IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v130y2025i3d10.1007_s11192-025-05258-6.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Diachronic change in lexical complexity of research articles (1970–2020): economics vs. medicine

Author

Listed:
  • Fan Pan

    (Huazhong University of Science and Technology)

  • Yiying Yang

    (Huazhong University of Science and Technology)

Abstract

Previous research on linguistic complexity features in research articles (RAs) has mainly focused on synchronic comparisons across disciplines or expertise levels. Relatively little research has been conducted from a diachronic perspective. The aim of the present study was to examine diachronic changes and disciplinary variations in the lexical complexity of RAs. A diachronic corpus consisting of 960 journal articles published between 1970 and 2020 in economics and medicine was compiled for analysis. Nine measures incorporated in Lu’s (2012) Lexical Complexity Analyzer were adopted to operationalize three dimensions of lexical complexity for all the texts. Results showed an increasing trend over the 50 years in the lexical density, variation, and sophistication of RAs in the two disciplines. More specifically, RAs in both disciplines have become more lexically complex over time, producing an increasing proportion of lexical words, a larger number of sophisticated words, and a wider diversity of word types. Results also showed that the two disciplines varied significantly in the complexity measures, with medicine generally exhibiting a higher level of lexical complexity during the examined period. These observed changes and variations could be interpreted as a result of shifting research paradigms and practices in the two disciplines. The findings of this study would facilitate a further understanding of linguistic changes occurring in disciplinary writing.

