Comparative Rhetorical Move Analysis of Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Research Article Abstracts in Iranian vs. International Applied Linguistics Journals

There is a shortage of studies on the generic structure of research article abstracts published in Iranian and international applied linguistics journals considering their employed research approach (i.e., quantitative, qualitative, or mixed methods). Thus, this study endeavored to analyze the moves in 288 quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods research (MMR) article abstracts in six Iranian and six international applied linguistics journals published between 2012 and 2019 following Hyland’s (2000) model. To analyze the data, the frequency of distribution and percentages of the rhetorical moves were estimated, and the Kruskal-Wallis test was run on the data. The findings indicated that the moves of Purpose, Product, and Method occupied the largest portion of local and international abstracts. Furthermore, in comparison to the international corpus, the Iranian corpus contained more moves based on Hyland’s (2000) model. A deeper analysis of both corpora revealed that the rhetorical moves were distributed almost evenly within quantitative, qualitative, and MMR abstracts, with the exception that in the international corpus, the Product move appeared significantly less in qualitative abstracts than quantitative and MMR abstracts. The most frequently used move patterns in both datasets were; I-P-M-Pr-C, P-M-Pr-C, P-M-Pr, and I-P-M-Pr. It can be concluded that applied linguistics researchers tend to follow Hyland’s (2000) model as much as possible when writing research article abstracts. Furthermore, although some divergences exist regarding the rhetorical moves frequency of distribution and patterning in qualitative, quantitative, and MMR abstracts in both local and international datasets, similarities are more remarkable than differences. The results can provide practical insights about the rhetorical and discursive practices associated with research article abstracts to applied linguistics researchers, students, and instructors.