Page 179 - English for Writing Research Papers

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Impersonal phrases beginning with it have the same function:

It is regrettable that the containers had become contaminated as this meant that …

It is reasonable to hypothesize that…
It appears possible that…

These tactics give the reader the impression that the responsibility for the contami-
nation does not rest entirely with the author. The author does not explicitly state
who is doing the assuming, speculating, hypothesizing etc. This means that you can
avoid losing face and so not be perceived as being incompetent ( 18.12 ).

9.7 Anticipate alternative interpretations of your data

If you want the referee and readers to accept your specific interpretation of your
data, you will be more convincing if you also provide alternative interpretations.
Basically you are anticipating any objections that they might have – you are playing
the devil’s advocate with yourself.

Let us imagine that you have stated that ‘Our findings show that dogs are more intel-

ligent than cats’. Below are some ways to hedge your claim by setting out an alter-
native interpretation.

S1. Of course , the opposite may also be possible. In fact, it cannot be ruled out that certain
species of cats, for example, Siamese, show intelligence traits that are remarkably similar
to those of dogs.
S2. Other factors besides intelligence could be involved , such as the visual and olfactory
senses. This implies that , in a restricted number of cases, cats could be considered as
being more intelligent…
S3. It may be premature to reach such conclusions, and clearly there may be other possible

interpretations for our fi ndings. However , we believe that our findings are evidence of…

S4. We do not know the exact reasons for the discrepancy between our findings and those of
Santac [2013], but it might reflect … Feeding habits may favor intelligence, or they may

simply be…, or they may result from… Future work will be devoted to investigating
these three alternative possibilities .

S5. Despite this apparently clear evidence of the superiority of dogs, our findings are in con-
trast with those of Karaja [1999] and Thanhbinh [2012], whose experiments with
Singapura and Sokoke cats apparently showed that both these species were superior to
Rottweilers in terms of emotional intelligence. However , we believe that the species of
cats involved are quite rare, and that Rottweilers were not a good choice of comparison.
S5 is an example of where you call into question the validity of a possible opposi-
tion to your findings (Sect. 8.10 ).