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Characterizing the Move Structure of Abstracts in Undergraduate Theses

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www.ciencia-heals.wmsu.edu.ph Volume 1, Issue 1 (2020)
e-ISSN:2704-2766 Submission : September 12, 2020
p-ISSN:2704-2758 Publication : December 29, 2020

HUMANITIES, EDUCATION, ARTS, LANGUAGE, SOCIAL SCIENCES

Characterizing the Move Structure of Abstracts in Undergraduate Theses

Jennibelle R. Ella

Colegio de San Juan de Letran Calamba, Philippines

jennibelle.ella@gmail.com

Abstract

Research abstracts are composed of essential moves to achieve coherence; however, these
moves do not perform in a fixed pattern. Writing styles tend to vary across contexts. This
study examined the usage, distribution, and order of moves in 30 thesis abstracts of
college students from the social sciences and the hard sciences in a private college in
Southern Luzon. Using Hyland’s five-move analysis framework, each move was coded
and categorized. The results showed that the introduction, purpose, methodology,
product, and conclusion occurred in the abstracts with variations across disciplines. The
purpose, method, and product were conventional moves in both sets of data. However,
the introduction in social sciences and the conclusion in the hard sciences were optional
moves. The product in social sciences and the method in hard sciences comprised the
biggest amount of space in the abstract in terms of the number of words and sentences
used. Findings further revealed that the abstracts were dominantly semi-linear with four
moves, noting the Product-Method-Results-Conclusion sequence. Thus, it would be
helpful to provide explicit instruction and experiential learning through genre-based
approach to guide the student researchers in developing well-written abstracts.

Keywords: move structure, thesis abstracts, linguistic conventions, social sciences,

hard sciences

Ella, J. R. (2020). Characterizing the Move Structure of Abstracts in

Undergraduate Theses. Ciencia (HEALS), 1(1), 26-43.
Introduction

The increasing number of research articles dealing with abstracts in various disciplines suggests
the critical role that abstracts play in scientific communication. Academic scholars view research
article abstracts as a gateway to learning about the latest scientific discoveries and to sharing
information of individual achievements in their specific fields (Hyland, 2000; Lores, 2004;
Kanoksilapatham, 2013). They act as a time-saving device (Martin-Martin, 2003; 2005),
enabling researchers to “master and manage the ever-increasing information flow in scientific
community” (Ventola, 1994, p. 333). In cases when a full paper is inaccessible, they serve as a
substitute of the entire paper as they mirror the content and structure of the whole text (Swales,
1981).

According to Bhatia (1993), an abstract is “a description or factual summary of the much

longer report and is meant to give the reader an exact and concise knowledge of the full article”
(p. 98). However, because it is short, brief, and concise, it can only give a quick preview of the
article’s content. Nonetheless, despite its length, its power and impact cannot be downplayed.
The target audience can still scrutinize and judge if the article deserves their time and attention
(Hyland, 2000) or if it offers relevant, novel, and useful information (Doro, 2013). Hence, an
abstract, when skillfully written, becomes effective in attracting and persuading readers to go
through the article (Hyland, 2000).

Abstracts are considered robust by the way moves are distributed and arranged. A move
is a “discoursal or rhetorical unit that performs a coherent communicative function in a spoken or
written discourse” (Swales, 2004, p. 228-229). Finding a statement that provides a background
on the topic is considered the Introduction, which is a move that accomplishes its communicative
role. In the past decade, move analysis has been performed in abstracts and in other sections of
the research articles, such as the introduction, methodology, results, and conclusion (Briones,
2018; Maswana, Kanamaru, & Tajino, 2015; Farnia & Barati, 2017; Stoller & Robinson, 2013)
to gauge the appropriateness and acceptability of the form and function of those sections to the
prospective and existing members of the specific academic community.

While student researchers are instructed to adopt the rhetorical and linguistic
conventions of abstract writing (having been presumably exposed to journal articles in doing
their literature review), their lack of or little experience results in near, if not, absolute failure in
accomplishing the daunting task. Apparently, the students’ basic writing skills do not readily
translate into a successful production of quality, scholarly output (Harris, 2006). They soon
realize that writing an abstract differs from writing a composition about personal experiences and
opinions on relevant societal issues, for instance. A work of this nature is more of an exercise in
freewriting while an abstract of a research paper requires a structured form of writing that makes
greater demands and sophistication in both form and content, especially with regard to brevity.
The researcher’s knowledge of the available language choices and rhetorical structures matters
considerably in writing its parts. Unfortunately, some college students, being novice researchers,
write abstracts that evaluators find inadequate, linguistically and structurally, and less acceptable
to a wider audience since their abstracts tend to lack the essentials. Without much thought about
how their abstracts will be judged, these student researchers write in a manner by which their
27
abstracts appear as either too long or too short. At times, they tend to be more confusing rather
than helpful to the target readers because of the variations in verb tense usage and the poor
organization of information, which ultimately do not serve the studies they seek to represent.

