Gender, Language and Influence

8/13/2019 Gender, Language and Influence

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INTERPERSONAL RELATIONS AND GROUPPROCESSES

Gender, Language, and Influence

Linda L. CarliCollege of the Holy Cross

Mixed- and same-sex dyads were observed to examine effects of gender co mpo sition on languageand of language on gender differences in influence. Ss discussed a topic on which they disagreed.Women were more tentative than men, but only in mixed-sex dyads. Women who spoke tentativelywere more influential with men and less influential with women. Language had no effect on howinfluential men were. In a second study, 120 Ss listened to an audiotape of identical persuasivemessages presented either by a man or a wo man, half of whom spoke tentatively. Female speakerswho spoke tentatively were more influential with male Ss and less influential with female Ss thanthose who spoke assertively. Male speakers were equally influential in each condition.

Researchers have reported a wide variety of language differ-ences between the sexes (e.g, Dabbs Ruback, 1984; Haas,1979; Kimble, Yoshikawa, Zehr, 1981; Mulac, Lundell, Bradac, 1986; Steckler Rosenthal, 1985), as well as genderdifferences in influenceability (Eagly & Carli, 1981). This ar ti-cle focuses on a number of the language differences that havebeen linked to gend er differences in status and power. In partic-ular, it examines the effect of sex composition of dyads ongender differences in language and, in turn, examines howthese differences affect social influence.

G e n d e r and Status

According to expectation states theory, inequalities in face-to-face interactions are a function of the relative status of partici-pants (Berger, Fisek, Norm an, Zelditch, 1977). In this model,status is culture specific and situation d epend ent. Th at is, indi-viduals may possess characteristics that reflect relatively lowstatus in one culture or situation but reflect high s tatus or con -vey no status information in another culture or situation. InAm erican culture, race, class, education, age, occupation, physi-cal attractiveness, and gender can act as diffuse status character-istics, characteristics of a person that are used, p articularly in

Preliminary analyses were presented at the 97th Annual Convention

of the Am erican Psychological A ssociation, August 1989, and at the2nd Annual Convention of the A merican Psychological Society, June1990.

I thank Michael Dorsey and three anonymous reviewers for theirhelpful comm ents on previous drafts of th is article. I also thank Mi-chael Carmen, Jane Kravitz, James Levy, Mary Ellen Mackesy, andDebbie R earick for their assistance in collecting, coding, and analyz-ing the data and for their thoughtful co ntributions to discussions aboutthe research.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed toLinda L . Carli, D epartme nt o f Psychology, College of the Holy Cross,Worcester, Massachusetts 0 1610.

the absence of specific inform ation, to assess his or her compe-tence, ability, or value (Berger Fisek, 1974; Berger, Rosen-holtz, Zeld itch, 1980; Eagly, 1983). Peop le with relatively highstatus are expected to be more competent, to perform better,and to have more desirable attributes than low status individ-uals; they are also given more opportunities to perform wellan d are, consequently, more influential (Berger et al, 1977,1980). In addition, in interactions amo ng peo ple who differ inrelative status, it is considered illegitimate for the individualpossessing lower status to behave too assertively, as such behav-ior could be construed as an attempt to gain status at the ex-pense of other members of the group (Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). Therefore, low status individuals whobehave assertively risk the rejection of others (Berger et al,1980; Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977).

Women generally have lower status than men, as is evidencedby the findings ha t stereotypical feminine traits are evaluatedless favorably than stereotypical m asculine traits (Broverman,Vogel, Broverman, Clarkson, Rosenkrantz, 1972) and thatwomen are considered to be less competent than men (Lock-heed Hall, 1976; Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). In interac-tions between men and w omen, in the absence of specific infor-mation abou t group memb ers' ability or competence, womenwould possess relatively lower status than men. However, insame-sex interactions, g ender would not act as a diffuse statuscharacteristic because it would convey no information about

the relative ability, competence, or value of different membersof the grou p. This suggests that in mixed-sex but not same-sexgroups, women would be given fewer opportunities to maketask contribu tions, w ould receive less support for their contri-butions, and would be less influential than men.

Language, Status, and G e n d e r

Lakoff(1975) proposed that assertive speech is one domainof power denied to women, but available to men. That is, be-cause women are relatively powerless and marginal compared

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 1990, Vol. 39, No. 3 ,941-931Copyright 199 0 by the American Psychological Association, Inc. 0022-3514/90/ 00.75

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942 LINDA L. CARLI

with men, they presumably are not given the opportunity toexpress themselves as forcefully and directly as men are. Lakoff(1975) argued that women's less powerful speech would bemanifested in their tendency to swear less, speak more politely,and use mo re tag questions, intensifiers, and hedges. Tag ques-tions refer to declarative statemen ts tha t are followed by a ques-tion concerning the statement (Lakoff, 1975), for example, Teenagers have more car accidents than older people, don'tthey? Statements are presumab ly less confident an d assertivewhen tag questions are added to them (Lakoff, 1975).

