This study examines 40 English engineering abstracts written by Thai students studying at both Thai and international universities in Thailand. It investigates whether the structural components are compatible with Swales (1990) pattern oI introduction moves or CARS model and Bhatias (1993) abstract move structure. It also investigates the use oI modality as hedges in this abstract genre.
This study examines 40 English engineering abstracts written by Thai students studying at both Thai and international universities in Thailand. It investigates whether the structural components are compatible with Swales (1990) pattern oI introduction moves or CARS model and Bhatias (1993) abstract move structure. It also investigates the use oI modality as hedges in this abstract genre.
This study examines 40 English engineering abstracts written by Thai students studying at both Thai and international universities in Thailand. It investigates whether the structural components are compatible with Swales (1990) pattern oI introduction moves or CARS model and Bhatias (1993) abstract move structure. It also investigates the use oI modality as hedges in this abstract genre.
An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts
NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006
43 A An n A An na al ly ys si is s o oI I M Mo ov ve es s a an nd d M Mo od da al li it ty y i in n E En ng gl li is sh h E En ng gi in ne ee er ri in ng g A Ab bs st tr ra ac ct ts s by Piyakarn Promsin M.A. student School oI Language and Communication National Institute oI Development Administration, Thailand Abstract This study examines 40 English engineering abstracts Irom the research theses written by Thai students studying at both Thai and international universities in Thailand to investigate whether the structural components are compatible with Swales` (1990) pattern oI introduction moves or CARS model and Bhatia`s (1993) abstract move structure. I also investigate the use oI modality as hedges in this abstract genre. The Iirst stage oI the study is to identiIy the overall structural components oI the abstracts, Iollowing the Swales` (1990) pattern oI introduction moves and Bhatia`s (1993) abstract move structure. Then, the common structural components maniIested by Thai students in both groups oI abstracts are presented. Secondly, I study the Irequency oI hedging items in the corpus: identiIying modal verbs, lexical or reporting verbs and others. In the data analysis, I Iound that the moves oI engineering abstracts in my corpus seem to diIIer in both communities: AIT abstracts tend to use all three moves in the CARS model whereas CU abstracts tend to be compatible with Bhatia`s (1993) move structure. However, I Iound some divergences Irom these two models in my corpus. For example, Step 1: Claiming Centralitv and Move 2: Establishing a niche seem to be optional rather than crucial elements Ior Thai students, as well as the redundancy oI Move 1, Step 2: Topic generali:ation and Move 3, Step 1A Outlining purposes. Moreover, based on Bhatia`s (1993) move structure, it is likely that Engineering abstracts tend to omit Move 4, Presenting conclusion and normally begin with Move 1, Introducing purpose in the phrase such as 'The objective oI this study is. and 'This thesis proposes.. Introduction Abstract has become an important aspect amongst research genres in proIessional academic settings. Yet, this academic genre is still neglected by many scholars (Swales, 1990:181). This is especially the case in the journal oI science and technology, which tends to An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 44 be considered most important among the scientiIic discourse community. (Swales, 1990 cited in Pupipat, 1998). The study oI the abstract genre is becoming increasingly important due to the growing number oI journals in academia. According to Thomson ScientiIic Website (2006), the estimated number oI science and technology journals around the world is 12,485 in only this research area. This is problematic iI one needs to pursue particular inIormation that lies in research articles which contain large amounts oI inIormation. A clear abstract is needed to help those scholars, as well as novice researchers or students in the Iield, in deciding whether they should consult the Iull text oI the research article (Cremmins, 1929:4). In addition, the advances in inIormation technology systems have recently made enormous contributions to the retrieval oI inIormation, including abstracts. According to Dudley-Evan & St. John (1998:51), in written academic settings, especially the science and technology Iield, there are diIIerences among genres within the discipline. 