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Friday 3 February 2023

Hedging in academic writing

When writing academically, we need to be very, very careful about using absolutes. Absolutes are statements like "no", and "none", and "never". These statements can trip us up - and make us look like idiots - because we just don't know who is out there, doing research that we are not yet aware of, which contradicts our apparently absolutely certain statement. Using absolutes leaves us at risk of 'over-claiming', so undermining our credibility.

What we need is a softly, softly, catchee monkey approach. In academic writing, we soften our claims and comments - such as “all” and “every” - by using 'hedging' language. Hedging language has been defined as "hedging terms [are adjectival and adverbial language] used to avoid overstating claims. Even where the evidence points to a highly likely conclusion, there is usually some degree of doubt" (Mewburn et al., 2018. p. 120). 

Some examples of hedging language include using terms such as "most" and "many". For example, "...have no..." and "...have none..." could be replaced with “…appear to have no...” or “…have apparently none…” JUST in case someone else knows more than we do (which, when we stop to think about it, is pretty likely!). 

Further, there are degrees of hedging: from very cautious, showing how we are worried about the validity of the evidence we are drawing on, to highly confident. We could go softly - show our increasing caution by saying “…have few…” or “…provides little…”; or show even more caution still with "...have some..." or "...provides some...". The image accompanying this post shows a Likert-style range of hedging language examples.

There are four key reasons why we use hedging language:

  1. To meet academic writing standards (Academic Marker, 2019). "Being precise is one of the most, if not the most, important of the academic values. We must be as precise about our uncertainty as we are about everything else. Hedging language is tentative. These terms help us modify strong claims without losing valuable nuance" (Mewburn et al., 2018. p. 119)
  2. "To reduce the possibility of being proven wrong by other researchers, peers, or academics [...] Remember that one of the primary purposes of academic research is to prove or disprove previously existing research" (Academic Marker, 2019)
  3. "To demonstrate accuracy and critical thinking when reporting research, showing that a study’s methodology may not be 100% accurate or its results completely trustworthy" (Academic Marker, 2019)
  4. "To use politeness strategies to concede to the reader or listener that there may be flaws in the information being provided" (Academic Marker, 2019).

Hedging language allows us to linguistically create space for other researchers doing work that we are not yet aware of; to understand that our literature review search may not have gone far enough; and allows us to acknowledge that our field understanding may be incomplete. It allows us to flag our potential knowledge gaps before someone is unkind enough to point it out to us - and is probably justified in doing so.

It is prudent, polite, and humble. All valuable skills for us to learn :-)


Sam

References:

Academic Marker. (30 April 2019). What is hedging language and why is it important?. https://academicmarker.com/academic-guidance/vocabulary/hedging-language/what-is-hedging-language-and-why-is-it-important/

Mewburn, I., Firth, K., & Lehmann, S. (2018). How to Fix Your Academic Writing Trouble: A Practical Guide. Open University Press.

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