The Emotions of Professional Writers

Abstract

In this study, 24 professional writers completed a short pencil-and-paper questionnaire on which they indicated how they felt before, at a pause, and after specific writing episodes. The intensity with which they experienced 20 emotions was assessed, as was the frequency with which these emotions were experienced when writing in general. Results indicated that the professionals experienced positive emotions significantly more often when writing in general than they experienced either negative-active or negative-passive emotions. Negative-passive emotions such as boredom, shame, and shyness were particularly rare and weak. During the actual writing process, positive emotions tended to intensify, whereas negative-passive and negative-active emotions resisted change. Sponsorship of writing had little impact on the quality of emotions experienced during the process. The professional poets, however, experienced negative-active emotions significantly more often when writing in general than did the prose writers.

The Effect of the Process Writing Approach on Writing Success and Anxiety

“…The latter type of anxiety can be understood through students' writing success to a certain extent. Citing Brand and Leckie (1988) as well as Petzel and Wenzel (1993), Yaman (2010) notes that the negative type of writing anxiety leads to procrastination, fear, tension, loss of self-confidence and power, and interruption of the thinking process. Bruning and Horn (2000) ascertained that checking written material carelessly increases writing anxiety, and that this anxiety harms students cognitively and affectively as well as decreasing their motivation.…”

Analyzing Writing Anxiety Level of Turkish Cypriot Students

“…Herhangi bir yazma eylemi bile (dilekçe, kart, rapor, mektup gibi) öğrencileri kaygılandırabilmektedir. Yazma kaygısı, kişinin özgüveninin azalmasına, güdülenme kaybına, yazmayı sürekli olarak erteleme isteğine ve düşünme sürecinin engellenmesine neden olabilmektedir (Brand ve Leckie, 1988). Tighe'ye (1987) göre, yazma kaygısı yüksek öğrenciler, yazma kaygısı düşük olanlara oranla okulda daha başarısız olmaktadırlar.…”

Writing about Writers

“…Brand and Leckie concluded that emotional responses to a writer's work depended on a number of factors, including education level, age and whether the writer was "self-sponsored." 59 Most notably, Brand and Leckie found that a participant's sense of satisfaction related to positive feelings about writing more generally. 60 This kind of cognitive psychoanalysis of writing and writer's habits continued into the 1990s, with the publication of Ronald T. Kellogg's The Psychology of Writing (1994), calling for the expansion of the field into creativity and "meaning making."…”

“…In 1988, Brand and Leckie argued that the late 1970s and 1980s saw an upsurge in research and publications about the cognitive processes of writing. 57 However, they exemplify how much of the work that precedes their own analysis of the emotions of professional writers focused on the negative emotional or cognitive impact of writing on the individual, whereas their work aimed to highlight the positive emotional experiences of writing. 58 Brand and Leckie surveyed twenty-four writers from a range of writing professions, including English teachers, full-time fiction writers, freelance writers and non-fiction writers.…”