Cognitive Approaches to Specialist Languages

Discourse of Drug Information for Experts and Patients

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Causative constructions

The corpus also contains construals of causal relationships, which involve
different levels of granularity. In PILs we find explicit, highly granular
construals of causal relationships, which code the causal and the result
components separately, e.g. by means of a causal conjunction (such as
because in example 32), or a conditional conjunction and modal
constructions, which explicitate the cause-effect relation (such as if and
can damage/could lead in example 33). On the other hand, also causal
verbs are used, which depict the causal relationships with a lesser degree
of granularity (such as to cause in example 34):

(32) Read all of this leaflet carefully before you start taking this medicine

because it contains important for you.

(33) High blood pressure, if not treated, can damage blood vessels in

several organs, which could lead sometimes to heart attacks, heart or

kidney failure, strokes or blindness.

(34) Angiotensin II Angiotensin II is a substance occurring in the body,

which causes your blood vessels to narrow, thus increasing your blood

pressure.

Causal relationships in SmPCs may be rendered by both explicit and
implicit construals. Due to the nominal style granular constructions mainly
use prepositions instead of conjunctions (such as because of in examples
35 and 36).

(35) If concomitant use is indicated because of documented hypokalemia,

they should be used with caution and with frequent monitoring of

serum potassium.

(36) The study was terminated early because of an increased risk of

adverse outcomes.

Such as in PILs the verb to cause is used to describe causality in a
more implicit way (example 37):

(37) The small reduction in AUC is not expected to cause a reduction in

the therapeutic efficacy.

Tense marking and deictic elements

As suggested by Verhagen (2006: 51) conceptualization may also be
understood in relation to another one by using means such as tense
marking and other deictic elements. This holds more particularly for PILs,