Admittedly though, the length of an abstract gives the impression that writing it is much
easier than writing the other sections of a thesis. It is likely that the abstract is given the least
attention since it is the last piece of writing that student researchers need to produce. Often, due
to the pressure and hustle, it might be submitted unchecked or unedited. The abstract then
appears to be done without much care when it should have been painstakingly written because it
is the first part that is read, or sometimes it is the only section that can be made available for
quick referencing.

Review of Related Studies

Genre and Genre Analysis

The term genre basically constitutes a communicative event, a purpose, a repetition of responses,
and a professional or academic community, among others. What defines a genre is its
communicative purpose (Dudley-Evans, 1993), which explains its forms and features of
language use (Darabad, 2016). To find out whether the language use conforms to the structural
forms of the discourse, genre is analyzed textually or structurally. Bhatia (2013) argues that
genre analysis acts to determine form-function correlations, which can be significant in “the
teaching of English for Specific Purposes (ESP)” (p. 47). In the past decades, interesting
traditional genre and contrastive rhetoric studies have paved the way to identify the differences
that writers exhibit when it comes to language use. Culturally speaking, they raise proper
linguistic aspects of communicative functions, but still, they may seem inadequate as there can
be more areas or fields that are left unexplored.

Recognized as a distinct genre, a research abstract is an abbreviated form, but it can stand
alone and is comprehensible because it has its own message type and conventional internal
structure (Bhatia, 2013). It promotes the article and hopes to gain readership by allowing readers
to see what valuable message the authors intend to share (Hyland, 2009). Between readers and
writers, the former is decidedly more important, as Swales and Feak (2004) note. Having said
that, the credibility of the researchers and their membership to the specialized discourse
community rest upon their strict adherence to the acceptable guidelines. Hence, it is only by
probing the abstract’s structure that one can determine its usefulness to developing writers or
researchers.

Move Analysis Models

Move analysis is a form of discourse analysis that normally utilizes a top-down approach. There
is an understanding that a specific analytical framework is already laid out at the beginning of the
research to identify and describe the move types that are present in the genre. A reader may find
that a research article starts with a move that introduces the topic, followed by moves that
contain the review of related studies, the methodology and finally, the major findings and the
28
conclusion. In other cases, the same reader may discover that another particular text employs an
atypical or more innovative sequences of move types (Upton & Cohen, 2009).

Researchers understand the large variation in relation to the issue of language acquisition,
description of native and non-native speakers, and teaching and learning needs in many differing
contexts. Using the top-down approach, researchers find moves necessary to achieve coherence,
although those moves do not function as a definite unit performing a fixed pattern. They vary
along with the context but still fulfill their communicative role in the expected transition of the
rhetorical structure. Accordingly, this variation accounts for the emergence of the most
fundamental models in move analysis – the three, four, and five move analysis models that can
be of significance to scientific texts in the intranational and international contexts.

Swales’ CARS model (1990), which consists of three moves, has been influential in
move analysis research in different academic fields as it strengthened the relationship between
linguistic inquiry and EAP (English for Academic Purposes) pedagogy. Swales’ CARS model,
having been widely utilized in analyzing research article introductions, was used in a diachronic-
comparative study conducted by Sanchez (2018) to determine its applicability and variation to
the introduction section of 92 applied linguistics abstracts from TESOL Quarterly and Reading
Research Quarterly. Sanchez (2018) found that the ‘Announcing the research’ within the move
‘Occupying the niche’ was frequent and varied over time, but that was the only conventional
move. Other steps were infrequently used or not present at all in the samples, and hence, the
study concluded that the model was not applicable to the introduction section of the abstracts.

When Pho (2008) compared the use of moves in abstracts of research articles on
linguistic realizations of rhetorical structure and authorial stance from applied linguistics and
educational technology, he identified three necessary moves, namely: 1) Presenting the research,
2) Describing the methodology, and 3) Summarizing the results. However, to Bhatia (1993), an
abstract must be composed of four essential moves: 1) Introducing Purpose, 2) Describing
Methodology, 3) Summarizing Results, and 4) Presenting Conclusions to make it more
informative. Other experts are convinced that a four-move model can better highlight the
significance of the research and create a more effective appeal to its audience (Golebiowski,
2009), and thus, many four-move patterns (e.g., PMRC, IMRD, OMRC, IMRC, CARS, IPMPrC
to name a few) have emerged. According to Lores (2004), the IMRD model represents the most
common rhetorical organization of the informative type of abstracts examined in previous studies
(Bhatia, 1993; Swales, 1990).

