Asymmetries in the Use of Verbal Irony

2019

Theoretical accounts of irony comprehension assume that when an ironic utterance is unfamiliar and the context does not prime for ironic interpretation, processing should take longer than when reading the same utterance with a literal meaning. This slowdown reflects problems in integrating the utterance into the developing text representation, which results in a reanalysis of the utterance. Similar assumptions are made about other forms of figurative language, such as metaphors, although studies have shown that there are differences in the cognitive demands of different forms of figurative language. Until fairly recently, most of the studies have ignored possible individual differences in irony comprehension among healthy adults. Recent results have suggested that there might be individual differences in irony comprehension related to working memory capacity (WMC) and emotion processing. In the present thesis, I wanted to answer the following questions: 1) How do readers resolve the meaning of irony? 2) How do individual differences in WMC and the ability to process emotional information affect the processing of irony? and 3) Does the processing of irony differ from the processing of other forms of figurative language, namely metaphors? These questions were examined in four studies using eye-tracking to tap into the detailed time-course of resolving the meaning of irony. The results of these studies showed that readers need to reprocess the ironic utterance to achieve the intended meaning, as suggested by the theories on irony comprehension. WMC aids this process by helping readers to keep contextual information in their mind while they integrate the meaning of the utterance with the context and/or inhibit a more salient literal interpretation while making the inference. Emotion processing abilities help to recognize the emotional cues of irony; readers with a poorer ability to process emotional information need to rely more on textual context to resolve the ironic meaning. Finally, resolving the ironic meaning differs from resolving other forms of figurative language, namely metaphors. Metaphors are easier to comprehend, and the processing of the intended meaning of metaphors starts at an earlier stage of reading. Moreover, emotion processing abilities are related to the processing of irony, but not metaphors. Based on the findings of this thesis, I present a new theoretical framework, the Cumulative Evidence Model.

Metaphor and Symbol, 2007

Results from 4 experiments support the view that, regardless of contextual information, when an end-product interpretation of an utterance does not rely on the salient (lexicalized and prominent) meanings of its components, it will not be faster than nor as fast to derive as when it does. To test this view, we looked into interpretations of salience-based (here, literal) interpretations and expectation-based (here, ironic) interpretations in contexts inducing an expectation for irony. In Experiment 1, expectancy was manipulated by introducing an ironic speaker in vivo who also uttered the target utterance. Findings show that ironic targets were slower to read than literal counterparts. Experiment 2 shows that ironies took longer to read than literals and that response times to ironically related probes were longer than to literally related probes, regardless of context. Experiments 3 and 4 show that, even when participants were given extra processing time and were exclusively presented ironically biasing contexts, the expectancy for irony acquired throughout such exposure did not facilitate expectancy-based compared to salience-based interpretations.

Journal of Pragmatics

This paper reports on two experiments which demonstrate that textual characteristics of irony (type of ironic evaluation and irony markers – e.g., hyperbole, quotation marks) can influence comprehension, perceived complexity and attitudes towards the utterance and text. Results of experiment 1 show that explicitly evaluative irony is perceived as less complex and is more appreciated than implicitly evaluative irony. In experiment 2, irony markers were found to increase comprehension, reduce perceived complexity and make attitudes towards the utterance more positive. Both experiments also demonstrate that the influence of irony on attitudes depends on comprehension and complexity; if irony is understood or perceived as relatively easy, it is better liked than when it is not understood or perceived as relatively difficult.

This article introduces the Verbal Irony Procedure (VIP), a first systematic method for identifying irony in natural discourse. The first section discusses previous operationalizations of irony and demonstrates that these are not explicit about which criteria were used to separate irony from non-irony. The second section argues why irony can be defined as an “utterance with a literal evaluation that is implicitly contrary to its intended evaluation.” This section also explains why ironic utterances can be placed on an evaluation scale. In the third section, clauses are proposed as a good unit of analysis when looking at irony in natural discourse. The different steps of the VIP are then introduced in the fourth section and subsequently applied in a sample analysis of a natural text in the fifth section. The sixth section discusses a reliability analysis of the VIP protocol. The article ends with an outlook on how future research on verbal irony might benefit from applying the VIP.

