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Some observations concerning transitivity and modality in scientific writing
fonsuuge Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1, pp. 59-78, Printed in Great Britain
1991
0388~OOW91 $3.00+.00 Pergamon Press plc
Some Observations Concerning Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
David Banks Universitk de Bretagne Occidentale
ABSTRACT consideration of a corpus of scientific writing shows that in this register modal verbs are more likely to be passive than non-medals. This is pa~icuiar~y so for verbs of mental process. The passive may and can in mental processes are exclusively of the epistemic type, and cun seems semantically can
closer than may to non-modal
in mental processes.
active.
Can is rare in these processes.
ships, although
expression.
The active may is much less frequent than
In material and relational processes,
the small numbers
examples of may are predominantly
Other modal verbs show similarly
involved preclude
interesting
relation-
extrapolation.
CORPUS This study (like Banks 1985, 1986, 1990) is based on a corpus of scientific writing from the field of oceanography. The corpus is made up of 11 academic articles from Vol. 5, Nos 1 and 2 of the journal Oce~log~cu Acta. The articles were selected on the basis of two criteria: the article was written in English; (2) at least one of the authors provided an address in an English-speaking country.
(1)
The object of this selection was to isolate those articles which were written by English speakers, so as to avoid possible interference from other languages. The method used is slightly finer than that suggested by Baldauf and Jemudd (1983) (who only consider the first-named author) but not as sophisticated as that suggested by Swales (1985, 1986). Swales’ method, however, seems directly applicable to singleauthor papers, while 8 out df the 11 articles in this corpus list more than one author.
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Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
The corpus contains the whole of the text of the articles, excluding only the abstract. I have excluded the abstract since it seems to me that the language of an abstract is a register in itself, and is not necessarily the same as that of an academic article, even when both are from the same domain. Gopnik (1972), despite its misleading title, was devoted exclusively to the language of scientific abstracts. Oceanography is a hybrid science. The articles which make up the corpus relate to the disciplines of physics, chemistry, biology, meteorology and paleontology. To some extent, then, oceanographical writing can be seen as a microcosm of scientific writing. Thus, whatever hypotheses might be formed on the basis of a study of oceanographical writing can be taken as working hypotheses for scientific writing in general. I take it that the structure of the active English verb is: (modality)
(perfect aspect) (progressive
aspect) tense
where brackets indicate optional elements. On this basis, all verbs that fit into the modality slot are counted as modal verbs. This definition includes will and shall in the category of modal verbs, but excludes ought, which requires the inclusion of the particle to. However, there are no examples of oughf in the sample, so its exclusion is not particularly pertinent to this study. The definition also excludes the periphrastic verbal expression have to, which, in any case, has syntactic features which distinguish it from the modal verbs properly so-called, and of which only one example occurs in the corpus. On this basis, the corpus contains 252 modal verbs, the distributions of which are given in Table 1. The articles are identified by the first-named author. TABLE
Vassie Elliott Uncles Chew Rice Gage Bruce Campbell Barton Thunell Berger
Will
Would
Shall
Should
8 7 4 2 1 1 4
-
-
-
1 4 3 6 11 6 3 5 3 -
1 8 2 4 1 1 2
Can 32 18 9 6 3 1 4 3 2 15
1 Could
1 2 3 4 2 1 1 2 1
May 311 3 11 3 14 6 8 1 5
Might
Must
Total
2 1 1 2 3
1 5 2 3 1 1 1 2
7 7 40 34 34 37 14 17 21 9 32
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
Table 2 lists the verbs in decreasing
order of importance.
61
It will be seen that can
accounts for more than one quarter (26%) of the modal examples, and may is of the same order of importance (22%). Would and wilE (17 and 11% respectively) form a middle range of importance, although it will be noticed that would, interestingly, is considerably more frequent than will. Should, could, must and might occur only in comparatively small numbers, none of them accounting for as much as 10% of the modal verbs. Shawl is completely absent from the sample. This is not too different from the proportions found in a scientific corpus by Huddleston (1971:297), where calz and may represent 30 and 24 % respectively; would and will 10 and 12 % respectively; and the other modal verbs less than 10% each, shall being the least frequent with 2%. It also follows the general lines of the distribution found by Barber (1962:29) for a small scientific sample, where the only major differences are a comparatively low percentage of would and a rather higher percentage of must. It is, however, considerably different from the distribution found by Larreya (1984:261) in a corpus of general English, where will + would is by far the most common category, and may + might account
for less than 10% of the sample.
TABLE
Can May Would Will
No.
%
66 55 42
26 22 17 11 8 7 6 4 -
27 19 17 16
Should Could Must Might
10 -
Shall
MODALITY
2
AND TRANSITIVITY
While the percentage of passives in the corpus as a whole is 31% of finite verbs (cf. Banks 1985, 1986), 41% of modal verbs occur in the passive form. Since passivization is related to transitivity, I shall approach this phenomenon using a simple transitivity network based on Berry (1975) and Halliday (1985).
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Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
unrestricted material
+
-b
r
causative
1
non-causative
r L restricted
r
4
middle
1
transitive
effective
+ [
intransitive
mental attributive relational
+ identifying
All processes are either material, mental or relational. Material processes are either unrestricted or restricted, i.e. the number of inherent participants is fixed (restricted) or not (unrestricted). Unrestricted processes may occur with two participants, and thus be causative: (1)
. . . surface slopes must almost balance
or with a single participant, (2)
..
the . .
processes
(3)
. . . dissolution
..
in which case they are non-causative:
slope will similarly
Restricted
the forcing mechanisms.
may be restricted
increase.
to a single participant,
and thus be middle:
can proceed more readily within CO*-rich microenvironments.
Where restricted processes are restricted to two participants (effective process), participants may be expressed giving the transitive process: (4)
. . depth averaged
models can only provide a guide
. .
both
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing or only one participant (5)
are either attributive,
process:
.
where a qualitative
attribute
is assigned
to
. . . the MSL . . . may be flat . . .
or identifying, (7)
giving the intransitive
. . . the fine net may not filter effectively
Relation processes the subject: (6)
may be expressed
63
where the process
serves to define the identity
. . . organic particles
Only four positions
which may constitute
in this network
permit
a selection
of the subject:
their prime source of food. between
active and passive
voice; they are the causative, transitive, mental, and identifying processes. Table 3 shows the distribution by process and distinguishes between active and passive where appropriate. TABLE Caus. Non-caus. Act. Pass. Vassie Elliott
1 1
1 -
-
5 2126 237 354 123 2 1 1
-
-
1 2 1 1
Thunell Berger
-
-
4
Total
33
1
1
Trans. Act. Pass.
-
Uncles Chew Rice Gage Bruce Campbell Barton
-
1
Mid.
9
1 -
1
21
Intrans.
1 1
26
Ment. Act. Pass.
Attrib.
Ident. Act. Pass.
