This paper is organized as follows : lexical bundles in Computer Science academic texts produced by novice and expert writers

Abstract

Conventional academic writing in English is crucial for scholars seeking publication in peer-reviewed international journals. English for Academic Purposes (EAP) materials often use a “one-size-fits-all” approach that does not cater to disciplinary variation or learner needs (Murray, 2016). Lexical bundles (LBs), defined as recurrent continuous sequences of words, are essential building blocks of academic discourse (Biber et al., 2002). While much research has been done on LBs in academic contexts (Neely & Cortes, 2009; Cortes, 2013; Staples et al., 2013; Gil & Caro, 2019), to the best of our knowledge, few studies have compared the use of LBs in texts produced by expert writers (EWs) and novice writers (NWs) to inform the design of EAP materials. This study explores two corpora: (i) a corpus of 170 undergraduate theses written in English by Brazilian undergraduates in Computer Science and (ii) a corpus of 581 published research articles of the same discipline. The primary focus of the study is the introduction section, wherein the goal is to extract, categorize, and compare the most frequently occurring 4-, 5-, and 6-word transparent bundles based on their rhetorical function. The results reveal four trends: (a) both groups of writers do not use LBs to realize certain steps; (b) both groups use LBs similarly; (c) NWs use LBs that EWs do not, and (d) EWs use LBs that NWs do not. These findings can inform the design of EAP materials that cater to the disciplinary variation and learner needs of different academic contexts.