Introductions and methods

in medical and educational reports

Members of academic contexts may be expected to understand and produce different types of texts to support beliefs, look for information and share knowledge. That may be why professionals read and write research papers. However, research papers as any other types of texts, have got their own content structure. That means they are composed by different parts through which researchers try convey a coherent meaning. The purpose of this paper is to compare the introduction and method in two research papers based on the educational and medical fields. Some considerations on format, purpose and tenses will be regarded.

 Both papers seem to fit academic layout requirements as the heading Introduction is placed on the left margin, and written in bold type, which gives a visually tidy characteristic to the piece of writing (Purdue Owl, 2005). In addition, there are different sub-sections in the medical research report and in the educational research paper which help researchers to organize different topics. (Aryadoust, 2004, Kraut, 2010)

The following section, Method, does not have a written headline so it is recognized in both papers when delving into them. The elements corresponding to this part of the papers have been treated differently. In the educational sample(Aryadoust,2004) under the participants section, the components are students, instructors, instruments, subscales and reliability of the instruments all of which are italicized and underlined. On the other hand, Kraut (2010) has headed this section of his medical research paper as procedures and participants and then measures written in bold type. Apparently, fewer participants are involved in the medical investigation.      

 Regarding grammar features, “introductions and methods make a quite static use of tenses to convey a clear meaning to the reader” (Swales 1990, as cited in Pintos Crimi 2010, p.14). In the particular cases that are being analyzed, the researchers use present perfect to show the importance of the study “…sub-skills of L2 essay writing has been extensively researched” (Aryadoust, 2004, p.2). Simple past is used to show what other researchers did: “Micken, Slater and Gibson contended that system; lexicon and task objectives affect L2 text writing” (p. 3).

Another instance of use of tenses is the simple present to refer to what has been found”…but the models postulated are not entirely homogeneous” (Aryaoust, 2004, p.3) or to say what the present study seeks to do:”In this light, the present study seeks to explore the convergence and separateness of the sub-skills in writing assessment” (p2).

In the same fashion, the present perfect tense is used in the medical paper to show the importance of the topic as in “the rapid expansion of the Internet has increased the amount of health information available to the general public” (Kraut, 2010, p.2) and simple past to show what other researchers did in previous findings:”43% reported using Internet health sources” (Kraut, 2010 p2). The simple past and past passive voice are used in the Method section to refer to the procedures developed and the use of tools and materials: “In 2000 we conducted a national sample survey of US households using digital dialing and a panel design” (Kraut, 2010, p.3).

As it has been stated by Swales (1990, cited in Pintos & Crimi, 2010), introductions aim at attracting the readers´ attention. Following the Create a Space Research Model, introductions contain moves that are characterized by a number of semantic and syntactic features.  Move 1 creates a space by showing that the research is important and reviewing previous ones. For instance, Aryadoust (2004, p.3) notices that “measurable sub-skills of L2 writing have been extensively researched”. In Move 2, the researcher establishes a gap by saying that the modes of writing assessment are not homogeneous and that proposing and evaluating writing models are not well researched.

In this work the review is also thoroughly developed between Move 2 and 3 during the following twelve paragraphs. Move 3 is at the end of the first paragraph where the purpose of the study is mentioned” to investigate on measurable writing sub-skills” and “explore the convergence of sub skills of a writing construct model, including grammar and lexis, cohesion and coherence” (Aryadoust,  2004, p. 3).

On its way, the medical paper introduction contains similar characteristics. In Move 1 the research establishes a territory when it says that “the rapid expansion of the internet has greatly increased the amount of health information available to the general public”, (Kraut, 2010, p.3) Move 2 indicates a gap in the investigation of the topic when it is claimed that “although prior research has shown the use of Internet to communicate is associated with the decline of depression, little reliable information exists” (p.3). Finally in Move 3 the purpose “to determine whether searching the Internet for health purposes is beneficial or harmful for physical and psychological well being” is mentioned and steps of the research are outlined (p.3).That is how the reader can get a quick first impression of the researcher’s work.

 Both papers include a detailed background of participants, to give credibility to the work. Kraut (2004, p.4) highlights that “participants agreed to participate, they received a letter consent form and honorarium “. In the same way, instruments and measure are listed to describe procedures such as surveys, one item general health question and confirmatory factor analysis. Finally the educational report follows the same way of developing the method; it refers to participants such as Iranian students and also materials as different types of prompts for proposing and evaluating writing sub-skills.

After having analyzed the first two parts of a medicine and an education research, both seem to have achieved the necessary requirements. In other words, both of them use discourse patterns, format standards, grammar elements that may contribute to start the report of what has been done by the researcher. The mentioned features that appear as being part of the medicine and education report may be evaluated as an effective way for guiding the reader to get new information to grow professionally in a specific field.       

References

Aryadoust, V.  (2004). Investigating Writing Sub-skills in Testing English as a Foreign

    Language: A Structural Equation Modeling Study. The Electronic Journal for

    English as a Second Language, 13 (52), 52-59.

Kraut, R.  (2010). Effects of the Internet Use on Health and Depression: A Longitudinal

 Study the Journal of Medical Internet Research. (1) E6 Retrieved June 2010 from

 www.jmir.org

Pintos, V. &Crimi, Y. (2010) Unit2: The Research article: Introduction, Literature

  Review and Method Sections. Universidad CAECE Buenos Aires Argentina Retrieved

  May 21, 2010 http://caece.campusuniversidad.com.ar/mod/resource/view-phpid=4582.