طاهره سالاری

Academic discourse is the collaborative interaction within academic communities, primarily aimed at convincing readers that the writers' arguments are valid. Despite the fact that nouns are frequently used in academic writing, the rhetorical functions of nouns have received limited attention in academic writing analysis. This research sets out to: (1) investigate the frequency of Metadiscursive Nouns (MNs) in Iranian scholars' research articles, and (2) compare MN usage across academic disciplines and genders. In this corpus-based study, 40 articles from the fields of Applied Linguistics, Psychology, Medicine, and Chemistry were carefully selected and analyzed based on Jiang and Hyland's (2016) MNs taxonomy. Chi-square analyses revealed significant differences across disciplines and genders, with generally weak effect sizes. The findings revealed gender-based disparities, with male scholars using MNs more frequently in soft disciplines (78.4%) compared to female scholars (69.6%), while female scholars (30.4%) exceeded male researchers (21.6%) in MN usage in hard disciplines. The results also indicated that MN usage differed significantly across disciplines, with the highest frequencies observed in Linguistics and Psychology, despite the relatively small effect size. This research underscores the impact of disciplinary norms and gender on MNs' selection and usage in academic writing, providing valuable insights for teaching academic writing skills, developing instructional materials, and conducting academic discourse analysis.

Objective: The present research aimed to compare the effectiveness of schema therapy and a mindfulness-based stress reduction program on sexual satisfaction among married individuals. Method: This quasi-experimental study employed a pretest-posttest design with a one-month follow-up and included a control group. The study population consisted of all married individuals with marital issues who visited the Khodbidari Psychological Center in the first half of 2019, totaling approximately 180 individuals. From this group, 45 individuals were selected through purposive sampling and randomly assigned to three groups of 15. The experimental groups underwent 8 sessions of 90-minute schema therapy by Young et al. (2003) and the mindfulness-based stress reduction program by Kabat-Zinn (2003), while no intervention was performed for the control group. The data collection tool was the Sexual Satisfaction Scale (Larson et al., 1998). The data were analyzed using SPSS software version 21 and repeated measures ANOVA. Findings: The results indicated that there was a significant difference in sexual satisfaction scores among the groups (p = 0.001, F = 21.58), and both schema therapy and the mindfulness-based stress reduction program increased sexual satisfaction among married individuals. Furthermore, there was no significant difference between the two groups in this regard (p < 0.05). Conclusion: According to the results, both schema therapy and the mindfulness-based stress reduction program can be used to improve sexual satisfaction in married individuals.