The Secret Life of Pronouns_ What Our Words Say About Us - James W. Pennebaker [36]
Across hundreds of essays, we separated out the various classes of function words, including personal pronouns, articles, prepositions, conjunctions, and auxiliary verbs. We then used a statistical method called factor analysis to see what clumps of function words emerged. With the stream-of-consciousness essays, three factors appeared that pointed to very different writing styles: formal, analytic, and narrative. In fact, no matter which texts we analyze, we generally find the same dimensions within almost any genre of writing, including similar types of literature, song lyrics, college admissions essays, or suicide notes.
FORMAL THINKING
The most consistent function word factor that always emerges, formality, often appears stiff, sometimes humorless, with a touch of arrogance. Formal thinking can be thought of as the opposite of immediacy. Highly formal (or low-immediacy) thinking and writing typically include big words and high rates of articles, nouns, numbers, and prepositions. At the same time, formal writing has very few I-words, verbs (especially present-tense verbs), discrepancy words (e.g., would, should, could), and common adverbs (really, very, so). Here is an example of someone who the computer identified as very high in formal thinking:
I hear the sound of sandals scuffing the ground. Vague sounds of the television and radio blend into an almost incoherent hum and beat. A monolog comes onto the television in the living room. Hum -the sound of the TruAir air purifier catches my attention amidst the bath of sounds in the apartment room.… Cosmic riddles come to my mind, why does the universe have entropy?
Compared to the examples of immediacy, the high-formality writer is much more intellectual and a bit distant. There is a sense that he is putting on a serious performance. Interestingly, Biber’s first factor in his genre analysis was also formality. Academic writing and general nonfiction tend to be highly formal compared with romance novels, which are high in immediacy.
Formality in writing and speaking is related to a number of important issues. Those highest in formal thinking tend to be more concerned with status and power and are less self-reflective. Compared to the less formal writers, they drink and smoke less, are more mentally healthy, but also tend to be less honest with themselves and others. As people age, their writing and speaking styles shift from more immediate to more formal. In other words, the first dimension of stealth words has tremendous social and psychological implications.
ANALYTIC THINKING
The factor of analytic thinking identifies people who work to understand their world. The hallmark of analyzing is making distinctions. These distinctions could be between what people did and what they didn’t do, which part of the test they passed and which part they failed. Words that contribute to analytic thinking include exclusives (but, without, except), negations (no, not, never), causal words (because, reason, effect), insight words (realize, know, meaning), tentative words (maybe, perhaps), certainty (absolutely, always), and quantifiers (some, many, greater). An example of high analytic thinking:
I always knew everyone’s different but I guess since I was with a few friends I don’t usually hang out with was why this came to my mind. It’s weird how some things are so common and simple for someone but complicated and strange for another. Who knows why I think the way that I do but it usually seems to be different than most people I have met. Some people really need attention and they’ll do whatever it is to get it. I’m not sure if they should be blamed because it’s probably the only way they know how to act.
The woman who wrote this essay is subtly trying to parse the world. Even though she is not a good writer, she attempts to understand what