A Discourse Analysis of Gender Differences in the Use of Hedging Devices in Applied Linguistics Research Articles

Hedges are recognized to be of great significance in research articles since they are the tools to which the academic writers resort in order to give an appropriate representation of their findings. Many variables such as language, discipline, culture and language proficiency can influence the frequency of hedges in research articles. This study, however, focuses on the role of gender in the frequency of hedges and aims to investigate whether there is any difference between Iranian males and females in the use of these devices. To this end, 60 applied linguistics research articles by Iranian females and males from well-organized journals were randomly selected and the analyses of the hedges were based on Hyland’s (1996a) model. The results of this study showed that there is a significant difference between males and females. Men make use of more hedges than women. Moreover, the findings showed that the discussion section of the articles included more hedges than the introduction section.