from the take-a-sad-song-and-make-it-better dept.
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
[...] Traditionally, linguistic analyses in this field have been carried out by researchers reading and taking notes. Nowadays, computerised text analysis methods allow the processing of extremely large data banks in minutes. This can help spot linguistic features which humans may miss, calculating the percentage prevalence of words and classes of words, lexical diversity, average sentence length, grammatical patterns and many other metrics.
[...] More interesting is the use of pronouns. Those with symptoms of depression use significantly more first person singular pronouns – such as “me”, “myself” and “I” – and significantly fewer second and third person pronouns – such as “they”, “them” or “she”. This pattern of pronoun use suggests people with depression are more focused on themselves, and less connected with others. Researchers have reported that pronouns are actually more reliable in identifying depression than negative emotion words.
[...] The style of language relates to how we express ourselves, rather than the content we express. Our lab recently conducted a big data text analysis of 64 different online mental health forums, examining over 6,400 members. “Absolutist words” – which convey absolute magnitudes or probabilities, such as “always”, “nothing” or “completely” – were found to be better markers for mental health forums than either pronouns or negative emotion words.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 02 2019, @07:11AM (7 children)
I thought that selection of pronouns is more related to what the discussion is about. If about politics, there are few self-references, but "them" and "they" are overflowing the comment field. If about personal achievements or thoughts, "I" will be plentiful.
This very post is a good illustration. I (again!) started it with "I". What else could I use if I express my own opinion? You know that Joseph Stalin instead of saying "I have decided that $x" liked to say "There is an opinion that $x". Nobody was mistaken about the origin of that opinion.
How many "I" have I used in this post? Does it demonstrate depression? I don't think so :-) Depression can be detected, but you'd need a true AI to do that, not a trained neural net. Otherwise it will call help to a Shakespeare site.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday January 02 2019, @07:27AM
Undecidable.
But it's very likely to have depressive effects
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 02 2019, @08:02AM
What were you talking about, again?
Perhaps there's indication of something in what you said, but I'm having trouble picking up on it. Well, the article had to do with others, so it was probably something along those lines.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 02 2019, @08:21AM (2 children)
I always thought the Magic 8 Ball was pretty accurate.
"Outlook not so good"
Their "AI" is practicing phrenology, reading tea leaves, the stars, whatever... on a computer. Call the patent office!
And they better watch out on that pronoun bullshit. It can get you into real trouble on campus and in the office these days.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday January 02 2019, @09:00AM (1 child)
I... I... I... don't think so.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 3, Funny) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday January 02 2019, @11:59AM
Many mental diagnoses rely upon the patient being unaware of the tests and criteria, so they can't consciously influence the results.
Does it mean your work is depressing if you sing "I owe, I owe, it's off to work I go"? Is Bill Wither's "Ain't No Sunshine" the love song with the most supremely depressing part because he sings "I know" 26 times in a row?
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday January 02 2019, @09:39AM (1 child)
"Ya is the last letter of the alphabet."
(It looks just like a backwards "R".)
-- Mikhail Dabit Krofort
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Wednesday January 02 2019, @10:26AM
I see what ya did there...
(Score: 5, Interesting) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday January 02 2019, @09:33AM (3 children)
In addition to having experienced severe depression many times with two quite-serious suicide attempts, I volunteered for the Suicide Prevention Service Of Santa Cruz County when I was a UCSC student.
Such experiences lead me to assert the following:
- Every mammal, each in its own special way is a Pack Animal
- The very worst experience any mammal can have is to be isolated from their pack
- "Reactive" Clinical Depression is caused by the depressed animal having rejected the pack, not the other way round
- "Endogenous" Depression has no external cause, but the depressed animal will start finding depressing things to react to
As I have Bipolar-Type Schizoaffective Disorder for me specifically my depressions are far more often Endogenous than Reactive. But for me to experience either type of Depression will result in my socially isolating myself.
How Can This Possibly Be?
The very worst thing for every mentally ill person is not failure to take our medicine but for us to become socially isolated. That led my very first therapist to say at the very beginning of our very first session, "Never Live Alone".
