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Communicating Certainty and Uncertainty in Medical, Supportive and Scientific Contexts
Edited by Andrzej Zuczkowski, Ramona Bongelli, Ilaria Riccioni and Carla Canestrari
[Dialogue Studies 25] 2014
► pp. 291–308

A theoretical contribution to tackling certainty and uncertainty in scientific writing

Four research articles from the journal Brain in focus

| University of Porto, Portugal
| University of Lisboa, Portugal
| University of Porto, Portugal

Our theoretical contribution to tackling certainty and uncertainty in scientific writing is based on a study of four research articles from the journal Brain collected at random (from 1997 to 2012), to determine whether any differences in writing, design and analysis with modality implications arise over that interval. We hypothesize that, according to the sections of a research article, considered as a multi-modal genre, several types of linguistic modality are used to convey contextual, evidential and interpreted truths. The study aims to show that methodological approaches, the type of analysis (qualitative/quantitative) and statistical tools, together with other means of translating modality, will affect the final product of scientific research articles regarding linguistic and non-linguistic devices used to convey certainty/uncertainty.

Published online: 26 November 2014
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ds.25.14pin
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