A Study of the Linguistic Features of English Abstracts of Highly-cited Geological Papers—Taking Journal of Earth Science as an Example

Wei Tao

School of Foreign Languages,China University of Geosciences,Wuhan,China

Email:weitaocug@163.com

[Abstract] In this study,the macro discourse structure and micro linguistic elements of the English abstracts of 30 highly-cited geoscience papers published in the Journal of Earth Science were quantitatively analyzed.The results show that most abstracts have the complete IMRD four-move structure.The use of tense and voice is related to the communicative function of the move.The main model of I,R and D move is"simple present+active tense/no voice",while the main model of M move is "simple past tense/modern tense + passive tense".The language characteristics of the abstracts of highly cited papers are basically consistent with the mainstream writing paradigm of international authoritative journals.This paper further explores the reasons for the formation of language features and gives some suggestions for domestic scholars to write high quality English abstracts.

[Keywords] highly cited papers;JES;abstracts;linguistic features

Introduction

The citation frequency of scientific and technological papers can objectively reflect their roles in the academic exchange,and is one of the important indicators to evaluate their academic value and influence(Wu,2017,pp.229-233).A highly cited paper has the high citation frequency(generally no less than 20 times),indicating that the paper is highly recognized by the academic community and has high academic value (Li,2012,pp.793-795).Generally speaking,the more highly cited papers published in scientific and technological journals indicate that more papers reflect the frontiers of disciplines (Wang,2016,pp.572-574).However,there are few studies on the linguistic fea⁃tures of highly cited papers from the perspective of textual pragmatics(Zhang,2018,pp.64-71).

The standardization of language has always been one of the focuses in domestic English sci-tech journals.The"four moves" (IMRD) genre analysis,that is,the Introduction (Introduction),Method (Method),Result (results) and Discussion (the Discussion),proposed by Swales is usually used to analyze the macro discourse construction model of abstracts and at the same time also study the micro language elements such as the tense,voice,first person and dangling participles.However,relevant research results are still controversial and lack of consensus.It is found that the comprehensive researches on the macro discourse structure and micro language elements of the English abstracts of geoscience papers have not been reported (Guo,2018,pp.39-43).Journal of Earth Science(JES),launched in 1990,is a comprehensive academic journal of geosciences,which is supervised by the Ministry of Education and sponsored by China University of Geosciences(Wuhan).It is one of the earliest English sci-tech journals started by universities in China.JES has won many honorary titles such as "China's Most Internationally influential Academic Journal","National Top 100 Science and Technology Journals"and so on.As an excellent representative of domestic academic journals of geosciences,the writing paradigm of English abstracts of papers published in JES plays a lead⁃ing role in the field of geology.The linguistic research on the abstracts of the highly cited papers,which are the vane of the journal's influence,has the guiding value.Therefore,in view of the research blank,we will focus on the Eng⁃lish abstracts of the highly cited papers published in the journal JES from 2010 to 2020,whose discourse structure,tense and voice features,will be analyzed.Based on these language characteristics,we will come up with some corre⁃sponding writing suggestions,aiming to help domestic authors improve their writing,and to promote the international spread of domestic English journals.

Research Methods

This study investigated the total citation frequency of all research papers(non-review papers)published in JES from 2010 to 2020 in the core collection of Web of Science.The top 30 research papers were selected in order of the total citations from high to low,and a small English abstract corpus was established.Each research paper selected in the corpus was cited more than 25 times.Firstly,30 abstracts were classified and labeled according to IMRD fourmove model,and the co-occurrence frequency of moves was quantitatively counted to reveal the macro discourse structure of the abstracts of highly cited papers.The four moves are as follows:I move generally involves introducing the research background,pointing out the research problems,outlining the research content and clarifying the neces⁃sity of the research.M-move mainly includes describing the research process and steps,summarizing the instru⁃ments and equipment required for the experiment,or the theoretical model and calculation method.R move mainly includes displaying research data,showing research findings or results;D move mainly includes summarizing,evalu⁃ating,judging and extending research results,or giving research suggestions.The method of quantitative analysis was employed,where the sentence was taken as the unit and the percentage of the number of sentences in which voice and tense are counted in the total number of sentences of abstracts and of each move so as to explore the micro language characteristics of abstracts.