'We Ieel that text analysis has shown that all academic disciplines share a common- core oI language and discoursal Ieatures, and that the most signiIicant diIIerences lie at the genre level. Each broad disciplinary area, such as engineering, medicine or law, makes use oI a number oI genres. The set oI genres varies Irom one disciplinary area to another and the actual Ieatures oI given genres may well also vary. While there has been some work examining the abstract genre in the Iield oI medicine, biochemistry, and other social sciences (e.g., Salager-Meyer, 1992; Martin, 2003; Kanoksilapatham, 2005; Samraj, 2005), studies oI abstracts in physical science are extremely scarce. In addition, many studies oI research article genre are centered on the micro level in terms oI their adjectives, collocation, lexical Irequency (e.g., Gledhill, 2000; Soler, 2002; Mudraya, 2006). Very little research has examined the macro-organization oI this genre as to their rhetorical moves as the strategic use. Some researchers in English Ior SpeciIic Purposes have explored the variation oI abstract genres across various disciplines (e.g., Samraj, 2005). Others have studied abstracts in speciIic discipline such as Salager-Meyer, 1992; Anthony, 1999; Kanoksilapatham, 2005. On the other hand, regarding the growing signiIicance oI English in international journals, many studies oI this genre have tended to investigate abstract writing by non-native English researchers or students (e.g., Martin, 2003). In Thailand, there are some studies related to rhetorical moves but these studies Iocused on the business context (e.g., Chakorn, 2002; Prachumpat & Thonthong, 2004). The An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 45 Iocus in other studies such as Vongvanit (2000); Phanthama (2000), however, Iocuses on the linguistics and medical abstracts respectively and not on the structure oI the abstracts in physical science as in engineering. The study oI abstract in this Iield is important in Thailand because most research articles or theses at master degree level require writing in English at least Ior writing the abstract. Additionally, among the Iive sections oI a scientiIic paper; abstract, introduction, materials and methods, results and discussion, Thai students perceive abstract as being one oI the most diIIicult sections among introduction and discussion. (Pupipat, 1998) The study reported here, examines the rhetorical moves used in the Iaculty oI engineering abstracts oI research theses written by Thai students in both Thai and international universities in Thailand. The analysis was mainly based on the Swales` (1990) introduction model and Bhatia`s (1993) pattern on moves. My goal is to speciIy the rhetorical preIerences that characterize the styles oI Thai engineering students. Previous Studies on Move Analysis According to Chan and Foo (2004: 101), abstract studies became interesting to ESP practitioners, who had to teach science and technical subjects in English. One oI them was Graetz (1985). Her intention was to investigate abstracts based on a learner-centered grammar approach. Later there was a shiIt Irom a grammar based approach to genre analysis which was initiated by Swales (1990). Swales (1990) Iirstly analyzed the introduction section oI research articles by identiIying its moves and steps which led to his so-called CARS` (Create A Research Space) model. Later on abstracts in various disciplines were analyzed through the use oI the CARS model, such as in the medical Iield by Salager-Meyer (1990). Those studies aimed to discover and investigate the conventional rhetorical structure oI abstracts in order to help second language learners. Subsequently, inIormation system technology has been advanced, thus leading to the inIormation interchange via the Internet. The abstract has been chosen to be registered as an important data instead oI the whole research article. Chan and Foo (2004) present an important discussion oI the impact oI technology inIormation retrieval to the abstract genre. In this article, two types oI abstracts have been characterized: inIormative and indicative. They suggest that inIormative abstracts would be more speciIic than indicative abstracts. Also the result and conclusion sections are oIten included in inIormative abstracts to which science and technology are preIerred. An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 46 Chan and Foo (2004) studied the abstracts in perspective oI inIormation system (IS) proIessionals in discussion with a group oI seven specialist inIormants who are the highly reputable proIessors responsible Ior courses in inIormation and technology science departments. They Iound that electronic abstracts should be concerned about the provision oI key words because they are an important tool Ior inIormation retrieval system. The writers should not only produce understandable abstracts, but also try to respond to the readers or end- users needs, i.e., to make abstracts easy to read and comprehend. In this important