During childhood, parents represent the most commonly used source of their child’s temperament information and, typically, do so by responding to questionnaires. Despite their wide-ranging applications, interviews present notorious data reduction challenges, as quantification of narratives has proven to be a labor-intensive process. However, for the purposes of this study, the labor-intensive nature may have conferred distinct advantages. The present study represents a demonstration project aimed at leveraging emerging technologies for this purpose. Specifically, we used Python natural language processing capabilities to analyze semistructured temperament interviews conducted with U.S. and German mothers of toddlers, expecting to identify differences between these two samples in the frequency of words used to describe individual differences, along with some similarities. Two different word lists were used: (a) a set of German personality words and (b) temperament-related words extracted from the Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire (ECBQ). Analyses using the German trait word demonstrated that mothers from Germany described their toddlers as significantly more “cheerful” and “careful” compared with U.S. caregivers. According to U.S. mothers, their children were more “independent,” “emotional,” and “timid.” For the ECBQ analysis, German mothers described their children as “calm” and “careful” more often than U.S. mothers. U.S. mothers, however, referred to their children as “upset,” “happy,” and “frustrated” more frequently than German caregivers. The Python code developed herein illustrates this software as a viable research tool for cross-cultural investigations.

中文翻译：

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利用Python处理跨文化气质面试：一种新型的文本分析平台

在童年时期，父母是孩子气质信息的最常用来源，通常通过回答问卷来实现。尽管面试的应用范围很广，但由于减少叙事的事实证明这是一个劳动密集型的过程，因此访谈仍然面临着减少数据的挑战。但是，出于本研究的目的，劳动密集型性质可能具有明显的优势。本研究是一个示范项目，旨在为此目的利用新兴技术。具体来说，我们使用Python自然语言处理功能来分析与美国和德国的幼儿母亲进行的半结构性气质面试，希望通过用来描述个人差异的单词频率来识别这两个样本之间的差异，以及一些相似之处。使用了两个不同的单词列表：（a）一组德国人格单词，以及（b）从“早期儿童行为问卷”（ECBQ）中提取的与气质相关的单词。使用“德国特质”一词进行的分析表明，与美国的保姆相比，德国的母亲将其幼儿描述为更加“快乐”和“谨慎”。根据美国母亲的说法，他们的孩子更加“独立”，“情感”和“胆小”。在ECBQ分析中，德国母亲比美国母亲更频繁地将自己的孩子描述为“平静”和“谨慎”。但是，美国的母亲比德国的照顾者更频繁地称自己的孩子“沮丧”，“快乐”和“沮丧”。本文开发的Python代码将该软件说明为跨文化调查的可行研究工具。