Representing own and other voices

insocialscience research articles*

Jean Parkinson
Victoria University of Wellington

That complement clauses are a prominent feature of various registers including

conversation and academic prose. In academic prose, that-clauses are of interest
because they frame research findings, the writers central message to the reader.
To achieve this persuasive purpose, that-clauses are employed to draw in vari-
ous voices, including those of other researchers, research participants, research
findings and the writer. This study extends prior investigation of complement
clauses to examine their distribution across different sections of a corpus of
research articles in social science. The social action of each section is partially
achieved through what the different voices in the different sections of the article
talk about, and the subtle variations in the stance of the author and other voices
across sections. This study finds that use of reporting verbs is nuanced accord-
ing to authors purposes in different sections, and also according to the source
of the proposition in the that-clause.

Keywords: That-complement clauses, reporting verbs, academic writing, stance,

research articles

1. Introduction

How authors express stance has received a good deal of interest in recent times
(e.g. Biber 2006, Hunston & Thomson 2001, Hyland 2005). In academic prose,
one important way that this is achieved is via that-complement clauses. Hyland &
Tse (2005a, 2005b) compared complement clause use in research article abstracts
across a number of disciplines. Charles (2006a, 2006b, 2007) compared their use
in PhD theses in two fields (politics and materials science). This article extends
this work by comparing the use of that-complement clauses across the different
sections of a corpus of research articles in the area of social science. Of interest is
how the authors of the articles package meanings associated with evaluation and

International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 18:2 (2013), 199228. doi 10.1075/ijcl.18.2.02par

issn 13846655 / e-issn 15699811 John Benjamins Publishing Company
200 Jean Parkinson

objectivity not only into the verbs controlling that-complement clauses, but also
into the human and abstract subjects which are the source of propositions in that-
clauses. In order to unpack what rhetorical work is being done with that-clauses
in the different sections of the research articles in my corpus, this study investi-
gates how different types of that-clauses are distributed across the sections of the
research articles. Focus in this study is on social science research articles based on
surveys, a widely used instrument in the social sciences.
A number of elements give the information in the that-clause a special status:
that of fact or evidence. Halliday (1994) notes that information in that-clauses is
less arguable. In Example (1) (taken from the corpus), if we add the tag question
doesnt it, we are arguing about whether the theory of compensating differentials
says this or not. The content of the that-clause, that workers may receive [] com-
pensation, is not called into question.
(1) The theory of compensating differentials states that workers may receive
pecuniary compensation commensurate with the strenuous or hazardous
nature of tasks or adverse working conditions.

Secondly, by noting that x says that the writer provides a provenance for the
information, making it more convincing to the reader. In this way, the writer
gains distance from the information in the that-clause, making it appear more
objective.
Both controlling verbs and controlling adjectives allow the writer to record
their own evaluative stance on the information in the that-clause, as Thompson
(1996) and Hyland & Tse (2005b), amongst others, have noted. The verbs that
control that-complement clauses provide a hint about how much store the writer
sets by the truth of the that-clause (see Example (2)). Words like claim and main-
tain (called argue verbs by Charles 2006b, following Francis et al. 1996) as well
as think verbs like believe and think, suggest less certainty on the part of the
source of the proposition than do either observe and find (which Charles 2006b
calls find verbs) or demonstrate and show (show verbs). The same can be said
about the more tentative it is possible/likely that compared to the more definite it is
clear that. Thus the writer has the option to call into doubt the factivity of the find-
ings and utterances of the contents of the that-clause, as we see in Example (2).
(2) Persons came to believe that in order to be a good and professional worker
no signs of weaknesses could be expressed.

The that-complement clause is thus a powerful tool for packaging evidence, for
distancing the writer from the fact in the that-clause, and for allowing the writer to
evaluate the factivity of the contents of the that-clause. That-clauses are also a way
of setting up a conversation between the different voices in the research a rticles.
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 201

These include the voices of prior literature, the data or findings, the studys author,
and the participants in the surveys.
That-clauses reflect the extent to which it is important to the reader to know the
status of the contents of the that-clause: who says this and how reliable the writer
claims it is. The writer could choose to state it baldly. In this case the reader would
be less likely to accept what is said. Attaching it to the present study in Example (3a)
limits the claim, making it more acceptable to the reader than is the case in (3b).
(3) a. The present study finds no evidence that early adolescence is a
particularly sensitive period for the onset of alcohol use.
b. Early adolescence is not a particularly sensitive period for the onset
of alcohol use.

In Section 2 I review literature on that-clauses, before going on in Section 3 to

outline the methods I used, describing both my corpus and the coding system
I employed. Section 4 shows the results of my application of this coding system
to my corpus data; in addition it discusses the placement of and status afforded
to claims in that-clauses made by different participants in research articles (e.g.
the research article author, the previous literature, etc.) and the controlling words
used to introduce these claims.

2. Packaging of information in complement clauses

Complement clauses include that-clauses, wh-clauses, to-infinitive clauses, and

ing-clauses (Biber et al. 1999:658); I limit my interest here to that-clauses because
this is the most common way that propositions are packaged in academic writing.
That complement clauses may occur in post-predicate position (e.g. They note
that) where they report speech, thoughts, attitudes or emotions (Biber et al.
1999:660) or in extraposed position (e.g. It is clear that), where they report un-
attributed attitudes, usually the attitude of the writer (Biber et al. 1999). H
alliday
(1994:264) calls these extraposed complement clauses fact clauses, because
similarly to clauses controlled by mental or speech act verbs, such fact clauses
are ready packaged in projected form (Halliday 1994:264). Hewings & Hewings
(2002) found extraposed it-clauses to function interpersonally in hedging, mark-
ing writer attitude, emphasis and attribution.
Complement clauses can complement both verbs and adjectives (Biber 1999).
Verbs that control complement clauses include mental verbs (both cognition
verbs like think and know, and affective verbs like hope), speech act verbs (like
say) and other communication verbs (such as prove, show and suggest) (Biber et
al. 1999). This variation allows a varying degree of authorial (or other human)
202 Jean Parkinson

presence. The most common controlling verbs in academic prose are show, say,
suggest, see, find, think, know, believe and feel (Biber et al. 1999). Verbs control-
ling extraposed clauses include appear, seem and be (Biber et al. 1999). Adjectival
predicates controlling that-clauses (e.g. he is confident that) include certainty
adjectives (such as certain and sure) and affective adjectives (such as aware and
careful). Adjectival predicates taking extraposed that-clauses include clear, (un)
likely, (im)possible and true (Biber et al. 1999). These are particularly common in
academic prose (Biber et al. 1999).
Biber et al. (1999:673) note that adjectival predicates with extraposed that-
clauses mark a stance or attitude towards the proposition in the that-clause. That
this is usually the attitude of the writer is an important point that I take up later
in this article. Groom (2005) finds systematic variation in use of adjectival predi-
cates taking that-clauses in two genres across two disciplines. Peacocks (2011)
study of use of this structure in eight disciplines similarly finds significant varia-
tion. The contribution of the present study is that it considers variation across
the different sections of the research article genre, and that it focuses on social
science, a discipline which has not been considered from this perspective.
Noun complement that-clauses are common in academic prose (Biber 1999:
647). They are controlled by a closed set of nouns, among them fact, idea, pos-
sibility, doubt and assumption. Charles (2006a, 2006b, 2007) finds variation in the
most frequently used nouns followed by that-clauses in two disciplines. She finds
argument nouns (e.g. argument, assertion) to be most prominent in politics theses,
while evidence nouns (e.g. evidence, observation) were most frequent in materials
science theses.
Hyland & Tse (2005a, 2005b) compares the frequency of that-clauses in ab-
stracts in six disciplines. They categorise the source of the proposition in that-
clauses into human, abstract entity, or unnamed (concealed) source. In addition
to source of the proposition, they consider two other elements. The first is what
the proposition in the that-clause refers to (writers claims, previous studies, re-
search goals, and methods, models and theories). The second is the evaluative
stance of the writer (affective or epistemic). As their concern is abstracts, that-
clauses in their corpus overwhelmingly concerned the writers own findings, a
contrast to my own findings based on whole articles. Hyland & Tse (2005b) report
that evaluative stance in their data is predominantly epistemic rather than attitu-
dinal, commonly attributed to an abstract entity rather than a human source, and
that controlling words are largely verbs rather than adjectives or nouns. My own
data support all three of these findings.
Comparing the construction of stance in reporting clauses in politics and ma-
terials science theses, Charles (2006a) too considers the source of the proposition
in the that-clause. She considers propositions made in a text to be averred by
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 203

the author, unless attributed to another source. When the self is the source of
the proposition, the author has three choices. Firstly, the source may be averred
(e.g. it was shown). This is Hyland & Tses (2005a, 2005b) concealed category.
Secondly, the source may be emphasised, where the author openly attributes the
source of a proposition to themselves (e.g. I argue); thirdly, a hidden source of a
proposition is attributed to another entity (e.g. this thesis argues). This is Hyland
& Tses (2005a, 2005b) abstract category.
Charles (2006a) finds that although taking a personal stance is important in
the discipline of politics, writers still felt the need to conceal themselves to a large
degree as the source of their propositions. She notes too that in line with the
popular idea of science as emphasising objectivity, materials science writers did
incorporate their own views, but they did so largely through impersonal forms
such as it was shown and this thesis argues. She finds a high level of hidden averral
(Hyland & Tses (2005a, 2005b) abstract category) in materials science because
of the status given in this discipline to experimental evidence rather than subjec-
tive judgement. Materials science authors thus view making abstract entities such
as results or data as the best way to make their claims convincing to readers.
Charles (2006a) finds argue to be the most frequently used controlling verb
in her politics corpus, while show is the most frequent in the her materials science
corpus. She notes that the frequency of argue reflects that knowledge in politics
is text-based, not experimentally-based as in materials science. Another feature
that Charles finds in politics texts is the higher use of I/we compared to the ma-
terials science texts, reflecting the greater importance in politics of putting for-
ward arguments. As I describe later in this article, that-complement clauses are
more frequent in the social science research articles in my data than in either of
Charless (2006a) thesis corpora, a difference likely to be related to both genre and
discipline differences.
Charles (2006a) notes that in politics, writers use phrases such as it could/
might be argued/said to anticipate objections by putting forward ideas they dis-
agree with and then arguing against them. This shows they are open to debate, a
positive value in this discipline.

3. Methods

The corpus consists of 50 journal articles, 5 from each of the ten social science
journals listed in Appendix 1. The journals were selected as being among the top
twenty most highly cited social science journals (Science Watch 2008). This study
concerns expression of meaning in the discussion of survey data, so highly cited
journals which do not publish survey articles were omitted. Articles were selected
204 Jean Parkinson

from each of the five most recently available issues of these ten journals, all later
than 2004, and most from 2010 or 2011 issues. Full details of the corpus may be
found in Parkinson (2013). The size of the corpus is 264,581 words, with the aver-
age size of the 50 articles being 5,292 words. WordSmith Tools 5.0 (Scott 2008)
was used to search texts for all uses of the word that. These were then sorted to
eliminate all uses of that other than complementation; in total there were 1,538
that-clauses. That-complement clauses were then coded according to a system
which I will outline below. Before doing so however, I consider my overall ap-
proach to analysing the data.
Firstly, it should be noted that I treat the different sections of the articles as
subcorpora. Depending on the genre, different parts of a text may have different
rhetorical purposes. Swales (1990), for example, has shown how the Introduction
sections of research articles function to indicate that the work to be reported on is
new, fills a gap in the literature or raises questions about prior research. By contrast,
the Method section functions to report on how the data for a study was collected
and processed. To test whether and how these differences are reflected in different
sections of research articles, I divided my corpus of articles into the different article
sections. Word counts for these different sections are reflected in Table 2.
In my analysis of the data, I have tried as far as possible to make comparisons
with the data of Hyland & Tse (2005b) and Charles (2006a). These comparisons
are reflected in Table 2 and Figure 2. Charless study (2006a), like the present
study, considers whole texts albeit a different genre (PhD theses rather than re-
search articles as in the present study), making comparison useful. To a large
extent I follow Hyland and Tses (2005b) labels for categories rather than Charless
(2006a), but these categories are essentially the same, as I outline above.
Following the system and terminology of Hyland & Tse (2005b), I coded both
the contents of the that-clause, or what they call the evaluated entity, and the
source of the contents of the that-clause, or what they call the evaluative source.
With regard to the first of these, the contents of the that-clause, each clause was
coded for whether it concerns:
i. Authors claim
ii. Previous studies
iii. Authors goals
A further category in Hyland & Tses (2005b) study is methods, models, theo-
ries. Because I compared different sections of the research articles, and because
I expected that discussion of methods might have a different distribution from
discussion of models and theories, I disambiguated these categories further into:
iv. Methods
v. Models and theories
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 205