Another framework designed by Santos (1996) had five moves, namely: Situating the
research, Presenting the research, Describing the methodology, Summarizing the findings, and
Discussing the research by drawing conclusions and/or giving recommendations to describe the
rhetorical structure of Applied Linguistics abstracts. There are times that the author leaves out the
details of the fifth move. This may mean that the omission is intentionally done to “tease” them
about the content, especially when the abstract ends with a certain statement – the conclusions
and recommendations are discussed in the paper (Santos, 1996). In this instance, the fifth move
is mentioned and is not completely absent in the structural organization.

29
 Moreover, Weissberg and Buker (1997) simplified this five-move model to Background,
Purpose, Method, Results, and Conclusion to mirror the form and content of the research article
while Hyland (2000) developed his IPMPrC model for Introduction, Purpose, Method, Product,
and Conclusion. Swales and Feak (2004) had BAMRC model for Background, Aim, Method,
Results, and Conclusion. All these models stress the importance of following a sequence or a
linear order appropriate to the discourse communities to achieve better writing outcomes.
However, in truth, it poses a challenge to some, especially college students who are novices in
the field of research, to strictly follow what is being prescribed.

Moves in Abstracts Across Disciplines

Given the various research articles that dealt with move analyses, it is safe to assume that how
researchers use and organize moves across disciplines depends on the information that they want
to highlight. In the medical field, Salager and Meyer (1992) investigated 84 medical abstracts
and identified the relationship between move and tense. They discovered that there is a
significant relationship between the variables, indicating that the past tense is the most preferred
in the purpose, method, and results sections. In Anderson and Maclean’s (1997) analysis of 80
abstracts, the majority conformed to Weissberg and Buker’s (1990) model, with a few that had
one or two moves missing. Lau (2004) examined the same number of research abstracts from the
life sciences and reported that almost half of the abstracts lacked the Background, Purpose, and
Method. Across 12 abstracts in protozoology, Cross and Oppenheim (2006) noted that moves
that dealt with Relation to other research, Purpose, Methodology, Summarizing the Results, and
Discussing the Research were present, but moves that presented the Methodology and
Summarizing the results were optional.

Research in the field of engineering offered similar results, as Maswana, Kanamaru, and
Tajino (2015), using Swales’ framework, found Purpose and Results conventional in the five
engineering subdisciplines. Methodology though was conventional only in three subdisciplines.
Other Arabic abstracts particularly in law and linguistics could not establish any conventional
move (Alhuqbani, 2013).

In Applied Linguistics, however, Can, Karabacak, and Qin (2016), Pho (2008), and
Santos (1996) revealed that in using the five-move model, only the Purpose, Methodology, and
Results were conventional. Introduction and Implications of the findings were apparently given
less attention and were thus optional. These results show a stark contrast to Tseng’s (2011)
discovery after looking into the move structure and verb tense of 90 abstracts randomly selected
from TESOL Quarterly, Applied Linguistics, and Language Learning. While all abstracts adopted
a four-move model (AMRC), variation occurred in the distribution of moves. Move 1
(Background) had more words in Applied Linguistics than in TESOL Quarterly and Language
Learning abstracts. Tseng (2011) attributed this to the authors being native speakers of English.

Following Swales and Feak (2004), Kafes (2012) revealed that regardless of cultural and
linguistic backgrounds, American, Turkish and Taiwanese academic writers in social sciences
preferred the M2-M3-M4 model, or the Purpose, Method, and Results sequence. This has been
true for the 40 students enrolled in public administration, management, fisheries management,
30
and mathematics education programs when they wrote their abstracts and considered a similar
sequence (Kosasih, 2018). Journals likewise suggest their own linguistic conventions as shown
in the comparative study of the rhetorical structure of abstracts taken from standard journals and
predatory journals. Yathip and Soranastaporn (2016) disclosed the two different standard forms.
Those in predatory journals had more variety in organization than those in the standard journals.

Results of these studies indicate that there are moves that are generally common or
universal across disciplines, although it cannot be denied that there are other disciplines and
subdisciplines that have their own preference for rhetorical organizational patterns.

Research Problem

Move analysis of abstracts in published research articles by professionals has consistently gained
attention among researchers globally, but little has been reported about how college students
structure and organize their thesis abstracts. Hence, this study investigated the move structure of
abstracts written by college students from the social sciences and the hard sciences. Specifically,
it sought to answer the following questions:

1. What are the moves in the thesis abstracts?

2. What moves are conventional?
3. What is the dominant organizational pattern of the moves?

Methodology

Research Design

The study utilized a descriptive research design to perform a contrastive genre-based analysis of
the structure of thesis abstracts by college students from the social sciences and the hard
sciences. The abstracts were chosen primarily because the researcher believed they could reveal
some variations in the disciplines in terms of their writing practices. The corpus of this study
consisted of 30 randomly selected abstracts written in 2015 by college students from the social
sciences and the hard sciences in a private college in Southern Luzon. They were manually
collected from the thesis section of the school library. The original plan was to gather at least 90
abstracts from three consecutive academic years (2015-2017) with 30 abstracts per academic
year; however, due to the current pandemic, entry to the school library for data collection was
prohibited, resulting in this limited number of abstracts.

