Psychological aspects of natural language use: Our words, our selves

The words people use in their daily lives can reveal important aspects of their social and psychological worlds. With advances in computer technology, text analysis allows researchers to reliably and quickly assess features of what people say as well as subtleties in their linguistic styles. Followi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Annual review of psychology 2003-01, Vol.54 (1), p.547-577
Main Authors: PENNEBAKER, James W, MEHL, Matthias R, NIEDERHOFFER, Kate G
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Artificial Intelligence
Biological and medical sciences
Emotions
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Health Status
Humans
Individuality
Interpersonal Relations
Language
Language and languages
Language awareness
Linguistics
Mental Health
Miscellaneous
Natural Language Processing
Oral communication
Personality
Psycholinguistics
Psychological aspects
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Semantics
Social aspects
Social Environment
Verbal Behavior
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Summary:The words people use in their daily lives can reveal important aspects of their social and psychological worlds. With advances in computer technology, text analysis allows researchers to reliably and quickly assess features of what people say as well as subtleties in their linguistic styles. Following a brief review of several text analysis programs, we summarize some of the evidence that links natural word use to personality, social and situational fluctuations, and psychological interventions. Of particular interest are findings that point to the psychological value of studying particles-parts of speech that include pronouns, articles, prepositions, conjunctives, and auxiliary verbs. Particles, which serve as the glue that holds nouns and regular verbs together, can serve as markers of emotional state, social identity, and cognitive styles.
ISSN:0066-4308
1545-2085
DOI:10.1146/annurev.psych.54.101601.145041