“I”, the source of rumination

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine how the use of different pronouns in reflecting on a stressful event affects emotions. Participants were asked to think of a stressful event and write about it in a self-immersed (“I” pronoun), self-distanced (“You” pronoun), or a self-objective (no pronouns) way. We used a mixed ANOVA to measure the before and after effects of the conditions. We did not find any significant difference between the use of pronouns.