The criteria used for the compilation of this corpus included the following: 1) the
abstracts must be written in English; 2) the theses must be written by students in the social
sciences and hard sciences; and 3) there must be at least five theses listed under each curricular
program. The programs considered under the social sciences were AB Communication, BS
Psychology, and BS Education while the programs under the hard sciences were BS Electrical
Engineering, BS Mechanical Engineering, and BS Industrial Engineering. For social sciences,
the abstracts were coded SS.IA.1-15 and for hard sciences, they were coded HS.IB.1-15. The
abstracts had a total of 7,703 words and 325 sentences.
31
Data Analysis

To guide the study, Hyland’s (2000) five-move model for genre analysis was adopted to
determine the discourse structure, specifically the distribution and arrangement of moves in the
abstracts. Table 1 presents Hyland’s framework which includes the Introduction (I), Purpose (P),
Method (M), Product (Pr), and Conclusion (C). The text was described as a series of moves,
where each move represents a sentence as an analytical unit serving a communicative function.
Once the discourse units were identified, the analysis of the text followed by identifying and
describing the move types based on their lexical and grammatical features. Using the top-down
approach, the content of the whole abstract was then analyzed and described according to their
organizational patterns.

The basic unit for move analysis in this study was sentence. In cases when the researcher
encountered a sentence with a phrase and/or a clause indicating another move (Pho, 2008; Tseng,
2011), that clause and/or phrase was considered as one analytical unit. Thus, each sentence was
carefully read at least twice and coded. Each clause/phrase was coded as well if it suggested
another move. Each move from the social sciences and hard sciences abstracts was identified,
manually coded, counted, and computed for the percentage of its occurrence to determine the
range or the typicality. Moves that recorded 60% or more occurrences in the abstracts were
tagged “conventional”; in contrast, moves that had 59% or less occurrences were tagged
“optional” (Can et al., 2016). All consecutive moves in an abstract were listed to identify the
patterns or move sequences.

Table 1.
Five-move model (Hyland, 2000)
Moves Functions
Introduction Establishes context of the paper and motivated the research or discussion

Purpose Indicates purpose, thesis, or hypothesis; outlines the intention behind the
paper
Method Provides information on design, procedures, assumptions, approach, data,
etc.
Product States main findings or results, the arguments, or what was accomplished

Conclusion Interprets or extends results beyond scope of paper, draws inferences,

points to applications or wider implications

32
Results and Discussion

The Moves in Thesis Abstracts

Findings from the analysis using Hyland’s five-move model are summarized in Table 2. The
frequency of the three, four, and five moves in the abstracts is indicated if the specific moves
were present in any part of the abstract. Half of the total number of abstracts (50%) from both the
social sciences and hard sciences contained four moves, such as Purpose (P), Method (M),
Product (Pr), and Conclusion (C). Ten (33%) of the abstracts had three moves and only five
(17%) of the abstracts used five moves. In the social sciences, 10 of the abstracts (67%) had four
moves. Four of the abstracts (27%) had five moves, and only one (7%) used three moves. These
three moves were Purpose (P), Method (M), and Products (Pr). Both the three and four moves in
the hard sciences had 7 occurrences (46.7%). The three moves in the 7 abstracts greatly varied,
but the most common ones were Introduction (I), Purpose (P), and Product (Pr) while in the four
moves, abstracts had Introduction (I). Only one abstract (6.7%) had five moves.

Table 2.
Frequency of three, four, and five moves in the abstracts
Model f (SS) % f (HS) % f %
three-move 1 7 7 46.7 10 33
four-move 10 67 7 46.7 15 50
five-move 4 27 1 6.7 5 17

Table 3 shows the frequency of occurrence and distribution of moves in 328 move-tags, the total
number of move-tags in the corpus. The highest among the five moves was the M with 29% of
the 328 tags, implying that the major focus was on the thorough discussion of the steps involved
in collecting and analyzing the data. The Pr was next with 28%, the C with 18%, and the P with
16%. The I had the least percentage with 9% of the tags although this does not necessarily mean
that it is not as important as the other four moves.

