Lexical Density in Age and Gender Variations of Selected Crime-Related Essays by Undergraduates in Southwestern Nigeria

Abstract

This study was carried out to investigate the characteristics of age and gender in the crime-related essays of selected undergraduates in Southwestern Nigeria, with a view to determining lexical density. M.A.K. Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar was used as a framework and a descriptive design for the study. With a convenient sampling technique employed, three Universities in Southwestern Nigeria: University of Lagos, Akoka (federal); Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba Akoka (state); and Crawford University, Igbesa (private), were chosen to represent different types of ownership. Forty-eight students, who were spread across the three Universities (four each from 100-400 levels), were purposively selected to write an essay on any of these four themes: Drug Addiction, Kidnapping, Robbery or suicide. The themes were selected due to their prevalence in Nigeria. Twenty-four (24) females and Twenty-four (24) males with predetermined ages from 16-18 and 19-21 were chosen. The data were subjected to stylometric and descriptive analyses. Findings reveal that female writings were characterised by drug addiction, while male writings were characterised by suicide. The mental process used by males in the 16-18 age bracket revealed that suicide victims react to depression by killing themselves to escape their predicament. Females in the 16-18 age bracket depicted drug addicted victims’ illegal use of drugs, resulting in hallucinations and deteriorating health. The study revealed that Nigerian undergraduates’ crime-related essays exhibited linguistic characteristics related to the age and gender of the students in terms of lexical density. The study provides data and enriches scholarship on corpus linguistics, forensic linguistics and other related research.