	Linguistic Features of Academic Writing	Example	Hints
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	Linguistic Features of Academic Writing	Examples
1	Concepts are defined	Creativity broadly refers to an ability or activity that produces something new and useful.
2	Tentativeness, or Hedging	broadly refers, appears to, it is therefore preferable to,
3	Sophisticated adverbs	increasingly important, particularly useful
4	Complex noun phrases	an activity that produces something new and useful, a unitary measure of overall creativity, a systems approach to the assessment, basis on gestalt theory, application across cultures, the individual’s ability of reformulation, removing mental blocks that result in premature closure, skills enabling an individual to reconstruct a fuller picture
5	Sophisticated connecting words	However, therefore, As such
6	Complex sentence structure (Subordination)	Its assessment appears to become increasingly important because creativity has enduring effects throughout the individual’s lifespan. For assessing figural creativity, the drawing task is particularly useful because of its basis on gestalt theory and application across cultures.
7	Tense and time	Predominantly the present simple and present perfect forms are used. In academic papers past and future forms are generally used less. A description of the research methodology is likely to use past verb forms.
8	Avoidance of personal pronouns	It is therefore preferable to, by using multiple measures to tap, the individual’s lifespan Nouns are often used as the subject of sentences
9	Full forms of words	It is (It’s), have not been (haven’t been)
10	Conciseness (Short and clear)	Ellipsis: the assessment (of overall creativity), verbal and figural (dimensions of creativity), Both (the verbal and figural dimensions of creativity) The use of its: e.g. its assessment (instead of - the assessment of creativity), its basis on gestalt theory by using multiple measures rather than by using different ways of measuring
11	Listing/Exemplifying	such as fluency and originality its basis on gestalt theory and application across cultures the individual’s ability of reformulation, analogical thinking, and removing mental blocks that result in premature closure
12	Reporting structures	Verbs: refers to, maintains References inform the reader of the origin of the information presented, e.g. (Mouchiroud & Lobart, 2001)
13	Formal academic vocabulary	e.g. broadly, increasingly important, attempts to devise a unitary measure, to adopt, multiple measures, dimensions, basis, application, maintain, enable, reconstruct
14	Sophisticated and logical cohesion	Click on this button to see how the cohesive devices in the text help it to flow logically

Words highlighted in yellow refer back to those highlighted in pink.

It is important to note that passive structures are a common language feature of academic writing, although there are no examples in the text above. See the sentence below for an example of the passive voice.
A systems approach to the assessment of creativity could therefore be adopted.