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Discovering Periodic Patterns in Historical News.
Fabon Dzogang1, Thomas Lansdall-Welfare1,
1Intelligent Systems Laboratory, University of Bristol, Bristol, BS8 1UB, United Kingdom.
Plos One
|November 9, 2016
Summary
Analyzing historical newspapers reveals that human behavior, particularly seasonal activities and disease outbreaks, exhibits strong 365-day periodicities. This effect has diminished in modern times, showing a reduced impact of natural cycles.
Area of Science:
- Computational linguistics
- Historical sociology
- Digital humanities
Background:
- Analyzing large-scale historical text data offers insights into societal patterns.
- Newspaper archives provide a rich source for studying past human behavior and cultural trends.
Observation:
- Daily word frequencies from US and UK newspapers (1836-1922) were analyzed across 50,000 time series.
- The study identified periodicities in language use related to natural cycles, calendars, and public health.
Findings:
- A significant portion of language use exhibited strong 365-day periodicities, linked to seasonal activities (harvesting, hunting) and natural elements (flora, fauna).
- Distinct periodic patterns were observed for weather-driven versus calendar-driven events, and for infectious diseases like fever and pneumonia.
- Approximately 2% of words showed strong periodicity, predominantly with a one-year cycle.
Implications:
- Historical language analysis can reveal fundamental, seasonally-driven human behaviors and societal rhythms.
- The reduced influence of seasonal cycles in modern discourse suggests significant societal and environmental changes over time.
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