In the social sciences, the Pr had the highest number of occurrences with 34% of the 189
tags, followed by the M with 24%. A reverse was seen in the hard sciences: the M had 36% and
the Pr had 19% in 132 tags. The Pr is more highlighted than the M in the social sciences while
the M appears to be more important than the Pr among the authors in the hard sciences.

Results further confirmed that the Pr, with a 1, 702-word count, was the most frequent move.
Meanwhile, in the hard sciences, the M appeared to be the most important as it was given the
most space in the construction of the abstract. The moves were ranked according to their
frequency of occurrence in the text, and the sequence was found to be as follows: M, Pr, C, P,
and I. The Method had the highest percentage; in contrast, the Introduction had the lowest. The
differences in the number of move-tags in relation to the whole corpus indicate that the authors
might have been mindful of their calculated use of space. Usually with 150-250 words, an
abstract is carefully written to fit into the small space allotted for it. Thus, the variation in the
amount of the move-tags should be taken with extreme caution as the data could be interpreted
differently. In fact, the relatively low to lowest percentage does not mean that the move-tag is
unimportant or negligible.

33
Table 3.
Frequency of occurrence and distribution of moves at sentence level
f
Move f (SS) % f (HS) % %
n = 328
I 8 4 21 16 29 9
P 23 14 25 19 53 16
M 47 24 46 36 95 29
Pr 65 34 26 19 91 28
C 46 24 14 10 60 18
Abstracts can also introduce more than one move in a sentence. With 328 moves out of 325
sentences, dual moves were seen in at least seven sentences. Giving two different textual
functions, these dual moves were a combination of a phrase and a clause, and thus they formed
the patterns M+P, M+Pr, and I+P. Evident in social sciences, M+P appeared to be the most
common dual moves among the three combinations. The extract below shows how M + P are
combined in one sentence:

[M] Using quantitative research method, [P] this research assessed the communication
adaptation between Generation X parents and Generation Y students in...
SS.IA.7
Abstracts that contained sentences with dual moves may indicate an improved level of the
authors’ writing skills as authors needed to use the space effectively. However, the relatively
small number of dual moves may suggest that since the data examined were thesis abstracts of
undergraduate students, space is not as great a concern compared to abstracts for journals. It may
also be considered that the authors may not have had an adequate exposure to abstract writing
since, at the time of their writing, they were beginners in the field of research. Constructing dual
moves in a single sentence may probably require a good amount of practice for greater
coherence.

The Conventional and Optional Moves

The frequency and percentage of moves in the abstracts are summarized in Table 4. The most
frequent move among the five was P (100%), which is consistent with the results reported by
Pho (2008) that most of the abstracts adopt a direct approach, that is, by giving the general aim
of the study. Setting the category of typicality at 60 percent usage made the P a conventional
move both in social sciences and hard sciences abstracts. Hyland’s (2004) claim that there is an
increasing trend of including the I in the abstracts is not evident in the social sciences or even the
hard sciences in this study.

With a 90% frequency, the M was the second most frequent and hence a conventional move,
while the P emerged as the third most frequent with 83% occurrences. The C (63%) was ranked
fourth in the five moves. However, only 47% recognized the importance of situating the research
or the I in the broader field. The P and C were conventional moves whereas the I was optional in
both sets of thesis abstracts.

34
 Between the social sciences and the hard sciences, the moves show a marked difference in
the frequency and order. In the social sciences, the P, M, and Pr were present in all abstracts,
while the C was included in 87% of the abstracts. The P, M, and Pr were deemed highly
significant by the authors, as they had been given equal weight in terms of length. An illustration
for a typical abstract from the social sciences with P, M, and Pr moves is given below:

[P] Our qualitative study focused on the sense of volunteerism among… top six student–
volunteers…[M] The participants were chosen by the Community and Extension Services
Department (CESD) based on their performance in the different volunteering activities of…
[Pr] Volunteerism was perceived as a serious leisure, as an opportunity to learn, as an
opportunity to share, as driven by free will, as an obligation, and as a rewarding
experience…

SS.IA.4

Table 4.
Distribution of moves in the abstracts

Move SS % HS % SS+HS % Typicality

I 4 27 10 67 14 47 Optional
P 15 100 15 100 30 100 Conventional
M 15 100 12 80 27 90 Conventional
Pr 15 100 10 67 25 83 Conventional
C 13 87 6 40 19 63 Conventional
Ca 13 87 6 40 19 63 N/A

Moreover, the C followed very closely with 87% occurrences. It is interesting to note that
the C is generally tagged as the informative discussion move where an interpretation of the
results/findings and/or recommendations are provided. As shown below, the C is found
conventional in this set of data.