Results and Discussion

Move features

According to statistics (Table 1),the R move accounts for 96.7% of the 30 abstracts,and is a required move.This feature is highly consistent with Hyland's comprehensive study of 800 English abstracts in 8 disciplines,which showed that almost all scientific abstracts had"R"moves(94%).(Hyland,2000,pp.73-75)In addition,the percent⁃ages of I,M and D moves are as high as 90% respectively,which are the important moves.Previous studies have proved that IMRD is not static,but deeply influenced by the characteristics of disciplines.For example,abstracts of computer science papers are usually organized according to the"two-move model"or"three-move model"of"prob⁃lem-algorithm" or "introduction-model-implementation" (Posteguillo,1999,p.139).Moves reflect the emphasis of the members of the academic community on the information highlighted in the research.As can be seen from Table 1,most abstracts have a complete four-move text structure,accounting for 73.3%.A few abstracts were constructed according to the three-move model(16.7%),and most of them were"introduction-method-result(or conclusion)"model,which can be attributed to R/D move combination.Only three abstracts were written in the two-move model,which was"introduction-result(or conclusion)".The absence of M-move is due to the relatively traditional and ma⁃ture experimental methods in some specific research fields,so the author omits the introduction of research methods.Therefore,it can be seen that the English abstracts of the highly cited papers in JES basically have a complete fourstep discourse pattern,and the serious irregularities such as the blurriness of moves and the absence of moves are rare.Abstracts with a complete four-move structure can fully convey the information of the paper,so as to help read⁃ers judge the value of the paper,which is exactly the specific embodiment of the "promotion" functional attribute of the abstract genre in the text structure.

Table 1 The co-occurrence frequency of moves in English abstracts of highly cited papers in JES

Tense

The 30 English abstracts studied have a total of 331 sentences.Among them,there are 62,50,96 and 119 sen⁃tences in I,M,R and D moves respectively.We calculated the proportion distribution of the sentences with the sim⁃ple present tense,simple past tense,simple future tense and present perfect tense respectively in the total number of sentences of abstracts and in the number of sentences in each move.The results are shown in Table 2.Therefore,among the 331 sentences of the 30 abstracts,there are generally 240 sentences with the simple present tense,ac⁃counting for 72.5%.There are 66 sentences with the simple past tense,accounting for 19.9%.Sentences with the present perfect tense and simple future tense are used less frequently,making up for 4.6% and 3% respectively.It can be seen that the simple present tense is used most frequently in the abstracts and is widely distributed in each move.This is because the simple present tense usually conveys a sense of objectivity,authority and freshness,which helps to gain the reader's trust and stimulate the reader's interest.The simple past tense is mainly focused on the M move of abstracts,which is consistent with Swales'statement that "the simple past tense is an important linguistic feature of the Method move in the paper writing"(Swales,1990,pp.101-103).According to the international author⁃itative journal Nature,the convention f abstract tenses are simple present tense (80.71%) and simple past tense(9.21%),but the communicative pragmatic functions of different tenses should be flexibly used to achieve the com⁃municative purposes of different moves(Wang,2017,pp.62-69).

Table 2 The distribution of tenses in abstracts and each move of the abstracts of the highly cited papers in JES

To be specific,I move is mainly used in the simple present tense (74.2%).Its main communicative function is to introduce the research background,which is the general fact not affected by time.A few authors use the simple past tense to summarize previous work (11.3%).If the present perfect tense is used to describe the current situation or the trend of research,or to emphasize the influence of the research completed on the paper,it can also be used in the present perfect tense.The M step is mainly used in the simple past tense or the simple present tense.It is be⁃lieved that the function of M-move is to describe the experimental process,method and theoretical model,and the simple past tense is often used to describe the research experiments (calculations) that the author has completed.However,46.3%of the authors choose the simple present tense,which may be influenced by the traditional view that the tense of abstracts should be unified into the simple present tense.

Example 1The ages for porphyry Mo deposits...Northeast China,are notwell known.

Example 2The widespread microbialites deposition...have been intensively studied because of...and its after⁃math.

In R and D moves,most abstracts use the simple present tense,with the percentages of 69.8% and 85.7% re⁃spectively.The core of papers is to display the research data and findings obtained through the R move.The main discourse function of the D move is to clarify the research conclusion and to evaluate the research,further highlight⁃ing its importance.Most authors choose the simple present tense to describe R or D move (example 3),in order to show that the content described is universal,feasible and strongly relevant,which is in line with the international mainstream paradigm.

Example 3Geochemically,the MTS granitesshowrelatively various geochemical compositions with low REE contents(87.76×10-6-249.71×10-6),......and low Nb/Ta ratios(2.40-6.82).

Voice

According to the traditional view,the passive voice should be used in abstract writing of scientific papers to re⁃flect the objectivity.And it also inevitably leads to problems such as clumsy sentence structure,boring language,and unclear author's position.In recent years,the academic style of abstracts has changed,and European and Ameri⁃can scholars have used the active voice more often in abstracts.(Xiao,2015,pp.5-8)International authoritative jour⁃nals such asNature and Scienceas well as a large number of SCI/EI journals also advocate the use of active voice in writing abstracts,and can even use the active voice of "We" and "I" to highlight the research content and promote the author's position.However,the authors of domestic journals have not fully realized that the style of abstracts has shifted from being formal,conservative and objective to constructing self-identity for the author's proper purpose.As a result,"a large amount of passive voice"is still the main feature of English abstracts of domestic sci-tech journals.As can be seen from Table 3,the frequency of active voice (118/35.6%) of abstracts in this corpus is significantly higher than that of passive voice(86/26%),indicating that the use of voice in English abstracts of highly cited papers of JES is close to international rules.Interestingly,the frequency of the non-voice sentences is as high as 38.4% in the abstracts,which is much higher than the figure in the previous study by Peng Qin et al.of the voice of abstracts of international geotechnical journals(15.9%for the non-voice).(Peng,2017,pp.538-540)Probably,authors of the highly cited papers in JES have come to realize the international trend of abstract voices,but they are still bound to the profound influence of the journal guidelines,thus using the no voice subconsciously instead of directly using the active voice in order to reach the compromise.

On the other hand,the use of voice in the abstracts should not be absolute and rigid,but should be specific to the specific problems.Otherwise it will lead to language stiffness.As can be seen from Table 3,active voice and nonvoice sentences are mainly used in I,R and D moves in the abstracts with a small amount of passive vice sentences enriching the sentence patterns.This is because the use of active voice in the introduction of research background(I),presentation of results and conclusions (R/D) can reflect the active participation of researchers in the whole re⁃search process,and can effectively build an interactive dialogue mechanism among authors,readers and cultures.Ex⁃ample 4 is the typical active voice in the abstract,with the basic structure being"subject+verb+signified object",which is especially suitable for R/D move to explain research findings and highlight research results with the charac⁃teristics of directness and conciseness.The passive voice is mainly used in the M move,which reflects the choice of voice for the communicative purpose.With M-move being mainly an overview of experimental steps,frequent use of passive voice may be to highlight research methods and process,and highlight the formality and objectivity of re⁃search.

Table 3 The distribution of voices in abstracts and each move of the abstracts of the highly cited papers in JES

Example 4Taken together,we conclude thatthe Fengshuigouhe Group in the northwestern Lesser Xing'an Range...Rather than...in the study area and adjacent regions.

Conclusion

Based on corpus,this paper adopts the method of quantitative analysis,investigating the 30 highly cited papers published in JES from the perspective of the textual structure,tense and voice features.Main findings are as follows:(1)most of the papers have a complete IMRD four-move model;few abstracts lack the M move or have the R/D move merging.(2)The abstract is mainly used in the simple present tense,and is written with a mixture of active voice and no voice.The different communicative purposes of different moves lead to different tenses and voices in different moves.To be specific,the I,R and D moves are based on "simple present tense + active voice/no voice",inter⁃spersed with simple past tense,present perfect tense,simple future tense and passive voice to achieve specific com⁃municative functions,while the M move is mainly based on"simple past tense/simple present tense+passive voice".(3)The macro text structure and micro language characteristics of the English abstracts of highly cited papers in JES better meet the requirements of international scientific and technological journals for the writing paradigm of ab⁃stracts,and therefore contribute to the international spread and improvement of influence of the papers.

Acknowledgements

This work was sponsored by the Philosophy and Social Science Project of Hubei Provincial Education Depart⁃ment in 2020,"Researches on Improving the Effectiveness of Flipped Classroom in College English Writing* (Proj⁃ect No.:20G016),the Industry-University Collaborative Education Project of Ministry of Education" Construction of College English ESP Learning Platform*(Project No.:202002070024),and the Teaching Research Project of Chi⁃na University of Geosciences (Project No.:2021A54).We gratefully acknowledge their support in preparing this pa⁃per.