-
-
3 2
1 1
1 1
-
-
319 58 17 5 11 -4 2 4 37
7 6 10 3 3 6 7
1 325 -1 --
-
1
1
121 222 17
3
1 -
2 126
2
34
1
72
l-l 4 49
1
-
-14
2
It will be seen that mental process accounts for the largest number of cases, 106 (or 42%), followed by the material, 81 (or 33%); and of these, 47 (19% of the total), are transitive. Relational process accounts for 65 cases (25%), and of these, 49 (or 19%
64
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
of the total) are attributive. As has been said, 41% of the modal examples occur in the passive form. However, this may be to some extent misleading, in the sense that in four of the process types (non-causative, middle, intransitive and attributive) the active/passive choice is not available. These are processes which occur uniquely in the active form; no passive correlate exists. If one considers only those process types where the active/passive choice is available (i.e. causative, transitive, mental and identifying), then passive has been chosen in 59% of the cases. This is most noticeable in the mental category, where 69% of the mental process examples are passive. Of the other types, causative has few examples, but those that do occur are evenly divided between active and passive. The transitive cases are also fairly evenly divided, with a slight bias towards passive (55 %). The identifying cases are not particularly numerous either, but are more so than causative, and of those that occur, one can say that passive seems to be rare, occurring in only 12% of the cases. From these results, a certain number of trends seem to be discernible. There seems to be some slight correlation between modality and mental process: 42 % of the modal verbs in the corpus are mental processes, compared with 33% material and 25% relational processes. In the material process category, active and passive examples seem equally probable; in the mental process category, there seems to be a strong tendency towards the passive. On the other hand, passive seems extremely rare in the relational process. That there should be some link between modality and mental process does not seem unreasonable. To the extent that mental processes deal with the human appreciation of the world, it may well be that this is a situation where the scientist prefers to hedge his bets, leaving himself an escape route rather than making unqualified statements. The qualification provided by the modal would then allow for the reader who did not wish to follow the line of reasoning suggested. McKinlay and Potter (1987) have shown that when talking about the supposed errors of others, scientists tend to do so in a non-specific way when speaking in a formal situation, as opposed to the informal (indeed anonymous) situations studied by Gilbert and Mulkay (1984), where they tend to be much more specific and assertive. It would seem reasonable that both written contexts and formal spoken ones, like scientific conferences, should be situations which lead scientists to be less assertive, to hedge their bets, on points that might be open to disagreement. A look at the distribution of the various modal verbs occurring in mental processes (Table 4) indicates that can accounts for almost half of the modal verbs which occur. This is true for both the active and passive categories, with 42 and 47% respectively. However, the figure of 42% for the active category may be misleading, to the extent that while for the passive category the examples of can are spread throughout the sample, 10 out of the 14 occurrences of active can appear in a single article, that identified here as Berger.
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
65
TABLE 4 Active
Will Would Shall Should Can Could
%
3 7
9 21 -
5 3
9 42 3 12 -
3 34 4 15 6 2
3 15 1 4 1
May Might Must
Passive No. %
No.
3
Total mental No.
%
7 4 -
8 10 -
8 10 -
4 47 6 21 8 3
6 49 5 19 6 3
6 46 5 18 6 3
The possibility that Berger is to some extent stylistically different from the other articles in this sample cannot be excluded. I note in passing that one of the co-authors of the Berger article is a French-speaker; it would therefore seem not unreasonable to suppose that this writer had a large hand in drafting the article, thus leading to this sort of stylistic difference. (This is not the only point on which Berger differs stylistically from the other articles.) If the figures are recalculated with a sample excluding Berger, then the percentage of active modal verbs in mental process represented by can falls to 20 % . This is the same as the occurrence rate of active may in mental process, and almost half that of active would. MENTAL
PROCESS
Huddleston
AND PASSIVE
(197 1:297-304)
MAY AND CAN
claims to isolate six uses of the epistemic
may:
1. Qualified generalization: x is true for at least some members of the group but not necessarily any particular individual. 2. Exhaustive disjunction: x is at least one of the attributes proposed. 3. Uncertainty: the truth of x is not certain (i.e. possibility). 4. Concession: whether x is true or not, y is the case. 5. Legitimacy: x is legitimate, valid. 6. Ability: (we) are able to do X. The epistemic can has the same uses as may with the exclusion of concession. Beyond this, Huddleston seems to imply that there is little difference between may and can. This also appears to be the conclusion of Palmer (1974: 120) (although in Palmer L3c 1381-E
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Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
(1979: 154-6) he links can to the notion of non-assertion). by Huddleston, those of uncertainly/possibility, legitimacy
Of the notions suggested and ability seem to cover
all of the examples found in the sample. The examples of passive can in the mental process are never of a deontic type. All of the examples can be classified as epistemic in some form. To the extent that these can be divided into an ability type and a possibility type (cf., e.g., Quirk et al. 1972:97), both occur. (8)
. . . it can be seen that the semi-diurnal clockwise direction . . .
(9)
. . the acceleration
tides propagate
. . . in an anti-
of the fluid can be neglected.
However, a considerable number of the examples are not easily classified as being one rather than the other, and seem to combine aspects of both possible interpretations, or indeed to be neutral as to which one should be selected. (10)
. . . possible similarities measurements ...
can be detected
between
the oceanic
and coastal
This seems to be open to interpretation, indicating both the ability of an observer to detect the phenomenon, and the possibility of detection. Indeed both seem feasible ways of glossing the proposition expressed by (10). The examples of passive may in the mental process are also exclusively of the epistemic type, i.e. indicating some form of possibility. (11)
. . the present work may be considered
Here the majority examples (12)
of Owen’s analysis
use: cf. (11) above, and:
. . growth may be acceptably modelled by a growth increment
The three remaining cases seem to fall into the ability category some cases are not easy to categorize). (13)
.
of the cases of passive may in mental process (12 out of 15) are
of the legitimacy . . . juvenile
an extension
The stratification contour plots ,
was weaker
...
(though here again
as may be seen by comparing
The examples of passive can in the mental process fall into a similar Twenty-eight out of the 34 examples are of the legitimacy type:
the
pattern.
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
(14)
. . . other signals
. . . can therefore
67
be disregarded.
and six are of the ability type: (15)
. . . has . . . reduced the minimum
size of organisms
which can be counted.
To the extent that can and may cover similar semantic areas in similar proportions, approach is justified, and it is true it might seem that the “virtually no difference” that in many cases substituting may for can or vice versa would make “virtually” no difference. However, some examples do not lend themselves to this ploy. (16)
..
it can be shown that the procedure
. . is reasonable
...
The substitution of may in (16) sounds distinctly odd, and even if acceptable, would alter the interpretation. As it stands, (16) is very close to saying that the procedure is reasonable; it is a justification. The substitution of may places the reasonableness much more in the domain of possibility, closer in fact to Huddleston’s notion of uncertainty. This seems to go against Palmer’s use of non-assertion as a distinguishing feature of epistemic can. My intuitive interpretation of the difference in this example is as follows. Both express a procedure which is considered legitimate. In the case of can, this legitimacy is considered to be the only one available in the present state of our knowledge, and hence is that to be used, until (if ever) it is shown to be less adequate than some other procedure. This interpretation is supported by the fact that in many cases there seems to be little difference, or at least only marginal difference, between the use of can and a non-modal sentence. Compare: (17) (18)
. these currents have been delineated using a simple linear theory . . . The extent . . . can be estimated by constituting a trace metal budget . .