Because my corpus consisted of research involving questionnaire and interview

data, a further category for the contents of the that-clause is:
vi. Participants opinions
For the second element in the coding scheme, source of the that-clause, Hyland &
Tse (2005b) code human, concealed or abstract sources, equivalent to what
Charles (2006a) calls emphasised, averred and hidden sources. In consider-
ing clauses that had a human source, as Charles (2006a) does, I divided Hyland &
Tses (2005b) human source into author and other human.
i. Human-Author: we do not find it likely that lowering the drinking age will
reduce HED totals
ii. Human-Other: Staff in other hospitals remarked that they were already on the
path to making the changes recommended by the D2B Alliance
iii. Concealed: It is unlikely that these kinds of response biases would fall along
diagnostic lines
iv. Abstract: Recent research suggests that brain maturation proceeds into the late
teenage years (Steinberg 2005).
Note that in the fourth example above, although the researchers responsible are
recoverable from the citation, the writer has chosen to foreground the research as
responsible entity, and I therefore have coded this as abstract.
In cases such as Example (4) and (5) however, a choice had to be made. Is
the responsible entity human (our/the superscript citation) or abstract (findings/a
review)? As the authors of Example (4) and (5) have given responsibility to the
findings/review, and as these abstract entities seemed more prominent than the
human(s) associated with them, instances of this sort were coded as abstract.
(4) Our findings suggest that one reason motherhood leads to declines in mari-
tal satisfaction is that []
(5) Consistent with a review of 24 studies demonstrating that the combination
of chronic conditions and the severity of conditions were associated with
poorer functioning or quality of life24 []

In extraposed that-clauses (it is obvious that) such as Example (6), and existen-
tial there-clauses (there is evidence that) such as Example (7), the empty subject
means that the entity responsible for the contents of the that-clause is concealed.
(6) It is interesting to see that increased age seems to offer protection against
worse PH.
(7) [] there is much research evidence that more RNs relative to others are
associated with better patient outcomes.
206 Jean Parkinson

A further difficulty in coding is in the wide nature of a category such as authors

claim, which can refer to small claims authors make when they do fine-grained
analysis of their data (e.g. Example (8)), as well as large claims they make con-
cerning their contribution to the field (e.g. Example (9)).
(8) The results indicate that 42% of respondents report that their GIS package
reassembles data from small spatial units
(9) we have shown that new individual career options for one partner create
potential conflicts in the relationship.

The unlikelihood of authors specifically attaching themselves to their claims con-

tributes to the difficulty of coding the category authors claim. Authors are far
more likely to give responsibility for their claims to abstract research entities such
as the data, the findings, etc. (e.g. Example (8)).
Using this coding scheme each that-clause was coded qualitatively. To illus-
trate the coding system in its entirety, I provide examples in Table 1. The contents
of the that-clause are underlined, while the source of the that-clause is in bold.

Table 1. Illustration of coding system

Word Controlling Contents of Source of the That-clause
class word that-clause that-clause
Verb indicate Authors Abstract greater child support payments to
claim other relatives and nonrelatives than
to grandparents may indicate that
grandparents are more likely to
support the children financially
Adj. clear Methods Concealed It is clear that none of the quantitative
indicators captures all of the criteria on
which traditional rankings are based
Verb believe Authors Human-author We believe that survey funds that go to
claim aggressive contact follow-up attempts
can be used for these efforts as well
Verb argue Models/ Human-other Evolutionary theorists have argued
theories that stepfathers befriend stepchildren
as a way of gaining social capital with
their mothers
Noun belief Participants Human- other The firm belief expressed by many of
opinions the interviewees that those living in
infill housing really did live differently
was captured in the survey variable
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 207

4. Results and discussion

All verbs, nouns and adjectives controlling that-clauses are included in Appen-
dix2. Relational verbs such as show, suggest and indicate make up a third of the
controlling words in the corpus. Appendix 3 shows the 26 most frequent control-
ling words out of the total of 208 used; these 26 words account for two thirds of
the that-complement clauses in the corpus. As Appendix 3 shows, suggest (when
it concerns a research related subject rather than a person) and show are the most
frequent, followed by find, report, fact and argue.
Table 2 compares the frequency of that-clauses in the different sections of the
corpus. Hyland & Tses (2005b:48) study of that-clauses in abstracts in six disci-
plines reports a range between 2.1 instances per 1000 words in electronic engi-
neering and 8.5 in computer science abstracts. Frequency in this corpus of social
science abstracts is thus rather low (3.7 per 1,000 words). This may be a result of
a tendency in many of the journals studied to prescribe division of the abstracts
into very short statements on Aim, Background, Methods, Results, Conclusion,
which may discourage the kind of elaboration constituted by that-clauses. Great-
est frequency of that-clauses in my corpus was in the Discussion and Conclusion
sections, which have a high incidence of expression of authors research findings.

Table 2. Frequency of that-clauses in the subsections of the corpus

Word count That-clauses That-clauses
per 1000 words
Abstract 10,278 38 3.7
Introduction 62,907 401 6.4
Method 64,744 138 2.1
Results 66,871 410 6.1
Discussion 53,051 486 9.2
Conclusion 6,730 65 9.7
Total 264,581 1,538 5.8
Hyland & Tse (2005b) abstracts in 6 disciplines 40,000 272 6.9
Charles (2006a) theses politics 190,000 817 4.3
Charles (2006a) theses materials science 300,000 920 3.1

Hyland & Tse (2005b) report that almost all that-clauses in their corpus related to
the authors claim. This was not the case in my corpus as can be seen in Figure1:
only one third relate to authors claim, a third to previous studies and around
17% to participants opinions. Clearly this difference between frequencies in my
corpus and frequencies in Hyland & Tse (2005b) reflects the fact that Hyland &
Tses (2005b) corpus consisted only of Abstract sections, a key function of which
is to put forward new findings. By contrast my corpus consisted of whole articles,
208 Jean Parkinson

so other voices, particularly previous studies, have a more prominent place. This
is one piece of evidence indicating the variation in use of that-clauses across sec-
tions of the research article; this in turn reflects the different rhetorical functions
of the different sections.