Iinding, they also stated that generic structure and qualities oI abstracts may be aIIected by the technology oI inIormation systems; however, this article would have been more persuasive iI the authors had more related the Iindings to previous works oI rhetorical structure analysis in order to Iacilitate the pedagogical application. Anthony (1999) examined the CARS model in terms oI how well this model can be applied to the introduction in soItware engineering research articles. According to Anthony (1999: 39), there are three reasons Ior which CARS model is used in the examination are: First, 'the model has been through several revisions since its conception in 1981|17|, incorporating the Iindings oI Cooper |18|, who applied it in electrical and electronic engineering, and Crookes |19| who applied it in both the 'hard and 'social sciences. As such, the model can be considered one oI the stronger descriptions oI text structure to date. Secondly, this model has been accepted among writing scholars, and there are various text books whose authors quote Irom it, and third, Swales himselI, whose many concepts and techniques are developed using by many genre analysts throughout the discipline, especially in the rhetorical structure oI research article introduction Anthony (1999) collected data with reIerence to the Best Paper` award in the Iield oI soItware engineering. In her view, a corpus oI 48 articles Irom diIIerent Iields used in Swales`1981 study was unsubstantiated (the average is 3.4 articles per discipline). For this reason, she selected 12 articles Irom a single, high-proIile journal concerned with soItware engineering. In the analysis, aIter using the Swales` move analysis, the results were discussed with Iour specialists in the soItware engineering Iield to avoid misinterpretations. One oI her Iindings revealed that there is a divergence Irom the CARS model, particularly in Move 3, thus causing the development oI the CARS model. The article by Anthony (1999) made an eIIort to An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 47 apply the CARS model in a particular discipline. Especially noteworthy was the Iinding that supports the concept oI variation among disciplines. According to Anthony (1999: 41), 'Even within a single Iield such as engineering, there may be considerable variations between its associated sub-disciplines. Cooper (1985), Ior example, Iound that electrical and electronic engineering articles showed Iew examples oI Step 1-3, with the number oI citations in the introductions and articles as a whole averaging only 7.6 and 17.6, respectively. Martin (2003) compares the structure moves used in English language abstracts and Spanish language abstracts oI the research article in the Iield oI experimental social science. Martin (2003) believes that most graduate students have diIIiculties in writing the scientiIic genre leading to imitation oI the previous writers` style. Meanwhile most research articles were usually published in the international journals in English. For Iear that misinterpretations may have occurred while transIerring the rhetorical structure between two cultures, Martin (2003) conducted this study to discover the variation oI English and Spanish abstracts structure. He Iurther emphasizes that abstracts play an important role as a time-saving tool. Consequently, one who is a novice in this academic genre, at least has to acquire some oI those rhetorical rules and linguistics Ieatures in order to successIully accomplish an assignment. In his corpus, 160 abstracts were randomly selected Irom English and Spanish journals, 80 English abstracts Irom two leading international journals in the Iield oI experimental psychology, likewise, the Spanish abstracts, Irom two existing journals, published in Spanish, in the same discipline, were randomly selected. With this larger corpus size, Martin (2005) believes that the results could obtain a higher degree oI reliability than previous studies. The analysis oI the data was conducted by both preliminary and co-analysis stages. In the Iirst stage, the overall text was thoroughly examined in terms oI their rhetorical structure Iollowed by the macro structure oI the abstracts, in addition to Swales` (1990) CARS model. The second analysis was aimed to validate the Iindings by co-analysts, who are specialists in linguistics and psychology, in order to reach the agreement based on the content criteria. The Iinding revealed that there are more English abstracts with Iour move-basic structures than Spanish. While Move 2 Step indicating a gap` is signiIicantly used higher in English (41.77 ) than Spanish (15 ). According to Martin (2003), non-native English An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 48 speakers have their own conventions oI writing within their communities. This socio-cultural Iactors yield to the