Books Reflect Shifts in Moral Talk After 9/11

Imagine flipping through a book published in the United States after the 2001 terrorist attacks. You might notice something different about the words on the pages. A recent study dug into how phrases about morality changed in books from the U. S. , Great Britain, and Spanish-speaking countries. Researchers looked at words that talk about things like following rules (authority-virtue) and breaking them (authority-vice), as well as being loyal to your group (loyalty-virtue) and betraying it (loyalty-vice).

They thought that after 9/11, books would have more words like "chaos" or "disobedience" and fewer words like "hierarchy" or "obedient". Similarly, they expected to see more words like "betrays" and less about sticking together. By checking books from 1960 to 2019, they found that in the U. S. , these predictions were on point. Interestingly, the years after 9/11 saw a slowing down in the usual increase of moral words in books. This study highlights how major events like terrorist attacks can influence the language we use to talk about right and wrong. It's like the books kept a record of the cultural shifts happening around them.

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