Previous studies 305

Participants' opinions 172

Methods 92

Theories and models 110

Author's goals 10

Author's claim 312

0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350

That-clauses per 1,000 words

Figure 1. Content of that-clauses in the corpus

Figure 2 compares the source of that-clauses by frequency in the social science re-
search article corpus with the frequency in Charles (2006a) corpora (politics and
materials science theses). Interestingly, that-clauses are around 35% more common
in my corpus of social science research articles than they are in Charless (2006a)
politics theses, and almost twice as common as in materials science theses. This
may be a reflection of the genre of the writing: theses compared to research articles.
The low rate at which authors make themselves the source of the proposition
(only 45 times per 100,000 words in my social science corpus, as can be seen from
Figure 2) suggests that authors of research articles avoid explicit identification of
themselves as the source of that-clauses. Presumably for reasons associated with
creating an appearance of objectivity, the source of only 8% of all that-clauses in the
corpus is explicitly the author. Authors can be assumed to be at least partly respon-
sible for the propositions in that-clauses which have abstract or concealed sources,
and, in putting forward propositions for which they are the source, it is clear that au-
thors prefer abstract expression (42% of that clauses), such as this finding means, or
concealed expression (23%), such as it was shown. The high rate of abstract sources
indicates a tendency to allow the research to speak for itself as far as possible.
A further interesting feature is the slightly greater tendency of the authors of
the research articles compared to either of Charless (2006a) corpora of theses to
explicitly attribute propositions to themselves, although this is still very much the
dispreferred option. This could be a reflection of the greater authority authors of
research articles feel they have compared to authors of theses, or a function of the
greater length of theses, providing opportunity for longer more tentative discussion.
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 209

700

600 582
That-clauses per 100,000 words

500
430
Social science
400
Politics
(Charles, 2006a)
307
300 Materials science
(Charles, 2006a)

200 242 192

133
162
100 80
125
33
125 125 45 11 45
0
Abstract Concealed Human - Human - Total
author other

Figure 2. Source of proposition in that-clauses in three corpora

4.1 Authors claim

In this section I discuss three issues: where the authors claim is placed in the
article, any difference in the kinds/status of claims made in the different sections,
and the controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives and what these indicate about
construction of stance.

2000
That-clauses per 1,000,000 words

1800
231
1600
1400 454
1200 Author's claim - human - other
Author's claim - human - author
1000
Author's claim - concealed
800 121 Author's claim - abstract
193
600 1123
400 170
578
200 344
0 72 110
t n d ts n n l
c
tio ho l
sio io ta
stra c et su s us To
Ab du M Re s cu nc
l
tro Di Co
In

Figure 3. Where is the authors claim?

210 Jean Parkinson

Overall in the corpus, in more than half of the that-clauses containing authors
claim, the source of the authors claim is an abstract entity as in Example(10):
(10) Overall, these observations leave no doubt that anxiety disorders carry with
them a profound burden. In a further 25% of cases the source is concealed:
(11) It is clear that earlier studies may have overlooked the magnitude of the
association between parenthood and alcohol.

Even for that-clauses containing the authors claim, explicit attribution to the au-
thor (e.g. Example (12) below) occurs in only 12% of cases. As might be expected
from what we know about how authority and objectivity are signalled in research
articles, authors are more likely to use impersonal forms (e.g. Example (13) be-
low) when expressing their own claims than they are baldly to attribute these
claims to themselves.
(12) I would argue that even though I accounted for many household
background []
(13) It is well known that in modern societies, changing employment patterns
affect couples in various ways.

Attribution to an abstract entity allows the author to put forward the authors
ideas without explicitly saying so. Attributing own claims to the results or the data
greatly strengthens what is said, making it appear more objective, because it looks
as if the research speaks for itself (Examples (14) and (15)).
(14) The results show that individuals attitudes are associated with commute-stop
generation.
(15) This study also suggests that husbands need to make more of an effort to
spend time with their wives after children arrive.

Similarly one purpose of using a concealed source is for the author to be able
to speculate without explicitly attaching the speculation to themselves. Examples
(16) and (17) illustrate this:
(16) It is possible that people with geriatric conditions are more likely to be mis-
diagnosed.
(17) It is not inconceivable that breakdown of the traditional family unit e.g.
through divorce, lone parent families or both []
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 211

Are there differences in the kinds of claims made in the different sections? It is
useful to compare claims made in the Results, Discussion, Conclusion and Ab-
stract sections, where authors claims were most frequent. Authors claims made
in the Results sections concern the detailed analysis of the data. They are mostly
claims made about what particular elements of the data mean. They are the small
beginnings of the larger claims that the authors will build on later in the present
article (see Examples (18) and (19)).
(18) Table 4 shows that four times as many nurses report decreases
(relative to increases) in the number of patients.
(19) The fact that 91% of respondents state that they use decennial census data
for transportation planning []

Authors claims made in the Discussion sections are more distanced from the data
and tend to be larger less detailed claims (see Example (20) below). In the Discus-
sion the writer is able to rely on the more detailed level of analysis that has been
done already in the Results. There is a tendency to relate the authors own findings
to those of previous researchers (Example (21) below), and to the authors meth-
ods, models and hypotheses (Example (22) below).
(20) In a more general view, this means that the efforts to achieve greater gender
equality in the labor market and in families go hand in hand.
(21) First, as Aslam (2007) found in Pakistan, I found that boys and girls are
equally likely to enrol in school and to attain a given amount of education.
(22) We found that if we had accepted a lower response rate, our estimates would
not have varied significantly.

Authors claims in the Conclusion sections follow the trend in becoming even
more wide-angled bigger claims (Example (23) below). Here the authors draw
together the case they have been building through their close analysis of data
in the Results and their building of their argument in the Discussion. Stress
may be put on how their findings support (or do not support) previous re-
search (Example (24) below), or on what the implications of the findings are
(Example(25) below).
(23) In sum, our study showed, in line with the spillover hypothesis, that in
general happy spouses were happy parents.
(24) The findings from this study support the international literature in
confirming that APNs are well placed as clinical leaders to promote EBP
among FLNs.
212 Jean Parkinson

(25) By showing that formal leadership for safety is of particular importance in

small hospitals, our results also have important practice implications for these
organisations.

As found by Hyland & Tse (2005b), almost all that-clauses in Abstracts concern
the authors claims. These that-clauses summarise the major claim made in the
article (Example (26) below), and may relate these to the methods used in the
article, contained in the subject of the sentence in Example (27) below. With the
abstract likely to be the first and most-read part of the article, that-clauses play
their part in foregrounding the authors claim, and putting it before the commu-
nity for consideration.
(26) We therefore argue that the breakdown of the traditional family unit along
with psychosocial pathways, demonstrate plausible mechanisms by which
a decrease in generalised trust could lead to an increasing trend of worse
psychological health in youth over successive birth cohorts.
(27) Quantitative, distributional and qualitative analyses show that vulnerability
compensating mechanism is mainly seen in the informal sector, in the
upper tail of the earnings distribution and particularly in the circumstance
of visible underemployment.

