Acknowledgments in Neurology research articles: A contrastive study (English – Spanish)

This article reports the findings of a content analysis of acknowledgments, authorship and collaboration practices in a medical corpus made up of 100 English- and 100 Spanish-written research papers, distributed in five blocks of 20 papers each, and randomly drawn in the period 2001–2012 from BMC Neurology and Revista Española de Neurología, two of the leading Neurology journals in their respective languages. In order to discover the similarities and differences between both samples, the objective of this contrastive research was three-fold: 1) to analyse the frequency, length and types of acknowledgments; 2) to examine the number of authors, sub-authors and unnamed individuals mentioned in the subtitles, acknowledgment sections, annexes and appendices of the research papers included in the whole sample; and 3) to explore the different types of collaboration among all the participants involved in the research. Although the types of acknowledgments are similar in both contexts, the English-medium sample presents more research papers with acknowledgments, more acknowledgments and longer acknowledgments. In both corpora public funding is the component which receives most acknowledgements, although again much more in English than in Spanish. Of the many people involved in the investigation, Spanish-speaking authors are more numerous than English-speaking authors, whereas English sub-authors and unnamed individuals outnumber their Spanish counterparts. As for the different types of collaboration, in the two samples ‘local’ collaboration clearly predominates above the remaining variants. Possible explanations for the differences and similarities observed, among them a possible correlation between the higher presence of acknowledgments and the research published in English, are provided. The results presented here give some hints about the collaboration and communication practices followed by two different language scientific communities

Exploring acknowledgement practices in English-medium astrophysics research papers: Implications on authorship

This article reports the findings of a diachronic study of acknowledgement practices in 300 randomly collected research papers published during three different periods (1998, 2004 and 2012) in the most prestigious American and European astrophysics journals written in English. In order to investigate the influence of these practices on authorship patterns, we analyzed the distribution over time of a series of quantitative variables (number, length and types of acknowledgements, mean number of words/number of acknowledgements per research paper and mean number of acknowledgements/number of authors per research paper, number of named and unnamed acknowledgees, number of identified and anonymous referees, and number of emotionally charged-words). Comparisons between periods were carried out and Student’s t-tests were applied to the quantitative results. Our main findings show that acknowledgements are very common in astrophysics since they are present in 96% of the whole corpus. Financial, mainly public, and instrumental supports are the most frequently acknowledged categories. The number and length of acknowledgements and the mean number of words/number of acknowledgements per research paper grow over time. Financial, instrumental and conceptual assistance, unnamed individuals and anonymous referees increase over time, whereas moral, editorial and unclassified supports, named individuals and identified referees, and emotionally-charged words decline. If we focus on each journal publication context, we can observe that the research papers published in the American journals include more and longer acknowledgements, with a higher mean number of acknowledgements per author, more financial and instrumental supports, and a lower percentage of emotionally-charged words, whereas the European journals contain more conceptual and editorial supports. All these data can be understood in the frame of growing scientific professionalism, while a detailed cross-journal analysis may occasionally suggest honorary/guest/gift authorship.Este trabajo presenta los resultados de un estudio diacrónico de los agradecimientos en una muestra de 300 artículos de investigación recogidos al azar y publicados durante tres periodos diferentes (1998, 2004 y 2012) en las más prestigiosas revistas de astrofísica, americanas y europeas, escritas en inglés. Con el fin de estudiar la influencia de los agradecimientos sobre los patrones de autoría, hemos analizado la evolución de una serie de variables cuantitativas (número, longitud y tipos de agradecimientos, media del número de palabras/número de agradecimientos por artículo y media del número de agradecimientos/número de autores por artículo, número de personas agradecidas identificadas y no identificadas, número de árbitros mencionados por su nombre y anónimos, y número palabras con carga emocional). Hemos utilizado la prueba t de Student para comparar los resultados cuantitativos entre periodos. Nuestros resultados principales muestran que los agradecimientos son muy comunes en astrofísica ya que están presentes en el 96% de todo el corpus. Las ayudas económicas, principalmente públicas, instrumentales y conceptuales son las más frecuentes. El número y la longitud de los agradecimientos, así como la media del número de palabras/número de agradecimientos por artículo, crecen paulatinamente. El apoyo económico, instrumental y conceptual, los individuos no identificados y los árbitros anónimos también aumentan, mientras que el apoyo moral, editorial y no clasificado, los individuos y los árbitros identificados, y las palabras con carga emocional decrecen. Si nos centramos en el contexto de cada publicación, observamos que los artículos publicados en las revistas americanas incluyen más agradecimientos y que éstos son más largos, con una media mayor del número de agradecimientos/número de autores, más ayudas económicas e instrumentales, y un menor porcentaje de palabras con carga emocional, en tanto que los artículos publicados en las revistas europeas incluyen más ayudas conceptuales y editoriales. Todos estos datos se pueden entender en el marco de una creciente profesionalización de la ciencia, mientras que un análisis detallado de cada revista puede ocasionalmente sugerir la existencia de una autoría honoraria/invitada/regalada

The Use of Abbreviations in English-Medium Astrophysics Research Paper Titles: A Problematic Issue

