4 ms·

I'm not a fan of the examples as both have the "lower status" person initiating the conversation. This further makes me wonder if looking at this in terms of wo

I'm not a fan of the examples as both have the "lower status" person initiating the conversation. This further makes me wonder if looking at this in terms of word-level usage is going to miss the true causation sources. Consider "I think this article has problems" versus "This article has problems". The former seems (to me) to be much less confrontational than the latter, but I don't think that's really a function of the appearance of the word "I". Going back to the examples, maybe the usage of personal pronouns is not directly related to the status of the email participants, but instead, is based upon who initiated the email. If the person with lower status is more likely to initiate the email (seems plausible, particularly in academia), then you might see the same results.

zacharycohn 12y ago
If a "higher status" person and sees problems, they're going to tend to be direct and say "There are problems here." If a "lower status" person has to tell someone there are problems, using "I think" softens it and sounds less like an order, which would be weird coming from low-to-high status.
- 1337biz 12y ago
  Problem is that such "absolute" statements are often frowned upon around here, e.g. people who consider their personal opinions as universal viewpoints.
  - aaron-lebo 12y ago
    I have observed in my own writing especially online, that I'm very quick to prefix almost everything with "I think", "in my opinion", and qualifiers like "maybe" and "probably". I've gotten in the habit because I'm aware what I say is just my opinion and not a universal viewpoint, on the other hand when you write like that your writing comes off as extremely deferential, mealy-mouthed, and lacking conviction. Just about everything people write is an opinion, so why not write in a manner that skips those formalities and gets straight to the point? It might come off as more absolutist, but should make for better writing. Of course, there are times that you should use a qualifying "I think" or "in my opinion", but when they are absolutely necessary isn't clear to me.
    - chubot 12y ago
      Yeah I had a writing teacher that informed me that you don't need to write "I think" in front of everything -- that is implicit because you are the author. "I think" is only for the purposes of softening a statement, which is sometimes (but not always) what you want. Another tip that I got as a high-schooler was to not use "very" or "extremely". That also "dilutes your prose" (his words, which were apt). That came up in a recent NY Times Book Review. If you put "very" in front of every adjective, you sound like a high school student who hasn't been corrected yet :)
      - jtheory 12y ago
        Right, most of the time "I think" is a waste of space. I sometimes say explicitly when I'm on the fence about an idea ("Mild preference for A because __, though B would be ok"), or if I feel like my currently viewpoint isn't well-considered yet, to encourage others to read with a critical eye -- otherwise the polite default is often to go with the flow if there are no obvious or serious problems, and that can be bad.
      - lmm 12y ago
        > Another tip that I got as a high-schooler was to not use "very" or "extremely". That also "dilutes your prose" (his words, which were apt). A generalized version of this is to never use an adjective/adverb/etc. unless it in some sense contradicts the thing it's applied to. There's no sense just trying to intensify the thing you've already written; the modifier should add new information.
goodcanadian 12y ago
Good point. However, those are simply examples of the researchers own email. They were not the basis of the study.
gamegoblin 12y ago
Your bit about confrontational writing reminds me of E-Prime: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime

zacharycohn 12y ago

If a "higher status" person and sees problems, they're going to tend to be direct and say "There are problems here." If a "lower status" person has to tell someone there are problems, using "I think" softens it and sounds less like an order, which would be weird coming from low-to-high status.

1337biz 12y ago
Problem is that such "absolute" statements are often frowned upon around here, e.g. people who consider their personal opinions as universal viewpoints.
- aaron-lebo 12y ago
  I have observed in my own writing especially online, that I'm very quick to prefix almost everything with "I think", "in my opinion", and qualifiers like "maybe" and "probably". I've gotten in the habit because I'm aware what I say is just my opinion and not a universal viewpoint, on the other hand when you write like that your writing comes off as extremely deferential, mealy-mouthed, and lacking conviction. Just about everything people write is an opinion, so why not write in a manner that skips those formalities and gets straight to the point? It might come off as more absolutist, but should make for better writing. Of course, there are times that you should use a qualifying "I think" or "in my opinion", but when they are absolutely necessary isn't clear to me.
  - chubot 12y ago
    Yeah I had a writing teacher that informed me that you don't need to write "I think" in front of everything -- that is implicit because you are the author. "I think" is only for the purposes of softening a statement, which is sometimes (but not always) what you want. Another tip that I got as a high-schooler was to not use "very" or "extremely". That also "dilutes your prose" (his words, which were apt). That came up in a recent NY Times Book Review. If you put "very" in front of every adjective, you sound like a high school student who hasn't been corrected yet :)
    - jtheory 12y ago
      Right, most of the time "I think" is a waste of space. I sometimes say explicitly when I'm on the fence about an idea ("Mild preference for A because __, though B would be ok"), or if I feel like my currently viewpoint isn't well-considered yet, to encourage others to read with a critical eye -- otherwise the polite default is often to go with the flow if there are no obvious or serious problems, and that can be bad.
    - lmm 12y ago
      > Another tip that I got as a high-schooler was to not use "very" or "extremely". That also "dilutes your prose" (his words, which were apt). A generalized version of this is to never use an adjective/adverb/etc. unless it in some sense contradicts the thing it's applied to. There's no sense just trying to intensify the thing you've already written; the modifier should add new information.

goodcanadian 12y ago

Good point. However, those are simply examples of the researchers own email. They were not the basis of the study.

gamegoblin 12y ago

Your bit about confrontational writing reminds me of E-Prime: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime