title: The way we speak, the way we feel: How do language patterns reveal stress? A study on long-term human isolation
creator: Anikushina, Valentina
subject: ddc-150
subject: 150 Psychology
subject: ddc-300
subject: 300 Social sciences
subject: ddc-400
subject: 400 Linguistics
description: This dissertation investigates the question of how psychological stress becomes visible in spontaneous speech. It comprises a study conducted on a small, mixed-gender international group of subjects who undergo a period of physical and social confinement for four months. This isolation period simulates a space flight to the Moon and the subsequent return to Earth. The aim of the dissertation is to elaborate reliable methods for assessing, in an unobtrusive and non-invasive way, the psychological state of space travelers to ensure safe manned spaceflights. It tries to connect views on stress from psychology and physiology with the linguistic data collected during decision-making discussions. The linguistic data is analyzed from two broad perspectives: content-oriented and extralinguistic context-sensitive approaches. Furthermore, the linguistic data is brought into correlation with the physiological data associated with stress experience (i.e. heart rate) and juxtaposed with the findings from sociometric research. The focus of the dissertation is thereby geared towards cognitive and social motives of stress. A number of theoretical accounts on language in use as well as multiple existing studies on language usage during taxing conditions are utilized to elaborate a comprehensive methodology to address the main question of the dissertation. Among other results, the elaborated methodology identifies unforeseen social tensions and linguistic attunement based on interpersonal affinities and illustrates how an examination of specific linguistic structures, which are assumed to require varying amounts of cognitive resources during language processing, can be applied to assess the speaker’s mental state.
date: 2024
type: Dissertation
type: info:eu-repo/semantics/doctoralThesis
type: NonPeerReviewed
format: application/pdf
identifier: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserverhttps://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/35219/1/The%20way%20we%20speak%20the%20way%20we%20feel_Dissertation_Valentina%20Anikushina.pdf
identifier: DOI:10.11588/heidok.00035219
identifier: urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-heidok-352196
identifier:   Anikushina, Valentina  (2024) The way we speak, the way we feel: How do language patterns reveal stress? A study on long-term human isolation.  [Dissertation]     
relation: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/35219/
rights: info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
rights: http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/help/license_urhg.html
language: eng