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Background: I have done a scientific project as a part of my graduation program and now I want to present my work through presentation slides. There were some techniques which didn't work and meant I had to employ other techniques. I want to name those techniques on a single slide, but I am unable to find a suitable title for that slide. I don't think that I should use "Challenges" as the title, because I think that that would only be suitable for techniques which posed some problem to me but I managed to solve them somehow.

What should be the title of the slide on which I present the techniques that failed?

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    How about Previous Attempts?
    – Damkerng T.
    Commented May 1, 2014 at 6:49
  • Attempted techniques.
    – think_meaning_buildß
    Commented May 1, 2014 at 6:53
  • Were they really failures? Each experiment was intended to answer the question "Does this technique work?" If the experiment answered that question, then it was successful, whether the answer was yes or no.
    – user1008646
    Commented May 1, 2014 at 14:37
  • Opportunities for improvement?
    – user6148
    Commented May 1, 2014 at 16:06

5 Answers 5

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"Approaches Tried" (particularly if you're giving an account of things you tried that didn't work on the path to discovering the technique(s) that did work)
"Other Approaches Tried"
"Unsuccessful Approaches"
"Unsuccessful Techniques"

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  • thanks, i think that Other Approaches Tried suits my case better.
    – skm
    Commented May 1, 2014 at 10:13
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Speaking as a scientist, I'd recommend the word:

Failures

There's no problem with being honest.

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When you're talking about experiments -- whether scientific experiments or attempts at building a machine or whatever -- I think the common phrase is "negative results".

As SeanD says, there's nothing wrong with honestly identifying failures as "failures". If you didn't ultimately succeed, you may not want to admit your failures. :-) But if you failed three times and then succeeded, I don't think there's anything embarrassing about saying, "I tried A and it failed. Then I tried B and it failed. Then I tried C and that failed too. But then I tried D and, wow, that worked." It makes it clear that you worked diligently to overcome your failures.

Like I often say, it doesn't matter if you fail ten times in a row ... as long as you try eleven times.

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You could use 'Lessons Learned' as an option, but it looks like you already have a few good answers from which to choose!

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Science proves itself wrong every day, that is the advancement of science. Only by acknowledging failure do we move forward.

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