Assessment of Psychological States Through Content Analysis of Verbal Communications

Abstract

The focus of many psychologists today is not so much on the traits and long-term characteristics of the people who participate in our research as on their reactions to events and situations. Psychologists are concerned with changing transitory psychological states, but have not yet developed fully effective techniques for their assessment. Content analysis of verbal communications can be helpful in assessing such states. Content analysis is based on the assumption that the language in which people choose to express themselves contains information about the nature of their psychological states. This assumption implies a representational or descriptive model of language, in contrast to the instrumental or functional model preferred, for example, by Mahl [1]. Content analysis can be applied only to verbal, not to nonverbal communications. However, although content analysis cannot be applied to nonverbal communications, inferences can be made about people's states through objective and systematic identification of specified characteristics of their verbal communications [2, 3]. Content analysis of verbal communications is a way of listening to and interpreting people's communicated accounts of events. When agreement between independent interpretations is achieved, the essential requirement of scientific endeavor (intersubjective agreement) is met [4].