Children’s Perceptions of the Social Functions of

DISCOURSEPROCESSES,36(3),147–165Copyright©2003,LawrenceErlbaumAssociates,Inc.Children’sPerceptionsoftheSocialFunctionsofVerbalIronyMelanieHarrisandPennyM.PexmanDepartmentofPsychologyUniversityofCalgaryVerbalironycanservemanysocialfunctions:Speakerscanmutetheaggressionconveyedbycriticismortemperthepraiseconveyedbyacompliment(theTingeHypothesis;Dews,Kaplan,&Winner,1995),andspeakerscanalsobringhumortoasituation.Afullunderstandingofironiclanguagerequiresonetomakecomplexinferencesaboutspeakerintent,ataskthatcanbechallengingforchildren.ThisstudywasdevisedasadevelopmentaltestoftheTingeHypothesis.Twoexperimentsassessed5-to6-and7-to8-year-oldchildren’sabilitiestodetectandinterprettheaggressiveandhumorousintentofspeakerswhomadeironiccriticisms,literalcrit-icisms,ironiccompliments,andliteralcomplimentsdepictedinpuppetshows.Whenchildrendetectedtheuseofirony,theiraggressionratingsprovidedsupportfortheTingeHypothesisbuttheirhumorratingsindicatedthatthehumorfunctionwasnotrecognized.Considerthefollowingsituation:Martha,a7-year-oldgirl,andherfatherspentanentireSaturdaycleaningthehouseandcuttingthelawn.Uponreturninghomeandobservingthecompletedwork,Martha’smothercommentedtoMartha’sfather,“Yousurehavebeenlazytoday.”CanchildrenlikeMartharecognizethisremarkasanironiccompliment?Canchildrenrecognizeandinterpretthehumorintendedinthissortofremark?Thesearesomeoftheissuesexploredinthisresearch.SOCIALFUNCTIONSSERVEDBYVERBALIRONYWhywouldaspeakeruseverbalironyinsteadofliterallanguagetoconveyames-sage?Hereweusetheterm“verbalirony”torefertocounterfactuallanguagethatCorrespondenceandrequestsforreprintsshouldbesenttoMelanieHarris,DepartmentofPsychology,UniversityofCalgary,Calgary,AB,T2N1N4Canada.E-mail:[e-mail]atverbalironyisusedtoachievecomplexsocialandcommunicativegoals(Kreuz&Roberts,1995;Leggit&Gibbs,2000).Forinstance,onemaychooseironiclanguageoverliterallan-guageinordertobringhumortoasituation(Kreuz&Glucksberg,1989;Kreuz,Long,&Church,1991;Kumon-Nakamura,Glucksberg,&Brown,1995;Long&Graesser,1988;Roberts&Kreuz,1994).Examinationsofadults’perceptionsin-dicatethatironicremarksareoftenviewedasfunnierandmoreplayfulthanliteralremarks(Gibbs,2000;Kreuzetal.,1991)andthatironicspeakerstendtobeviewedashumorous(Pexman&Olineck,2002a).Ironicutterancesmightalsobemadewhenspeakerswishtoindirectlyconveytheirattitudestowardaparticularindividualorevent(Giora,1995;Sperber&Wilson,1986).Inthecaseofironiccriticisms(sayingsomethingpositivetomeansomethingnegative)thatattitudeisgenerallycritical,butironyallowsthecriticismtobeexpressedindirectly,therebyallowingthespeakertomutetheforceofone’smeaning.Thiseffecthasbeentermedthemutingfunction(Dews&Winner,1995).Dews,Kaplan,andWinner(1995)examinedthemutingfunctionandthehumorfunctionofironiccriticisms,reportingthatadultsratedironiccrit-icismsaslessmeanandmorefunnythanliteralcriticisms.Dewsetal.concludedthat“thetwooverarchingfunctionsofirony...[are]tosavefaceandtobefunny.”(p.366).Therearenowseveraltheoriesthathavebeendevisedtoexplainverbalironycomprehensionandprocessing.TheseincludetheEchoictheories(Kreuz&Glucksberg,1989;Sperber&Wilson,1981,1986),Pretense(e.g.,Clark&Gerrig,1984),andAllusionalPretensetheories(Kumon-Nakamuraetal.,1995),theGradedSalienceHypothesis(e.g.,Giora,1997),ImplicitDisplayTheory(Utsumi,2000),andColston’s(2002)theoryofContrastandAssimilation.Thesetheorieshavenottendedtofocusonthesocialfunctionsofirony.Incontrast,theTingeHypothesis(e.g.,Dewsetal.,1995)wasdevisedtoexplainthesefunctions.Thishypothesisassertsthatforironiccriticisms,thepositiveliteralmeaningoftheut-terancetingestheinterpretationofthespeaker’sintended(negative)meaningandresultsinalessnegativetone.TheTingeHypothesisisalsorelevanttointerpreta-tionofironiccompliments.Whereasanironiccriticismisapositivestatementmadewithanegativemeaningintended(e.g.,saying“You’resograceful”inresponsetosomeonetrippingandfalling),anironiccomplimentisanegativestatementwithapositivemeaningintended(e.g.,saying“You’resoclumsy”inresponsetosomeoneexecutingaperfectdiveoffthedivingboard).Dewsetal.re-portedthatironiccomplimentswereratedasmoreinsultingthanliteralcompli-ments.AccordingtotheTingeHypothesis,thisisbecausethenegativeliteralmeaningofironiccomplimentsresultsinalesspositiveinterpretation.Thus,theTingeHypothesisholdsthatironymutesthenegativityofcriticismandtingesthepositivityofpraise.Dewsetal.alsoreportedthatironicstatementswereperceivedtobefunnierthanliteralstatementsandarguedthatthehumorfunctionofironyCHILDREN’SPERCEPTIONSOFVERBALIRONY149resultsfrom“surpriseyieldedbythedisparitybetweenwhatissaidandwhatismeant.”(p.348).ChallengingtheTingeHypothesis,recentdataindicatesthatironydoesnotal-wayssoftencriticism.Forinstance,ithasbeenreportedthatadultsperceiveironiccriticismsasmorecondemningthanliteralcriticisms(Colston,1997),andthattheinterpretationadultsgivetoironydependsontheconsequencesofthesituationforthelistener(Colston,2002).PexmanandOlineck(2002b)foundthatwhenadultsratedspeakerintent,theypercei