[C] The study concluded that the current strategies used by the literature teacher are varied
and mostly enjoyed by the students; however, those are not suited to the needs of the
learners since the major factor that makes the learning of literature difficult for the students
was the bewilderment with unfamiliar words…
SS.IA.12

Given the high percentage of occurrences of the P, M, Pr, and C, they are therefore
considered conventional in the social sciences. The I (27%) was optional, although it must be
noted that I is equally important as it gives the readers background information on the topic at
hand and states reference to another research as well. It also builds an argument and attracts the
readers to go through the entire article. Interestingly, the least priority given to the I was also
established in previous studies (Santos, 1996; Weissberg & Buker, 1997; Pho, 2008; Can et al.,
2016).

35
 On the other hand, in the hard sciences, all abstracts had the P. The M had 80% while the Pr
and I had 67%. These results show that the P, M, Pr, and I were all conventional moves in the
hard sciences, but in an earlier study by Cross and Oppenheim (2006), the Pr along with the M
move was optional in protozoology. The occurrence of the I in the 20 abstracts in the hard
sciences indicates a striking difference from the social sciences abstracts having only eight, this
time showing consistency with Hyland’s (2004) claim. The I, P, M, and Pr moves are illustrated
below:

[I] For over a hundred years, people have hopped on bicycles for transportation, recreation,
competition, and more. In many parts of the world, spinning pedals move goods and
generate electricity... [P] This study aimed to construct a pedal-powered lawn mower to help
conserve energy and reduce the emission of the pollutants into the atmosphere. [M] Primary
and secondary data used in the study were gathered through interviews and study of related
works on pedal power... [Pr] The researchers found that the pedal-powered lawn mower was
efficient in cutting grasses.
HS.IB.9

Overall, the high frequencies of the P, M, and Pr in both sets of data may imply that the
authors recognize these moves as the three most essential keys to reporting and communicating
the exact and concise knowledge generated from the research. Their occurrences likewise tend to
suggest that authors regard these moves as crucial to the promotion of their research to their
academic community, particularly to the succeeding batch in the program. Authors may have
adopted the P, M, and Pr sequence because these moves appeared to be the most frequent in the
sample abstracts provided for them during lectures or the most common that they found while
doing their literature review.

Further, putting a major emphasis on the P suggests that the authors saw the importance of
clearly pointing out what the research was all about instead of stating why the research was
pursued (Van Bonn & Swales, 2007). With the primary focus given on the “what,” the abstracts
imply that the authors generally intend to provide the readers the purpose of the research without
necessarily discussing its significance. Favoring the P over the I further indicates that the authors
find it more fitting to tell their readers directly the purpose and the facts. Meanwhile, the authors
may have avoided the I as it may have been a challenge to construct an introduction.

Conversely, both sets of abstracts showed less serious efforts to discuss the way their
research was situated in the broader field. According to Van Bonn and Swales (2007), the act of
situating research is clearly manifested by justifying the research being undertaken and by
overtly linking the research to general or specific references. Although the abstracts from the
hard sciences recorded the I as conventional, still less effort can be seen to justify their research
and refer to other research or even define a terminology. Similarly, with only eight occurrences
of the I in the social sciences, there was very little attempt to discuss the merits or the
significance of their research. This phenomenon can probably be explained by the fact that since
these are thesis abstracts by undergraduate students in a small academic community, the amount
of “pressure to justify, defend, and sell the research” (Yakhontova, 2002 as cited in Van Bonn &
Swales, 2007: 97) is lesser compared to the thesis abstracts produced in bigger universities where
there are more students and more abstracts written and often competition is inevitable.

36
 Unlike in the abstracts appearing in leading journals, thesis abstracts in this study avoided
presenting the C in a style that says, “implications and recommendations are discussed.” Perhaps,
student researchers were not exposed to samples that contained such constructions of a pseudo-
discussion move or they were instructed to include the recommendations as it could be that,
based on previously submitted abstracts, no abstracts were written in this style. Abstracts with a
“pseudo-discussion” move, as Can et al. (2016) call it, are used as typically a promotional
technique in order to “sell” the article as details of the valuable information are not explicitly
stated or included in the abstract. In the case of the student researchers’ abstracts, the readers can
readily get hold of the entire thesis as it is always available in the library; thus, the promotion of
the thesis abstracts becomes less of a priority.

Organizational Patterns of Moves

The variation in the number of moves that exist in the abstracts reveals differences in their
organization or sequences. The ideal organizational pattern follows a linear order involving five
moves sequenced accordingly, starting from the Introduction, Purpose, Method, Product, and
Conclusion, and thus represented as IPMPrC. Only three (10%) abstracts from the social
sciences contained five moves. There were abstracts that contained less than five moves but
followed a sequence that resembles a linear order. Six semi-linear organizational patterns were
discovered in the corpus, namely: PMPrC, IPMPr, PMPr, IPM, PMC, and IPPr, and they were
seen in the 16 abstracts (10 hard sciences and 6 social sciences). The PMPrC sequence (27%)
was the most frequent in the social sciences while the IPMPr sequence (27%) was the most
common in the hard sciences.

