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Related Experiment Videos

Dutch taboo norms.

Sander A Roest1,2, Tessa A Visser3, René Zeelenberg3

  • 1Department of Psychology, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. roest@fsw.eur.nl.

Behavior Research Methods
|April 15, 2017
PubMed
Summary

This study provides norms for Dutch taboo words, revealing that high taboo words correlate with low valence and high insult, except for sex-related terms. These findings offer insights into taboo word effects on cognitive processing.

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Area of Science:

  • Psycholinguistics
  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Lexical Semantics

Background:

  • Understanding the emotional and social dimensions of words is crucial for psycholinguistic research.
  • Existing word norm databases often lack comprehensive data on taboo words, limiting studies on their cognitive processing.
  • Previous research suggests a relationship between valence, arousal, and taboo, but specific norms for Dutch taboo words were needed.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To establish comprehensive norms for taboo, personal taboo, insult, valence, and arousal for a large set of Dutch words.
  • To investigate the relationship between these dimensions, particularly for taboo words.
  • To create a valuable resource, the Dutch Taboo Norms (DTN) database, for researchers.

Main Methods:

  • Collected ratings on a 7-point Likert scale from 87 psychology students at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
Keywords:
Arousal ratingsEmotionLexical normsTaboo ratingsValence ratings

Related Experiment Videos

  • Included 672 Dutch words, with 202 specifically identified as taboo.
  • Utilized split-half analyses to ensure high reliability of the collected norms.

    • Main Results:

    • High correlations were found with existing Dutch norms for arousal and valence.
    • The U-shaped relationship between valence and arousal was confirmed for taboo words.
    • Words high in taboo were generally low in valence and high in insult, with notable exceptions for sex-related terms which rated high on both taboo and valence but low on insult.
    • High taboo and insult ratings were associated with high arousal.

    Conclusions:

    • The Dutch Taboo Norms (DTN) database provides reliable data on taboo words, valence, arousal, and insult.
    • The findings confirm and extend previous observations on the interplay between word characteristics and emotional/social ratings.
    • The DTN database is a valuable tool for researchers investigating the cognitive processing of taboo language.