Abstract

STEIN-SPARVIERI, Elena. Text mining and defense inference in psychology discourse analysis. Subj. procesos cogn. [online]. 2010, vol.14, n.2, pp.304-313. ISSN 1852-7310.

Text mining is a strategy employed in discourse analysis, used mainly by IT tools to identify key information. It consists in extracting solely the data from discourse presenting an interest to the researcher. The present study explains some of the strategies used in TM for discourse analysis in psychology. The following issues are considered: a) extraction of information considered of specific interest in the discourse of the patient, b) classification of the information according to observed patterns, c) evaluation, interpretation of the results, d) organization of the results in databases, e) construction of hypothesis derived from results. From this standpoint, the study shows the possibility of inferring defenses employed on the verbal level of the patient / therapist discourse analyzed by means of the David Liberman algorithm (DLA) with advanced IT tools of language processing, specifically through the implementation of the DLA in the GATE system of Natural Language Processing (NLP). In order to justify the inference of defenses in automated discourse analysis the Freudian theory is presented insofar as: a) main defenses, pathogenic as well as functional, b) complementary defenses, c) clinical structures and libidinal fixations relative to the main and complementary defenses. In second term, the concept of psychic currents is put forward to explain: a) the positions taken by the Ego to resolve the conflict arisen between the wishes, reality and the Superego, b) the relationship between psychic current and defense. Thirdly an example of inference of defense taken from words analyzed in discourse with the GATE/DLA tool is presented. To conclude the possibility of progressing towards the inference of the state of the defense through analysis of the last speech act in each paragraph is assessed.

Keywords : Text mining; Defense inference; Discourse analysis; DLA methodology; Automated discourse analysis; GATE IT system.

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