Twitter shows daily cycles in our thought patterns

London, June 21: Our mode of thinking changes at different times of the day and follows a 24- hour pattern, say scientists who decoded the human thought cycle after analysing 800 million tweets.

Researchers at University of Bristol in the UK used artificial intelligence ( AI) to analyse aggregated and anonymised twitter content sampled every hour over the course of four years across 54 of the country's largest cities to

determine if our thinking modes change collectively.

The, study published in the journal PLOS ONE, revealed different emotional and cognitive modalities in our thoughts by identifying variations in language through tracking the use of specific words across the twitter sample which are associated with 73 psychometric indicators, and are used to help interpret information about our thinking style.

At 6 am, analytical thinking was shown to peak, the words and language at this

time were shown to correlate with a more logical way of thinking.

However, in the evenings and nights this thinking style changed to a more emotional and existential one.

Although 73 different psychometric quantities were tracked, the team found there were just two independent underlying factors that explained most of the temporal variations across the data.

The first factor, with a peak expression time starting at around 5 am to 6 am, linked with measures of analytical thinking through the high use of nouns, articles and prepositions, which has been related, in other studies, to intelligence, improved class performance

and education.

This early- morning period also shows increased concern with achievement and power. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the researchers find a more impulsive, social, and emotional mode.

The second factor had a peak expression time starting at 3 am to 4 am, the aggregated twitter content found this time to be correlated with the language of existential concerns but anti- correlated with expression of positive emotions.