Negativity bias in language: A cognitive-affective model of emotive intensifiers

Jing–Schmidt, Zhuo

doi:10.1515/cog.2007.023

Cited by 70 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 26 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Nerlich & Clarke, 1992), with newer meanings often retaining elements of older senses (cf. Macaulay, 2006;Jing-Schmidt, 2007). For instance, the development of gay 'homosexual' to gay 'lame' has been accompanied by the emergence of gay 'unmanly'.…”

Section: Discussion: Semantic Change Through a Sociolinguistic Lensmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agaypaper: why should sociolinguistics bother with semantics?

Robinson¹

2012

English Today

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The study of meaning and changes in meaning has enjoyed varying levels of popularity within linguistics. There have been periods during which the exploration of meaning was of prime importance. For instance, in the late 19th century scholars considered the exploration of the etymology of words to be crucial in their quest to find the ‘true’ meaning of lexemes (Geeraerts, 2010; Malkiel, 1993). There have also been periods where semantic analysis was considered redundant to linguistic investigation (Hockett, 1954: 152). In the past 20–30 years semantics has enjoyed a period of revival. This has been mainly led by the advances in cognitive linguistics (and to some extent, historical linguistics) as well by the innovations associated with the development of electronic corpora and computational methods for extracting and tracing changes in the behaviour of the lexicon (cf. Geeraerts, 2010: 168ff, 261ff). However, there are still areas of linguistics which hardly involve lexis in their theoretical and epistemological considerations. One such area is sociolinguistics.

show abstract

Section: Discussion: Semantic Change Through a Sociolinguistic Lensmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agaypaper: why should sociolinguistics bother with semantics?

Robinson¹

2012

English Today

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Many studies in social psychology document the negativity bias (e.g., Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Finkenauer, and Vohs, 2001;Ito, Larsen, Smith, and Cacioppo, 1998;Vaish, Grossmann, and Woodward, 2008 and many others) which posits that negative information has a greater impact on individuals than positive information. When comparing positive and negative words on intensity, various scholars argue that negative words are perceived as more intense than their positive counterparts (e.g., Crandall, 1975;Jing-Schmidt, 2007;Liebrecht, Hustinx, and Van Mulken, 2012). These findings have implications for language intensity in news texts: After all, if equivalent information is presented in negative rather than with positive terms (cf.…”

Section: Extending the Definition Of Sensationalism To Printed Newsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Language intensity as a sensationalistic news feature: The influence of style on sensationalism perceptions and effects

Burgers

Graaf²

2013

Communications - The European Journal of Communication Research

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article extends the definition of sensationalism to print media by arguing that language intensifiers may be an aspect of sensationalism. In addition, this paper investigates if an indirect effect can be established by which sensationalistic message features influence news reception through the perception of sensationalism. Two between-subjects experiments show that sensationalistic message features like intensifiers increase perceived language intensity (PLI). In experiment 1, intensifiers had a negative effect on news article appreciation, which was not influenced by PLI. Experiment 2 revealed positive indirect effects of intensifiers through PLI on newsworthiness and news article appreciation.

show abstract

“…Obviously, these characteristics occur in expressions that are more subjective and emphatic than in objectively descriptive ones, and therefore tend to appear more frequently in colloquial language. This approach is clearly linked to the mechanism of negativity bias discussed in 3.1.1, as indicated cross-linguistically in the lexical choice of intensifiers from conceptual domains such as taboo (see Hoeksema & Napoli, 2008;Napoli & Hoeksema, 2009), death and horror (see Jing-Schmidt, 2007), among other domains.…”

Section: Universality Vs Cultural Differencesmentioning

confidence: 95%

‘I’m dying on you’

Vardi¹

2015

RCL

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A specific type of intensification in the domain of love/desire/adoration is conveyed in Hebrew through the use of the idiomatic construction [X PRD al Y] ['X die/crazy/ill/devastated on Y'] which deviates from the basic patterns of the grammar at both the morphosyntactic and the semantic levels. The present paper examines both the process of emergence and the accessibility of the construction: it explains how pragmatic needs drive a metonymy-based metaphorical mapping between dissociative conceptual domains, and how the mechanisms of negativity bias and embodiment are involved in this mapping. Subsequently the present paper shows how these pragmatic-driven processes are realised within a grammatical construction with a fixed, accessible idiomatic meaning. The paper additionally argues that emotive intensification is not limited to (adverbial) modification, but instead can be expressed by more complex constructions.

show abstract

Negativity bias in language: A cognitive-affective model of emotive intensifiers

Cited by 70 publications

References 26 publications

Agaypaper: why should sociolinguistics bother with semantics?

Agaypaper: why should sociolinguistics bother with semantics?

Language intensity as a sensationalistic news feature: The influence of style on sensationalism perceptions and effects

‘I’m dying on you’

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About