Zhicheng Zhang

Writing 2
Zack De Piero
Feb. 23 2016
How Biology, Sociology, and News Article Analyze Anger
Compared to other animals, human beings are rich in emotions in a way that we tend to
exhibit different and complex emotions. However, even the most complicated emotion is still
made up of basic emotions such as happiness, sadness, surprise, and anger, among which
anger is the most mysterious emotion that people focus more researches on, because
sometimes anger motivates people, whereas excessive anger is dangerous and harmful. This
paper will compare and contrast different approaches to study and analyze anger from three
articles: a Biology research paper published on Frontiers in Psychology named "Frontal
Cortical Asymmetry May Partially Mediate the Influence of Social Power on Anger
Expression"; an scholarly Sociology article published in Work and Stress titled "Perceived
violence climate: A new construct and its relationship to workplace physical violence and
verbal aggression, and their potential consequences", and finally an article from The
Washington Post, "Breaking the cycle of rage in families". The sources and genres largely
determine an essays conventions, moves, and structures as authors purposes vary, so we can
see similarities and differences among the biology article, the sociology article, and the news
article.
Rhetoric features and conventions of the biology article and the sociology article are
mostly the same for they both avoid using first person, whereas they also differ from each
other because their research method and analysis are different. When Kerry Dirk writes about
genres and rhetorical features, he notes that "[headlines] are a rhetorical action meant to bring
about a specific response"(Dirk, 254). He is saying that every rhetorical action and

convention authors use is for specific purpose. For instance, both authors avoid use first
person such as "I" and "we" in their research papers. The reason of doing this is that authors
want to show readers that components of research paper such as background information,
data, and conclusions do not depend on researchers' subjective will, and they are all objective
and credible.
However, in terms of conventions, two academic papers are not totally the same as their
sources are differentone relates with biology and the other associates with sociology. In the
method part, the first research focuses more on experiment and data. It spends two long
paragraphs explaining principles and processes of a series of experiments. One the other
hand, the second paper emphasizes more on participants and definitions because it is full of
descriptive language and its data is collected from participants answers. Such difference not
only reflects that two authors study the same topic from two perspectives, but also indicates
the professionalism of two researches, because sociology is soft science which deal with
words and sentences, whereas biology is hard science involves numbers, computations, and
experiments.
Nevertheless, since the news article Breaking the cycle of rage in families is a different
genre from two academic articles, it is another totally different kind of writing, because it is
more personal and informal. In term of conventions, since it is a mothers personal
experience about how she hurts children and family, how she regrets about what she has
done, and how she advices some ways to deal with anger issues, the whole essay is mix of
personal feelings and subjective opinions. For example, when talking about her experiences
of dealing with anger issue, the mother notes, [m]y journey of healing resembles more
closely an acclivity than an even easy path, but it is a steady quest nonetheless (Wendy). She
is saying that although dealing with anger issues is difficult, she makes steady progress to
change herself. This kind of writing differs from academic writings in a sense that it has no

standard format and does not use data and evidence to support the idea. This personal
testimonial makes readers close to the author and through sharing her personal experiences,
the author wants to encourage people who are struggling with anger issues to overcome
difficulties.
Besides conventions, moves are also especially important in building an essays
identity. Mike Bunn tells his readers that "the goal as your read like a writer is to locate what
you believe are the most important writerly choices represented in the text"(Bunn, 72). He is
saying that detecting moves helps readers to understand authors purpose. First of all, two
academic articles use hedged language very frequently as some words such as might,
seem, and often appear. For instance, when discussing how social power affects anger
expressions, researchers argue that [a]lthough the participant was similarly angry in both
scenarios, the social power contrast might lead to different anger expressing inclinations (Li
et al., 6) and that Variability in support across samples in different studies might be a factor
that contributed to inconsistent results (Spector et al., 119). Authors use might in both
sentences to make sentences more accurate, because they cannot be too absolute in case that
things can change or differ. Making such vague statement instead builds research essays
credibility.
Secondly, in the introduction and background paragraphs, two academic article quote
very frequently from previously existed research papers. For example, one quotes that [t]he
left prefrontal cortex may be involved in the processing of power-related social motivations
(Quirin et al., 2013) (Li et al.,2), while the other quotes that [t]here has been growing
awareness in both the scientific literature and popular press that workplace injury due to both
accidents (e.g., Barling & Frone, 2004) (Spector et al.,117). Such move basically serves
two functions. Firstly, it makes authors claims more credible, because they quotes from
published articles that often have been rigorously examined. Secondly, it explains the

