Abstract

To identify the dimensions underlying Korean emotion terms, two studies were performed. Study 1 yielded a list of Korean emotion words and Study 2 explored its structure. The emotion words were selected from 'The Frequency of Korean Word Usage' published by the Center for Linguistic Informatics Development in Yonsei University. Ten experts participated in the selection process and generated a list of 434 emotion words. 365 undergraduate students rated the words in terms of prototypicality, familiarity, pleasantness-unpleasantness, and activation. In study 2, three experts selected 87 representative emotion terms from the 434 word list. 80 undergraduates participated in similarity sorting task of the words selected. The data were subjected to MDS analysis and yielded two dimensions : pleasantness -unpleasantness and other focused-self focused emotion. While previous studies of English emotion words provided support for pleasantness-unpleasantness and activation dimensions, neither the present study nor Aim's study(1993, 1994) produced activation dimension. The difference was explained in terms of selection criteria for emotion words and lack of Korean emotion terms with extreme degree of activation.