Etc 4, 2010
ETC
– Empirical Text and Culture Research
Contents
| Francesca Bianchi | |
Understanding culture. Automatic semantic analysis of a general Web corpus and a corpus of elicited data |
1-29 |
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Abstract: This study investigated the suitability of different methodological approaches to automatic semantic tagging in the analysis of cultural traits as they emerge from subjective meaning reactions to given words (EMUs). Elicited data from British native speakers were collected and coded manually and with an automatic tagging system (Wmatrix). The results of manual coding were then compared to the results produced by Wmatrix, at different levels and using a variety of methods. Subsequently, automatic tagging was applied to 10,000 sentences containing the node word extracted from a general Web corpus, and the results of the Web corpus were compared to those of the elicited data. Though further investigation is needed, each of the experiments described provide results that are relevant for the definition of a method in the use of large corpora for the extraction of EMUs. |
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| Arjuna Tuzzi, Ioan-Iovitz Popescu, Gabriel Altmann | |
| The golden section in texts | 30-41 |
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Abstract: The golden section is a well known phenomenon observed in nature, arts and sciences, documented with an enormous number of publications. Here we shall try to show its presence in the rank-frequency distribution of words in natural texts with emphasis on Italian using the End-of-Year Speeches of the Presidents of the Italian Republic. |
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| Bernadette Péley, János László | |
| Character functions as indicators of self states in life stories | 42-49 |
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Abstract: Experiences of emotion regulation and self-experiences derive from early mother-child interaction. In later stages of life, these experiences regulate how individuals perceive and interpret their interactions with other people and manage their interpersonal relations. When reconstructing their significant life episodes, the psychological functions they implicitly assign to their partners reflect this perception and interpretation and thereby their self-state. The paper presents a computer program that identifies positive and negative character functions in life stories and a validity study which supports that the program measures self-states. |
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| Katalin Szalai, János László | |
| Activity as a linguistic marker of agency: Measuring in-group versus out-group activity in Hungarian historical narratives | 50-58 |
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Abstract: Agency is the ability to act effectively. It is a major component in social perception and identity studies. Life narratives and group narratives reflect agency of narrators in terms of semantic and grammatical features It is assumed that implicit activity-passivity of verbs embodies important aspects of psychological agency This study presents an automatic content analytic algorithm for mapping active and passive verbs. This algorithm is used to uncover Hungarian as well as out-group agency in a sample of historical narratives. Results are interpreted in term of Hungarian national identity. |
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| Réka Ferenczhalmy, János László | |
| In-group versus out-group intentionality as indicators of national identity | 59-69 |
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Abstract:Intentionality plays a significant role in the evaluation of actions. It is related to agency, to attribution of responsibility and of control. The study presents an automatic content-analytic algorithm for identifying linguistic markers of intention, constraint and possibility in the text. This algorithm was used to uncover both the Hungarian and the out-group intentions in a sample of Hungarian historical narratives taken from historical text-books and from a pool of folk-narratives. Results are interpreted in terms of the Hungarian national identity. |
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| Enikő Gyöngyösiné Kiss | |
| Personality and the familial unconscious in Szondi’s fate-analysis | 70-80 |
| Abstract: Szondi considered his fate-analysis as belonging to depth psychology and he thought that it would be a contact between Freud and Jung. Szondi supposed that between the personal and collective unconscious there is a third, the familial unconscious. The familial unconscious is originally based on genealogy. The descendent gets his genetic structure from his ancestors which determines the possibilities of his life and fate. Consequently, the goal of fate-analysis is the scientific investigation of human destiny. Szondi’s phrase was that „Fate is always on the move”. According to Szondi, fate has not only a compulsive part but also a freely chosen part, and he distinguished the components of compulsive and selective fate. The selective fate is directed by the ego (Pontifex-ego) and the spirit. The aim of fate-analytical therapy is to find a much happier fate for the patient as he lived the compulsive fate earlier. The readers of the journal could read about the Szondi test in the previous number by Rita Hargitai. This article presents a short sketch of Szondi’s fate-analytical theory and practice. | |
| Bruno Gonçalves, Ana Ferreira, Mátyás Káplár, Enikő Gyöngyösiné Kiss | |
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Comparing the Szondi Test results of Hungarian and Portuguese community samples |
81-89 |
| Abstract: This study makes a comparison between two nations’ Szondi test profiles. The aim of this study was to compare the Szondi Test results of a Hungarian community sample (n=126) with those of a Portuguese community sample (n = 175). Both samples were heterogeneous convenience samples. Results show a general agreement (with some minor differences) in 5 factors: h, e, hy, k, and d. There are very clear differences in s and p factors, where s- and p+ are the most frequent results in the Hungarian sample vs. s+ and p0 or p- in the Portuguese sample. Differences in the m factor are significant but less important: m+ is the most frequent result in both samples but it attains a relatively higher frequency in the Portuguese sample, where it is also more frequently loaded (+!!). The differences in the samples’ educational level contribute to the differences in p factor but do not explain all the observed differences. Age and gender seem to have only a slight influence on the results. | |