exigence of their researches based on previous ones by arguing that something more need to
be found.
However, the same moves two articles employ serve different purposes, because they
approach distinctly to anger. The purpose of Biology article is to determine certain area in the
brain affects anger expression. It collects evidence by having participants answer questions
and recording EEG data. On the other hand, the Sociology article aims to develop a scale to
assess violence climate by gathering evidence from surveys. They might have common
audience who are academic readers caring anger issues, and expecting to mediate, overcome,
and deal with anger problems.
Differently, the news article employs some non-academic moves to achieve its goals.
For example, the author uses personal experiences as evidences to tell readers how to solve
anger issues. She uses a lot of I, which is hardly ever seen in academic papers. Since it is a
non-academic essay, the tone as well as the style is causal in a way that it is more like a
personal journal than a reasoning writing. The author wants to share some helpful advices
through her own experiences to readers who might care about anger issues. Thus she gives
six tips in form of bullet point followed by detail explanations, and the use of tips makes her
tone friendly and casual, but also makes her article considerate and helpful. Overall, the kinds
of moves that the author employs in this news article are more casual and personal than
those of academic papers.
Besides moves, structure of each essay is also determined by the sources and genre of
the essay. The structure of two academic papers is the same, because they both follow the
standard academic writing format. Both of two paper starts with abstract and introductions to
give readers a big idea of what two researches are about, state the reason why two researches
are conducted, and conclude the outcomes that researchers expected. These are both typical
standard openings of academic papers, because they help readers better understand what will

happen in following paragraphs. Secondly, both papers organize their body paragraphs in the
same ordermethod, result, and discussion. As a big convention of academic paper, such
structure best makes sense to readers for it records the actual sequence of how the researches,
surveys, or experiments are conducted and analyzed.
However, two articles approach the topic from various angles. The biology article
analyzes and measures the area in the brain that may affect anger expression using numbers,
tables, and statistical approaches, whereas the sociology article discusses a scale of assessing
violence climate using descriptive sentences and definitional measures. Thus, we can
conclude the biology article studies anger by analyzing how brain can influence anger
expression, and sociology article studies anger by defining different levels of anger.
As for the news article, its structure is different from academic article in a sense that it
does not use certain kind of standard format. Since the news article is less formal and less
strictly censored than academic paper, authors often make their ideas flow. In this news
article about how to deal with anger issues, the author firstly tells her own story as a mother
with anger issues, then she shares her experiences of how she overcomes anger problem, and
finally she offers six helpful methods to mediate anger. Distinct from academic paper, the
news article use neither hard data nor solid descriptive evidence to support its idea.
Nevertheless, personal experiences might be better fit into news article than academic papers
as readers have different expectations on two kinds of writing.
Both academic article and news article have virtue and vice as they belong to different
genres and serve different purposes. For academic article, its method, data, and conclusion
are rigorously examined so that it builds credibility to convince readers. In addition, as a
scholar text, it aims to solve academic problem and provide valuable resources and insight to
academic field. However, scholar article is often very long and elusive, it requires audience to
have certain knowledge about the field, so the range of readers is very limited. On the other

hand, news article is short in length and uses less professional words and sentences so that it
has a wide range of audience. Nevertheless, news article often uses less evidence and data to
support its idea and convince readers.
In conclusion, since three articles all discuss anger issues, they do share some similarity
in terms of content and definitions. However, two academic articles are different from the
news article because they belong to different genres, use different conventions, and employ
different moves. In addition, two academic articles are also distinct from each other in a way
that they approach the same topic from different angles and use different methods.

Work Cited
Li, Dongdong et al. "Frontal Cortical Asymmetry May Partially Mediate the Influence of
Social Power on Anger Expression". 2 Feb. 2016 Frontier in Psychology
Spector. Paul et al. "Perceived violence climate: A new construct and its relationship to
workplace physical violence and verbal aggression, and their potential consequences". AprilJune 2007 Taylor&Francis
Bradford Wendy. "Breaking the cycle of rage in families". 28 Apr. 2015 The Washington Post

Dirk, Kerry. Navigating Genres. Parlor Press

Bunn, Mike. How to Read Like a Writer. Parlor Press