Behav Res Methods
August 2019
In the present research, we investigated whether people's everyday language contains sufficient signal to predict the future occurrence of mental illness. Language samples were collected from the social media website Reddit, drawing on posts to discussion groups focusing on different kinds of mental illness (clinical subreddits), as well as on posts to discussion groups focusing on nonmental health topics (nonclinical subreddits). As expected, words drawn from the clinical subreddits could be used to distinguish several kinds of mental illness (ADHD, anxiety, bipolar disorder, and depression).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFProc Natl Acad Sci U S A
February 2018
We use big data methods to investigate how decision-making might depend on future sightedness (that is, on how far into the future people's thoughts about the future extend). In study 1, we establish a link between future thinking and decision-making at the population level in showing that US states with citizens having relatively far future sightedness, as reflected in their tweets, take fewer risks than citizens in states having relatively near future sightedness. In study 2, we analyze people's tweets to confirm a connection between future sightedness and decision-making at the individual level in showing that people with long future sightedness are more likely to choose larger future rewards over smaller immediate rewards.
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