The Self-Help Literature on Self-Compassion and on Postpartum Depression: Linguistic and Psychological Elements

This study was designed to further understanding of how self-compassion impacts postpartum depression. The content of the corpuses was analyzed using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count software. Specific words were analyzed, and results showed significant differences in first-person plural pronoun use, self-compassion word use, and no significant difference in negative emotion word usage between the study and reference corpuses. This research suggests a lack of self-compassion discourse in postpartum depression self-help literature and the need for counselors to incorporate self-compassion intervention in postpartum depression treatment.