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You are here: Home / Grammar for IELTS / IELTS Task 2 essays: formal writing (hedging)

IELTS Task 2 essays: formal writing (hedging)

By ieltsetc on December 17, 2020 13

Hedging language can make a big difference to the way you express your ideas and opinions in academic writing.

What are hedging words examples?

The language of hedging includes:

  • Adverbs of frequency (sometimes or often but not ALWAYS)
  • Quantifiers (some or many but not ALL)
  • Modals (may or might, but not WILL)
  • ‘Cautious’ verbs (indicate, suggest, appear)
  • Modal adverbs (possibly, arguably)
  • Modifiers (quite, somewhat)

See the full list below.

In this lesson you’ll learn the purpose and benefits of hedging, plus 9 examples that you can use NOW to make your writing sound more academic in Writing Task 2.

What is hedging language in academic writing?

Compare the two statements below. Which one is more appropriate for academic writing?

  1. ‘Young people prefer to eat fast food.’

  2. ‘It is often thought that many young people tend to eat food which may be considered to be unhealthy. Although some youngsters might go to fast food outlets quite regularly when compared to older age groups, evidence suggests that in general this assumption is largely untrue’.

Answer

You’re right! Sentence 2 is much better (though it is a little too long – I tried to include as many examples of hedging as possible, as you will see below).

Why do we use hedging language?

In academic writing it is REALLY important to show the difference between

  1. your opinion 
  2. the facts 

A simple way to do this is to say ‘In my opinion’ or ‘I believe/think that…’

e.g. ‘I believe that young people prefer to eat fast food’.

But you can’t do this for every sentence.

So if you’re not 100% sure that your claims are correct (you have no evidence to support your claims*) you need to ‘hedge’.

[*claim (noun) = a statement that something is true, even though it has not been proved]

Hedging (or ‘being cautious’) has many benefits:

  • It stops the reader from dismissing your claims or disagreeing with you
  • It allows you to tell the reader how sure you are about your claims
  • It helps you to avoid generalisations
  • It stops you from presenting your ideas as facts
  • It shows your awareness of the ‘bigger picture’ 
  • It makes your language more precise

How to use hedging language in a sentence

Look again at the long sentence I wrote (Sentence 2 above).

How many examples of hedging can you identify?

‘[It is often thought that] [many] young people [tend to] eat food [which may be considered to be] unhealthy. [Although] [some] youngsters [might] go to fast food outlets [quite] [regularly] [when compared to older age groups], [evidence suggests] that [in general] this [assumption] is [largely] untrue’.

You can see that if you take out the hedging [in brackets] you are left with a statement that may be untrue, inaccurate or just too general.

Types of hedging language

Here are some options for you to use in your own writing:

  1. ‘It’ and ‘That’ clauses
  2. Adverbs of frequency
  3. Quantifiers
  4. Hedging verbs
  5. Modals
  6. Passives
  7. Modifiers
  8. Comparison
  9. Evidence

‘It’ and ‘That’ clauses

  • It is often thought that
  • It could be suggested that
  • It might be the case that
  • It is generally agreed that
  • It is (un)likely that
  • There is a possibility that
  • There is every hope/likelihood that

Adverbs of frequency

  • often
  • usually
  • commonly
  • regularly
  • frequently
  • sometimes
  • occasionally
  • rarely
  • hardly ever

Quantifiers

  • many
  • most
  • the majority (of)
  • several
  • some
  • a few
  • a minority of
  • a fraction of
  • a proportion of
  • in certain situations
  • to some extent

‘Hedging’ verbs

  • tend to/ have a tendency to
  • appear to
  • seem to
  • , which may suggest that…
  • , which may indicate that..
  • which appears to be

Modals

  • may
  • might/could/can

Modal language

  • has the potential to
  • has the possibility of
  • is able to

Modal Adverbs

  • probably
  • perhaps
  • possibly
  • presumably
  • certainly
  • definitely
  • arguably

Passives

  • is considered to be
  • can be described as
  • is sometimes labelled as
  • the term is often used to mean…

Modifiers

  • quite
  • rather
  • somewhat
  • largely
  • mostly
  • somehow
  • in general
  • as a rule
  • approximately
  • about

Comparison

  • when compared to
  • in comparison with
  • more/less than
  • in a (kinder) way than

Evidence

  • evidence suggests that
  • evidence appears to indicate that
  • There is some evidence which indicates that
How to use hedging in IELTS

Task 1: Can you spot the hedging in these sentences? (Try this on your desktop if you can’t see this activity on your phone)

Task 2: Take this generalisation and ‘hedge’ it e.g.