In so far as there is a difference in concept between the proposition expressed in (17) and that in (18), it lies not in the fact that the estimation in (18) is possible, for it has been carried out just as much as has the delineation in (17), but in the fact that the possibility can be verified by anyone who wishes to repeat the process. May, on the other hand, claims that the procedure is legitimate, but does not exclude other possibilities. The other possibilities are not necessarily known to the author and thus act in effect as a sort of guard against unforeseen objections. It will be noticed that this interpretation would not be appropriate in (16) with may substituted for can, which accounts for the block on the substitution in this case. This would seem to counter Lewis’s (1986: 113) suggestion that with can the speaker
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Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
perceives the existence of a possibility, whereas with may he is volitionally involved in the creation of a possibility. There may be some justification for saying, as Suzuki (198621-2) does, that can always retains some nuance of ability. But Perkins (1982:257, 1983:38) seems closer to the mark when he says that can focuses primarily on the current state of circumstances, whereas the epistemic may focuses primarily on the current verifiability of the truth of a proposition. We seem, therefore, to have a cline of guarding against unforeseen objections, which has non-modai expression and may at opposite poles, with can at some mid-point. MENTAL
PROCESS AND ACTIVE MAY AND CAN
Mental process, by definition, typically requires an intelligent agent. Scientific discourse tends to avoid the use of human agent subjects. One might expect then that active mental process would be rare in this type of document. As far as may is concerned, this is true: there are only four examples in the corpus. In addition, of these four, only one has a human subject, the other three being cases of what might be called “untypical animacy” [extending the range of the term used by Berry (1975)l; that is, in this case, an inanimate subject occurring where the process would normally require an animate one. (19)
This reinforcement
may expfain the steep drop . .
Moreover, one might note that, in terms of Huddleston’s semantic categories, the three examples of untypical animacy are of the possibility type, while the single remaining example expresses legitimacy.
(20)
. . . we may draw the following
conclusions
...
There is a rather higher number of examples of active CUE in the mental process, but it must be pointed out that 10 out of the 15 cases occur in Berger, about which some reserve has been expressed above. One might add here that nine of these Berger examples have the pronoun we as subject, which constitutes an unusually high concentration for this type of discourse; and one of them is the only example in the whole corpus of a question with a personal pronoun subject. (21)
However, involved,
Can we conclude from this that the fine fraction dissolves slowly than the coarse fraction?
five times more
despite this reserve, and in so far as can be judged from the small numbers the Berger examples follow the same pattern as the others. Of the 15
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
examples,
11 have we as subject,
69
and 10 (but not all with we as subject)
express
We can now state . . . that . . there is no evidence . . . The second alternative . not only can account for the increased tivity . .
produc-
legitimacy (22) (23)
while the other five express ability, (24)
.
lacking
or are neutral (25)
suitable data we cannot quantify
as to an ability or legitimacy
this reinforcement
.
interpretation.
We can check whether the loss Profile B is plausible
.
The corpus examples then present two basic differences between active may and active can in mental process. Firstly, may, but not can, occurs more frequently with untypical animacy ; and secondly, whereas may expresses primarily uncertainty and secondarily legitimacy, can expresses primarily legitimacy and secondarily ability. The numbers are too small to warrant extrapolation, but it would be interesting to see if these results are confirmed in a larger sample. CAN AND MAY: OTHER
PROCESSES
Can is fairly rare outside of mental process. occur in the corpus. (26)
Seven passive and 10 active examples
The seven passive examples
. . . an inclinometer
are all transitive
can be attached to the sledge
processes.
...
However, while (26) is a typical example of transitive process, many of the examples here might be felt by some readers to be fairly close to the mental process. (27) (28)
. .
examples can be found in the lower layer flow . . the region zero bias can be located with sufficient accuracy
...
This is not as strange as it might at first seem, since scientific experimentation is surely an area where mental and physical activity are inextricably intermingled. Perhaps one could say that in scientific experimentation, mental processes are expressed in and through physical actions, i.e. material processes.
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Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
In addition, these seven examples seem exclusively to have an ability reading, with the possible exception of (26) above, which might be taken to express legitimacy. There would seem, then, to be a tendency for passive can to express legitimacy in the mental process and ability in the material (transitive in these examples) process. Active can, on the other hand, occurs in a wide range of processes, six out of the possible seven processes being represented in the 10 examples. Only identifying does not appear. Attributive is the most common, occurring four times. In terms of Huddl~ston’s semantic categories, the majority (seven) express uncer~inty (or possibility), in the sense required, it need not be true on every occasion, (30) (31)
. . . low . . . gradients in tidal energy (such as can occur in bays). . . . the sea surface . . can become heated . .
while the remainder (three), I have categorized out of the three cases contain a negative, (32) (33)
However,
two
. . . cannot be strictly valid . . . I . . no vorticity effect . . . can balance the Ieading terms in Table 5.
whiie the third has negative (34)
as cases of legitimacy.
bias created by the word only.
. . . depth averaged
models can only provide a guide
...
The result of this is that the legitimacy expressed in the verb is within the scope of the negative, thus making the reading of the proposition as a whole, in (32) and (33), express something which is illegitimate, totally out of court. Here, again, one might notice a difference between the mental process examples, where acrive can tended to express legitimacy, and the materiai and relational process examples, where it tended to express unce~ainty. May is more common than cm outside the mental process, with 36 examples in the sample. What is more, the may examples are predominantly active: only six are passive. Even here one example is of doubtful classification: (35)
. . * the increase off . . .
. . . may have been related to increased
continental
run-
Although morphologically passive, some may prefer to consider this a purely copula construction. With the exception of (35), all of the passive examples are transitive. (36)
. . . some may have been produced
in the water column
...
71
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
In any event, it seems reasonable
to say that in material
and relational
process,
may
rarely occurs in the passive. This contrasts with mental process where the majority of cases (79%) are passive. The 30 active examples show a bias towards relational process (20 cases) and of these the majority (14) are attributive: (37) (38)
* . . the calculated currents may be suitable for predicting flushing dispersion . . . ... . . . which may also be a result of large spatial variability
and
and six identifying. Of the 10 examples of material process, four are middle. All of the material and relational process examples of may express uncertainty, which contrasts with passive may in the mental process, where legitimacy was the dominant semantic feature. If one now sets up a table (Table 5) of the main semantic tendencies of active and passive may and CCIIE,two main facts emerge. (In Table 5 the figures give the fraction of the sample which corresponds to the trait in question.)
TABLE
5
MAY
Mental
Passive
Active
Passive
Uncertainty
Legitimacy
Legitimacy
Legitimacy
(12115)
(10/15)
(28/34)
Uncertainty (7110)
Ability
(3/4) Material
and relational
In the mental process,
CAN
Active
Uncertainty (30/30)
Uncertainty (516)
(6/7)
may and can tend to be used to express legitimacy,
except
in active may where, if anything can be said from the small numbers involved, it would be that they seem to indicate a bias towards uncertainty. In mental and relational processes, may and can tend to express uncertainty, except passive can which tends to express ability. OTHER Table voice.
MODALS 6 shows the distribution
of the various
modal
verbs by process
and by
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Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
TABLE6 Material
Mental
Relational Act. Pass.
Act.
Pass.
Act.
Pass.
May Would Will Should Could Must Might
6 10 12 II I 6 7 -
7 5 4 1 4 4 2 1
15 4
4 20 15 7 8 2 4
-
-
34 15 3 5 3 4 2 6
3
-
Total
53
28
34
72
63
Can
7 3 3 1 1
1 1
2
Table 7 shows the distribution of active and passive voice for each verb with the percentage of active and passive in each case.
TABLE7 Active No.
%
Can
25
38
May Would Will
33 34 21
Should Could Must Might
12 9 12 3
Passive No. %
60 81 78
41 22 8 6
62 40 19 22
63 53 75 30
7 8 4 7
37 47 25 70
While 62% of the can examples and 40% of the may examples occur in the passive, much smaller percentages of would and will do so. Only eight of the 42 cases of would (19%) occur in the passive. The examples of would involved in the mental process seem to indicate a strong collocation with the verb expecr which occurs in five out of the 10 examples. (39) (40)
Accelerated transfer . . . would be expected to result in a seasonal variation . ‘. we would expect to find a diatomaceous sapropel D . . .
...
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
Huddleston
(1971:307-9)
found three semantic
types represented
73
by his would
examples: 1. Tentativeness. 2. Prediction, including
“unreal
conditions.
3. Real mode, where it is the past element Out of the 42 examples (41) (42)
” which is uppermost.
of would studied here,
15 were of the tentative
type.
It would appear that . . the exchange processes tend to be limited . . which would further indicate that a finer grid resolution is necessary . .
In two cases, the tentative nature of would was reinforced by probably. These seem to be another case of the scientist hedging his bets. It is easy to imagine these sentences occurring in a non-modal form, but the less affirmative modal form leaves the author an escape route if objections are raised to the statement made. Just over half of the examples of would (22 out of 42) fall into the prediction category. However, only a minority have an explicitly stated conditional clause. This is the case in six examples (43) (44)
If the Nile region was the primary source we would expect to find a diatomaceous sapropel D . this would be true of the catch estimates if the odometer failed to operate properly.
plus one case where an example (45)
are deducible
it would be expected
i.e. if there were no curvature (47)
pertaining
is given.
A less dramatic odometer fault, for instance if it lost traction slightly . . would be more difficult to detect . .
In the other cases the conditions elements in the written context, (46)
of the condition’s
the depth averaged
i.e. if visual estimates
from the context,
in the absence
of curvature
either from explicit
effects.
effects; or from the more general currents
and skidded
that one would estimate
context, visually
..
were carried out. It seems to be the case, then, that although
74
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
would indicates
a conditional sense in a majority of cases, it is infrequent to be explicitly given in a conditional clause.
conditional
Only a small number of real mode examples of would occurred. examples were of this type. (48)
The coarse meshes would be caught .
. made it unlikely
for the
Five out of the 42
that the smallest
postlarvae
. .
There seemed to be a tendency for this type to occur in the introductory section of the articles. Twenty-seven examples of will occur in the corpus, of which only six are passive, and all but one of the passive examples are mental process. In material and relational processes, will very rarely occurs in the passive. Three semantic types of will are given by Huddleston (1971:305-7): 1. Future. 2. Induction (including explicit and implicit conditions). 3. Deduction (which gives a conclusion, which may also result from a condition). Only one example (49)
of the deductive
type occurred
Where both fV and KV* increase slope will similarly increase.
in this sample.
downstream,
the cross-stream
sea level
Of the rest, 11 are future and 15 induction. Despite the fact that induction is related to conditions, there was not a single example of an explicitly stated condition in this corpus. (50)
. . whereas bed
in nature,
it will depend on the current
structure
near the sea
Hence explicit conditions appear to be more closely related to would than will. In the mental process six out of the eight examples express future. Moreover, in all of these cases, the future involved is internal to the text itself. (51) (52)
..
In material the text.
as we will later see the leading terms will be designated and relational
processes,
however,
by R the future reference
is external
to
Transitivity
(53) (54)
and Modality
in Scientific Writing
75
. . . progress will perhaps be made in the near future . . . . . . most work . . . will continue to be based on data . . .
Although a tendency of this type might be expected from the nature of the processes involved, the absolute dichotomy found here is striking. The corpus provides 19 examples of should. The eight relational examples are exclusively active, while of the material examples, four are passive. The six mental process examples are equally divided between active and passive. Three of Huddleston’s semantic categories for should (1971:310-l 1) appear to be relevant to the examples in the corpus: 1. Obligation. 2. Logical expectation. 3. First person form of tentative
wouM.
However, it seems to me that the two examples of the third category which occur contain a notion of obligation and can thus be assimilated to the obligation type. (55) (56)
. . . we should reject as implausible a result identifying . . . we should expect no change . . .
...
When this is done, we find that in the mental process, five out of the six examples are of the obligation type. On the other hand, the eight active examples of relational process and the single active material example are all of the logical type. (57) (58)
. . the true density A major malfunction
. . . should be about twice that estimated . . of the odometer should be detectable . . .
The corpus contains 17 examples of could, of which 10 are material process, six active and four passive. Out of the five mental process examples, four are passive. Three of Huddleston’s categories (1971:304-5) are relevant here: 1. Uncertainty/possibility. 2. Legitimacy. 3. Ability. The only general trend that might be discerned from the small numbers involved is a tendency for active examples to be of the uncertainty/possibility type. Eight out of the nine examples fall into his category.
76
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991) (59)
(60)
A general downslope “drift” . . . could conceivably cause the effect . . . . local forcing, which could account for about 55% of the variance . . .
Of the 16 examples of musr, nine are material process, of which seven are active. Taking obligation and logical necessity as the two basic semantic traits involved (cf. Huddleston 1971:311-12), it transpires that logical necessity is the dominant factor here. This might be expected on the basis that scientific enquiry is inherently involved with logical argumentation. In this sample, 13 out of the 16 examples are of the logical necessity type. (61) (62)
Estimates must at best be approximations .. . . the dearth . . must therefore have resulted from its inability these organisms.
to collect
This includes all but one of the active examples, and from another point of view, all but one of the examples of active and passive material and relational process. Out of the three obligation cases which occur, two are passive mental process. (63)
The computerized
data . . must therefore be considered rather qualitative
...
Out of the 10 examples of might in the sample, the six mental and the single material process are all passive, while the three relational process are all active. With uncertainty/possibility and legitimacy (cf. Huddleston 1971:302) as the two basic meanings of might to be found here, it turns out that only the material example is of the uncertainty/possibility type. (64)
. energy might be dissipated
All of the mental and relational (65) (66)
examples
in this region. express legitimacy:
. . it might be anticipated that the effects A sample might have the index “30”
.
will become weaker
..
I would not wish to extrapolate the results found for those modals which appear in small numbers in the sample. However, it would be interesting to see whether the tendencies found here are corroborated in a larger sample. CONCLUSION What I would like to retain
from the details of this analysis
is the fact that, in
scientific writing, there is a series of relationships modality.
These are manifested
strong, for particular
between processes (transitivity)
in the form of tendencies,
processes to have strong collocation
choice in scientific writing. Transitivity of modality in scientific writing.
and
in some cases particularly with specific forms of modal
is then a significant
parameter
in the analysis
REFERENCES Baldauf, R. B. and B. H. Jernudd “Language Use, Pattern in the Fisheries Periodical Literature,” Sciento1983 metrics 5. 245-55. Banks, D. “Scientific English is Impersonal, Isn’t It?” Echanges Pedagogiques 1985 9110. 58-66. “Copulation and the Passive,” Travaux {CZEZUX) LII. 127-40. 1986
i990
“Agents
and Instruments
in Scientific
Writing,”
International Review
of Applied Linguistics 28. 336-45. Barber, C. L. 1962 “Some
Measurable
Characteristics
of Modern
Scientific
Cont~butions to English Syntax and PhiloZogy, ~thenburg English, Vol. 14, Stockholm, Sweden: Almqvist & Wiksell. Berry, M. 1975 Introduction to Systemic Linguistics, U.K.: Batsford.
Prose,”
in
Studies in
Vol. 1, Structures and Systems,
Gilbert, G. N. and M. Mulkay Opening Pandora’s Box, a Sociological Analysis of Scientists’ Discourse, 1984 U.K.: Cambridge University Press. Gopnik, M. Linguistic Structures in Scienttjic Text, France: Mouton. 1972 Halliday, M. A. K. An Zntrodu~tion to Functional Gram~r, U.K.: Edward Arnold. 1985 Huddleston, R. D. The Sentence in Written English, a Syntactic Study Based on an Analysis 1971 of Scientific Texts, U.K.: Cambridge University Press. Larreya, P.
1984
Le Possibfe et Ze Necessaire: Woolite Britunnique, France: Nathan.
Leech, G. Meaning and the English Verb, U.K.: 1971
et Auxiliares ~~~
Longman.
en Anglais
78
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
Lewis, M. 1986 i’%e English Verb, an Exploration of Structure and Meaning, U.K.: Language Teaching Publications. McKinlay, A. and J. Potter 1987 “Model Discourse: Interpretative Repertoires in Scientists’ Conference Talk,” Social Studies of Science 17. 443-63. Palmer, F. R. 1974 Z7zeEnglish Verb, U.K.: Longman. 1979 Modality and the English Medals, U.K.: Longman. Perkins, M. R. 1982 “The Core Meanings of the English Modals,” Journal of Linguistics 18. 245-73. 1983 M&l Expressions in English, U.K.: Frances Pinter. Quirk, R., S. Greenbaum, G. Leech and J. Svartvik 1972 A Grammar of Contemporary English, U.K.: Longman. Suzuki, N. Y. 1986 TIhe MoaWs in American English: It Is their Background that Matters, Germany: Linguistic Agency, University of Duisburg. Swales, J. M. 1985 “English Language Papers and Authors’ First Language: Preliminary Explorations, ’ ’ Scientometrics 8. 9 1- 10 1. 1986 “ESP in the Big World of Reprint Requests,” ESP Journal 5. 81-5.
1991
0388~OOW91 $3.00+.00 Pergamon Press plc
Some Observations Concerning Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
David Banks Universitk de Bretagne Occidentale
ABSTRACT consideration of a corpus of scientific writing shows that in this register modal verbs are more likely to be passive than non-medals. This is pa~icuiar~y so for verbs of mental process. The passive may and can in mental processes are exclusively of the epistemic type, and cun seems semantically can
closer than may to non-modal
in mental processes.
active.
Can is rare in these processes.
ships, although
expression.
The active may is much less frequent than
In material and relational processes,
the small numbers
examples of may are predominantly
Other modal verbs show similarly
involved preclude
interesting
relation-
extrapolation.
CORPUS This study (like Banks 1985, 1986, 1990) is based on a corpus of scientific writing from the field of oceanography. The corpus is made up of 11 academic articles from Vol. 5, Nos 1 and 2 of the journal Oce~log~cu Acta. The articles were selected on the basis of two criteria: the article was written in English; (2) at least one of the authors provided an address in an English-speaking country.
(1)
The object of this selection was to isolate those articles which were written by English speakers, so as to avoid possible interference from other languages. The method used is slightly finer than that suggested by Baldauf and Jemudd (1983) (who only consider the first-named author) but not as sophisticated as that suggested by Swales (1985, 1986). Swales’ method, however, seems directly applicable to singleauthor papers, while 8 out df the 11 articles in this corpus list more than one author.
60
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
The corpus contains the whole of the text of the articles, excluding only the abstract. I have excluded the abstract since it seems to me that the language of an abstract is a register in itself, and is not necessarily the same as that of an academic article, even when both are from the same domain. Gopnik (1972), despite its misleading title, was devoted exclusively to the language of scientific abstracts. Oceanography is a hybrid science. The articles which make up the corpus relate to the disciplines of physics, chemistry, biology, meteorology and paleontology. To some extent, then, oceanographical writing can be seen as a microcosm of scientific writing. Thus, whatever hypotheses might be formed on the basis of a study of oceanographical writing can be taken as working hypotheses for scientific writing in general. I take it that the structure of the active English verb is: (modality)
(perfect aspect) (progressive
aspect) tense
where brackets indicate optional elements. On this basis, all verbs that fit into the modality slot are counted as modal verbs. This definition includes will and shall in the category of modal verbs, but excludes ought, which requires the inclusion of the particle to. However, there are no examples of oughf in the sample, so its exclusion is not particularly pertinent to this study. The definition also excludes the periphrastic verbal expression have to, which, in any case, has syntactic features which distinguish it from the modal verbs properly so-called, and of which only one example occurs in the corpus. On this basis, the corpus contains 252 modal verbs, the distributions of which are given in Table 1. The articles are identified by the first-named author. TABLE
Vassie Elliott Uncles Chew Rice Gage Bruce Campbell Barton Thunell Berger
Will
Would
Shall
Should
8 7 4 2 1 1 4
-
-
-
1 4 3 6 11 6 3 5 3 -
1 8 2 4 1 1 2
Can 32 18 9 6 3 1 4 3 2 15
1 Could
1 2 3 4 2 1 1 2 1
May 311 3 11 3 14 6 8 1 5
Might
Must
Total
2 1 1 2 3
1 5 2 3 1 1 1 2
7 7 40 34 34 37 14 17 21 9 32
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
Table 2 lists the verbs in decreasing
order of importance.
61
It will be seen that can
accounts for more than one quarter (26%) of the modal examples, and may is of the same order of importance (22%). Would and wilE (17 and 11% respectively) form a middle range of importance, although it will be noticed that would, interestingly, is considerably more frequent than will. Should, could, must and might occur only in comparatively small numbers, none of them accounting for as much as 10% of the modal verbs. Shawl is completely absent from the sample. This is not too different from the proportions found in a scientific corpus by Huddleston (1971:297), where calz and may represent 30 and 24 % respectively; would and will 10 and 12 % respectively; and the other modal verbs less than 10% each, shall being the least frequent with 2%. It also follows the general lines of the distribution found by Barber (1962:29) for a small scientific sample, where the only major differences are a comparatively low percentage of would and a rather higher percentage of must. It is, however, considerably different from the distribution found by Larreya (1984:261) in a corpus of general English, where will + would is by far the most common category, and may + might account
for less than 10% of the sample.
TABLE
Can May Would Will
No.
%
66 55 42
26 22 17 11 8 7 6 4 -
27 19 17 16
Should Could Must Might
10 -
Shall
MODALITY
2
AND TRANSITIVITY
While the percentage of passives in the corpus as a whole is 31% of finite verbs (cf. Banks 1985, 1986), 41% of modal verbs occur in the passive form. Since passivization is related to transitivity, I shall approach this phenomenon using a simple transitivity network based on Berry (1975) and Halliday (1985).
62
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
unrestricted material
+
-b
r
causative
1
non-causative
r L restricted
r
4
middle
1
transitive
effective
+ [
intransitive
mental attributive relational
+ identifying
All processes are either material, mental or relational. Material processes are either unrestricted or restricted, i.e. the number of inherent participants is fixed (restricted) or not (unrestricted). Unrestricted processes may occur with two participants, and thus be causative: (1)
. . . surface slopes must almost balance
or with a single participant, (2)
..
the . .
processes
(3)
. . . dissolution
..
in which case they are non-causative:
slope will similarly
Restricted
the forcing mechanisms.
may be restricted
increase.
to a single participant,
and thus be middle:
can proceed more readily within CO*-rich microenvironments.
Where restricted processes are restricted to two participants (effective process), participants may be expressed giving the transitive process: (4)
. . depth averaged
models can only provide a guide
. .
both
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing or only one participant (5)
are either attributive,
process:
.
where a qualitative
attribute
is assigned
to
. . . the MSL . . . may be flat . . .
or identifying, (7)
giving the intransitive
. . . the fine net may not filter effectively
Relation processes the subject: (6)
may be expressed
63
where the process
serves to define the identity
. . . organic particles
Only four positions
which may constitute
in this network
permit
a selection
of the subject:
their prime source of food. between
active and passive
voice; they are the causative, transitive, mental, and identifying processes. Table 3 shows the distribution by process and distinguishes between active and passive where appropriate. TABLE Caus. Non-caus. Act. Pass. Vassie Elliott
1 1
1 -
-
5 2126 237 354 123 2 1 1
-
-
1 2 1 1
Thunell Berger
-
-
4
Total
33
1
1
Trans. Act. Pass.
