The language of defense - Linguistic patterns in narratives of transgressions

To investigate how defensive motivations would affect patterns of language use, the authors compared narratives of personal transgressions (about hurt ing someone) against a set of narratives about making someone happy. Compar ed to the happy stories, transgression narratives were more likely to descr ibe actions occurring without deliberate guidance or intention. Length in w ord count did not vary, but transgression narratives had shorter sentences, especially in the sections describing the transgression and its consequenc es. They had longer introductions, presumably to explain background and mit igating circumstances. Transgression narratives featured the emotions and t houghts of the narrator significantly more than did narratives of making so meone happy (which focused heavily on the target's feelings), and they used more adverbs and similar words to emphasize the narrator's emotions. Trans gression narratives had fewer specific details but more (ostensibly) exact quotations.