| Anita Deák, Laura Csenki, György Révész | |
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Hungarian ratings for the International Affective Picture System (IAPS): A cross-cultural comparison |
90-101 |
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Abstract: Emotions serve as universal adaptations to social life. Social interactions, however, are implemented in a cultural context. In this experiment we examined how cultural context influences ratings in response to emotionally evocative stimuli. 187 Hungarian university students rated valence, arousal and dominance of pictures from the International Affective Picture System (IAPS). The affective ratings of the Hungarian sample correlated with the normative North-American results: 0.95 for valence, 0.72 for arousal and 0.69 for dominance dimension. Means of valence and arousal ratings did not differ significantly between groups. A significant difference was found in the ratings of dominance. Distribution of pictures in the valence-arousal affective space was similar in both samples. These results have underlined the biphasic motivational-emotional model of appetition and aversion that seems to be universal across cultures. |
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| Attila Oláh, Henriett Nagy, Kinga G. Tóth | |
| Life expectancy and psychological immune competence in different cultures | 102-108 |
| Abstract:
In our study we examined the relationship between psychological immune
competence and life expectation at birth, plus the relationship between
the life expectancy at birth and per-capita GDP. We supposed that a health
promoting culture and material investment in health promotion will
influence the level of psychological immune competence and thus contribute
to an increase of life extension. Our sample consisted of more than three
thousand young participants from 12 different countries. We administrated
the Psychological Immune Competence Inventory (Oláh, 2005) to measure
psychological immune competence and used the World Factbook 2006 to
determine life expectancy and per-capita GDP. We found that there is a
strong correlation between psychological immune competence and life
expectancy, and this relationship is stronger than the correlation between
life expectancy and per-capita GDP. As our conclusion states, these
results prove that culture which implants psychological immunity
contributes to life extension even more than material investment. |
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| Paszkál Kiss | |
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Hungarian answers to an international crises: Parliamentary debates during the 1999 Kosovar conflict |
109-118 |
| Abstract:
This article examines different contexts of political discourse in
Hungary in a heated situation of Hungarian participation in the NATO
interventions to the Kosovar conflict. The Hungarian position had many
complexities (Hungarian minority in Serbia, neighbouring relations,
aspirations to join the Transatlantic community) that were reflected in
the dynamics of political discourse. Overall representations of
international relations, their historic change, and the national
perspective (aspirations) were seen to determine the views of political
actors and ultimately their behaviour. It was also important to
show that even in such a heated situation the complexity of intergroup
relations appearing in the discourse of the opposing sides was not seen as
black and white and the shades changed dynamically through time. |
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| Kaoru Takahashi | |
| A Study of Sociolinguistic Variables in the British National Corpus | 119-134 |
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This paper deals with the
study of sociolinguistic variables which are fairly systematically
associated with age, sex and social class. These variables are dealt with
as linguistic features assigned to each speaker in each text in the spoken
part of the British National Corpus. By means of multivariate analysis,
the variation of the occurrence of selected linguistic features among
registers will be classified. A multivariate analysis of this sort holds
out the promise of being able to systematize domains in the corpus while
also revealing the characteristic linguistic features of the groups
classified. That is, the aim of an analysis of these variables is to yield
a more sophisticated classification, based on the similarities and
dissimilarities between register categories and also to characterize
register variation in terms of linguistic style. |
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| Andrew Wilson | |
| Fetishism and anxiety: A test of some psychodynamic hypotheses | 135-143 |
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Abstract:
A computer-assisted content analysis of a corpus of 676
German-language foot, shoe, and boot fetish fantasies using the Dresdner
Angstwörterbuch demonstrated an elevated rate of anxiety themes when
compared with a broad-based general corpus containing 500 samples of
published written German. This
lends some support to the psychodynamic theory that fetishism has its
roots in anxiety. More specifically, rates of mutilation (i.e. castration)
anxiety themes were significantly higher in the fetish texts than in the
control texts, but no significant difference was detected between the two
sets of texts in relation to separation anxiety.
This finding seems to support the traditional Freudian theory of
fetishism, as opposed to the theories of the object-relations school;
however, a phrasal analysis of the corpus also supports a modification
of the Freudian theory, in that the woman may be the fetishist's perceived
agent of castration rather than its original victim.
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