National stereotypes are grave things , often the products of racism and often used to free wars . That does n’t mean there is never any truth to them , however , and a discipline of almost 40 million tweet has reported that Canadians are courteous people on social medium than their southerly neighbour . It should be noted , however , the depth psychology was done by Canadians , so skeptics may essay sovereign confirmation .
McMaster University Ph.D. student Daniel Schmidtke create an algorithm to liken the words and symbols used on Twitter and to name which were disproportionately used by Canadians compare to resident physician of the United States .
" The most distinctive word choice of Americans and Canadians on Twitter paint a very accurate and familiar moving picture of the stereotype we connect with people from these country , " Schmidtke said in astatement .
Favored Canadian words included : “ great ” , “ thanks ” , “ amazing ” , and “ felicitous ” . American tweets were more likely to include “ hate ” , “ harebrained ” and “ tired ” .
Other differences were less predictable , with Americans being more fond of net shorthand such as “ lol ” . Americans on Twitter utilization more emotionally charge emojis than Canadians , who opt emoticon . When Canadians do apply emojis , they tend to opt happy ones than their southern counterparts .
The findings confirm and expand on aprevious studySchmidtke undertook of a smaller routine of tweet , which also included English and Scottish individuals on Twitter for compare .
Schmidtke notice inPLOS Onethat retiring studies testing Canadians ' repute for niceness and positivity have consistently found it to bea myth . Why should it appear on Twitter , but not in everyday life-time ?
To do this , Schmidtke collected a group of 80 North Americans , evenly separate between the two nations , and prove them the words and emojis most favored by one country or the other , without telling them how the parole were chosen . Participants were asked to describe the personalities of people who used these words a portion , and fare up with descriptions that almost dead match US and Canadian stereotype .
Schmidtke and Colorado - authors debate we are witnessing a process known as identity construction in action . Being aware of the stereotype , hoi polloi become fain to play them out , particularly when interacting with people from other nations . Presumably , this applies a circle more strongly to Canadians , who so often find themselves a little minority in online outer space , than to Americans surrounded by their compatriots .
The study may appear amusing but irrelevant , but identity building is a serious business . If mass have a tendency to adopt the role attributed to them , then stereotypes can arrive to work the future – depict their neighbors as positive , friendly , and gracious may have help oneself America keep up a peaceable boundary line .
