什麼時候「認真就輸了」？ - - 語料庫中「認真」一詞的語意變化(Do We Lose When Being Serious? - Change in Meaning of the Word "Renzen(認真)" in Corpora)

From the Internet slang “ (You’ll lose if being serious)” to a wide variety of collocations with the word “ (being serious)”, the Internet users in Taiwan show a preference to the word “ .” While the dictionary definitions of this word have included “being practical”, “being serious”, and “not being careless,” this study aims to bridge the gap between dictionary and authentic language use, and see how this word is differently used during online text discussion. Written Mandarin corpora Sinica Corpus and COPENS are selected as the analysis data for comparison between formal written texts and online discussion texts in terms of the negative tone in a sentence, collocations, and connotations. The results show that Taiwanese Internet users have divided opinions about whether to restrict the word to a positive connotation, or impose a negative connotation on this word. However, although the slang is less seen on the Internet, the word “ ” is still frequently used. This study concludes that people try to convey the message that they can take whatever they think important serious regardless of the conventions, and still hold onto a serious attitude. COPENS