One happy language!

[Chris Waigl]

On 31 Aug 2011, at 11:32, Laurence Horn wrote:

> Overall, the researchers found that positive words outnumbered negative ones, suggesting “a positivity bias” in the language, the authors wrote.

The thought that immediately came to mind when I saw this flash by is why anyone would do this study on one language only. What is a reasonable baseline for "happy" vs "unhappy" words? How would English compare with, say, Germanic or Romance languages? With some from very different cultural backgrounds?

For me the result as reported is close to completely meaningless. Maybe that's because of the reporting, but my days are full enough with stuff I know are going to be interesting that I would not chase up the source on something that comes across as prima facie not.

Chris Waigl


--
Chris Waigl -- http://chryss.eu -- http://eggcorns.lascribe.net
twitter: chrys -- friendfeed: chryss

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org