Poets who killed themselves were more self-preoccupied and isolated than a control1 group, the researchers found. There are several theories about why people kill themselves: for instance, the“social integration / disengagement”model of sociologist Emile Durkheim2 , who theorized that a major cause of suicide was an individual’s lack of bonding with others, and a more traditional model emphasizing the role of hopelessness and helplessness. Psychologists James Pennebaker from the University of Texas, Austin, and Shannon Wiltsey Stirman of the University of Pennsylvania used poetry to put these two to the test.

　　They selected nine American, Russian, and British poets, all but one from the 20 th century, who had committed suicide, and matched each with a colleague of the same sex and nationality who lived at approximately the same time. About 300 poems were analyzed by software called Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count, which is programmed to recognize some 70 dimensions of language , such as whether a word is a pronoun, or whether it refers to a negative emotion. The researchers tested Durkheim’s integration theory by looking at references to self and others, and to communication ( words like“ talk”or “ alone ”) . Hopelessness, they decided, would be marked by mentions of death and negative emotions.

　　Many of the control poets shared depression and other mood disorders with the ones that committed suicide , says Pennebacker:“Nonsuicidal poets are not a particularly optimistic group. ”But a higher number of first person singular self-references in the works of the suicidal poets suggested they were more self-preoccupied and detached from others — thus backing up3 the Durkheim model. Reading over Sylvia Plath4 , for example , who killed herself in 1963 , “ there’s‘ I’s’ everywhere, ” Pennebacker says. And near the poets’death, the word“ we ”became less common , signaling increasing isolation. “ A tremendous amount of action is in the pronouns, ”he says.

　　One finding the authors did not expect was that the suicide group used a significantly higher percentage of sexual words throughout their careers. Whether that supports either of the two theories will have to await further research, Pennebaker says.

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　　練習題：

　　Ⅰ. Fill in e ach bla nk with p rop er phra ses from th e p assa ge :

　　1. Durkheim believes that a major reason people kill themselves is .

　　2. A person would kill himself if he fell more .

　　3. Some words in poems are believed to communicate like .

　　Ⅱ. Question :

　　How many dimensions of a language can the software Linguistic Inquiry and Word

　　Count know?

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　　參考答案

　　Ⅰ. 1. an individual’s lack of bonding with others 2. self-preoccupied and isolated

　　3.“talk”or“alone”

　　Ⅱ. 70 .

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　　參考譯文：

　　自殺了的詩人和他們的詩

　　《 身心醫學》雜志7 — 8 月號上的一篇論文說, 也許能從詩人在詩中的用詞來探出他們的自殺傾向。研究人員發現, 與對照組的詩人相比, 那些自殺了的詩人具有更多的自我關, 也更孤獨。

　　有關人們為何自殺的理論有幾種, 比如: 社會學家埃米爾· 涂爾干的“ 社會結合性和脫離性”的理論認為, 自殺的主要原因是個人缺乏與他人的聯系。一個更為傳統的理論則強調自殺是因為無望和無助。美國德州大學奧斯汀分校的心理學家詹姆斯· 彭尼貝克和賓夕法尼亞大學的心理學家香農· 維爾茨· 斯特曼用詩來對這兩種理論進行了檢驗。

　　他們選擇了來自美國、俄羅斯和英國的9 位自殺身亡的詩人, 除了其中一人以外, 都是生活在20 世紀的, 并將他們中的每一位與一個與他同性別、同時代、同國籍的同行作比較。研究人員用一個名為《語言學調查和詞匯計數》的軟件分析了近300 首詩, 這個軟件可以識別語言的70 個方面, 如一個單詞是否是代詞, 或者一個詞是否含有消極悲觀的情緒。研究人員認為涂爾干的社會結合性理論可以通過那些表示自我和他人的詞匯, 以及表示如“ 談話”或“ 獨自”等交流方面的詞語來得以證實。而“ 絕望”, 他們覺得可以通過詩中提及的死亡或消極悲觀情緒來表示。

　　許多對照組詩人和自殺了的詩人一樣都有消沉和其他情緒失調癥狀, 彭尼貝克說:“ 沒有自殺的詩人并不是特別樂觀的人群。”但是, 在自殺詩人的作品中有更高頻率的第一人稱使用率, 由此可推測他們更傾向于自我關注以及和其他人分離, 這是對涂爾干理論的支持。

　　例 如, 彭尼貝克說, 讀1963 年自殺的詩人西爾維亞· 普拉絲的詩, 就會發現詩中“ 到處都是‘ 我’字”。在詩人生命的后期, 單詞“ 我們”變得更少, 表明她的孤獨感在增加。他說:“ 代詞里含有大量的行動。”

　　研究人員的一個意外發現是, 自殺詩人在其創作生涯中使用了相當高比例的涉及性的詞匯。彭尼貝克說, 這一發現是否能支持上述兩種理論中的一種還有待于進一步的研究。