It happens that the regulations that govern my "Permanent Assistive Housing" stipulate that I _must_ live alone. I expect that's done to avoid disputes between housemates, but again in my actual experience is a really good way to make me suicidal.
To avoid that I visit a cafe Every Single Day.
Lately I've just been asking for free water at Starbucks; they surely have a corporate policy of serving those without the means to purchase their wares as the baristas are _always_ quite happy to serve me, and even to give me their restroom combination lock codes.
Having mentioned this to one of my case managers led to two of them _taking_ me to Starbucks twice a week; one of them started doing so for her other clients.
LOL: when searching for "Suicide Prevention Service Of Santa Cruz County" - which may not have a website - at the very top of the page was an ad for "Amazon Suicide - Millions Of Books".
One such book is no joke: "Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide" by John's Hopkins Research Psych Prof Kay Redfield Jamison. I will _never_ read that book as I understand it's chock full 'o triggers, that is, to read that book would make me suicidal. In "An Unquiet Mind", Jamison writes of her experiences as a Manic-Depressive UCLA Grad Student, including her attempt to take her own life by overdosing on Lithium.
A mental hospital once overdosed me with Lithium, as it's quite tricky to get the dose right.
You Don't Want To OD On Lithium, it's a very unpleasant experience. Yes Sodium and Potassium are Essential Nutrients but Lithium is _deadly_ with its effective dose for Mania being just slightly less than its toxic dose.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 02 2019, @09:54AM (2 children)
Maybe that's what the books say, but in practice about 1% of human population rejects the pack and happily lives away from others. Hermits are the ultimate expression of this, monks are a bit more common, but loving being mostly alone is a variant of the norm. Not everyone is a depressed girl who ran away; you have to leave room for submariners, merchant sailors, explorers, astronauts. They are certified as 100% sane; at the same time, they are fine alone or in a small group.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by coolgopher on Wednesday January 02 2019, @10:29AM
I'll add that's its also very easy to be lonely without being alone.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday January 03 2019, @01:43AM
Not always, but there are some places in the world where lots of hermits live, albeit with lots of distance between each of them.
Consider Feral Cats: they are _highly_ territorial but they too live in Colonies.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 02 2019, @12:16PM (1 child)
This I agree with and in addition these people are depressing to be around.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 03 2019, @02:11AM
Especially the ones that are sure the free market is always best.
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Wednesday January 02 2019, @01:40PM (3 children)
Optimistic, pessimistic, depressed:
- full
- empty
- don't have a glass
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Rich on Wednesday January 02 2019, @06:25PM (2 children)
- wasted, because it's overdimensioned by factor two for the task required.
What state of mind is that?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 02 2019, @09:16PM
Asshole.
(Score: 2) by DeVilla on Thursday January 03 2019, @12:52AM
anallytic
(Score: 2) by TheFool on Wednesday January 02 2019, @03:34PM (4 children)
I wonder what you'd come up with if you data mined this site.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 02 2019, @04:54PM (1 child)
A depressed AI, probably.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday January 02 2019, @05:03PM
Maybe that's what happened to Marvin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_the_Paranoid_Android [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday January 02 2019, @05:00PM (1 child)
Your post contained twice as many "you" than "I", so I guess you should be safe. :-)
And as prophylaxis against depression I'll add:
You, your, they, them, he, she, thou!
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 03 2019, @03:58PM
Whew! That was close!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by linkdude64 on Thursday January 03 2019, @06:02PM
I took a look at the data: Every person who has snapped their ankle was, immediately afterward, said to be heavily biased towards thinking about their broken ankle rather than their healthy one! It's almost as if evolution has biased us into focusing on the locus of the pain we're experiencing, in a desperately primitive effort to convince us to address its source.
Or, goodness me, is it possibly that more introverts are depressed than extroverts, and so might potentially share the understanding that we can ultimately speak only for ourselves?
This is why many extroverts annoy me, because many are often "micro-aggressive" about the way quieter people should be.