-
Uncles Chew Rice Gage Bruce Campbell Barton
-
1
Mid.
9
1 -
1
21
Intrans.
1 1
26
Ment. Act. Pass.
Attrib.
Ident. Act. Pass.
-
-
3 2
1 1
1 1
-
-
319 58 17 5 11 -4 2 4 37
7 6 10 3 3 6 7
1 325 -1 --
-
1
1
121 222 17
3
1 -
2 126
2
34
1
72
l-l 4 49
1
-
-14
2
It will be seen that mental process accounts for the largest number of cases, 106 (or 42%), followed by the material, 81 (or 33%); and of these, 47 (19% of the total), are transitive. Relational process accounts for 65 cases (25%), and of these, 49 (or 19%
64
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
of the total) are attributive. As has been said, 41% of the modal examples occur in the passive form. However, this may be to some extent misleading, in the sense that in four of the process types (non-causative, middle, intransitive and attributive) the active/passive choice is not available. These are processes which occur uniquely in the active form; no passive correlate exists. If one considers only those process types where the active/passive choice is available (i.e. causative, transitive, mental and identifying), then passive has been chosen in 59% of the cases. This is most noticeable in the mental category, where 69% of the mental process examples are passive. Of the other types, causative has few examples, but those that do occur are evenly divided between active and passive. The transitive cases are also fairly evenly divided, with a slight bias towards passive (55 %). The identifying cases are not particularly numerous either, but are more so than causative, and of those that occur, one can say that passive seems to be rare, occurring in only 12% of the cases. From these results, a certain number of trends seem to be discernible. There seems to be some slight correlation between modality and mental process: 42 % of the modal verbs in the corpus are mental processes, compared with 33% material and 25% relational processes. In the material process category, active and passive examples seem equally probable; in the mental process category, there seems to be a strong tendency towards the passive. On the other hand, passive seems extremely rare in the relational process. That there should be some link between modality and mental process does not seem unreasonable. To the extent that mental processes deal with the human appreciation of the world, it may well be that this is a situation where the scientist prefers to hedge his bets, leaving himself an escape route rather than making unqualified statements. The qualification provided by the modal would then allow for the reader who did not wish to follow the line of reasoning suggested. McKinlay and Potter (1987) have shown that when talking about the supposed errors of others, scientists tend to do so in a non-specific way when speaking in a formal situation, as opposed to the informal (indeed anonymous) situations studied by Gilbert and Mulkay (1984), where they tend to be much more specific and assertive. It would seem reasonable that both written contexts and formal spoken ones, like scientific conferences, should be situations which lead scientists to be less assertive, to hedge their bets, on points that might be open to disagreement. A look at the distribution of the various modal verbs occurring in mental processes (Table 4) indicates that can accounts for almost half of the modal verbs which occur. This is true for both the active and passive categories, with 42 and 47% respectively. However, the figure of 42% for the active category may be misleading, to the extent that while for the passive category the examples of can are spread throughout the sample, 10 out of the 14 occurrences of active can appear in a single article, that identified here as Berger.
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
65
TABLE 4 Active
Will Would Shall Should Can Could
%
3 7
9 21 -
5 3
9 42 3 12 -
3 34 4 15 6 2
3 15 1 4 1
May Might Must
Passive No. %
No.
3
Total mental No.
%
7 4 -
8 10 -
8 10 -
4 47 6 21 8 3
6 49 5 19 6 3
6 46 5 18 6 3
The possibility that Berger is to some extent stylistically different from the other articles in this sample cannot be excluded. I note in passing that one of the co-authors of the Berger article is a French-speaker; it would therefore seem not unreasonable to suppose that this writer had a large hand in drafting the article, thus leading to this sort of stylistic difference. (This is not the only point on which Berger differs stylistically from the other articles.) If the figures are recalculated with a sample excluding Berger, then the percentage of active modal verbs in mental process represented by can falls to 20 % . This is the same as the occurrence rate of active may in mental process, and almost half that of active would. MENTAL
PROCESS
Huddleston
AND PASSIVE
(197 1:297-304)
MAY AND CAN
claims to isolate six uses of the epistemic
may:
1. Qualified generalization: x is true for at least some members of the group but not necessarily any particular individual. 2. Exhaustive disjunction: x is at least one of the attributes proposed. 3. Uncertainty: the truth of x is not certain (i.e. possibility). 4. Concession: whether x is true or not, y is the case. 5. Legitimacy: x is legitimate, valid. 6. Ability: (we) are able to do X. The epistemic can has the same uses as may with the exclusion of concession. Beyond this, Huddleston seems to imply that there is little difference between may and can. This also appears to be the conclusion of Palmer (1974: 120) (although in Palmer L3c 1381-E
66
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
(1979: 154-6) he links can to the notion of non-assertion). by Huddleston, those of uncertainly/possibility, legitimacy
Of the notions suggested and ability seem to cover
all of the examples found in the sample. The examples of passive can in the mental process are never of a deontic type. All of the examples can be classified as epistemic in some form. To the extent that these can be divided into an ability type and a possibility type (cf., e.g., Quirk et al. 1972:97), both occur. (8)
. . . it can be seen that the semi-diurnal clockwise direction . . .
(9)
. . the acceleration
tides propagate
. . . in an anti-
of the fluid can be neglected.
However, a considerable number of the examples are not easily classified as being one rather than the other, and seem to combine aspects of both possible interpretations, or indeed to be neutral as to which one should be selected. (10)
. . . possible similarities measurements ...
can be detected
between
the oceanic
and coastal
This seems to be open to interpretation, indicating both the ability of an observer to detect the phenomenon, and the possibility of detection. Indeed both seem feasible ways of glossing the proposition expressed by (10). The examples of passive may in the mental process are also exclusively of the epistemic type, i.e. indicating some form of possibility. (11)
. . the present work may be considered
Here the majority examples (12)
of Owen’s analysis
use: cf. (11) above, and:
. . growth may be acceptably modelled by a growth increment
The three remaining cases seem to fall into the ability category some cases are not easy to categorize). (13)
.
of the cases of passive may in mental process (12 out of 15) are
of the legitimacy . . . juvenile
an extension
The stratification contour plots ,
was weaker
...
(though here again
as may be seen by comparing
The examples of passive can in the mental process fall into a similar Twenty-eight out of the 34 examples are of the legitimacy type:
the
pattern.
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
(14)
. . . other signals
. . . can therefore
67
be disregarded.
and six are of the ability type: (15)
. . . has . . . reduced the minimum
size of organisms
which can be counted.
To the extent that can and may cover similar semantic areas in similar proportions, approach is justified, and it is true it might seem that the “virtually no difference” that in many cases substituting may for can or vice versa would make “virtually” no difference. However, some examples do not lend themselves to this ploy. (16)
..
it can be shown that the procedure
. . is reasonable
...
