hi-
my code-a-text demo should be here in the mail today, but i do have a couple of
follow up questions:
1) what you are saying is that if i used messages as my unit of anlaysis, each
message could be a speech unit within one large file?  so there are just some
separators that would be inserted between each message so the program would
"know" what the unit of anlaysis was?
2) <From your point of view the main limitation of Code-A-Text is that it will
not generate a complete matrix of word co-occurances.>
    - not a problem, for one phase of my project, i want coders to determine
the coding scheme (actually i'm looking specifically for positive and negative
word -of-mouth communication examples), so for phase one code-a-text sounds
good so far!
    but, for another phase of my project i want the computer to automatically
generate
word co-occurence matrices--do you have any experience with/reccommendations
for packages that do this?

3) <You have to specifify the word, word group or other forms of code in which
you are
interested and then the programme will calculate the co-occurance with all
other words, word groups or codes in the text.>
3a) Can this word group or other forms of code be something like: "Pronoun
reccommends buy* noun." or would it be more like: "reccommend" co-occurs
repeatedly within three words of "saturn" automobile.?

Very Important:
3b) once the word, word group, or form of code i'm interested in is programmed,
can that code be applied to a new text to see if the code works on a new text
(new meaning not the one it was developed from)?
Cheers,
Peter Newman

Alan Cartwright wrote:

> Peter,
>
> I am aware of several projects which are using Code-A-Text for this form of
> analysis and on the surface it would appear that the programme would be
> appropriate. Be aware that you can generate huge amounts of data if you
> pursue them in an unfocussed fashion.
>
> >From the way you describe the project you would create a "text" from the
> postings for each month in which each posting would constitute a "speech
> unit". Code-A-Text will add the required designators which convert the text
> into the dialogue format it uses internally.
>
> It would certainly provided for you basic statistics (total number of
> words, total number of unique words, in your monthly texts.  You can group
> words together; so for analytic purposes  every occurance of a word in the
> group is treated as a single word. You can then get frequency counts for
> word groups within the text. You could also code each posting yourself.
>
> It would be important to decide upon your "unit of analysis".  Are you
> concerend with the text as a whole or the individual postings within the
> text.  Code-A-Text Can manipulate texts to provide different units of
> analysis, for instance speech units (postings), segments (paragraphs within
> postings) or sentences.  When calculating co-occurances the unit of
> analysis is critical.  Obviously, if you work with sentences there will be
> lower rates of co-occurance than if you work with postings.
>
> >
>
> A second limitation is that these analyses only work with one text at a
> time.  However you can merge each of the monthly texts to form a "super
> text" and analyse that.
>
> Hope this helps
> Regards
>
> Alan Cartwright
>
> At 07:51 09/11/98 -0600, you wrote:
> >hello all-
> >
> >my name is peter newman and i am currently a doctoral student in the
> >institute of communications reseach at the university of illinois.
> >i am working on my dissertation and wanted the advice of the group on
> >what software package might be "best" for the type of analysis that i wish
> >to engage in.
> >
> >i have become very interested in automated text analysis over the past
> >six months. i have one year's worth of newsgroup data that i wish to
> >analyze.
> >
> >based on my limited understanding of this type of analysis, i
> >believe i want to do the following:
> >1) take 12 months worth of newsgroup data (from a particular hobbyists
> >group) and divide it into one month blocks of text data
> >2) take each month of data and run it through at automatic indexing and
> >word co-occurence program. of course i need to remove words like "if,
> >that, and..."; plus build a thesauras for words that should be "lumped"
> >together and treated the same, for example: "metal halide" = "halide" =
> >"halides" = "MH", etc.
> >3) map word co occurences in multi dimensional space based on what
> >emerges from the text and on researcher defined criteria (including or
> >excluding certain terms)
> >4) compare the maps from month to month to see how usenet discussion
> >changes across time with new innovations in the hobby and new product
> >introductions.
> >
> >it seems that several programs including CATPAC, Word Stat, MCCA, and
> >Code-A-Text  might let me do some or all of these items?
> >Does anyone have experience with these programs? Could you share your
> thoughts
> >on their suitability for my proposed project?
> >
> >thanks in advance for your time,
> >sincerely,
> >peter newman
> >
> Alan Cartwright PhD
> Code-A-Text Developer
> Email [log in to unmask]
> web page http://www.codeatext.u-net.com
> Also
> Senior Lecturer In Psychotherapy
> Kent Institute of Medicine and Health Sciences.
> University of Kent. UK.



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