Using Emotive-Evaluative Vocabulary to Express Conflict Situations on Twitter

Abstract

Emotive words are often used to express emotional responses explicitly in situation of conflict. It is important that the speaker should be aware of the meaning and functioning of the emotive vocabulary when applied. The purpose of this study was to examine how emotive vocabulary can affect communicators in expressing conflict. The qualitative content analysis method was used to analyze the data collected from conflicting situations in popular social networks of 51 randomly selected users. Each of them showed their emotional reaction to a stated event using emotive words and statements colloquially. The users were divided into two groups having positive and negative value judgments. Since communicants most often expressed negative emotions (e.g., anger, irritation, hatred) in revealing the conflict, they consequently used negatively colored vocabulary. A close observation of their vocabulary revealed a connection between conflict and emotional labor of the user, giving conflict itself a negative connotation. The study also revealed that
there exists a major relationship between emotive vocabulary and conflicting situation, wherein emotive words helped the user to influence and persuade, argue and, in some cases, manipulate the situation. Emotive words were also found to be a key means of expressing emotions of the interlocutors through verbal components and reactions. These findings would prove useful to researchers and media personnel in the field of media linguistics, psycholinguistics and neurobiology and help understand the behavior of both
senders and recipients of emotive vocabulary.