The Passive Voice in Abstracts in Research Articles: A Diachronic Variation across Disciplines

The passive voice has been commonly used in academic writing for decades. This research aims to investigate the diachronic changes in the use of passive voice in abstracts across four disciplines in natural sciences and social sciences over the past fifteen years. The study corpus comprises 180 abstracts in four disciplines, ranging from 2008-2012, 2013-2017, and 2018-2022. Both tag tools and statistical tools were utilized to reveal the changes in the use of passive voice. The results indicated a slight decline in the use of passive voice in the 180 abstracts over the years, with an increase in natural sciences and a decline in social sciences. Additionally, in the past five years, there has been a discernible difference between the use of passive voice in natural sciences and social sciences, with natural science abstracts containing more passive voice. This research offers insights into changes in passive voice use in abstract writing and contributes to English for Academic Purposes (EAP) instruction.