Linguistic complexity in scientific writing: A large-scale diachronic study from 1821 to 1920Linguistic complexity in scientific writing: A large-scale diachronic study from 1821 to 1920

Abstract: This study intends to describe the diachronic changes of linguistic complexity (i.e. overall, morphological, and syntactic complexity) in scientific writing based on Kolmogorov complexity, an information-theoretic approach. We have chosen the entire data (i.e. all the 24 text types including articles, letters, news, etc.) and two individual registers (i.e. the full texts and abstracts of articles) of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, the world’s oldest scientific writing journal. The Mann-Kendall trend tests were used to capture diachronic changes in linguistic complexity at three complexity levels, and the Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated to investigate the relationships between the three complexity metrics. Results showed that the overall and morphological complexity of both the entire data and full texts increased from 1821 to 1920, indicating a massive lexical expansion during this 100-year period, as evidenced by more and more word form variants in scientific writing. In contrast, the syntactic complexity of the entire data and full texts declined, suggesting a gradual shift towards grammatical simplification in the evolution of scientific writing, particularly in word order rules and syntactic patterns. A trade-off effect has also been found between syntactic and morphological complexity in the entire data. In addition, concerning abstracts, the overall and morphological complexity decreased while the syntactic complexity increased. Drawing from these results, researchers can better understand the changing linguistic complexity styles in scientific writing, thus making adjustments in their writing accordingly to garner greater attention in academia.

摘要： 本研究基于信息论方法 Kolmogorov 复杂度，描述科学写作中语言复杂度（即整体、形态和句法复杂度）的历时变化。研究对象为世界上最古老的科学期刊《伦敦皇家学会哲学汇刊》，既包括全部数据（涵盖文章、信件、新闻等 24 种文本类型），也包括两个单独的语域（文章全文与摘要）。我们采用 Mann-Kendall 趋势检验捕捉三个层面语言复杂度的历时变化，并计算 Pearson 相关系数，考察三项复杂度指标之间的关系。结果显示，1821 年至 1920 年间，全部数据和全文的整体复杂度与形态复杂度均有所上升，词形变体日益增多，说明这一百年间科学写作的词汇经历了大规模扩展。相比之下，全部数据和全文的句法复杂度有所下降，表明科学写作在演变中逐渐走向语法简化，尤其体现在词序规则和句法模式上。在全部数据中，句法复杂度与形态复杂度之间还存在此消彼长的权衡效应。此外，摘要的整体复杂度和形态复杂度下降，句法复杂度则上升。这些结果有助于研究者更好地把握科学写作语言复杂度风格的变化，从而相应调整自己的写作，在学术界获得更多关注。