I now move on to consider the verbs, nouns and adjectives controlling that-claus-
es about the authors claim. I have claimed above that detailed smaller claims are
made in the Results sections by comparison with the Discussion, Conclusion and
Abstract sections where more general larger claims are made. This is supported
to some degree in the controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives that are associated
with authors claims in the different sections (see Table 3). Because of the low
incidence of these words, raw frequencies rather than normed values are shown.
Show, indicate, mean, and suggest are particularly frequent in the Results sec-
tions. These verbs are used by authors to point to the data, say what they show/
reveal and what they mean (see Example (28) and (29) below). Suggest, show,
indicate, find, and evidence are frequent in the Discussion sections. Suggest, the
most frequent in the Discussions, is relatively more tentative and is associated
with interpreting the data (see Example (30)), while the less frequent find, findings
and evidence are more definite and are words used to make stronger claims by the
author (see Example (31)).
(28) Sometimes the management structure and composition of working team
changed as well. This meant that social support networks decreased, further
straining persons availability of resources.
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 213

Table 3. Authors claim: controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives*

Abstract Intro Method Results Discussion Conclusion Total
argue 1 1 2 2 6
clear 4 2 6
confirm 1 3 1 2 7
demonstrate 2 3 5 1 11
ensure 1 1 4 6
evidence 2 10 1 13
fact 1 1 1 6 7 2 18
find/found 5 2 1 8 17 1 34
findings 1 2 7 2 12
imply 4 4 2 10
indicate 16 19 2 37
un/likely 1 6 7
mean/means 1 10 5 1 17
observation 5 1 6
possible 1 5 1 7
possibility 2 3 1 6
reason 1 2 2 5
result 1 1 3 5
reveal 1 6 3 1 11
see 5 1 6
show/s/ing/ed 6 2 31 27 4 70
suggest/ed/ing/s 5 1 1 13 62 2 84

* The table reflects only those controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives that are represented 5 or more
times (authors claims only).

(29) Table 1 shows that organizations engaged most frequently in learning

responses related to major event analysis []
(30) Our data suggest that some stepchildren think and act more positively
toward stepparents who are supportive of their parents.
(31) First, as Aslam (2007) found in Pakistan, I found that boys and girls are
equally likely to enroll in school and to attain a given amount of education.
214 Jean Parkinson

4.2 The voices of previous researchers

In this section I discuss where the voices of other researchers are placed in re-
search articles, and the controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives associated with
these voices and what these indicate about construction of stance.

2000
1800
That-clauses per 1,000,000 words

1600
1400 733
1200 Previous studies - human - other
Previous studies - human - author
1000
514 Previous studies - concealed
265
800 Previous studies - abstract

600
181
400 113 752
200 446
261
0
ct n d ts n n l
ra io ho ul io sio ta
t
uc
t
et s
us
s To
A bs d M Re sc n clu
tro Di Co
In

Figure 4. The source of other researchers findings

As reflected in Figure 4, two thirds of the references to the findings of previous

studies are found in the Introduction section, where the survey of literature is
placed, with a further 25% of references to findings of previous studies found in
the Discussion sections; this is expected because it is in the Discussion section
that researchers place their own findings in the context of the literature, making
comparisons with it or drawing on its support. Almost all references to previ-
ous studies findings were directly attributed to the human author of those stud-
ies. Around half of these were integral citations (coded human-other by me)
and a similar number were non-integral citations (coded abstract by me), see
Examples (4) and (5). This incidence of integral citation attributed directly to a
human subject is in line with Charles (2006b) similar finding in close to half the
references in theses in materials science and politics. This high incidence of at-
tribution to the human subject, whether integral or non-integral, reflects the fact
that unlike the authors claims, which are risky to make and lose an appearance
of objectivity by being directly associated with the author, direct association of
the claims of published studies with the author of those studies is essential; firstly
this avoids plagiarism and secondly, as published claims, these have a degree of
acceptance by the research community already, and thus support the researchers
own claims.
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 215

Table 4. Previous studies: controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives*

Introduction: Discussion:
previous studies as source previous studies as source

human author

human author
human other

human other
concealed

concealed
abstract

abstract
Total

Total
More persuasive controlling words
suggest/ed/ing/s 31 1 1 9 42 10 1 4 5
indicate 14 3 17 4 1 5
argue 3 2 7 12 1 1 3 5
evidence 4 3 2 9 2 1 3 6
More definite controlling words
find/found 13 3 2 47 65 10 6 16
show/s/ing/ed 25 5 30 15 1 1 17
report 4 2 12 18
note 2 1 1 4 8 1 1 1 2 5
identify 2 2 4 3 2 5
demonstrate 1 1 5 5
Total 99 10 6 91 206 51 5 22 69

* The table reflects only those controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives that are represented 5 or more
times (previous studies only).

Table 4 includes that-clauses in the Introductions and Discussions only, as refer-

ences to other researchers in other sections are very sparse. The most common
controlling verbs appear to fall into two categories: those that are more emphatic
and less negotiable (find, report, show), and those that are more persuasive, more
suggestive, more tentative and more negotiable (suggest, argue, indicate). The less
negotiable controlling verbs (see Example (32)) are strongly associated with other
researchers as the source:
(32) Dreze and Srinivasan (1997) focused specifically on widow-headed house-
holds and found that, overall, female-headed households appear to be no
poorer than male-headed households are.

The more negotiable controlling words are more usually associated with a source
that falls into the abstract rather than human category, as illustrated in Exam-
ples(33) and (34):
216 Jean Parkinson

(33) Several recent theory papers by experts in the field of patient safety have
suggested that visible leadership supporting patient safety improvement
efforts is required.
(34) Among children who live with a resident parent, most studies have
indicated that nonresident mothers have more frequent and higher quality
contact and greater closeness with their children
 (Hawkins, Amato & King 2006; Nord & Zill 1996)

This is a curious feature of that-clauses used in connection with the ideas and find-
ings of previous researchers. The more emphatic more uncompromising control-
ling verbs in the find category, like find, report and note co-occur with the author
of previous studies in subject position. Persuasive, negotiable controlling verbs co-
occur with abstract subjects (Examples (33) and (34)), and the author of the study
may appear in a non-integral citation (Example (34)). The abstract source (most
studies and Several recent theory papers) appear to be being used as part of a bigger
argument of the authors. The definiteness conferred by the published nature of the
findings of published research is combined with the greater tentativeness (reflected
in persuasive verbs like suggest) of the argument the author is building up; at the
same time the author of the previous finding ceases to be foregrounded in subject
position and becomes an afterthought in a non-integral citation (Example (34)).
Interestingly, although abstract and explicit researcher source are equally
frequent in the Introductions, in the Discussion sections, an Abstract source of
that-clauses (like Example (33) and (34) is twice as frequent as a source that is
explicitly the researcher (as in Example (32)). This suggests that the authors of
previous research articles are more present in the Introductions, and perhaps are
given more individual attention, while in Discussions other researchers are not
the focus and are more likely to be tacked on in non-integral citations, or appear
in summaries of what many reports have shown or some studies have reported
(as in Example (34)).