Eight non-linear patterns emerged from the corpus, and they were PIPMIPrC, MPMPrC,
PMPrMCPrC, MPMIC, IPMCMPrC, PMPPrC, IPPrP, and PPrM. Of these occurrences, six
were from the social sciences. The MPMPrC sequence occurred four times while the PIPMIPrC
and the PMPrMCPrC sequences occurred once. The other five non-linear patterns - MPMIC,
IPMCMPrC, PMPPrC, IPPrP, and PPrM with one occurrence each were from the hard sciences.
These non-linear patterns were mostly characterized by recurrence or repetition of a move. The
following extracts illustrate how the M move in the MPMPrC sequence and the P move in the
PMPPrC sequence were repeated:

MPMPrC sequence

[M] “Utilizing qualitative analysis, [P] this research focused on the self-concept of the
homeless foreigners in selected areas in Manila specifically in Baywalk and Taft
Avenue. [M] Four homeless foreigners whose ages ranged from 30 to 60 years old and
who qualified with the set of criteria became the research participants. [Pr] Majority
of responses of the homeless foreigners resulted to negative self-image. However,
their condition taught them to be resourceful and to adapt different ways to
survive…[C] The researchers recommended this research to the responsible
departments of the government of the Philippines…”

SS.IA.2

37
 PMPPrC sequence

[P] This study aimed to provide an alternative way of solving the problem of long
waiting in lines when ordering and paying in fast food restaurants. [M] Through in-
depth research and qualitative method of data collection, the research was completed.
[M] Actual scenario observations in long piles, interviews with customers and
professionals, and surveys to possible future users were conducted in order to gather
strong information that aided the researchers to analyze and design the system. [P]
The main purpose of the system was to shorten long waiting in lines in counters in
fast food restaurants as well as to aid the customers to conveniently choose products
ahead of time. [Pr] Near Field Communications (NFC) is one of the merging mobile
technology embedded to Smartphones, enabling new wireless communication within
NFC enabled devices. [C] Using this technology, users can fully utilize NFC feature
in their smartphones.

HS.IB(14)

Table 5.
Organization of moves

Pattern Sequences f (SS) % f (HS) % n=30 %

Linear IPMPrC 3 20 0 0 3 10
Semi-linear PMPrC 4 27 1 7 5 17
Semi-linear IPMPr 0 0 4 27 4 13
Semi-linear PMPr 2 13 0 0 2 7
Semi-linear IPM 0 0 1 7 1 3
Semi-linear PMC 0 0 2 13 2 7
Semi-linear IPPr 0 0 2 13 2 7
Non-linear PIPMIPrC 1 7 0 0 1 3
Non-linear MPMPrC 4 27 0 0 4 13
Non-linear PMPrMCPrC 1 7 0 0 1 3
Non-linear MPMIC 0 0 1 7 1 3
Non-linear IPMCMPrC 0 0 1 7 1 3
Non-linear PMPPrC 0 0 1 7 1 3
Non-linear IPPrP 0 0 1 7 1 3
Non-linear PPrM 0 0 1 7 1 3

38
 With 15 different patterns, the data suggest that the authors from the social sciences and the
hard sciences created their own patterns that they believed would best present the key elements
of their research. Notably, the P and the M were the most common moves that were repeatedly
used in the organization of abstracts (e.g., PIPMIPrC, MPMIC). This clearly shows that often
moves are not constructed in the expected sequence. They do not follow the linear order; they
change their positions; and they even recur.

The organizational patterns discovered in genre-based studies such as this is not unique since
even the abstracts on paper or online in applied linguistics and other disciplines would
demonstrate variations in the patterns. However, when it comes to the evaluation of a well-
structured abstract, it may need further investigation as Salager-Meyer (1990) emphasized that a
well-structured abstract has moves that are logically sequenced in a linear order. If linear order is
believed to be the only logical sequence acceptable, then the corpus has a very minimal number
of logically structured abstracts. It is possible, though, that the differences in the organization of
move structures can be explained by authors’ subjectivity or it may have something to do with
varying conceptualizations of research in their field and goals in communicating the outcomes.

