Extraverts Use Subtly Different Words, Analysis of 80,000 People Finds

The way a person talks or types might reveal little clues about their personality. A meta-analysis of psychological research involving more than 80,000 people has found a small but noticeable link between certain word choices and extraversion, one of the big five personality traits. When talking in person or online, the study found extraverts tend to choose words that express optimistic emotions (such as 'happy' and 'love'), as well as words that refer to community interactions (such as 'we', 'talk', 'share', and 'meet'). But whether or not we can pick up on these subtle distinctions is another matter. “This is the first time a relationship has been established between extraverts and their tendency to use the two categories of words,” says psychologist Lin Qiu from NTU Singapore. “As it is a small correlation, we believe that stronger linguistic indicators are needed to improve machine learning approaches, amid rising interest in such tools in consumer marketing.”

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