Essential Sections for Supporting
Hypotheses in Research Papers
For behaving as researchers, teachers should possess the writing skills
necessary to identify and produce different text-types useful to provide and
support evidence for their findings. In
addition, the implementation of these text-types would reflect teachers´
critical thinking and their ability to encode their messages making them
accessible to the academic community. For
this reason, this paper aims to make a deep analysis of Results, Discussions
and Conclusions sections in order to compare the devices utilized in articles
from different fields.
Taking into account the organization of the aforementioned sections
included in research papers, Barrs´s (2012) article presents the Results and the
Discussion sections written separately, being the last section implied under
the heading of Limitations. Similarly,
in Aspelund´s et al. (2010) paper, the two sections are written in a separate
way. Furthermore, in the work previously
mentioned it can be assumed that the Discussions section comprises sub-headings
as Strengths and Limitations; and Conclusion.
It is worth mentioning that in Discussions
sections from both papers, de-personalized statements are avoided since
researchers from the two articles assume responsibilities for their findings
using the first person singular in Barrs´s (2012) case and first person plural
in Aspelund´s et al. (2010) work; for example, expressing “we also found that
advanced stages...” (p. 5). Additionally,
a wide variety of reporting
verbs are used to enrich the evaluative comments made by the researchers when
analyzing advantages and drawbacks of the procedures followed in both studies.
Aspelund et al. (2010) include the main findings in the Results section
using past tense and comparative adjectives.
For example, they state that “people with chronic kidney disease had
higher mean levels of cardiovascular risk factors than did people without
chronic kidney disease” (p. 3). The main
findings in Barrs´s (2012) work are divided into two sub-sections: the 1st
and the 2nd period of action research. In both sub-sections, it can be observed that
there are explanations anticipating a further discussion on a specific topic by
means of phrases like “see the limitation section for a discussion of this” (p.
17).
Swales (1990) states that tables and/or figures are used in the Results section to
summarize data. Barrs (2012) uses eight
numbered tables in the Results section and cites them in the text using a repeated phrase like “as can be seen from the
data in Table ...” (p. 16). In contrast, Aspelund et al. (2010) include tables and figures and place the reference
to them between brackets
after mentioning the obtained data. These
researchers support evidence alluding to varied formats of visual aids
mentioning analogies among them; for example, it can be observed that figures 1
parallels table 3 and web table C (p. 3).
Analyzing notes for tables, it could be assumed that
Aspelund´s et al. (2010) work makes use of notes for uncommon concepts as
“estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR)” (p. 3). By contrast, these authors do not expand the
meaning of the acronym for standard deviation (SD) assuming it can be deduced
from statistical previous knowledge. On
the other hand, this type of notes is not used by Barrs (2012) since he shows
the data by means of tables with percentages without relying on statistical
resources.
Persuasive and argumentative text is used to write Conclusions sections in
research papers. In this case, Barrs
(2012) and Aspelund et al. (2010) employ that text-type to produce their
respective conclusions. Though, Barrs
(2012) also includes, the cause-effect relationship by means of a preposition
stating that “[it was shown that students] participated in the project because
of the desire to stay in contact with classmates and to practice their English
skills” (p.22). Likewise, Aspelund et al.
(2010) establish that “stages of chronic kidney disease are associated with
excess risk of subsequent coronary heart disease” (p.6).
In the analysis of the researchers´ attitude towards their findings, Barrs
(2012) is careful about making strong conclusions, instead statements
expressing probability are introduced by means of modal verbs such as “this
would suggest that [Computer-Mediated Communication] (CMC) projects ... can be
of value” (p.22). Aspelund et al. (2010)
apply a similar strategy stating “assessment of ... modestly improves...” (p.6).
Consequently, expressions
of tentative language which denote distance are recurrent not only in Results and
Discussions sections but also in Conclusions sections from both articles.
Promoting further research is another objective of the Conclusions section
in research papers. Aspelund et al.
(2010) advise that “further studies are needed to investigate associations
between chronic kidney disease and non-vascular mortality from causes other
than cancer” (p. 6). Similarly, Barrs
(2012) argues that “[certain programme] could be an area of further
investigation in that a teacher may like to research whether or not there is a
development in English ability through the use of such a programme” (p. 22).
On the whole, it can be stated that research papers are considered
effective means by which professionals can share their experiences in
their field of study. For that reason, results, discussions and
conclusions in a research paper should be presented clear and objectively. Consequently, it is crucial to be acquainted
with the characteristic layout and linguistic tools used for that purpose in
each of those sections. This fact will
contribute to being able to interpret different text-types and produce the
appropriate one in each case.
References
Aspelund, T. ,et al (2010). Chronic kidney disease and risk of major
cardiovascular disease and non-vascular mortality: prospective population based
cohort study. BMJ;341:c4986. doi:
10.1136/bmj.c4986
Barrs, K. (2012). Fostering computer-mediated L2 interaction beyond the
classroom. Language, Learning
&Technology, 16(1), 10-25. Retrieved April, 2012 from
Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and research
settings. (Cambridge Applied Linguistics Series). Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press.
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