structural variations. However, he notices that cultural diIIerences do occur to a considerable extent even in smaller scale oI discourse community such as variation among hard science Iield and soIt knowledge Iield. Samraj (2005) compared the generic structure oI two related genres, research article introductions and abstracts, as a genre set, and then analyzed their relationships in one discipline compared to another. The two closely related disciplines selected to investigate their relationship among a genre set were wildliIe behavior, and conservation biology. Both disciplines are sub-disciplines in interdisciplinary Iields. The corpus is made up oI 48 texts Irom two journals oI these Iields: Animal Behavior and Conversation Biology. Twenty Iour abstracts (twelve abstracts per journal) were randomly selected. Likewise were the research article introductions. Analytic Irameworks used in this study are Swales (1990) Ior article introductions and Bhatia (1993) Ior abstracts. Firstly, abstracts were analyzed by both Irameworks and then the introductions are examined by Swales` (1990) CARS model. Overall, Samraj`s (2005) Iindings on the variation among disciplines are correspondent with Anthony (1999). Especially interesting is the notion that a gap between disciplines, the short or long time established disciplines and the nature oI disciplines could be the key Iactors responsible Ior persuasive element`, i.e. requiring the moves that perIorm a persuasive Iunction, in some abstracts. Another Iinding, a common result oI both disciplines, is that wildliIe behavior and conservation biology share the same traditional abstract moves in which the method part seem to be absent. The article Iurther states that the abstract genre is not merely a simple summary oI the Iull length article. In addition, abstracts should contain the Iour important moves. Based on Swales` move analysis, Kanoksilapatham (2005) conducted the study oI rhetorical structure oI research articles in the biochemistry Iield to present a complete guided model oI this particular discipline. FiIteen moves consisted oI three moves Ior the introduction section and other twelve moves Irom the method, result and discussion sections were investigated in a relatively large corpus oI sixty biochemistry research articles. According to Kanoksilapatham (2005), this study is an important contribution to those interested in the Iield who could apply this model to organize their own research article written; especially, non- native speakers oI English who need to publish the article in an international journal. One oI her Iindings indicates that there was little use oI Move Two, to prepare for the present studv. This is possibly because Iirst, the conducting study is similar with the previous studies in the approach, thus there has not been a gap to indicate. Second, Taylor and Chen (1991) cited in An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 49 Kanoksilapatham (2005) state that this move may be deIined as a Iault Iinding strategy which could lead to Iace-threatening in one culture. ThereIore, apart Irom variation among disciplines, there is also the variation among cultures that plays a crucial role in the rhetorical moves selected by the writers. To contribute to the pedagogy oI English Ior Science Technology (EST), Pupipat (1998) examined the scientiIic article written by Thai scientists in English and then interviewed both ESP specialists or editors and scientists to explore their perceptions. He Iinds that the eIIective strategies that Thai scientists employed in their research articles are, Ior example, using graphics as an outline, revising, writing the literature review in Thai language to avoid plagiarism. Other ineIIicient strategies are, Ior example, writing with a rigid linear sequence, using cut-and-paste technique in draIting and revising. Apart Irom grammatical diIIiculties which are the main problem, how to write in each section oI research articles such as the discussion, abstract and introduction is respectively perceived the most diIIicult genre Ior Thai scientists. According to Pupipat (1998), these three sections should be given priority in the EST pedagogical system Ior Thai scientists. Previous studies on modality Void (2006) has conducted a comparison study oI the use oI hedges among research articles written in three diIIerent languages (English, French and Norwegian) across two disciplines (i.e., linguistics and medicine). Epistemic modality markers were explored by using statistical analyses. The result has shown that Norwegian and English writers use more hedges than French-speaking writers. As opposed to previously published articles, disciplinary variation is unlikely to occur; however, it should be noted that there are still variation oI the type oI markers used between disciplines. Void (2006) states in his