Text Messages Study Shows Fear Turned to Anger on 9/11

TECHNOLOGY -- September 1, 2010 at 4:09 PM EDT

Text Messages Study Shows Fear Turned to Anger on 9/11

By analyzing a database of 500,000 text messages sent on Sept. 11, 2001, researchers at the University of Mainz in Germany have created an hour-by-hour psychological profile of texting Americans on that day. The pager text messages, which were posted to Wikileaks in 2009, were analyzed for words that correlated to sadness, anxiety and anger. The results show that words related to anger dominated communications as the day wore on. The study was published in the Journal of Psychological Science.

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