Likewise, it is relevant to examine the disciplinary differences in the way the first and last
sentence of the abstracts are constructed. The findings revealed that the P (43%) was the
dominant opening sentence, followed by the I (40%), and the M (17%), which lends support to
the P-I-M order that previous studies have uncovered. This result may suggest that the authors
preferred to start the abstract by stating the purpose and informing the readers of what the article
is all about rather than providing information as a way of building an argument to explain how
significant the topic is. For the social sciences, the P (53%) was the most frequent, followed by
the M (27%) and then the I (20%). A marked difference between social sciences and hard
sciences was noted, as the I (60%) was the most frequent, followed by the P (33%) and the M
(7%) in the hard sciences. Notably, 67% of the abstracts adopted the C as the closing sentence,
which is regarded as a common way of ending the abstract. Other authors preferred to end the
abstract by stating the Pr (23%), M (7%), and the P (3%). As it is quite expected, none used the I
in the final statement. In the social sciences, 93% ended their abstracts with the C while 7% used
the Pr. In the hard sciences, the most frequent moves were the C and Pr with 40% each while the
less frequent were the M (13%) and P (7%).

The move that starts the abstract is as crucial as the move that closes the abstract. The high
percentage of the C indicates that the authors understand the importance of providing the
interpretation of the findings, the conclusion, and the recommendation as it is helpful in giving a
signal to the readers regarding what the research accomplished in view of the broader field.

Conclusion

This study investigated the distribution and arrangement of moves in thesis abstracts of
undergraduate students from the social sciences and the hard sciences. Using Hyland’s five-move
model, findings from the analysis showed that the five moves were present in the two sets of
abstracts, although very few had all the five moves, as most had four moves and others, only
three. There were only three abstracts that contained all the five moves identified in the

39
framework in a linear order. The P, M, Pr, and C moves were all found to be conventional, while
the I move, in keeping with research done in the past, was optional. This also suggests that with
at least two moves missing, an abstract can still convey the salient points of a study; however, if
more than two moves are missing, then the abstract may already sacrifice readership and
readability, along with relevance, novelty, and the usefulness of a study. With the missing moves,
abstracts may not be received positively since the failure to explicitly state other moves may be
taken as a sign of the weakness of the study itself, thus leading to less favorable results.
Moreover, the emergence of 15 different structures implies the unpredictability of the
organizational pattern, which suggests that the writers themselves, though they may have been
advised to observe objectivity and strict formality of linguistic features, applied their own
personal judgment in writing a structured abstract.

In terms of similarities, both sets of abstracts employed three and four moves and had
variations in move sequences, with almost an equal share of semi-linear and non-linear types.
The differences, however, were focused on the amount or priority given to the above. In the
social sciences, product was the top priority, whereas in the hard sciences, methodology was
given the most importance, gearing towards an understanding that those from the social sciences
are inclined to elaborate on the results of the study while those from the hard sciences are drawn
to highlight the method or process. It also proves that the move structure or the amount of space
given to a move varies according to discipline. Further, the I in the social sciences and the C in
the hard sciences were the least preferred and therefore deemed optional. Nevertheless, both
disciplines must considerably give adequate attention to each move for they largely contribute to
the clarity, accuracy, and readability of the abstract.

The findings of this study provide some pedagogical implications. First, the results offer
grounded evidence that can be useful for decision-making, policy formulation (i.e.,
mentoring/editing), teaching strategies, instructional plans, and instructional material
development and that can enable the research department and the academic department of the
college to better address concerns related to the quality of students’ written outputs. Abstract
writing, in general, is not taught as a lesson, and as a result, there exists a gap between
expectation and performance. This study therefore offers some insights to bridge that gap. Using
a genre-based approach and authentic samples, the instructors handling research courses could
focus on the form and function correlation of these rhetorical units and linguistic structures, as
well as other specific information and examples. Hyland’s (2000) five-move model may be
useful in highlighting the significance of each particular move and the sequence of the five
moves in the overall organization of the abstracts to achieve coherence. With the findings of this
present study that there were structures that had recurrence or cycling of moves, it is encouraged
to provide a thorough writing instruction of the acceptability of the order of moves. In turn,
students, in both the college and senior high school levels, who have difficulty in composing
abstracts, would have a better grasp of the essential moves and rhetorical structures. As they
learn about and practice abstract writing, they would be more reflective of the task, bearing in
mind its social-rhetorical purpose.

Second, the study can increase students’ awareness on disciplinary differences in terms of
the appropriate range, amount, and patterns of the discourse moves. A scrutiny of larger samples
may be helpful to adequately describe the specific culture of each discipline and other factors

40
that may influence the objectivity, content, and style of writing abstracts. The differences in the
instances of inclusion, recurrence, or omission of a specific move may indicate a pattern that is
discipline dependent (especially in a small academic community), although this warrants further
investigation. Hence, informing L2 student researchers/writers of this aspect would enable them
to learn to foreground a specific move that is conventional and utilize a pattern that meets the
expectations of the target readers in a specific discourse community. Finally, this study
emphasizes the importance of gaining knowledge and building confidence through skill practice
so that the students can find themselves promoting their own research outputs through student
conferences and publications in the future.

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