4.3 Survey participants voices

As might be expected, survey participants are seldom the source of propositions

in that-clauses outside of the Results section and to a much smaller degree, the
Discussion section (see Figure 5). Their opinions are openly attributed to this
group. Survey participants speak openly in the Results section, but in the Discus-
sion and Conclusion sections, their opinions have been summarised and trans-
formed into authors findings/claims.
A very wide variety of controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives 88 in total
were associated with the utterances of the participants. Table 5 shows only those
that occurred 5 or more times in the Results and Discussion sections. These fell
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 217

1200
That-clauses per 1,000,000 words

1000

800
Participants' opinions - human -
other
600 782
Participants' opinions - concealed
650 Participants' opinions - abstract
400

200 102
60 125
72 117
0 34
ct l
tio
n d lts io
n n ta
tra ho su ss sio To
bs
c et Re l u
A du M sc
u
nc
tro Di Co
In

Figure 5. Where are survey participants opinions found?

into two categories: firstly, reporting verbs (placed by Charles 2006b) into the ar-
gue group of controlling verbs), most prominently report, but also say, indicate
and state, and the noun fact; the second category involves participants mental
processes; these were nouns such as belief and idea, and verbs like dis/agree, be-
lieve and realise (in Charless (2006a) think category). The survey participants
mental processes are given more expression than those of either author or other
researchers. This is presumably because it is the authors goal to examine the be-
liefs and perceptions of the survey participants.

Table 5. Controlling verbs and nouns: survey participants*

Results: survey participants Discussion: survey participants
abstract concealed human abstract concealed human
Participants mental processes
agree/disagree 2 16 1
belief 3 4 1 2 2 1
believe 6 8
perceive 4 2
realise 5 1
idea 4 1 1
Reporting signal
fact 1 5
indicate 2 8
report 29 4
say 15 1
state 4 3

* The table reflects only those controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives that are represented 5 or more
times (survey participants opinions only).
218 Jean Parkinson

The controlling words used give the impression that the authors of the ar-
ticles are careful to report the survey participants opinions and beliefs in neu-
tral language. These controlling words do however reflect a very different role
for the participants than for either the author or previous researchers. It is the
participants role to report their beliefs and ideas in response to questions, many
of which are closed-ended. Responses of the survey participants to questionnaires
have been anticipated by the researchers and are thus constrained accounting for
the high incidence of (dis)agree in the data (see Example (35)).
(35) those living on the residential quarter-acre sections were more likely to
agree that infill housing goes against the New Zealand way of life.

4.4 The role of the Methods

It is difficult to extend my metaphor of voices to view the Methods as having a

voice in the research articles in the corpus. This is because propositions about
methods usually have abstract or concealed source on the one hand, and the
controlling verbs and nouns are not communicative ones, but rather verbs like
indicate and show. The methods do not speak out; rather they reveal things. For
the most part propositions about methods are found in the Method, Results and
Discussion sections. As can be seen from Figure 6, however, only a small number
(9%) of that-clauses in the corpus as a whole concern methods.

600
That-clauses per 1,000,000 words

500 53
49
400
Methods - human - other
212 Methods - human - author
300
Methods - concealed
Methods - abstract
200 38
23 26
79 106 223
100
87 64 60
0
ct l
on od lts n n ta
tra ti h su sio sio To
bs
c et Re
s
clu
A du M s cu n
tro Di Co
In

Figure 6. Source of propositions concerning Method

 Own and other voices in social science research articles 219

Table 6 reflects the most common verbs, nouns and adjectives controlling that-
clauses referring to methods. Interestingly, the most common verbs (including
indicate, mean, reveal, show) all fall into a category referred to as show verbs by
Charles (2006b).

Table 6. Controlling verbs and nouns where research methods are the source
of propositions*
Method section Results section Discussion Total
ensure 4 2 6
fact 2 5 7
indicate 10 5 15
limitation 5 5
mean 2 1 3 6
possible 1 4 5
reveal 2 3 5
show 3 4 7
Total 24 13 19 56

* The table reflects only those controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives that are represented 5 or more
times (propositions about methods only).

That-clauses in which the research methods were the source of the proposition
and which were in the Method section concerned explanations of scoring frame-
works, statistical methods etc. and how these would work in the study (see Ex-
ample (36)):
(36) A score of 0 indicated that both partners shared the same tendency for a
move regardless of the strength of that preference.

In the Results sections, that-clauses in which the research methods were the
source of the proposition concern the statistical and other analytical procedures
and what they revealed/indicated/showed (see Example (37)):
(37) The goodness of fit of the outcome equation is relatively low at 0.053, which
indicates that many factors important to the chaining frequency decision
have not been captured by this study.

Where the research methods were the source of the proposition in the Discus-
sion section, they concerned the strengths and limitations of the study (see Ex-
ample (38)):
(38) A major strength of this study is the fact that it is longitudinal, covering a
seven year time frame.
220 Jean Parkinson

4.5 Theories and models

As shown in Figure 7, propositions in that-clauses about theories and models are

found mainly in the Introduction and Method sections.

700
That-clauses per 1,000,000 words

600 42

132
500 Theories & models -
human - other
400 Theories & models -
human - author
276 Theories & models -
300 concealed
64 Theories & models -
200 23 abstract
98 57
100 189
-

113 94
60
0 26 23
l
ct n od ts n n ta
tra tio h sul sio sio To
s c et Re cu
s
clu
Ab du M s n
tro Di Co
In

Figure 7. Source of propositions about theories and models

While the source of propositions about theories and models is most frequently
concealed or abstract, an interesting feature is that a fair number of the proposi-
tions are directly attributed to the author. These associations are partly the result
of authors discussing what their hypotheses were either initially or during the
research (Example (39)); in other places they apparently reflect that authors are
keen to claim the models they use or design (Example (40)), where the author is
making an important and definite claim), or that association with these models is
not regarded as risky in the same way that making claims is risky.
(39) We hypothesized that the EQ-5D, HUI2, and HUI3 index scores would be
strongly correlated.
(40) In general, then, we hypothesize that declines in spousal time mediate the
relationship between the transition to motherhood and declines in marital
satisfaction.

