Cross-disciplinary perspectives on research article introductions : the case of reporting verbs

Abstract

In academic writing, stance reporting is used to reflect the position of the writers towards the literature in order to establish the niche and value of the research. Cross-generic and cross-disciplinary studies of reporting verbs have been conducted on hard and soft disciplines, and yet the specific functions of reporting verbs in different sections of an academic genre across disciplines remain unexplored. This study examines and compares the use of reporting verbs in the introduction section of research articles published in high impact journals in the disciplines of psychology, radiology, and linguistics. A combination of the Create-a-Research-Space (CARS) model on analysing research article introductions by Swales and Feak (2004) and a functional taxonomy on reporting verbs by Hyland (2002) has been used to examine discipline-specific stance reporting constructions in the introduction sections of 142 research articles of the three disciplines. Findings suggest that the choice of reporting verbs is not only discipline specific but also depends on the section (and sub-section) in which such reporting verbs are employed.