Journal of Neurolinguistics, 2019

We investigated the neurocognitive processes behind the asymmetry of affect observed in irony understanding, where ironic criticism is more easily understood than ironic praise. We recorded the ERPs of participants while they listened to positive (e.g., "These children are always smiling") or negative (e.g., "His son is very unfortunate") remarks pronounced with a sincere or ironic prosody. Participants had to decide whether or not the speaker was sincere. Behavioural results confirmed the asymmetry of affect phenomenon and ERP results revealed that the N400 and P600 were differentially sensitive to the negative or positive emotional connotations of the speaker's messages. These findings shed new light on the cognitive processes behind biphasic N400/P600 cycles, and how they are differentially affected by negativity. 1. Introduction Verbal irony is a form of nonliteral language in which speakers can convey implied meanings that intentionally contradict the literal meanings (e.g., saying "He is bright!" about somebody who says stupid thing). When they use verbal irony, speakers simultaneously communicate literal information and a dissociative attitude toward this literal information, and thus toward the referent (event, person or object). This attitude can be manifested by counterfactual aspects of the context, or by the speaker's facial cues, body posture, or tone of voice (Gibbs & Colston, 2007). For example, "That's a really good idea!" can be taken as either a compliment or a criticism, depending on the tone of voice, referred to as prosody in the literature. Although there is no consensus as to which vocal cues are most indicative of verbal irony, research has confirmed that prosody can inform listeners about a speaker's ironic attitude. For example, Bryant and Fox Tree (2002) found that participants could correctly distinguish between spontaneously produced ironic versus nonironic utterances based on prosody. Consistent with this, Rockwell (2000) showed that sarcastic irony can be detected when no context is provided, further emphasising the role of prosody in irony perception (see also Voyer & Techentin, 2010). Prosodic aspects of speech can therefore supplement or modify the meaning of the spoken sentence by providing valuable clues to the speaker's attitude. At least two kinds of prosody have been identified in the literature: emotional prosody and attitudinal prosody (Mitchell & Ross, 2013). While emotional prosody refers to the emotions conveyed by the tone of voice, attitudinal prosody refers to the expression of a person's attitude towards an event, person or object, be it scepticism, doubt, enthusiasm, or boredom (

International Journal of Psychology, 2013

V erbal irony relies on contrast, that is, incongruity between the situational context and the ironic assertion. But is the degree of contrast related to the perceived humorousness of ironic comments? We answered this question by conducting two experiments. In the first experiment, participants were asked to read a list of sentence pairs (ironic or control) and judge the extent to which the meaning of the first sentence contrasted with that of the second. In the second experiment, participants were invited to rate the humorousness of ironic comments compared with their literal counterparts. Results showed that ironic remarks were rated as more contrasting and more humorous than their literal counterparts, but that humour only emerged from a moderate contrast.

According to relevance theory, irony comprehension invariably entails the identification of some opinion or thought (echo) and the identification of the speaker’s dissociative attitude. In this paper, it is argued that it is also essential for hearers to identify not only that propositional attitude, but also the affective attitude that the speaker holds towards the source of this echo, so that an optimally relevant interpretive outcome is achieved. The term comprises feelings and emotions of a non-propositional quality which affect the propositional effects obtained in ironical communication. The paper further argues for the need to incorporate non-propositional effects to the traditional propositional object of pragmatic research.

Frontiers in psychology, 2017

Studies of irony detection have commonly used ironic criticisms (i.e., mock positive evaluation of negative circumstances) as stimulus materials. Another basic type of verbal irony, ironic praise (i.e., mock negative evaluation of positive circumstances) is largely absent from studies on individuals' aptitude to detect verbal irony. However, it can be argued that ironic praise needs to be considered in order to investigate the detection of irony in the variety of its facets. To explore whether the detection ironic praise has a benefit beyond ironic criticism, three studies were conducted. In Study 1, an instrument (Test of Verbal Irony Detection Aptitude; TOVIDA) was constructed and its factorial structure was tested using N = 311 subjects. The TOVIDA contains 26 scenario-based items and contains two scales for the detection of ironic criticism vs. ironic praise. To validate the measurement method, the two scales of the TOVIDA were experimentally evaluated with N = 154 subjects ...

HUMOR, 2014

Irony is often related to humor, both in spoken and written language. One possibility is that humor arises once people reconcile the incongruity between what speakers say and imply when using irony. Humor automatically emerges in these cases given the release of tension following a momentary sense of disparity. Our claim is that this proposal does not capture many of the dynamic complexities in real-world ironic discourse. We describe psychological research on irony understanding showing that ironic meanings are not always understood via a process of drawing conversational implicatures. Studies on people's spontaneous laughter when using irony suggest that the recognition of incongruity between what is said and implied is not necessary for eliciting humor. Laughter occurs at various places in conversation, and not necessarily at the end of speakers' utterances. People also laugh for reasons other than humor, such as to signal affiliation. Overall, finding the humor in irony ...

Journal of Memory and Language, 2017

In this paper we investigate the socio-emotional functions of verbal irony. Specifically, we use eye-tracking while reading to assess moment-to-moment processing of a character's emotional response to ironic versus literal criticism. In Experiment 1, participants read stories describing a character being upset following criticism from another character. Results showed that participants initially more easily integrated a hurt response following ironic criticism; but later found it easier to integrate a hurt response following literal criticism. In Experiment 2, characters were instead described as having an amused response, which participants ultimately integrated more easily following ironic criticism. From this we propose a two-stage process of emotional responding to irony: While readers may initially expect a character to be more hurt by ironic than literal criticism, they ultimately rationalize ironic criticism as being less hurtful, and more amusing.