Suggested Citation

  • Fan Pan & Yiying Yang, 2025. "Diachronic change in lexical complexity of research articles (1970–2020): economics vs. medicine," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(3), pages 1789-1812, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:130:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-025-05258-6
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-025-05258-6
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-025-05258-6
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11192-025-05258-6?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Clair, Jeffrey Michael & Clark, Cullen & Hinote, Brian P. & Robinson, Caroline O. & Wasserman, Jason A., 2007. "Developing, integrating, and perpetuating new ways of applying sociology to health, medicine, policy, and everyday life," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 248-258, January.
    2. Alexandre Truc, 2021. "Interdisciplinary Influences in Behavioral Economics: A Bibliometric Analysis of Cross-Disciplinary Citations," Post-Print halshs-03455796, HAL.
    3. Josh Angrist & Pierre Azoulay & Glenn Ellison & Ryan Hill & Susan Feng Lu, 2020. "Inside Job or Deep Impact? Extramural Citations and the Influence of Economic Scholarship," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 58(1), pages 3-52, March.
    4. Diane Coyle, 2020. "Economists must collaborate courageously," Nature, Nature, vol. 582(7810), pages 9-9, June.
    5. Song, Ningyuan & Chen, Kejun & Zhao, Yuehua, 2023. "Understanding writing styles of scientific papers in the IS-LS domain: Evidence from abstracts over the past three decades," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 17(1).
    6. John B. Davis, 2019. "Specialization, fragmentation, and pluralism in economics," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(2), pages 271-293, March.
    7. Paul Downward & Andrew Mearman, 2007. "Retroduction as mixed-methods triangulation in economic research: reorienting economics into social science," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 31(1), pages 77-99, January.
    8. Kube, Roland & Löschel, Andreas & Mertens, Henrik & Requate, Till, 2018. "Research trends in environmental and resource economics: Insights from four decades of JEEM," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 433-464.
    9. Tan Jin & Huiqiong Duan & Xiaofei Lu & Jing Ni & Kai Guo, 2021. "Do research articles with more readable abstracts receive higher online attention? Evidence from Science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(10), pages 8471-8490, October.
    10. Lu, Chao & Bu, Yi & Dong, Xianlei & Wang, Jie & Ding, Ying & Larivière, Vincent & Sugimoto, Cassidy R. & Paul, Logan & Zhang, Chengzhi, 2019. "Analyzing linguistic complexity and scientific impact," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 817-829.
    11. Kragt, M.E. & Pannell, D.J. & McVittie, A. & Stott, A.W. & Vosough Ahmadi, B. & Wilson, P., 2016. "Improving interdisciplinary collaboration in bio-economic modelling for agricultural systems," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 217-224.
    12. Gui Wang & Hui Wang & Xinyi Sun & Nan Wang & Li Wang, 2023. "Linguistic complexity in scientific writing: A large-scale diachronic study from 1821 to 1920," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(1), pages 441-460, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sun, Zhuanlan & He, Dongjin & Li, Yiwei, 2024. "How the readability of manuscript before journal submission advantages peer review process: Evidence from biomedical scientific publications," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3).
    2. Muriel Dal-Pont Legrand & Alexandre Truc, 2022. "Agent-Based Models: impact and interdisciplinary influences in economics," Working Papers halshs-04832295, HAL.
    3. Jussi T. S. Heikkila, 2022. "Journal of Economic Literature codes classification system (JEL)," Papers 2207.06076, arXiv.org.
    4. Xueying Liu & Haoran Zhu, 2023. "Linguistic positivity in soft and hard disciplines: temporal dynamics, disciplinary variation, and the relationship with research impact," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(5), pages 3107-3127, May.
    5. Nhu Le Quynh Nguy & Hung Tan Ha, 2022. "Lexical Profile of Academic Written English Revisited: What Does it Take to Understand Scholarly Abstracts?," SAGE Open, , vol. 12(3), pages 21582440221, September.
    6. Alexandre Truc, 2022. "The Disciplinary Mobility of Core Behavioral Economists," GREDEG Working Papers 2022-27, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France.
    7. Song, Ningyuan & Chen, Kejun & Zhao, Yuehua, 2023. "Understanding writing styles of scientific papers in the IS-LS domain: Evidence from abstracts over the past three decades," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 17(1).
    8. Andrew Mearman & Tim Wakeley & Gamila Shoib & Don J. Webber, 2011. "Does Pluralism in Economics Education Make Better Educated, Happier Students? A Qualitative Analysis," International Review of Economic Education, Economics Network, University of Bristol, vol. 10(2), pages 50-62.
    9. Fragkandreas, Thanos, 2025. "Case study research on innovation systems: Paradox, dialectical analysis and resolution," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 54(1).
    10. Jishnu Das & Quy-Toan Do, 2020. "US and them - The geography of academic research," Vox eBook Chapters, in: Sebastian Galliani & Ugo Panizza (ed.), Publishing and Measuring Success in Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 1, pages 111-114, Centre for Economic Policy Research.
    11. Joshua Aizenman & Kenneth Kletzer, 2020. "Networking, citations of academic research, and premature death," Vox eBook Chapters, in: Sebastian Galliani & Ugo Panizza (ed.), Publishing and Measuring Success in Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 1, pages 51-55, Centre for Economic Policy Research.
    12. Andrew Mearman, 2012. "Pluralist economics curricula: do they work; and how would we know?," Working Papers 20121203, Department of Accounting, Economics and Finance, Bristol Business School, University of the West of England, Bristol.
    13. Stan Liebowitz, 2020. "Our uneconomic methods of measuring economic research," Vox eBook Chapters, in: Sebastian Galliani & Ugo Panizza (ed.), Publishing and Measuring Success in Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 1, pages 99-104, Centre for Economic Policy Research.
    14. Angela Ambrosino & Mario Cedrini & John B. Davis, 2024. "Today’s economics: one, no one and one hundred thousand," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(1), pages 59-76, January.
    15. Martina Cioni & Giovanni Federico & Michelangelo Vasta, 2021. "Spreading Clio: a quantitative analysis of the first 25 years of the European Review of Economic History [Plague in seventeenth-century Europe and the decline of Italy: an epidemiological hypothesi," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 25(4), pages 618-644.
    16. Blanco, Esther & Baier, Alexandra & Holzmeister, Felix & Jaber-Lopez, Tarek & Struwe, Natalie, 2022. "Substitution of social sustainability concerns under the Covid-19 pandemic," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    17. John O’Hagan & Lukas Kuld, 2020. "Multi-authored journal articles in economics - Why the spiralling upward trend?," Vox eBook Chapters, in: Sebastian Galliani & Ugo Panizza (ed.), Publishing and Measuring Success in Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 1, pages 93-98, Centre for Economic Policy Research.
    18. Weerahewa, Jeevika & Dayananda, Dasuni, 2023. "Land use changes and economic effects of alternative fertilizer policies: A simulation analysis with a bio-economic model for a Tank Village of Sri Lanka," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 205(C).
    19. Hai Long Vo & Duc Hong Vo, 2023. "The purchasing power parity and exchange‐rate economics half a century on," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(2), pages 446-479, April.
    20. Ju Wen & Lei Lei, 2022. "Adjectives and adverbs in life sciences across 50 years: implications for emotions and readability in academic texts," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(8), pages 4731-4749, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:130:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-025-05258-6. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.