Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches.
There is some evidence that liberal politicians use more complex language than conservative politicians. This evidence, however, is based on a specific set of speeches of US members of Congress and UK members of Parliament. This raises the question whether the relationship between ideology and lingu...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2019-01-01
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| Series: | PLoS ONE |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208450 |
| _version_ | 1811307221896658944 |
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| author | Martijn Schoonvelde Anna Brosius Gijs Schumacher Bert N Bakker |
| author_facet | Martijn Schoonvelde Anna Brosius Gijs Schumacher Bert N Bakker |
| author_sort | Martijn Schoonvelde |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | There is some evidence that liberal politicians use more complex language than conservative politicians. This evidence, however, is based on a specific set of speeches of US members of Congress and UK members of Parliament. This raises the question whether the relationship between ideology and linguistic complexity is a more general phenomenon or specific to this small group of politicians. To address this question, this paper analyzes 381,609 speeches given by politicians from five parliaments, by twelve European prime ministers, as well as speeches from party congresses over time and across countries. Our results replicate and generalize earlier findings: speakers from culturally liberal parties use more complex language than speakers from culturally conservative parties. Economic left-right differences, on the other hand, are not systematically linked to linguistic complexity. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-13T08:59:58Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-8aca869bb2484f8598100791331686ca |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1932-6203 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-13T08:59:58Z |
| publishDate | 2019-01-01 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | PLoS ONE |
| spelling | doaj.art-8aca869bb2484f8598100791331686ca2022-12-22T02:53:09ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032019-01-01142e020845010.1371/journal.pone.0208450Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches.Martijn SchoonveldeAnna BrosiusGijs SchumacherBert N BakkerThere is some evidence that liberal politicians use more complex language than conservative politicians. This evidence, however, is based on a specific set of speeches of US members of Congress and UK members of Parliament. This raises the question whether the relationship between ideology and linguistic complexity is a more general phenomenon or specific to this small group of politicians. To address this question, this paper analyzes 381,609 speeches given by politicians from five parliaments, by twelve European prime ministers, as well as speeches from party congresses over time and across countries. Our results replicate and generalize earlier findings: speakers from culturally liberal parties use more complex language than speakers from culturally conservative parties. Economic left-right differences, on the other hand, are not systematically linked to linguistic complexity.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208450 |
| spellingShingle | Martijn Schoonvelde Anna Brosius Gijs Schumacher Bert N Bakker Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches. PLoS ONE |
| title | Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches. |
| title_full | Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches. |
| title_fullStr | Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches. |
| title_full_unstemmed | Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches. |
| title_short | Liberals lecture, conservatives communicate: Analyzing complexity and ideology in 381,609 political speeches. |
| title_sort | liberals lecture conservatives communicate analyzing complexity and ideology in 381 609 political speeches |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208450 |
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