RESEARCH ARTICLES: Introductions and Methods Sections

            

Introduction and Method Section in Research Articles: A Comparative Analysis  

            Introductions and Method sections are major constituent parts of academic research articles. As all components in academic writings, they both follow conventions as regards content and internal structure which are established and, thus, recognized by the academic writing community. Equally important to the constitutive aspect is the purpose of each of these sections. In his review to Swales's (1990) book Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings, Marius (n.d.) states the purpose of introductions: “They serve both to define the discourse community to which a research article may be addressed, to grant the writer authority with that community, and to shape the problem that the writer will consider in the article itself” (p.460). It should be added that through the introduction the writer must also draw the readers' attention and arouse their interest in reading the complete work. On the other hand, a method section basically purports to explain to the readers which tools and instruments were used for collecting data as well as which procedure was applied for doing so. Even though research academic papers share many characteristics, on occasions they do present some differences, mainly as regards writing conventions. Much academic work has been done to thoroughly explain the different steps to be followed when carrying out research and writing research papers. However, there does not seem to be much comparative and contrastive analysis of research writing conventions in different fields of study. The purpose of this paper is to analyse and compare the introduction and method section in two research articles from two different professional fields: medicine and education.

            Swales and Feak (1994) sustain in their that research articles introductions follow the Create a Research Space Model (C.A.R.S.) through which introductions are organized according to three moves that structure the presentation of information from the general to the specific. Analysed from this model, it is possible to find this organizational pattern in both articles. The first part of the paragraphs in both papers establishes the research territory by mentioning some of the work previously done on the field. As well as that, they explain the current state of the topics under analysis, which in the case of the article on education is the increasingly communicative use Taiwanese students give to the English language whereas in the article on medicine the current state is expressed by establishing the relevance for the research: “It is unknown whether these risks remain increased after the conventionally defined 6-week postpartum period” (p1308). It should also be said that the relevance for the research in the former article is mentioned when the writer states the difficulties the students find to fulfill their needs in their own learning environment. This general-specific format of the texts forms the first move of the model. Introduced by a contrastive connector, the second move is developed in both articles. The problem found by the writers between previous research and the current state of the situations under analysis starts this move, as it is evident in the following two examples extracted from the articles: “However, previous studies and isolated case reports have suggested that an increased thrombotic risk may persist beyond 6 weeks after delivery.” (p.1308) and “However, content analyses of the English textbooks used in junior high schools revealed that these textbooks provide inadequate cultural information about Anglo-American cultures (Chen, 2007)” (p.57). Finally, with the third move the introductions end with a solution-type text by detailing the purpose of the research articles and outlining their structures: “To address language-learning problems in the Taiwanese context, this action research study carried out three technology-enhanced, collaborative intercultural projects. The aim of the projects was to demonstrate that technology-enhanced, cross-cultural tasks could provide…” (p.58). The same is seen in the last move in the medicine article: “Therefore, more data are needed to rigorously assess the risk after the 6-week postpartum period. We designed this study to assess the duration of an increased postpartum thrombotic risk in a large population-based cohort of women.” (p.1308).

            Similarly, both research articles can be analysed by comparing their method sections. Even though neither of these articles fails to include this section, they call it differently. Chen and Yang (2014) used the term Methodology while the authors of the article on medicine preferred the term Methods. The different implications of these two terms should be reminded though since they do not refer to the same aspect. While the word methods makes reference to the technique and tools used to collect data, the word methodology describes the underlying theory on which the method is grounded. Another noticeable difference is the subdivisions within this section. In this respect, most research writers propose a three-subsection division for this type of academic writing (Swales, 1990, Swales and Feak, 1994, among others), in which the participants, the materials used and finally the procedure applied in the research are listed in a how-to-do fashion along a process paragraph format. However, these subsections are headed differently and the information in them differs at some point. While neither of them fails to provide information about the participants, the article on education describes the materials used and the procedure for data collection and analysis, presented under the headings “Instructional design” (p.4) and “Data collection” (p.7) respectively. Conversely, the article on medicine contains procedural information in two of its three subsections: “Study design” (p.1308) and “Study outcomes and measurements” (p.1309) according to which stage of the research it refers to: before or after the study. Tools and instruments used for obtaining the data are mentioned in these subsections as well.

            Having analysed and compared two research articles from different professional fields, we can assert that this type of academic writing presents substantial similarity in both fields of study. This can be seen in the structuring of the introductions. However, some differences have been found in the method sections as regards subdivision and the distribution of information. The reason for this might be that the medical academic writing community shares writing conventions that could differ in certain aspects from the academic writing community in the educational field. As a result, both writing systems should be equally accepted in their corresponding fields of work.

           

References

Chen, J. J., & Yang, S. C. (2014). Fostering foreign language learning

through technology-enhanced intercultural projects. Language Learning & Technology, 18(1), 57–75. Available from http://llt.msu.edu/

Hooman Kamel, M.D., Babak B. Navi, M.D., Nandita Sriram, B.S., Dominic A. Hovsepian, B.S., Richard B. Devereux, M.D., & Mitchell S.V. Elkind, M.D. (2014). Risk of a thrombotic event after the 6-Week postpartum period. The New England Journal of Medicine. Available from http://www.nejm.org/medical-articles/research

Marius, R. (n.d.). Journal of Advanced Composition [Review of the book Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings]. 11 (2), 458-460. Harvard University. Retrieved from http://www.jaconlinejournal.com/archives/vol11.2/marius-genre.pdf

Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings. Cambridge Applied Linguistics Series. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.