The substitution of may in (16) sounds distinctly odd, and even if acceptable, would alter the interpretation. As it stands, (16) is very close to saying that the procedure is reasonable; it is a justification. The substitution of may places the reasonableness much more in the domain of possibility, closer in fact to Huddleston’s notion of uncertainty. This seems to go against Palmer’s use of non-assertion as a distinguishing feature of epistemic can. My intuitive interpretation of the difference in this example is as follows. Both express a procedure which is considered legitimate. In the case of can, this legitimacy is considered to be the only one available in the present state of our knowledge, and hence is that to be used, until (if ever) it is shown to be less adequate than some other procedure. This interpretation is supported by the fact that in many cases there seems to be little difference, or at least only marginal difference, between the use of can and a non-modal sentence. Compare: (17) (18)
. these currents have been delineated using a simple linear theory . . . The extent . . . can be estimated by constituting a trace metal budget . .
In so far as there is a difference in concept between the proposition expressed in (17) and that in (18), it lies not in the fact that the estimation in (18) is possible, for it has been carried out just as much as has the delineation in (17), but in the fact that the possibility can be verified by anyone who wishes to repeat the process. May, on the other hand, claims that the procedure is legitimate, but does not exclude other possibilities. The other possibilities are not necessarily known to the author and thus act in effect as a sort of guard against unforeseen objections. It will be noticed that this interpretation would not be appropriate in (16) with may substituted for can, which accounts for the block on the substitution in this case. This would seem to counter Lewis’s (1986: 113) suggestion that with can the speaker
68
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
perceives the existence of a possibility, whereas with may he is volitionally involved in the creation of a possibility. There may be some justification for saying, as Suzuki (198621-2) does, that can always retains some nuance of ability. But Perkins (1982:257, 1983:38) seems closer to the mark when he says that can focuses primarily on the current state of circumstances, whereas the epistemic may focuses primarily on the current verifiability of the truth of a proposition. We seem, therefore, to have a cline of guarding against unforeseen objections, which has non-modai expression and may at opposite poles, with can at some mid-point. MENTAL
PROCESS AND ACTIVE MAY AND CAN
Mental process, by definition, typically requires an intelligent agent. Scientific discourse tends to avoid the use of human agent subjects. One might expect then that active mental process would be rare in this type of document. As far as may is concerned, this is true: there are only four examples in the corpus. In addition, of these four, only one has a human subject, the other three being cases of what might be called “untypical animacy” [extending the range of the term used by Berry (1975)l; that is, in this case, an inanimate subject occurring where the process would normally require an animate one. (19)
This reinforcement
may expfain the steep drop . .
Moreover, one might note that, in terms of Huddleston’s semantic categories, the three examples of untypical animacy are of the possibility type, while the single remaining example expresses legitimacy.
(20)
. . . we may draw the following
conclusions
...
There is a rather higher number of examples of active CUE in the mental process, but it must be pointed out that 10 out of the 15 cases occur in Berger, about which some reserve has been expressed above. One might add here that nine of these Berger examples have the pronoun we as subject, which constitutes an unusually high concentration for this type of discourse; and one of them is the only example in the whole corpus of a question with a personal pronoun subject. (21)
However, involved,
Can we conclude from this that the fine fraction dissolves slowly than the coarse fraction?
five times more
despite this reserve, and in so far as can be judged from the small numbers the Berger examples follow the same pattern as the others. Of the 15
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
examples,
11 have we as subject,
69
and 10 (but not all with we as subject)
express
We can now state . . . that . . there is no evidence . . . The second alternative . not only can account for the increased tivity . .
produc-
legitimacy (22) (23)
while the other five express ability, (24)
.
lacking
or are neutral (25)
suitable data we cannot quantify
as to an ability or legitimacy
this reinforcement
.
interpretation.
We can check whether the loss Profile B is plausible
.
The corpus examples then present two basic differences between active may and active can in mental process. Firstly, may, but not can, occurs more frequently with untypical animacy ; and secondly, whereas may expresses primarily uncertainty and secondarily legitimacy, can expresses primarily legitimacy and secondarily ability. The numbers are too small to warrant extrapolation, but it would be interesting to see if these results are confirmed in a larger sample. CAN AND MAY: OTHER
PROCESSES
Can is fairly rare outside of mental process. occur in the corpus. (26)
Seven passive and 10 active examples
The seven passive examples
. . . an inclinometer
are all transitive
can be attached to the sledge
processes.
...
However, while (26) is a typical example of transitive process, many of the examples here might be felt by some readers to be fairly close to the mental process. (27) (28)
. .
examples can be found in the lower layer flow . . the region zero bias can be located with sufficient accuracy
...
This is not as strange as it might at first seem, since scientific experimentation is surely an area where mental and physical activity are inextricably intermingled. Perhaps one could say that in scientific experimentation, mental processes are expressed in and through physical actions, i.e. material processes.
70
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
In addition, these seven examples seem exclusively to have an ability reading, with the possible exception of (26) above, which might be taken to express legitimacy. There would seem, then, to be a tendency for passive can to express legitimacy in the mental process and ability in the material (transitive in these examples) process. Active can, on the other hand, occurs in a wide range of processes, six out of the possible seven processes being represented in the 10 examples. Only identifying does not appear. Attributive is the most common, occurring four times. In terms of Huddl~ston’s semantic categories, the majority (seven) express uncer~inty (or possibility), in the sense required, it need not be true on every occasion, (30) (31)
. . . low . . . gradients in tidal energy (such as can occur in bays). . . . the sea surface . . can become heated . .
while the remainder (three), I have categorized out of the three cases contain a negative, (32) (33)
However,
two
. . . cannot be strictly valid . . . I . . no vorticity effect . . . can balance the Ieading terms in Table 5.
whiie the third has negative (34)
as cases of legitimacy.
bias created by the word only.
. . . depth averaged
models can only provide a guide
...
The result of this is that the legitimacy expressed in the verb is within the scope of the negative, thus making the reading of the proposition as a whole, in (32) and (33), express something which is illegitimate, totally out of court. Here, again, one might notice a difference between the mental process examples, where acrive can tended to express legitimacy, and the materiai and relational process examples, where it tended to express unce~ainty. May is more common than cm outside the mental process, with 36 examples in the sample. What is more, the may examples are predominantly active: only six are passive. Even here one example is of doubtful classification: (35)
. . * the increase off . . .
. . . may have been related to increased
continental
run-
Although morphologically passive, some may prefer to consider this a purely copula construction. With the exception of (35), all of the passive examples are transitive. (36)
. . . some may have been produced
in the water column
...
71
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
In any event, it seems reasonable
to say that in material
and relational
process,
may
rarely occurs in the passive. This contrasts with mental process where the majority of cases (79%) are passive. The 30 active examples show a bias towards relational process (20 cases) and of these the majority (14) are attributive: (37) (38)
* . . the calculated currents may be suitable for predicting flushing dispersion . . . ... . . . which may also be a result of large spatial variability
and
and six identifying. Of the 10 examples of material process, four are middle. All of the material and relational process examples of may express uncertainty, which contrasts with passive may in the mental process, where legitimacy was the dominant semantic feature. If one now sets up a table (Table 5) of the main semantic tendencies of active and passive may and CCIIE,two main facts emerge. (In Table 5 the figures give the fraction of the sample which corresponds to the trait in question.)
TABLE
5
MAY
Mental
Passive
Active
Passive
Uncertainty
Legitimacy
Legitimacy
Legitimacy
(12115)
(10/15)
(28/34)
Uncertainty (7110)
Ability
(3/4) Material
and relational
In the mental process,
CAN
Active
Uncertainty (30/30)
Uncertainty (516)
(6/7)
may and can tend to be used to express legitimacy,
except
in active may where, if anything can be said from the small numbers involved, it would be that they seem to indicate a bias towards uncertainty. In mental and relational processes, may and can tend to express uncertainty, except passive can which tends to express ability. OTHER Table voice.
MODALS 6 shows the distribution
of the various
modal
verbs by process
and by
72
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
TABLE6 Material
Mental
Relational Act. Pass.
Act.
Pass.
Act.
Pass.
May Would Will Should Could Must Might
6 10 12 II I 6 7 -
7 5 4 1 4 4 2 1
15 4
4 20 15 7 8 2 4
-
-
34 15 3 5 3 4 2 6
3
-
Total
53
28
34
72
63
Can
7 3 3 1 1
1 1
2
Table 7 shows the distribution of active and passive voice for each verb with the percentage of active and passive in each case.
TABLE7 Active No.
%
Can
25
38
May Would Will
33 34 21
Should Could Must Might
12 9 12 3
Passive No. %
60 81 78
41 22 8 6
62 40 19 22
63 53 75 30
7 8 4 7
37 47 25 70
While 62% of the can examples and 40% of the may examples occur in the passive, much smaller percentages of would and will do so. Only eight of the 42 cases of would (19%) occur in the passive. The examples of would involved in the mental process seem to indicate a strong collocation with the verb expecr which occurs in five out of the 10 examples. (39) (40)
Accelerated transfer . . . would be expected to result in a seasonal variation . ‘. we would expect to find a diatomaceous sapropel D . . .
...
Transitivity and Modality in Scientific Writing
Huddleston
(1971:307-9)
found three semantic
types represented
73
by his would
examples: 1. Tentativeness. 2. Prediction, including
“unreal
conditions.
3. Real mode, where it is the past element Out of the 42 examples (41) (42)
” which is uppermost.
of would studied here,
15 were of the tentative
type.
It would appear that . . the exchange processes tend to be limited . . which would further indicate that a finer grid resolution is necessary . .
In two cases, the tentative nature of would was reinforced by probably. These seem to be another case of the scientist hedging his bets. It is easy to imagine these sentences occurring in a non-modal form, but the less affirmative modal form leaves the author an escape route if objections are raised to the statement made. Just over half of the examples of would (22 out of 42) fall into the prediction category. However, only a minority have an explicitly stated conditional clause. This is the case in six examples (43) (44)
If the Nile region was the primary source we would expect to find a diatomaceous sapropel D . this would be true of the catch estimates if the odometer failed to operate properly.
plus one case where an example (45)
are deducible
it would be expected
i.e. if there were no curvature (47)
pertaining
is given.
A less dramatic odometer fault, for instance if it lost traction slightly . . would be more difficult to detect . .
In the other cases the conditions elements in the written context, (46)
of the condition’s
the depth averaged
i.e. if visual estimates
from the context,
in the absence
of curvature
either from explicit
effects.
effects; or from the more general currents
and skidded
that one would estimate
context, visually
..
were carried out. It seems to be the case, then, that although
74
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
would indicates
a conditional sense in a majority of cases, it is infrequent to be explicitly given in a conditional clause.
conditional
Only a small number of real mode examples of would occurred. examples were of this type. (48)
The coarse meshes would be caught .
. made it unlikely
for the
Five out of the 42
that the smallest
postlarvae
. .
There seemed to be a tendency for this type to occur in the introductory section of the articles. Twenty-seven examples of will occur in the corpus, of which only six are passive, and all but one of the passive examples are mental process. In material and relational processes, will very rarely occurs in the passive. Three semantic types of will are given by Huddleston (1971:305-7): 1. Future. 2. Induction (including explicit and implicit conditions). 3. Deduction (which gives a conclusion, which may also result from a condition). Only one example (49)
of the deductive
type occurred
Where both fV and KV* increase slope will similarly increase.
in this sample.
downstream,
the cross-stream
sea level
Of the rest, 11 are future and 15 induction. Despite the fact that induction is related to conditions, there was not a single example of an explicitly stated condition in this corpus. (50)
. . whereas bed
in nature,
it will depend on the current
structure
near the sea
Hence explicit conditions appear to be more closely related to would than will. In the mental process six out of the eight examples express future. Moreover, in all of these cases, the future involved is internal to the text itself. (51) (52)
..
In material the text.
as we will later see the leading terms will be designated and relational
processes,
however,
by R the future reference
is external
to
Transitivity
(53) (54)
and Modality
in Scientific Writing
75
. . . progress will perhaps be made in the near future . . . . . . most work . . . will continue to be based on data . . .
Although a tendency of this type might be expected from the nature of the processes involved, the absolute dichotomy found here is striking. The corpus provides 19 examples of should. The eight relational examples are exclusively active, while of the material examples, four are passive. The six mental process examples are equally divided between active and passive. Three of Huddleston’s semantic categories for should (1971:310-l 1) appear to be relevant to the examples in the corpus: 1. Obligation. 2. Logical expectation. 3. First person form of tentative
wouM.
However, it seems to me that the two examples of the third category which occur contain a notion of obligation and can thus be assimilated to the obligation type. (55) (56)
. . . we should reject as implausible a result identifying . . . we should expect no change . . .
...
When this is done, we find that in the mental process, five out of the six examples are of the obligation type. On the other hand, the eight active examples of relational process and the single active material example are all of the logical type. (57) (58)
. . the true density A major malfunction
. . . should be about twice that estimated . . of the odometer should be detectable . . .
The corpus contains 17 examples of could, of which 10 are material process, six active and four passive. Out of the five mental process examples, four are passive. Three of Huddleston’s categories (1971:304-5) are relevant here: 1. Uncertainty/possibility. 2. Legitimacy. 3. Ability. The only general trend that might be discerned from the small numbers involved is a tendency for active examples to be of the uncertainty/possibility type. Eight out of the nine examples fall into his category.
76
Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991) (59)
(60)
A general downslope “drift” . . . could conceivably cause the effect . . . . local forcing, which could account for about 55% of the variance . . .
Of the 16 examples of musr, nine are material process, of which seven are active. Taking obligation and logical necessity as the two basic semantic traits involved (cf. Huddleston 1971:311-12), it transpires that logical necessity is the dominant factor here. This might be expected on the basis that scientific enquiry is inherently involved with logical argumentation. In this sample, 13 out of the 16 examples are of the logical necessity type. (61) (62)
Estimates must at best be approximations .. . . the dearth . . must therefore have resulted from its inability these organisms.
to collect
This includes all but one of the active examples, and from another point of view, all but one of the examples of active and passive material and relational process. Out of the three obligation cases which occur, two are passive mental process. (63)
The computerized
data . . must therefore be considered rather qualitative
...
Out of the 10 examples of might in the sample, the six mental and the single material process are all passive, while the three relational process are all active. With uncertainty/possibility and legitimacy (cf. Huddleston 1971:302) as the two basic meanings of might to be found here, it turns out that only the material example is of the uncertainty/possibility type. (64)
. energy might be dissipated
All of the mental and relational (65) (66)
examples
in this region. express legitimacy:
. . it might be anticipated that the effects A sample might have the index “30”
.
will become weaker
..
I would not wish to extrapolate the results found for those modals which appear in small numbers in the sample. However, it would be interesting to see whether the tendencies found here are corroborated in a larger sample. CONCLUSION What I would like to retain
from the details of this analysis
is the fact that, in
scientific writing, there is a series of relationships modality.
These are manifested
strong, for particular
between processes (transitivity)
in the form of tendencies,
processes to have strong collocation
choice in scientific writing. Transitivity of modality in scientific writing.
and
in some cases particularly with specific forms of modal
is then a significant
parameter
in the analysis
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i990
“Agents
and Instruments
in Scientific
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International Review
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Measurable
Characteristics
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Language Sciences, Volume 13, Number 1 (1991)
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