“We conclude” or “I believe”? In the post-factual age, individual opinions and sensitivities are often given more weight than rational analyzes and facts. According to a literature analysis, this trend started around 40 years ago, long before the advent of social media. Words associated with rationality and logic have increased since 1850 in specialist books, fiction and articles in the New York Times. Since the 1980s, however, this trend has been reversed in favor of emotion-laden terms.
Millions of people share their views, feelings and individual experiences on social networks. While rumors and false reports spread quickly, facts and rational arguments often have a hard time. Public awareness of this phenomenon has been particularly high since the tenure of former US President Donald Trump, who shared his subjective beliefs on Twitter, which in many cases contradicted scientifically proven facts.
From logic to feeling
But the trend away from rational arguments towards personal views began much earlier, an analysis now shows. “To find out how facts and feelings were historically weighted, we systematically analyzed the word usage in millions of books in English and Spanish from the period 1850 to 2019,” reports a team led by Marten Scheffer from Wageningen University in the Netherlands . “While print culture cannot be interpreted as a direct reflection of culture, changes in the frequency of large word volumes do provide some insight into how people see the world and what they were interested in at the time.”
The researchers used the Google Ngram program as the data basis, which, based on Google Books, enables computer-aided analysis of millions of books. The analyzes showed: Between 1850 and 1980, words associated with reasoning, such as “determine,” “conclusion,” and “analysis,” increased in the English and Spanish publications analyzed. In contrast, words related to human experience, such as “feel,” “believe,” and “hope,” declined during this period. From the 1980s onwards, however, this trend reversed – with a steep rise in terms charged with emotion and a decline in terms that focus on rationality.
Trends in specialist literature, fiction and the press
In order to rule out that this change is only due to the fact that the older publications included in Google Books were mainly specialist literature, while more fictional works have been added in more recent times, which are naturally more emotionally charged, the researchers analyzed fictional and non-fictional works on the one hand. fictional literature separated again – with the same result. On the other hand, they conducted the same investigation with articles from the “New York Times” since 1850. The same pattern emerged here as well. The researchers also observed that the new literature uses “I” rather than “we” more often—a shift from a collectivist to an individualistic emphasis.
“The interpretation of this synchronous change in book language remains a challenge,” the authors write. “One possibility, regarding the trends from 1850 to 1980, is that the rapid developments in science and technology and their socio-economic benefits led to an appreciation of the scientific approach, which gradually transformed culture, society and its institutions from education to Politics penetrated.” In the 1980s, however, neoliberal politics led to social tensions. This policy relied on rational arguments, but its benefits were not shared equally. From the authors’ point of view, this could have contributed to the perceived value of rationality decreasing in public perception – which in turn was reflected in literature and the press.
Long-term change
In this context, the authors consider the fact that the Internet also emerged in the 1980s to be of secondary importance. On the other hand, they see the spread of social media from the mid-2000s as a very likely influencing factor. This shows that the shift from rationality to feelings in book language has accelerated significantly since around 2007. “The global financial crisis could also have had an impact,” say the authors. “Importantly, the observed trend reversal originated decades before the advent of social media, suggesting that while social media may have been an amplifier, other factors must have been the trigger.”
The researchers understand the emphasis on views over facts as part of a deeper, long-term shift: “Whatever the causes, our findings suggest that the phenomenon of post-truth is related to a historical shift in the balance between our two fundamental ways of thinking: thinking and intuition.” In this case, the authors say, it might be difficult to reverse this change. “Instead, societies may need to strike a new balance by explicitly acknowledging the importance of intuition and emotion, while harnessing the much-needed power of rationality and science to address issues in all their complexity,” they suggest.
Source: Marten Scheffer (Wageningen University, The Netherlands) et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, doi: 10.1073/pnas.2107848118