The Independent's journalism is supported by our readers. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn commission.
If you use these words a lot, scientists say you could be stressed out
How often do you use these words?
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.There are some words which, when spoken frequently, might indicate that you are stressed, a new US study has found.
According to a group of speech experts, when someone is stressed they will naturally use more adverbs such as “really”, “so” and “very”.
They will also speak less, the researchers found.
Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the study examined the speech patterns of 143 volunteers, each of whom wore a voice recorder which was turned on every few minutes for two days.
Matthias Mehl, a psychologist at the University of Arizona, subsequently transcribed and studied the recordings, listening out for any repeated words and expressions.
He was particularly interested in the volunteers' use of pronouns and adjectives.
“By themselves they don’t have any meaning, but they clarify what’s going on,” Mehl told Nature.
Next, he and a team of genomicists analysed participants’ psychological stress levels by looking at the gene expression in their white blood cells.
In addition to finding that stressed participants were more likely to use adverbs, they also found that they were less likely to use third-person plural pronouns such as “their” and “they”.
This might be due to the fact that people tend to focus on themselves when they feel under pressure, rather than thinking about those around them, the researchers suggested.
They concluded that speech patterns were a better indicator of stress levels than a volunteer’s personal assessment.
While much research has been conducted on the subject of stress, linking it to speech patterns is a relatively new approach, explains David Creswell, a psychologist at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Creswell said that the study “holds tremendous promise” for providing a deeper understanding into how psychological pressures can impact our health, reports Nature.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments