A comparative study on the structure of English abstracts of Persian and English medical journals

Nowadays writing an essay is very important to represent scientific achievements providing that the principles of rhetorical patterns would be considered. The present study aimed to compare the structural variations in English abstracts of Persian and English journals in the area of medical sciences. In this analytical-descriptive study, 64 medical article abstracts (32 in Iranian journals, 32 in international journals) were analyzed and compared on the basis of Swales’ model. Furthermore detailed analysis was done on the Introduction section regarding CARS (Create- a- Research- Space) model proposed by Swales. The IMRC (Introduction, Methods, Results, Conclusion) sequence was considered as the structural conventions for the analysis. Data were analyzed using Chi square and Fisher tests. The results showed that while all translated abstracts considered IMRC sequence, the original ones did not considered it completely. In the introduction section, there was a significant difference, in writing the aim of the study and it was found more in translated abstracts compared to the original ones (P<0.001). In addition, there was a significant difference in using the Material and Methods section between the two groups of abstracts but pro translated abstracts (P<0.01). Both groups of abstracts were identical in the Results and Conclusion sections. The results showed that the translated abstracts from Persian to English in medical articles more closely reflected the criteria of scientific writing structure than the abstracts excerpted from the original English articles.