Gender Differences in Speech Temporal Patterns Detected Using Lagged Co-occurrence Text-Analysis of Personal Narratives

• Published in: Journal of psycholinguistic research Vol. 38; no. 2; pp. 111 - 127
• Main Author: Cohen, Shuki J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Boston Springer US 01-04-2009; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Behavioral Science and Psychology; Biological and medical sciences; Cognitive Psychology; Computational Linguistics; Computer Software; Content analysis; Correlation; Data Interpretation, Statistical; Economic Status; Factor Analysis; Female; Females; Form Classes (Languages); Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Gender Differences; Humans; Individual Differences; Language; Language Patterns; Language Research; Language Usage; Linguistics; Male; Markov Processes; Multivariate Analysis; Production and perception of spoken language; Psycholinguistics; Psychological Studies; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Psychopathology; Research Methodology; Resistance (Psychology); Sex Characteristics; Software; Speech; Speech Acts; Time; Women; United States > US; Gender differences; Text-analysis; Auto-correlation; Speech patterns; Human; Text analysis; Choice; Lexicon; Sex; Verbal production; Experimental study; Discourse; Language; Narrative
• ISSN: 0090-6905; 1573-6555
• DOI: 10.1007/s10936-008-9088-9

This paper describes a novel methodology for the detection of speech patterns. Lagged co-occurrence analysis (LCA) utilizes the likelihood that a target word will be uttered in a certain position after a trigger word. Using this methodology, it is possible to uncover a statistically significant repetitive temporal patterns of word use, compared to a random choice of words. To demonstrate this new tool on autobiographical narratives, 200 subjects related each a 5-min story, and these stories were transcribed and subjected to LCA, using software written by the author. This study focuses on establishing the usefulness of LCA in psychological research by examining its associations with gender. The application of LCA to the corpus of personal narratives revealed significant differences in the temporal patterns of using the word “I” between male and female speakers. This finding is particularly demonstrative of the potential for studying speech temporal patterns using LCA, as men and women tend to utter the pronoun “I” in comparable frequencies. Specifically, LCA of the personal narratives showed that, on average, men tended to have shorter interval between their use of the pronoun, while women speak longer between two subsequent utterances of the pronoun. The results of this study are discussed in light of psycholinguistic factors governing male and female speech communities.