In this study, we carry out a qualitative and quantitative analysis of abbreviations in 300 randomly collected research paper titles published in the most prestigious European and US-based Astrophysics journals written in English. Our main results show that the process of shortening words and groups of words is one of the most characteristic and recurrent features in Astrophysics research paper titling construction. In spite of the convenience of abbreviations as a mechanism for word-formation, some of them may pose certain difficulties of understanding and/or misinterpretation because of their specificity, ambiguity, or overlapping. To overcome these difficulties, we propose a series of options which with no doubt would lead to a better interaction among the different branches of Astrophysics in particular and of science in general and would definitely improve how research is currently performed and communicated

Simultaneous and comparable numerical indicators of international, national and local collaboration practices in English-medium astrophysics research papers

Introduction. We report an investigation on collaboration practices in research papers published in the most prestigious English-medium astrophysics journals. Method. We propose an evaluation method based on three numerical indicators to study and compare, in absolute terms, three different types of collaboration (international, national and local) and authors' mobility on the basis of co-authorship. Analysis. We analysed 300 randomly selected research papers in three different time periods and used the student's t-test to determine whether the paired two-sample differences observed were statistically significant or not. Results. International collaboration is more common than national and local collaboration. International, national and local authors' mobility and intra-national collaboration do not seriously affect the indicators of the principal levels of collaboration. International collaboration and authors' mobility are more relevant for authors publishing in European journals, whereas national and intra-national collaboration and national mobility are more important for authors publishing in US journals. Conclusions. We explain the observed differences and patterns in terms of the specific scope of each journal and the socio-economic and political situation in both geographic contexts (Europe and the USA). Our study provides a global picture of collaboration practices in astrophysics and its possible application to many other sciences and fields would undoubtedly help bring into focus the really big issues for overall research management and policy

Astrophysics Titles in Scientific American Magazine (1990-2014): Linguistic and Discourse Practices

We analyze Astrophysics titles published in Scientific American Magazine in the period 1990-2014 and compare them with Astrophysics titles of specialized journals. Our main results show that titles published in Scientific American are short, clear, direct and with low lexical density and little terminology. They mainly consist in simple and nominal constructions with few adjectives and compound groups. The predominance of nominal compounds and the high number of verbal titles and definite articles imply that popularized science titles mainly deal with global and well-established concepts. Pragmatic and rhetorical strategies are common in Astrophysics Scientific American titles in order to appeal to multiple audiences and invite them to use their cultural background knowledge to grasp at the actual meaning. Although pragmatic and rhetorical mechanisms overlap in some titles, rhetorical devices seem to prevail over pragmatic ones. All in all, however, both types of devices reveal a growing trend over time

La premodificación nominal en el ámbito de la informática

Recensión de: FERNÁNDEZ, FRANCISCO Y BEGOÑA MONTERO FLETA. La premodificación nominal en el ámbito de la informática: estudio contrastivo inglés-español. Universitat de València: Studies in English Language and Linguistics. Sell Mono-graphs, vol. 14, 200

Medical case reports and titleology: a diachronic perspective (1840-2009)

This paper is a diachronic analysis of a corpus of 180 titles drawn from CRs published in the BMJ and the BMJ Case Reports between 1840 and 2009. The frequency of occurrence of 69 variables (e.g. title type and length, punctuation, grammatical and syntactic data, number of authors and collaboration practices) was recorded for each title. The corpus was divided into three blocks (1840-1850, 1920-1930 and 2009) and between-block comparisons were carried out. Our findings show that CR titles have evolved over the 160-year period studied in the sense that they have increased in length, syntactic complexity, semantic richness and title type diversity. Authorship patterns and collaboration practices have changed, too. Although internationalization of case reporting has increased over time, today’s preferred practice is still local collaboration. The only variable that has remained constant over the years is the nominal nature of CR titles. We put forth several social and scientific factors that could account for the various shifts observed. The non-informativeness of CR titles that persisted over time can be explained by the fact that CR authors are reluctant to give a generalization flavor to their findings based on single cases.This paper forms part of a wider research that is supported by Grant M-976-09-06A from the Scientific, Technological, Humanistic and Artistic Research Center (CDCHT) from the University of The Andes, Mérida (Venezuela)

Titles are "serious stuff": a historical study of academic titles

In this paper we carried out a diachronic analysis (1840-2009) of a corpus of 180 medical case report titles drawn from the British Medical Journal. We analyzed a series of quantitative variables (number of authors and their institutional affiliation, title length, and punctuation/grammatical data) and qualitative variables (authors’ collaboration and types of titles). The results of our research show various shifts over the period studied that could be attributed to the following factors: 1) the progressive professionalization of medicine; 2) the need of disciplinary teams to conduct an ever-increasing complex research; and 3) the increased specialization and the growing complexity of medical science. The only variable that has remained constant over the years is the nominal nature of case report titles. It could then be stated that case report titles would distinguish themselves from research article titles, which are being characterized by a certain tendency towards verbalization

Género y crítica en la prosa médica escrita en español: Función comunicativa y relación de poder

This study addresses the issue of academic conflict (AC) in four different genres of medical discourse, viz., editorials, review and research papers and case reports. The rhetorical strategies used to convey AC were recorded and their qualitative features (their level of commitment or detachment, their overall tone, the presence of irony, sarcasm, etc.) were analyzed in 40 medical articles written in Spanish in the last decade of the 20th century. Our results show that the communicative function of each genre and the rank/status power relations that exist between authors and their audience have a direct bearing on the way medical researchers express their dissension