以語料庫探究跨領域學術寫作緒論之詞組框架

Abstract

許多先前研究曾探討詞組框架(phrase frames)於學術寫作上的議題(Ang& Tan, 2019; Grey & Biber, 2013; Lu et al, 2021)。另一方面，先前的研究亦闡明詞組框架與Swale (1981)所提出的文部(move analysis)之間關聯的重要性。許多研究該領域的學者將研究重心置於使用小型語料庫的研究來探討詞組框架於文部緒論上的運用，然而，使用較大型的語料庫來檢視詞組框架於學術英文寫作上的研究卻很有限。此外。也鮮少有研究深入探究詞組框架於跨領域學科間的差異性。 基於以上所提及之研究缺口及利基，本研究提出四個相關的研究問題: 1) 在社會學與生物生命科學領域，哪些是最常用的五字詞與六字詞之詞組框架? 2) 就詞組框架的使用層面而言，是否有跨領域之差異? 3) 大型語料庫是否能產出如同小語料庫相似的詞組框架變異詞? 4) 生物與生命科學學門的詞組框架如何串聯文部? 此研究基於Swale (1981)的文部類別以及Lu等學者(2021)所分類的學術寫作緒論之詞組框架分類作為研究架構。透過使用語料庫工具AntCorGen擷取文本內容，將社會學與生物生命科學領域之語料庫從原先Lu研究的600筆語料擴大為6000筆文本，而KfNgram工具則使用來產出兩個學科領域的相關詞組框架。另外使用線上工具Venny產生統計對比數據以比較兩學科領域之間的差異。最後得以收集詞組框架之變化詞作為對應其詞組框架。研究結果顯示在此兩學科領域最常用的詞組框架之五字詞與六字詞及其變化詞。此研究有許多發現，第一，隨著詞組框架長度的增加，詞組框架數量減少。第二，就詞組框架的使用而言，跨領域之間有其相似性與差異處。例如，有些特定詞組框架於兩個學科領域皆有發現，而有些詞組框架則較具有領域特殊性(discipline-specific)。針對第三個研究問題，此研究亦發現，隨著語料庫的擴大，能產出類似及較多的詞組框架變化詞，亦稱為片語實現詞(phraseological realizations)，而能提供詞彙的可供性(affordance)及豐富性(abundance)以利於學術寫作之使用，最後，透過KfNgram蒐集到之語料，串連及彙整出生物生命科學領域之詞組框架。本研究基於研究發現之結果，希望能提供對於學術寫作格式化當中的詞組框架之運用盡棉薄之力，此外，本研究建議，不論是此領域之研究者與教育人士、學術論文作者及教材研發者能將此研究之格式化詞組框架與寫作緒論之文部關係引入相關課程，以期待能增進學術寫作之新手與學生的表達能力。A number of previous studies have delved into the issue of connecting phrase-frames, one type of formulaic expressions, in academic writing (Ang& Tan, 2019; Grey & Biber, 2013; Lu et al, 2021). On the other hand, previous studies have also shed light on the important relationship between p-frame structures and Swale’s (1981) moves and steps model. While many scholars have focused their attention on the research of phrase frames in a small corpus and the connection of phrase frames with moves and steps in academic writing introduction, there is little research of adopting a large corpus to examine the phrase-frame structures in academicwriting. Furthermore, little do previous studies explore the interdisciplinary variations in terms of the phrase frames in introduction.Based on the research niche, four research questions were proposed in the current study: 1) What are the most-frequently used 5-word and 6-word phrase frames in social science and biology life science? 2) Are there any cross-disciplinary variations in terms of the use of phrase frames? 3) To what extent can the larger corpus generate similar p-frame realizations as the smaller corpus? 4) How can p-frame variants in biology life science be connected to moves and steps?The study was based on Swale’s (1981) framework of moves and steps model and Lu et al’s (2021) classification of phrase frames in research paper introduction. The corpus size in both the social science and biology life science was expanded, with 6000 texts (published research articles) being retrieved from AntCorGen. Another tool KfNgram was also used to generate phrase frames in introduction from the two disciplines. An online tool called Venny was also adopted to yield statistic figures to compare the variations between the two disciplines. Finally, phrase-frames tokens were also collected and matched to the phrase-frame structures.The results demonstrated the frequently-used phrase frame patterns and variants in the two disciplines. There were several important findings in the current study. With the increase of word length, the number of phrase frames would decrease. Second, there are similarities and differences in interdisciplinary variations. For example, some phrase frames are commonly shared across disciplines, while there are still discipline-specific p-frames in certain fields. Last, with the expansion of the corpus size, more phrase frames would be generated, which provides lexical affordance and abundance to facilitate academic writing. It is hoped that the present study could make contributions to the research on formulaic expressions in academic writing. Additionally, the results and findings in the present study could offer pedagogical implications for researchers, instructors, academic writers and teaching material developers.