‘Men prefer science subjects whereas women choose arts subjects’.

Answer 1

There are many ways of re-writing this to make it sound more academic e.g.

  • It is often assumed that most men prefer to study science-related subjects when compared with women who traditionally have tended to favour the arts. 
  • Although it seems likely that the majority of science students are male, evidence suggests that this is more to do with tradition than with inherent gender differences.
  • In the past, it was widely thought that male students were better suited to studying science than their female counterparts, who were often encouraged to study the arts. 

Warning: Don’t ‘over-hedge’

If you are new to hedging, there is a danger that you might hedge too much and use too many ‘redundant’ words (words that you don’t need to say).

Here are some examples that I wrote when I was trying to create the ‘hedging sentence’ that I posted at the start of this blog.

Topic: The danger of video games

Too simplistic:

‘Video games make people violent’.

Too much hedging:

‘It is often thought by some people that perhaps many youngsters might possibly prefer to spend a large proportion of their time playing video games that might be considered as arguably having the potential to be dangerous in certain circumstances.’

Appropriate level of hedging:

  • ‘There is some evidence to suggest that video games may be linked to violence.’
  • ‘It is often thought that playing video games can have a harmful effect on young people’.

Topic: British food

Too simplistic:

‘British food is awful.’

Too much hedging:

‘It is likely that some aspects of British cuisine might arguably be considered to be somewhat bland when compared to other cuisines which tend to favour using a wider variety of flavourings which have the potential to produce food which can safely be labelled as ‘tasty’.

Appropriate level of hedging

‘British food is often considered to be somewhat lacking in variety when compared to the cuisines of other countries’.

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Learn more about hedging:

EAPFoundation: Hedging and Cautious Language

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Alphonsa says

    July 13, 2021 at 4:15 pm

    Hey Fiona,

    I am confused about a sentence given in this website. It would be great if you could just help me out with it.

    Video games make (makes)people violent
    Just wanted to confirm which one is the right.

    Reply
    • Fiona says

      July 13, 2021 at 5:46 pm

      Hi Alphonsa! Thank you so much – it was a typo! Please don’t hesitate to let me know if you find any typos. Sometimes I just don’t see them. All the best with your studies!
      Best wishes and thanks again,
      Fiona

      Reply
    • Sarawan says

      August 9, 2022 at 8:45 am

      Hello Alphonso right sentence is video games make people violent(Because here you use plural form and with plural form( video games) so plural verb should be in sentence). If I am wrong then please clarify

      Reply
      • Fiona says

        August 22, 2022 at 12:18 pm

        Hi Alphonsa
        Yes, ‘video games’ is plural so I use the plural form ‘video games make people violent’,
        Best wishes
        Fiona

        Reply
    • Fiona says

      August 22, 2022 at 12:20 pm

      Hi Alphonsa
      Yes, ‘video games’ is plural so I use the plural form ‘video games make people violent’,
      Best wishes
      Fiona

      Reply
  2. Eitan says

    August 18, 2021 at 2:52 pm

    I am confused that if the hedging words will make our article less persuasive and make my stance less steady?

    Thanks.

    Reply
    • Fiona says

      August 28, 2021 at 11:00 pm

      Hi Eitan and thanks for your message.
      I understand why you might think this, but I hope you can see from the examples in the article, that hedging simply allows you to be more cautious with making claims that may be opinion or may not have any evidence to support them.
      Best wishes
      Fiona

      Reply
    • Fiona says

      August 22, 2022 at 12:21 pm

      Hi Eitan and thanks for your message.
      I understand why you might think this, but I hope you can see from the examples in the article, that hedging simply allows you to be more cautious with making claims that may be opinion or may not have any evidence to support them.
      Best wishes
      Fiona

      Reply
  3. CHIBUZOR says

    October 2, 2021 at 3:42 am

    I mean definition of hedging in academic writing

    Reply
    • Fiona says

      October 7, 2021 at 6:11 pm

      Hi Chibuzor. The definition is explained in the article above.
      Best wishes
      Fiona

      Reply
    • Fiona says

      August 22, 2022 at 12:21 pm

      Hi Chibuzor. The definition is explained in the article above.
      Best wishes
      Fiona

      Reply
  4. UMAIR says

    October 11, 2022 at 10:24 pm

    Impressive ideas. Thanks for this exceptional article. I will practice this from now on.
    Stay Blessed and Keep it up. 😀

    Reply
    • Fiona Wattam says

      November 16, 2022 at 9:05 am

      Thanks Umair – same to you.
      Best wishes
      Fiona

      Reply

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