conclusion that misunderstanding could occur in academic writing oI diIIerent styles such as English and French iI people have not been aware oI these diIIerences oI hedges. Gosden (1992), analyzing marked themes in each section oI research article discourse, covering three broad disciplines oI the hard sciences (i.e., physics, chemistry, biological sciences), Iinds that the Irequency oI occurrence oI marked sentence-initial elements (e.g., however, in this studv) within Iour sections oI research article discourse i.e. introduction, method, results, and discussions is based on the communicative purposes or rhetorical goals lied in its section. For example, however and although are most likely to be Iound in Introduction corresponding with the explanation oI the CARS model as a writer aims to achieve the purpose by creating a research niche and then to occupy it. An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 50 Data Collection Regarding the purpose oI this study, the Iirst criterion in the selection oI my corpus is trying to speciIy what sub-discipline oI engineering will be studied. One interesting sub- discipline is telecommunications; aIIiliated in electrical engineering. This area covers a wide variety oI research ranging Irom modeling, analysis oI wire line and wireless systems to application and protocol development. The second criterion deals with the selection oI universities with which the student`s theses are aIIiliated. To reduce the possibility oI errors or the potential problems oI analyzing nonnative speaker writing, I chose to collect abstracts Irom two high-proIile universities in Thailand. Forty abstracts were selected Irom School oI Engineering and Technology, the Asian Institute oI Technology (an international university), and Faculty oI Engineering, Chulalongkorn University (a Thai university). My corpus consists oI 40 abstracts in telecommunications written in English Irom two sources; that is; 20 abstracts by Thai students at Chulalongkorn University (CU) and 20 abstracts by Thai students at the Asian Institute oI Technology (AIT). The abstracts were written by diIIerent writers, most oI whom are male. Although I could not trace the whereabouts oI the authors oI the abstracts, I tried to select abstracts Irom diIIerent advisers in order to obtain a variation oI the data. Most abstracts were submitted in the years 1999 to 2002. These abstracts were obtained by the data retrieval means Irom Internet system. I careIully chose abstracts Irom both communities with concerning the similar content in the Iield oI telecommunications. Data Analysis The analysis oI the data was carried out in two main stages. In the Iirst stage oI the study; rhetorical structure or move analysis abstracts were examined to identiIy the overall structural components oI the abstracts, Iollowing Bhatia`s (1993) Iour basic moves and Swales` (1990) pattern oI introduction moves. In the second stage, I continued to analyze in more details with the use oI modality as hedges in the abstracts. Swales` (1990) move structure in the introduction research articles In order to see whether Swales` (1990) pattern oI introduction moves can be applied to the Engineering abstracts in my corpus, I thoroughly analysed all the moves in each abstract. An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 51 The results are shown in Figure 1: Figure 1 Move structure in AIT and CU abstracts Figure 1 shows that the number oI abstracts that contains the rhetorical moves based on Swales (1990). As can be seen, the AIT abstracts tend to use all three moves. Move 3, Occupving the niche is the most Irequent and is an obligatory element in abstracts oI both groups. On the other hand, in the CU group, Move 1, Establishing a territorv and Move 2, Establishing a niche are Iound less than the AIT group, especially Step 1, Claiming Centralitv and Step 2, Making topic generali:ation. However, Move 2 occurs inIrequently in both groups. According to my result, Step 1, Claiming Centralitv and Move 2, Establishing a niche are considered an option than crucial Ior Thai students. This results support Swales` notion on Step 1 that 'it also seems quite widely distributed across various disciplinary areas, although exercised somewhat less in the physical sciences. Bhatia`s (1993) move structure Following the other purpose oI this study to see whether the corpus is compatible with the traditional Iour-move structure oI abstracts, I examined the engineering abstracts based on Bhatia`s (1993) move structure. The results are shown in Figure 2: Moves Steps realizing the moves No. Rate No. Rate Move 1 Step 1 Establising a territory Centrality claims 11 55 1 5 Step 2 Topic generalization 15 75 3 15 Step 3 Review previous 6 30 5 25 Move 2 Step 1B Establising a niche Indicating a gap 9 45 4 20 Step 1D Continuing a tradition 6 30 1 5 Move 3 Step 1A