Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania are poring over people’s Facebook posts in an effort to determine what sort of social media language different people use. More than 75,000 people are participating in the study via a Facebook app (which gives them a personality test and logs their age and gender) and their own Facebook posts.

So far, researchers have tracked some interesting linguistic differences between introverts (who tend to use emoticons and talk about stuff related to anime and manga) and extroverts (who use more words such as party, baby and ya).

They’ve also discovered some intriguing differences in different demographic groups. For instance, people who are 60 or older are less inclined to complain about being bored (a favorite word among the study’s youngest participants), but more likely to talk about something that’s made them proud. While youth are inclined to talk about getting drunk at age 25, they’re far more likely to just talk about wine 30 years later. (The Atlantic)

Paul Asay has written for The Washington Post, Christianity Today, Beliefnet.com and The (Colorado Springs) Gazette. He writes about culture for PluggedIn and wrote the Batman book God on the Streets of Gotham (Tyndale). He recently collaborated with Jim Daly, president of Focus on the Family, on his book The Good Dad. He lives in Colorado Springs with wife, Wendy, and his two children. Follow him on Twitter.