An example of text analysis software (EMOTAIX-Tropes) use: The influence of anxiety on expressive writing

Abstract

This article comes in two sections. The first one provides an introduction to the EMOTAIX-Tropes text analysis software, describing the method that was used to create the collection of terms (4,921 words belonging to the emotional and affective lexicon), the three-tiered thematic organization of this lexicon on either side of a hedonic axis, and the software operating instructions. The second section explains how EMOTAIX can be applied in an experiment. A study of the impact of students' anxiety on the way they described their feelings (expressive writing) after passing or failing an exam yielded some entirely new results. Students used both positive- and negative-valence items in both situations. Particularly anxious subjects, however, were found to maximize emotional items conveying ill-being when describing their success and to minimize ones with a positive valence when relating a failure.