Research papers are a core genre in many academic contexts. Yet many English for Academic Purposes (EAP) foundation programs do not teach students how to write them. This paper will focus on the research paper and will argue that metaphor is an effective way of teaching hypothesis testing, an essential part of empirical reasoning. It will propose a metaphor-based model to teaching empirical research paper writing for the social sciences to EAP students. It will describe a case study of a writing course focused on the research paper and it will highlight relevant extracts from a sample research paper.