The LIWC dictionary used in this demonstration is composed of 5,690 words and word stems. Each word or word stem defines one or more word categories. For example, the word 'cried' is part of four word categories: sadness, negative emotion, overall affect, and a past tense verb. Hence, if it is found in the target text, each of these four category scale scores will be incremented. As in this example, many of the LIWC categories are arranged hierarchically. All anger words, by definition, will be categorized as negative emotion and overall emotion words.
Each of the 69 preset LIWC categories used in this demo is composed of a list of dictionary words that define that scale. The table below provides a comprehensive list of these LIWC categories with sample scale words.
LIWC Dimensions and Sample Words |
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DIMENSION |
EXAMPLES |
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I. STANDARD LINGUISTIC DIMENSIONS |
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| Pronouns | I, them, itself | |
| Articles | a, an, the | |
| Past tense | walked, were, had | |
| Present tense | Is, does, hear | |
| Future tense | will, gonna | |
| Prepositions | with, above | |
| Negations | no, never, not | |
| Numbers | one, thirty, million | |
| Swear words | ***** | |
II. PSYCHOLOGICAL PROCESSES |
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| Social Processes | talk, us, friend | |
| Friends | pal, buddy, coworker | |
| Family | mom, brother, cousin | |
| Humans | boy, woman, group | |
| Affective Processes | happy, ugly, bitter | |
| Positive Emotions | happy, pretty, good | |
| Negative Emotions | hate, worthless, enemy | |
| Anxiety | nervous, afraid, tense | |
| Anger | hate, kill, pissed | |
| Sadness | grief, cry, sad | |
| Cognitive Processes | cause, know, ought | |
| Insight | think, know, consider | |
| Causation | because, effect, hence | |
| Discrepancy | should, would, could | |
| Tentative | maybe, perhaps, guess | |
| Certainty | always, never | |
| Inhibition | block, constrain | |
| Inclusive | with, and, include | |
| Exclusive | but, except, without | |
| Perceptual Processes | see, touch, listen | |
| Seeing | view, saw, look | |
| Hearing | heard, listen, sound | |
| Feeling | touch, hold, felt | |
| Biological Processes | eat, blood, pain | |
| Body | ache, heart, cough | |
| Sexuality | horny, love, incest | |
| Relativity | area, bend, exit, stop | |
| Motion | walk, move, go | |
| Space | Down, in, thin | |
| Time | hour, day, oclock | |
III. PERSONAL CONCERNS |
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| Work | work, class, boss | |
| Achievement | try, goal, win | |
| Leisure | house, TV, music | |
| Home | house, kitchen, lawn | |
| Money | audit, cash, owe | |
| Religion | altar, church, mosque | |
| Death | bury, coffin, kill | |
IV. SPOKEN CATEGORIES |
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| Assent | agree, OK, yes | |
| Nonfluencies | uh, rr* | |
| Fillers | blah, you know, I mean | |
Selected References
Pennebaker, J. W. (1997). Writing about emotional experiences as a therapeutic process. Psychological Science, 8, 162-166.
Pennebaker, J.W., & Francis, M.E. (1996). Cognitive, emotional, and language processes in disclosure. Cognition and Emotion, 10, 601-626.
Pennebaker, J.W., & King, L.A. (1999). Linguistic styles: Language use as an individual difference. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77, 1296-1312.
Pennebaker, J. W., Mayne, T., & Francis, M. E. (1997). Linguistic predictors of adaptive bereavement. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 72, 863-871.
Pennebaker, J.W. (2002). What our words can say about us: Toward a broader language psychology. Psychological Science Agenda, 15, 8-9.
Newman, M.L., Pennebaker, J.W., Berry, D.S., & Richards, J.M. (2003). Lying words: Predicting deception from linguistic styles. Personality and social psychology bulletin, 29, 5, 665-675.