Background: Technical communication, business communication, and professional communication are potentially overlapping disciplines with open disciplinary questions. A comparative topical analysis of research topics can identify similarities and differences between them, addressing intellectual and physical concerns for each. Literature review: Recent topical analyses have been done for technical communication. Historical topical analyses have been done for business communication. Few professional communication topical analyses exist. Some studies were done 15 or more years ago, and one related comparative study exists. Research questions: 1. What research topics are unique to each of the disciplines of technical communication, business communication, and professional communication in a corpus of research abstracts spanning 1963–2017? 2. What topics are shared among the disciplines of technical communication, business communication, and professional communication in a corpus of research abstracts spanning 1963–2017? Research methodology: I used collocation analysis on the target phrases technical communication, business communication, and professional communication from a 4822-abstract corpus. I compared words collocated with target phrases to find words unique to a single term, those shared with two terms, or those shared with all three terms. Results/discussion: Findings identified science communication as a technical communication topic; other findings corroborated previous research. Business communication findings corroborated previous research and identified an emphasis on global communication. Findings show professional communication as a rhetorically flexible term that creates a space for emerging concepts and expands disciplinary boundaries. The three shared communication, pedagogy, international, and disciplinary concerns. Conclusions: The disciplines feature some overlap but maintain distinct research foci. Professional communication is a distinctive discipline that assists technical communication and business communication by incubation of emerging concepts.

中文翻译：

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与技术交流、商务交流和专业交流相关的研究主题的比较，1963-2017

背景：技术交流、商务交流和专业交流是具有开放性学科问题的潜在重叠学科。对研究主题的比较主题分析可以确定它们之间的异同，解决每个人的智力和身体问题。文献综述：最近对技术交流进行了专题分析。已经对商业通信进行了历史专题分析。很少有专业的传播主题分析存在。一些研究是在 15 年或更长时间之前完成的，并且存在一项相关的比较研究。研究问题： 1. 在 1963 年至 2017 年的研究摘要语料库中，技术传播、商务传播和专业传播等各个学科有哪些独特的研究主题？2. 在 1963 年至 2017 年的研究摘要语料库中，技术传播、商务传播和专业传播学科之间共享哪些主题？研究方法：我对4822个抽象语料中的目标短语技术交流、商务交流和专业交流进行了搭配分析。我比较了与目标短语搭配的单词，以找到单个术语独有的单词、与两个术语共享的单词或与所有三个术语共享的单词。结果/讨论：调查结果将科学传播确定为技术传播主题；其他研究结果证实了先前的研究。商务沟通的研究结果证实了之前的研究，并确定了对全球沟通的重视。调查结果表明，专业交流是一个修辞灵活的术语，为新兴概念创造空间并扩展学科界限。三人共同关注交流、教学、国际和学科问题。结论：这些学科有一些重叠，但保持不同的研究重点。专业传播是一门独特的学科，通过孵化新兴概念来辅助技术传播和商业传播。