Interestingly, Table 7 shows that the majority of the most common controlling
verbs and nouns have to do with mental processes such as assume (the think
category of verbs) and nominalisations of these such as assumption and hypothesis.
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 221

Table 7. Controlling verbs and nouns where theories and models

are the source of propositions*
Introduction Method Discussion Total
argue 5 1 6
assume 10 1 3 14
assumption 5 1 1 7
believe 3 1 4
hypothesis 2 2 4 8
possible 4 2 6
show 4 2 6
suggest 4 3 2 9

* The table reflects only those controlling verbs, nouns and adjectives that are represented 5 or more
times (theories and models only).

4.6 The voice of the reader

Thompson (2001) points out that one of the ways that authors interact with the
reader is to anticipate arguments objections and questions that readers might
pose. This might be achieved in a range of ways; Thompson (2001) suggests that
hypothetical-real text structures and concession are two prominent ways that au-
thors use. Because focus in this article is on that-clauses only, few examples of
reader voice were noted. However two that-clauses that do appear to represent the
voice of the reader are Examples (41) and (42):
(41) Although it may be argued that the link between planning praxis and
peoples feelings is somewhat tenuous, the strength of emotion expressed
by respondents during this research makes it essential that the relationships
between the two are better explored. By employing Lefebvres conceptual
triad we []

The person who might be imagined to put forward the argument in Example (41)
is the reader. Similarly, in Example (42) the person to whom this may seem obvi-
ous is the reader:
(42) It may seem obvious that there is association between trust levels and
psychological health, as lack of trust is often associated with clinical
psychoses. However, we should point out that the GHQ-12 instrument is
not a diagnostic tool used by professionals to determine the mental health
of patients, but []
222 Jean Parkinson

In each case the writer carefully counters these arguments and assumptions
by the imagined reader, and uses this rhetorical device to emphasise some impor-
tant element in their study.

Summary across sections of variation in reporting verbs

4.7 
and role of section

As the discussion above has shown, the voices that project that-clauses in the ar-
ticles, those of the author, prior researchers, the survey participants, the research
itself, its methods and the theories it relies on or generates, are distributed differ-
ently across sections. In examining this distribution, this article has considered
the controlling words associated with the different voices across the sections, as
well as the source and content of the propositions in that-clauses. Table 8 sum-
marises this variation, showing firstly that authors use more definite controlling
verbs in the Results sections, where they make smaller more detailed claims;
they use more persuasive controlling words in the Discussions, where they make
more wide-angled claims. Secondly, Table 8 reflects that previous studies may be
associated with more tentative or more definite controlling verbs. More emphatic
controlling words are connected explicitly to the researchers themselves as sen-
tence subject. Where more persuasive controlling verbs are used the researchers
are more likely to appear as non-integral citations. Table 8 shows too that survey
participants mental processes are reflected in words controlling that-clauses as
are their neutral reports of their experiences and ideas. Research Methods reveal
findings, while Theories allow authors to conceptualise and argue.
Table 8 suggests too that the verb categories that are prominent in this corpus
indicate a predominance of show and argue verbs, congruent with the authors
purpose of proving and convincing the reader of their new knowledge claims.
Only the research participants state their experiences and reveal their beliefs.

5. Conclusion

The limitations of this research are firstly the relatively restricted size of the
corpus. This limited size, comparable to the size of each of Charless (2006a)
corpora, reflects the qualitative nature of the analysis in both studies. The fre-
quency with which these complement clauses appear in this corpus (1,538) and
in Charless (2006a) combined corpora (1,737) does serve to ameliorate this
limitation to a certain extent. A second limitation of the study is that coding
was done by a single person.
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 223

Table 8. Reporting verbs and roles co-occurring with the authors,

the authors of previous studies, and the survey participants*
Role Prominent controlling words Verb categories
(Francis et al.
1996:97101)
Authors Results section: detailed show, indicate, mean, suggest show
analysis of data
Discussion section: broader suggest, show, indicate, find, show
interpretation of data/ evidence
building of claim
Authors of State findings tentatively suggest, indicate, argue, argue
previous evidence
studies State findings definitely find, show, report, note, find/show
identify, demonstrate
Survey Express beliefs agree/disagree, belief, believe, think/believe
participants perceive, realise, idea
Report experiences report, say, indicate, state, fact say
Methods Reveal or show what the data indicate, mean, reveal, show, show
means ensure, fact, limitation,
possible
Theories conceptualise assume, suggest, hypothesis, think/argue
assumption, argue, possible,
show, believe

* Boldface indicates the more prominent words.

A third limitation is that of discipline: the study considers a particular type of

study in a single discipline (questionnaire surveys in the social sciences). Hyland
& Tses study (2005b) shows that there is likely to be wide variation between disci-
plines, and further investigation of other disciplines is likely to be fruitful.
Further investigation is needed too of other genres, including other research
genres such as seminar and conference presentations, and pedagogical genres
such as various genres of written student genres and oral pedagogical genres such
lectures, workshops and office hours. Such investigation of pedagogical genres
will allow application of the present study in writing pedagogy at both under-
graduate and post-graduate level.
Building on prior studies of that-clauses, this articles contribution is to con-
sider how distribution of that-clauses varies across sections of research articles
in a particular discipline, reflecting how different sections perform different
rhetorical actions. As Table 8 shows, authors claims are most frequent in Results
and Discussion sections. By comparison with Discussion sections, authors claims
224 Jean Parkinson

