Writers build trust by expressing uncertainty

Writers can build readers’ trust by expressing uncertainty when it is warranted, linguist Nele Karolin Teiva writes in an article for ERR. In the age of text-generating bots, confidently stated but questionable claims are increasingly common, she says.

Teiva, a junior researcher in linguistics at the University of Tartu, studies how uncertainty is expressed in Estonian writing and how readers perceive it. Her research looks at hedging words such as “probably” and “perhaps”, phrases such as “I think”, and grammatical forms such as the conditional mood.

Writing guides often advise students to sound confident and avoid the conditional, warning that it can make them seem unsure. But although excessive uncertainty may weaken a text, Teiva says these recommendations overlook why and when expressing uncertainty is not only acceptable but necessary.

Hedging appears frequently in students’ writing despite the advice, and its use varies with the writer’s experience, the text’s purpose and the relationship with its reader. A student who writes that something “may probably be the reason” signals that this is their interpretation and that other explanations may be possible.

Teiva has found that the more advanced students are in their studies, the fewer hedging expressions appear in their texts. Writing conventions also matter: in her findings, experienced writers in English use more hedging than beginners, while its use declines as Estonian students gain experience.

In writing by people, hedging can indicate how certain an author is and help readers judge whether to trust a claim.