea, or person.

You can find one of the common cause and effect essay examples in the answer to the question ‘How does a sedentary lifestyle impacts our health?’ To write a decisive answer on such a topic, you need to understand the topic well by carrying out deep research on it.

These types of essays demand the writer to have robust critical thinking skills. Only such skills allow them to build cause-effect reasoning. Teachers commonly assign such essays to pupils in order to sharpen their persuasive writing and logical thinking skills. Some of the common forms in which you will find this essay are as follows:

A scientific case study
A lab report abstract
A research paper

How to Write Cause and Effect Essay Outline?

The first part of writing is to create a good outline. This essay must be formatted really well. If you don’t spend time structuring your paper, whatever you claim will not be apparent to the reader.

This outline contains the usual introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. The body of this essay differs according to what you are writing about. You can structure the whole essay by looking at the format below.

1. Introduction

2. Body

A. First variable

First cause
Second cause
First effect
Second effect

B. Second variable

First cause
First effect
Second cause
Second effect

C. Third variable

First cause and effect
Second cause and effect
Third cause and effect

3. Conclusion

You can use any three templates or schemes to structure your paper. All of them will enable you to discuss your claims in a detailed manner. This plan will help you to write smoothly and communicate your views properly.

Let’s discuss the structure of this essay in more detail.

Introduction in a cause and effect essay

The introductory paragraph of all-cause and effect essay topics is very important as it forms the basis of your essay. Ensure to make the introduction short but exciting. You can use three kinds of hook statements to attract the reader’s attention. They include the following:

Statistics hook – An example would be ‘According to Datareportel, 5 billion people worldwide use the Internet daily.’
Rhetorical question – Its example is ‘Can virtual classes replace in-person interaction’?
Quotation hook – Its example can be ‘According to Amy J Martin, social media is the ultimate equalizer.’

After writing the hook statement, list out general information about your topic. It will familiarize the reader with your topic. Lastly, formulate a strong thesis statement at the end of the introduction. This statement should say something unique about your case instead of just stating it.

Body parts in a cause and effect essay

While writing this essay, you will require to analyze a problem through its various causes. It will make your teacher realize that you have in-depth knowledge of the issue from every aspect. In this essay, every section must revolve around a specific idea. It will make your message fully clear to your readers.

Carry some research and cite valid sources to make your point evident. You can cite them in the format you follow (APA, Harvard, MLA, or Chicago). Always make the comments to describe your evidence. However, many students make the mistake of paraphrasing another author’s thoughts while doing so. Instead of doing that, you must interpret the problem and then write about it.

Here is a convenient format for the body paragraph you can use in this type of essay.

Topic sentence
Proof or facts
Support
A sentence concluding it.

Here are some points to consider to write the body paragraphs of the effects part of your essay in a better way.

Always check that your causes are linked to another logically.
Concentrate particularly on the immediate outcome of the problem. The message should be precise to your readers.
Critically analyze the sources so that your writing is wholly unique.
Always make comments to describe the significant claims and findings.

Conclusion in a cause and effect essay

It is the last element of this type of paper. So, when you are learning how to write a cause and effect essay outline you must also learn the aim of the conclusion and how it affects your reader. Do not just copy your thesis statement while writing the conclusion. The underlying purpose of this part is to remind your teacher or reader what you were arguing about in the whole paper.

This paragraph should be a summary of your essential points. So, before writing it, go through your paper and define the main claims and findings. After doing that, present them in a short paragraph. Here are some cause and effect essay examples that will make it clear to you how to write a good conclusion.

Thesis – ‘The art of kids, is more than just art. It showcases what they are feeling and what they are worried about.’
Restatement – ‘The art that kids make gives a view into their mental condition.’

You must consider certain points while structuring a cause and effect essay. It is crucial for your essay to reflect the following:

Your write-up should make the reader well familiar with your main view or subject.
The essay should define certain causes and assess them in good detail.
Your write-up should address all the consequences of the causes.
You must be able to give good arguments and evidence for each one of your claims.
The cause and effect essay should provide a summary of all the major points that leave a good impression on your readers.

Easy Steps to Write a Great Cause and Effect Essay

After creating a systematic outline, you can begin the process of writing. Below is a stepwise guide that will help you in every stage of writing this essay.

1. Choose a topic

This step is crucial since you need to pick a topic you have a level of interest in. Go through various cause and effect essay topics and choose the one you resonate with. Ensure that the topic you select is a chain event with a starting and an endpoint, for example, a social movement.