Occupying the niche Outlining purposes 11 55 15 75 Step 1B Announcing research 18 90 16 80 Step 2 Principal Iinding 19 95 18 90 Step 3 Indicating structure 1 5 0 0 AIT CU Abstracts containing move/step An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 52 Figure 2 Move structure oI AIT and CU abstracts Figure 2 presents the numbers oI abstracts utilizing Iour-move structure in my corpus and indicates that abstracts Irom both groups generally contain these moves: Move 1, Introducing purpose, Move 2, Describing methodologv and Move 3, Summari:ing results. It should be noted that Move 1 and Move 3 are the most Irequent and are considered as the obligatory elements in both groups oI abstracts. In addition, there is a similarity in the numbers oI Move 3, oI both Swales and Bhatia`s pattern. However, it is interesting to see that there is a tendency to omit Move 4, Presenting conclusion. This discrepancy indicates the contradiction between my results and Bhatia`s Iindings. According to Bhatia (1993), the research article abstract is perceived as the synopsis containing all oI the important elements oI the whole research paper and Move 4, is also crucial and meant to interpret results and draw inIerences. In my data this move seems to be optional since it is rare in both groups. Data analysis of the structural components Figure 3 Numbers oI structural units in abstracts Moves No. Rate No. Rate Move 1 Introducing purpose 20 100 20 100 Move 2 Describing methodology 19 95 20 100 Move 3 Summarizing results 19 95 17 85 Move 4 Presenting conclusions 7 35 5 25 AIT CU Abstracts containing move AIT CU Total AIT CU Total (N40) (N40) 4 units 6 4 10 3 units 13 5 18 3 units 13 14 27 2 units 5 2 17 2 units 1 2 3 1 unit 2 13 15 1 unit 0 0 0 Swales' move structure Bhatia's moves (N20) (N20) An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 53 Following Swales` CARS model, Irom Figure 3, it is interesting that the abstracts which are considered to be more complete, i.e., containing three structural units, are those written by AIT group (13 oI 20 abstracts), whereas only 5 oI 20 abstracts written by CU group, had all three moves. This is also a signiIicant statistical diIIerence. In my corpus, the AIT abstracts are compatible with the Swales` model; however, some interesting diIIerences can be seen in the two minor divergences. First, the occurrence oI Move 1, Step 2 Topic generali:ation and Move 3, Step 1A, Outlining purposes is redundant. The latter is Iound embedded in one sentence oI Move 1, Step 2 at the beginning oI the abstracts to introduce the research. The most common signal oI purposive statement is the verb 'use to and the prepositional phrase 'in order to. Second, the prevalence oI the methods move is prominent and Irequently Iound aIter Move 3, Step 1B Announcing research. To demonstrate, the AIT abstract can be outlined as Iollows: Note: Para. Paragraph, S Sentence Figure 4 AIT abstract outline structure From the above demonstration, it was obvious that this abstract Iollowed the CARS model apart Irom the exclusion oI the Indicating structure (Move 3 Step 3) which was rather identiIied as the important move in the research article introduction, it was organized in the same manner with the exception oI two points, that is; it began with Topic generali:ation (Move1, Step 2) but Iollowed promptly by pointing to the purpose (Move 3, step 1A) within Move-Step Signals (mv corpus) Para.1 1-2 (embeded 3-1A) (S1) The Wideband Code Division Multiple Access(WCDMA) has been selected as the main air inerIace standard used to... 2-1B (S2) The main problem oI this technology is. 1-3 (S3) In the search Ior suitable MUD solutions most emphasis has been placed on. 2-1B (S4) The question oI. has not been fullv explored. 3-1B (S5/6) In this thesis , the perIormance oI. has been evaluated. Para. 2 methods move (S7/8/9) The performance is analvsed under.. Para. 3 3-2 (S10~16) Simulation results show that. (AIT # 05) (AIT # 05) (AIT # 05) (AIT # 05) (AIT # 05) (AIT # 05) (AIT # 05) An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 54 one sentence. This is perhaps the result oI space constraints. Interestingly, aIter announcing research, the methods are brieIly indicated. Let us move on to consider the abstracts in CU group which is rather, on the other hand, more compatible with Bhatia`s (1993) move structure than AIT group. As shown in Figure 3, while the abstracts Irom these two communities are similar in the number oI structural components, 13 abstracts in AIT and 14 abstracts in CU group have three moves. There is clearly diIIerence related to the sequence and structure oI the abstracts. To demonstrate, the CU abstract can be outlined as Iollow: Note: S Sentence Figure 5 CU abstract outline structure In CU group, the abstract is relatively short as the outline shows. Based on Bhatia`s (1993) move structure, this