in Results sections are detailed and smaller. In Discussion sections these broaden
out, becoming bigger and more wide-angled, making links to the literature and
the implications of the claims. This is supported by the controlling verbs used
to express authors claims, with suggest (more persuasive and interpretive) being
more prominent in Discussion sections and show (more definite) most prominent
in Results.
As this article has discussed, these patterns are related to the fact that the
main goal of authors of research articles is to argue the case convincingly for the
claim they are making. However they are constrained in the sense that they are
working within the unwritten rules for how objectivity is expressed in academic
writing. So their ability to attribute ideas and claims to themselves is very restrict-
ed. They seldom do so, preferring to make the source of their claims abstract (e.g.
the findings show) or to conceal it (e.g. it is clear that). Instead they deploy other
voices in their arguments that give credibility to the claims being made. Abstract
entities speaking for the author, such as the findings, the study, the evidence etc. are
the most prominent voice in journal articles.
Unlike authors claims, which it is risky for the author to explicitly link to
themselves, previous authors are almost always explicitly linked to their findings
either in integral or non-integral citations (by use of abstract entities in subject
position). This is related to the fact that it actually strengthens the authority of the
authors writing to cite and draw on published literature.
Table 8 shows that previous studies as a source of the proposition in that-
clauses appear most frequently in the Introduction section and also in the Discus-
sion section. More persuasive controlling words (e.g. suggest, indicate) are more
likely to have abstract entities in subject position (i.e. non-integral citation), while
more definite controlling verbs (e.g. found, report) are explicitly sourced to the
previous authors (integral citation). I have argued that that those with non-inte-
gral citation are more likely to be functioning as part of a broader argument being
advanced by the author.
Opinions of survey participants are openly attributed to them and they are
most prominent in the Results and to a much less extent in the Discussion; here
participants opinions have been condensed and transformed into authors find-
ings, and thus the participants do not appear in subject position. Propositions at-
tributed to survey participants may be either neutral reporting verbs (e.g. report,
say), or those indicating mental processes (e.g. (dis)agree, believe). Because it is the
authors aim to examine participant beliefs, the mental processes of survey partici-
pants are given more expression that those of other voices in journal articles.
To return to the distinction Charles (2006b) makes between argue, think,
show, and find verbs, Table 8 indicates that authors of journal articles, like the
authors of previous studies use show and find verbs. This is true as well of the
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 225

methods they use. By contrast, both survey participants and authors theories and
models are associated with think verbs.
In their use of that-clauses, authors deploy the findings of previous research,
the utterances of the survey participants, the objective voice of the research find-
ings, and the imagined objections and questions of the readers. Authors draw
these voices into their texts, in support of their central goal of arguing the claim
they are making. Although these voices are given more or less prominence in the
different sections of research articles, and although this reflects the different so-
cial action of each section, overall they combine to fulfil the authors main intent:
convincing expression of their research findings and claims to new knowledge.

Notes

* I would like to thank Dr Fanie Tsiamita and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful
comments on an earlier draft of this article.

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Appendix 1. Journals from which the research articles

in the corpus were drawn

Environment and Planning

Health Services Research
Journal of Advanced Nursing
Journal of the American Geriatrics Society
Journal of Marriage and Family
Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs
Medical Care
Patient Education and Counseling
Social Science & Medicine
World Development.
 Own and other voices in social science research articles 227

Appendix 2. Verbs nouns and adjectives that control

that-complement clauses in the corpus

Mental verbs 341 accept, anticipate, assume, believe, care, conclude, consider,
detect, determine, discover, estimate, expect, feel, find, hope,
hypothesise, infer, keep in mind, know, notice, observe, perceive,
posit, postulate, predict, prefer, premise, realise, recognise, reflect,
remember, remind, see, speculate, suspect, think, understand,
wish.
Speech act and other 262 acknowledge, admit, advise, (dis)agree, argue, assert, assure,
communication verbs claim, complain, contend, convince, deny, describe, dictate,
emphasise, establish, explain, inform, insist, maintain, mention,
point out, promise, propose, relate, remark, report, request, say,
state, tell, document, highlight, note, pray, qualify, recommend,
suggest (person), write.
Relational verbs 526 appear, confirm, could be, demonstrate, depict, ensure, establish,
guarantee, identify, illustrate, implicate, imply, indicate, may
be, mean, prove, requires, reveal, seem, show, signify, suggest
(research), support, turn out, uncover.
Adjectival predicates 60 apparent, clear, evident, likely, obvious, possible, unlikely, well
certainty known.
Adjectival predicates 40 aware, better, concerned, confident, crucial, essential, imperative,
affective important, inconceivable, interesting, nice, notable, noteworthy,
of concern, plausible, surprising, vital.
Nouns 311 acceptance, advantage, (dis)agreement, appreciation, argument,
assumption, awareness, belief, category, caveat, certainty,
common denominator, concern, conclusions, confidence,
consequence, conviction, criticism, difference, doubt, effect,
evidence, example, expectation, experience, explanation, fact,
fear, feeling, finding, flip side, gist, hint, hypothesis, idea, image,
implication, indication, information, interpretation, issue,
likelihood, limitation, maxim, notion, objection, observation,
pattern, perception, point, possibility, preconceptions, principle,
probability, problem, proposition, reason, recommendation,
report, requirement, result, risk, sense, signal, situation,
statement, stereotype, suggestion, supposition, surprise, theory,
thesis, thought, threat, trend, view, worst of it.
Total 1,540
228 Jean Parkinson

Appendix 3. The 26 most frequently used controlling words

(out of a total of 208 words)

Abst Intro Meth Result Disc Concl Tot % of all 1540

controlling
words in the
corpus
Nouns assumption 9 5 1 1 16 1.04
belief 1 2 9 4 16 1.04
hypothesis 3 6 1 3 4 1 18 1.17
finding 1 2 15 2 20 1.30
evidence 2 9 1 16 1 29 1.89
fact 2 5 4 13 16 2 42 2.73
Adjectival possible 1 4 1 13 3 22 1.43
predicates
Relational imply 5 1 4 6 2 18 1.17
verbs ensure 4 6 2 3 4 19 1.24
demonstrate 3 1 1 4 10 1 20 1.30
reveal 2 3 2 9 3 1 20 1.30
mean 5 11 10 1 27 1.76
indicate 17 13 31 24 3 88 5.72
suggest (research) 5 34 4 16 75 3 137 8.91
show 7 31 7 40 46 6 137 8.91
Speech act say 3 14 1 18 1.17
verbs state 6 2 6 4 1 19 1.24
(dis)agree 1 18 1 20 1.30
note 8 1 4 7 2 22 1.43
suggest (person) 15 1 6 2 24 1.56
argue 1 15 5 3 8 4 36 2.34
report 18 4 30 4 56 3.64
Mental assume 4 12 3 6 25 1.63
verbs believe 4 4 6 13 1 28 1.82
hypothesize 15 1 3 19 1.24
find/found 5 68 3 10 33 1 120 7.80
Total 1,016 66.06

Authors address
Jean Parkinson
School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Victoria University of Wellington
6012, Wellington
New Zealand
jean.parkinson@vuw.ac.nz
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