Movements like the Civil Rights Movement or the Women’s Movement have a clearly defined starting and end point. You can also visibly make out its impact on society and the economy. Another good example is the natural phenomenon.

2. Research deeply

After choosing a topic, research deeply on it. While doing it, you can write the main ideas you’ll cover. Use as many resources as you can to understand the topic well. It will increase the quality of your essay.

After writing the points, you’ll cover, go through them once again to see if you need some more to put your views across. Likewise, you can also cancel out those points that you feel are irrelevant.

3. Make an outline

Follow the method described in the previous sections to create a robust cause and effect essay outline. At this time, you can also make a thesis statement showing how the event creates various effects. After that, put the data you’ve gathered through research into proper body paragraphs.

4. Create the first draft

Now that you know what you will include in your introduction and body parts, you can create a rough draft of the essay. While doing that, ensure that you are maintaining the flow. Always remain focused on your central point.

Write clear sentences and use transition words so that the reader can understand your essay well. Create a relevant argument about how a particular thing, event, or idea impacts another.

5. Analyze your write-up

The next step after creating the first draft is to review or analyze your write-up thoroughly. It will ensure that your work does not lack clarity and logic. While reviewing your essay, ask yourself these questions:

Is my work giving a clear viewpoint?
Are my examples relevant and show how an event resulted in another?
Am I using transition words?
Are my topic sentences clear, or do they sound confusing?
Am I able to argue my point and put it across convincingly?

6. Prepare the final draft.

Now that you have reviewed your essay thoroughly and are convinced about it, you can proceed to write the final draft. It means redrafting your work and giving it the final touches. Note that while creating a rough draft, you might not write the concluding section. So, include that in the final draft. Do not just restate your introduction in the exact words. You must make it insightful.

Some Good Cause and Effect Essay Topics

There are numerous topics you can use to write a paper of this kind. It’s because these essays are perfect for wide-ranging subjects. You can find numerous articles of this kind in several disciplines like sociology, history, arts, and even technology. However, you must pick the one that appeals to you the most while going through different examples. Only then can you prove how it is significant and really make an impression on your audience.

Here is a list of topics that will give you a boost of inspiration. You can pick any one of them from any domain that interests you and follow the steps you’ve read till now to create a meaningful cause and effect essay.

Politics

What were the events leading to the American Revolution?
What leads some people to choose politics as their career path?
What are the adverse consequences of drug legalization?
How does the impact of bad leadership show on the economy of a country?
What are the reasons behind the increase in immigration?
How the United States did comes to embrace the idea of democracy?

Social Media

What is the impact of social media on teenagers?
What causes people to spend so much time on social media?
What are the reasons behind some social media channels decreasing in popularity among people?
What causes video-based social media channels to become so popular?
What is the impact of excessive chats on social media on people’s minds?
Do online communication on social media impact the real-life social skills of a person?

History

How are the Roman Empire and the growth of Christianity connected with each other?
How did the Soviet Union collapse?
What was the background of the assassination of John F. Kennedy?
Why Witch Trials in Salem carried out and what were its effects?
Assess the reasons for the pact between Hitler and Stalin?
Explain the consequences of the Pearl Harbour attack?

Education

What is the impact of online schooling on the overall performance of students?
Describe the connection between standardized tests and the drop-out rates of students.
Why do many students consider learning a boring activity?
How is learning more effective through the adoption of technology?
What are the pros and cons of school uniforms?
How is the success of a student influenced by a gap year?

Social happenings

What was the effect of the lockdown on the global unemployment rate?
What are the reasons for continuous social conflicts in the United State?
Describe the cause and effect of natural disasters?
What led to the outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic, and what are its long-term consequences?
Why does police brutality occur, and what are its consequences?
What triggered the Black Lives Matter movement, and what are its effects on the society?

Healthcare

What has led to the enormous rise in obesity among the world population?
How does inadequate medical insurance impact a person’s health?
What are the reasons for a greater number of children experiencing Autistic Spectrum Disorder?
What are the causes for HIV to spread rapidly in Africa?
How has globalization affected the spread of disease?
What causes some individuals to get cancer?

Wrapping up

Now you might have no issues in preparing such a paper that requires you to analyze causes and explore their effects critically. Ensure to find interesting topics, establish a solid thesis, and arrange your main views in body paragraphs, giving sufficient evidence. You must also create a rough draft using your thesis and body section ideas and then find how clear and logical it is. If you need additional help preparing such an essay, please visit the Write My Essay platform. The expert essay writers of the service will deliver a great essay to you as per your requirements and guidelines.

How to Write Cause and Effect Essay – A Helpful Guide