Lexical and pragmatic features of English-language media headlines: a corpus study of world health organization news releases

Abstract

This article investigates lexical and pragmatic choices in the headlines of English-language institutional news releases. The corpus comprises 80 authentic headlines published by the World Health Organization between 21 January and 21 October 2026. Items were selected consecutively from the organization’s official news archive; their titles, publication dates and counting rules are supplied in an auditable dataset. The analysis combines rule-based tokenization and lexical frequency counts with contextual interpretation of communicative functions. The corpus contains 1,022 tokens and 491 distinct word forms. The abbreviation WHO occurs in 49 headlines and occupies the initial position in 35. Numerical expressions appear in 18 headlines, while 18 contain at least one preselected lexical marker of risk, threat or required action. These findings suggest that institutional positioning is conveyed through both explicit organizational naming and predicates associated with reporting, recommending, announcing and validating. The study distinguishes directly measurable patterns from interpretations of communicative purpose.