Impressive Words: Linguistic Predictors of Public Approval of the U.S. Congress.

ABSTRACT: What type of language makes the most positive impression within a professional setting? Is competent/agentic language or warm/communal language more effective at eliciting social approval? We examined this basic social cognitive question in a real world context using a "big data" approach-the recent record-low levels of public approval of the U.S. Congress. Using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC), we text analyzed all 123+ million words spoken by members of the U.S. House of Representatives during floor debates between 1996 and 2014 and compared their usage of various classes of words to their public approval ratings over the same time period. We found that neither agentic nor communal language positively predicted public approval. However, this may be because communion combines two

SUBMITTER: Decter-Frain A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4763029 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature