Via Psychology Today:
Six months after Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy, was abducted from her Tucson home, the Pima County Sheriff’s Department has finally released the full text of the two emails associated with the crime, sometimes referred to in the media as “ransom notes.”
Their release enables specialists in the analysis of language evidence, forensic linguists, to analyze the exact language of the two email communications in minute detail.
How Language Patterns Reveal Identity
People’s linguistic usages give us clues to their identity because no two people’s writing style is exactly alike. Any communication we make involves language choices—between formal and informal wording, standard or non-standard grammar, or just free choice between equal options
Each individual has different patterns of choices, some conscious, some that have become unconscious habits. For example, do you say, “He looked up the number” or “He looked the number up?” Some tendencies are associated with large groups of speakers, such as regional dialect features or features used more by young people than older writers. And some are more individualized or even idiosyncratic.
We all use both types of features, but no two people use the exact same features in all the same ways. In a way, each person has their own unique dialect, what linguists call an “idiolect.”
Idiolectal patterns of language use often persist even when people are trying to disguise their style or mask their identity. Linguists can use these patterns to home in on author characteristics, and to compare communications of questionable origin to those whose authors are known, to help establish author identity.
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