abstract begins with Move 1, the most common signal oI Move 1 Introducing purposes is the phrase 'The objective oI this study is and 'This thesis proposes. An interesting point to note is the absence oI Move 4 Conclusion may be due to the Iact that the authors do not Iollow the IMRD (Introduction, Method, Result and Conclusion) move structure and the diIIiculties in distinguishing between the Results and Conclusion moves as Martin (2003:39) notes 'This indicate that the division between the Results and Conclusion units is not always very clear, and this is especially so in the case oI abstracts which have no headings that serve as lexical clues to identiIy the diIIerent units. Modality analysis The purpose oI this section is to investigate the use oI hedging devices in the abstract. In this section, I study the Irequency oI hedging items in the corpus. My Iinding on modality is shown in the Figure below: Move Signals (mv corpus) Paragraph.1 1 Purposes (S1) The obfective of this studv is to improve borrowing channel allocation oI the TDMA cellular mobile telephone system in order to . 2 Methods (S2~S6) This method can be implemented bv. 3 Results (S7~9) Results of the simulation show that. (CU # 01) (CU # 01) (CU # 01) An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 55 Figure 6: The Irequency oI occurrence oI modal items A total oI 74 modals were recorded in my sample. They constitute less than one word in every 100 in my corpus. Modals, especially can, should, mav, must have been used more Irequently as hedging device than the other grammatical Iorms to indicate the degree oI certainty. As shown in Figure 6, can represents 83.78 oI the total modal verbs expressing hedging. Interestingly, this Irequency oI occurrence does not diIIer in both AIT and CU groups: 86 in AIT versus 91 in CU. Some examples oI can, mav, should used as hedge Irom my corpus are presented below to illustrate this result. Example (1) The proposed algorithm can estimate the propagation delays and DOAs in the situation that the number oI incoming signals is greater than the number oI antennas. (AIT#01) Example (2) Analytical and simulation results are then compared and Iactors that may have inIluence on the bound are investigated. (AIT#14) Example (3) To avoid changes oI ATM switch conIiguration, buIIering at base station (BS) should be utilized. (AIT#15) 6.76% 83.78% 4.05% 5.41% Can Should May Must An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 56 It should be noted that, Iirst, can which is used to express possibility or uncertainty normally appeared in the result move oI the last paragraph oI abstracts in my corpus. Yet, Ior Thais, this highest Irequency oI occurrence could stem Irom the diIIerent meaning oI the modal verb, can, and also it may be diIIicult to distinguish and decide whether can represents a Iact or possibility or uncertainty in my corpus. Second, mav, which is the modal oI highest Irequency in general scientiIic writing (Salager-Meyer, 1992:105), is rare in my corpus and Iound in the methods and result moves oI abstracts. In addition, should is also extremely rare, they are Iound in both the introducing move and methods move. Apart Irom these modal verbs, hedging devices can be expressed in the Iorm oI reporting verbs. The most common verbs used as hedging in my corpus was show which is the reporting verb that shows high degree oI possibility or writer`s commitment, occurs Iar more oIten than other verbs such as offer, introduce, indicate, propose, as well as, reporting verbs that show low degree oI possibility or writer`s commitment as tend to. Some examples oI this occurrence are shown as Iollows: Example (4) The simulation results show that the Iirst and second proposed schemes give lower blocking probability oI new voice calls than the variable rate based and the power control based CACs proposed by other researches. (CU#07) Example (5) Furthermore, the introduced method offers the advantage oI better perIormance, especially in situations where the incoming signals are highly correlated. (AIT#01) Example (6) By comparison with the Shortest Path Routing Algorithm, the proposed algorithm has introduced better perIormance in both higher in P(success) by 94 percentage and lower in delay by 44 percentage at node density more than 50 nodes and using Gaussian Distribution.(AIT#16) Example (7) Moreover, the new improving intracell handover method is introduced in the proposed algorithm too. (CU#02) An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 57 Example (8) However, perIormance gained when multiplexing two streams with high Hurst values (H 0.8 and 0.9) tends to be the same as when aggregating two stream with H 0.9. (AIT#03) Additionally, we can see Irom my corpus that some modal nouns, adjectives, adverbs and lexical phrases have been used as hedges. The Iollowings are some examples oI modals showing high degree oI possibility or writer`s commitment. Example (9) ThereIore, it has a good potential Ior providing a sign language closed captioning service. (CU#08) Example (10) The simulation results clearly illustrate that the proposed algorithm perIorms under the situation that the incoming signals having either the value oI delays or DOAs closely to the others. (AIT#01) Example (11) As a result it is reasonable to conclude that allowing Mobile Agent to return to the previously passed node does not cause signiIicant impact on the overall system costs. (CU#17) Example (12) OI these Iour indices, the position oI the state oI polarization on the Poincare sphere has proven to be the most accurate and reliable approach Ior identiIying the growth states oI each individual species and classiIying the three species Irom one another. (CU#19) On the other hand, the examples below show modal adjectives, adverbs and lexical phrases that indicate the lower degree oI possibility or writer`s commitment. Example (13) It is Iound that the perIormance, both in BER and convergent rate aspects, oI the proposed receiver and the MOEBAPIC receiver, in an asynchronous channel, at high level oI number oI users are almost the same. (CU#14) An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 58 Example (14) From the simulation results, it can be seen that the perIormance degrades in the case oI multiple users. (AIT#04) Example (15) Simulation results show that the SIC and PIC detector has nearly the same BER perIormance and their perIormance are near to the single user bound when the number oI stage increased. (AIT#05) In sum, as reported above in this section, my Iindings on modality seem to reveal that a writer Iollows the convention when writing an abstract. This convention diIIers Irom diIIerent academic cultures including the language itselI. Thai language may have diIIerent language strategies as to hedging devices. According to my result, the Irequency oI hedging occurrence does not reach statistical signiIicance. However, this is partly due to the Iact that, nature oI this research (i.e. student`s abstracts in theses) does not allow the author to make strong claims when writing this type oI abstract genre. Conclusion As Ior move analysis, in order to see whether the structural components oI engineering abstracts utilized Swales` (1990) pattern on introduction, my Iindings on the rhetorical moves reveal that AIT abstracts tend to use all three moves in the CARS model diIIering Irom CU abstracts. Perhaps, this could result Irom some institutionally speciIic writing patterns. I also investigate the use oI hedging devices in the engineering abstracts which are seldom Iound in my corpus. Hedging is oIten in the Iorm oI modals; especially can which have been used more Irequently than the other grammatical Iorms to mitigate the degree oI certainty. It is interesting that this occurrence does not diIIer in both groups oI abstracts. This could be a maniIestation oI the culture-speciIic concept oI hedging use in the abstract genre. According to my analysis and discussion oI the Iindings, it can be concluded that although I Iound the similarities oI structural components in compatible with either Swales` (1990) or Bhatia`s (1993) pattern in both group, it seems to me that, writers in each communities tend to base their structural components, including other linguistic Ieatures, on the conventional pattern within the community. An Analysis oI Moves and Modality in English Engineering Abstracts NIDA Language and Communication Journal / 2006 59 At present, there are very Iew studies on technical or academic writing oI research articles in Thailand. This study is a small-scale case study with an aim to shed light on the rhetoric oI engineering abstracts, which is a type oI text commonly Iound in the inIormation system. Furthermore, the implications oI the study oI moves and other linguistic Ieatures in abstracts involve the pedagogical system. This knowledge can raise the student`s awareness in the technical or academic writing classroom in employing the appropriate strategies. Also this can Iacilitate the development process oI the advanced material to be more eIIective. However, to understand the nature oI this genre, whether abstracts should be viewed as the synopsis oI the whole research article or they should represent the strategies used in research article introduction to persuade readers, Iurther research is needed. To determine the deIinite pattern oI moves in students` engineering abstracts, more research needs to be conducted in a larger corpus to ensure high accuracy and reliability, as well as with the involvement oI specialists in the IieldEngineering Science) to ensure the validity oI the initial analysis. Bibliography Anthony, L. (1999). 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