Intensifiers are adverbs, such as the word so in the sentence, Drinking and driving is so dangerous, that are used to provideemphasis but are considered by some researchers (Key, 1972;Lakoff, 1975) to be less powerful than more absolute superla-tives. Hedges are adverbs or adverb phrases, such as sort of,perhaps, and maybe, that weaken the strength of a statement(Hewitt Stokes, 1975; Lakoff, 1975).

Other researchers have also proposed links between statusand language, arguing that the lower status of women causesthem to interrupt o thers less than men d o (Thorne & Henley,

1975); to qualify and w eaken their statements with disclaimerssuch as / may be wrong but, I mean, and / don't know but (Pear-son, 1985); and to verbally reinforce the speech of others m orethan men do by interjecting yeah, mm-hmm, an d right whileothers are speaking (Th orne & Henley, 1975).

Studies testing these h ypotheses have yielded m ixed results,bu t overall provide supp ort tha t gender differences in languagedo exist. Although there is no documented evidence that m enswear more than women, and on e study found no gender differ-ence in th e rep orted use of expletives (Staley, 1978), wom en aremore polite (Hartman, 1976), less likely to interrupt (Argyle,Lalljee, & Cook, 1968; Eakins & Eakins, 1976; McCarrick,Manderscheid, & Silbergeld, 1981; Mulac, Wiemann, Widen-mann,

Gibson, 1988; Natale, Entin,

Jaffe, 1979; O ctigan &

Niederman, 1979; West & Z immerm an, 1983; Willis & Wil-liams, 1976; Z immerm an West, 1975), and less successful atgaining the floor after interrupting (Zimmerman & West,1975) than are men. In addition, some evidence indicates thatwomen are also more likely than men to hedge (Crosby Ny-quist, 1977, Studies 1 and 3; Fishman, 1978, 1980; Mulac &Lunde ll, 1986; M ulac et al, 1986), ask tag questions (Crosby &Nyquist, 1977, Studies 1 and 3; M cMillan, Clifton, M cGrath, Gale, 1977; Zimmerman & West, 1975), verbally reinforceothers (Fishman, 1978; H irschman, 1974), and use disclaimers(Hartma n, 1976; Hirschman, 1973) and intensifiers (Key, 1972;Mulac & Lundell, 1986; Mulac et al, 1986, 1988). Other re-searchers have found n o gender differences in language (Bau-man , 1976; Beattie, 1981 ; Crosby, Jose, & Wong-McCarthy,1981; Crosby Nyquist, 1977, Study 2; Dubois & Crouch, 1975;Moore, Shaffer, Goo dsell, & B aringoldz, 1983; Roger & Nes-shoever, 1987).

There are several possible exp lanations for the inconsistencyin finding s. First, it is possible that the gender differences arereal, but small, because small differences can be expected tosometimes lead to null results (Eagly, 1983).'

Ano ther possibility is that gender differences occur prim ar-ily when men and women are together and are less likely tooccur in same-sex interactions. In mixed-sex interactions,gender can act as a diffuse status cha racteristic. Consequently,

dom inant or assertive behavior among women would be leastappropriate when they are interacting with men (Berger et al,1980; Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). It is likely that subjectsin past research on language have used gender to infer status,because in much of this research subjects have been strangerswho had little specific information about o ne another. Diffusestatus characteristics are more likely to be used under suchconditions.

If gender differences in language are related to status differ-ences between the sexes, then status characteristics other tha ngender should also affect language. In fact, peop le, regardless ofgender, may use tentative language when interacting with some-one possessing higher status or power, but not when amongequals. There is evidence that this is the case. For example,amon g rom antic couples (Courtright, M illar, & Rogers-Millar,1979; Kollock, Blumstein, Schwartz, 1985), parents an d chil-dren (West Zim me rma n, 1977), and strangers (O'Barr, 1982;Roger & Nesshoever, 1987; Rogers & Jones, 1975), the morepowerful or dominant person of either sex is more likely tointerrupt and to be mo re successful at it, whereas the less power-

ful person tends to use more tag q uestions (Kollock et al, 1985).In addition, high status or high dominance men and womendisplay a greater amount of verbal and nonverbal power, asmeasured by the amount that subjects look at their partnerswhile speaking and look away while listening (Dovidio, Elly-son, K eating, Heltman, Brown, 1988), and in mixed-sex dis-cussions of gender neu tral topics, men display a greater amoun tof verbal and nonverbal power, except when the topic discussedwas sex typed; in that condition the gender that possessedgreater knowledge of it exhibited more verbal and nonverbaldominance (Dovidio, Brown, Heltman, Ellyson, & Keating,1988).

A third possible explanation for the inconsistency in find-

ings is that not all of the reported gender differences in lan-guage may reflect the greater tentativeness of women. In fact,two of th e gender differences, the use of intensifiers and verbalreinforcers, appear to be less a reflection of women's greatertentativeness than of heir greater emotional expressiveness andsociability.2 Verbal reinforcers serve to encourage others to con-

1 In some insta nces, un pred icted or nonsignificant gen der differ-ences in language may be a function of the am ount that subjects spoke.For example, Bilous and Krauss (1988) reported a greater num ber ofinterruptions among pairs of women than among mixed-sex pairs orpairs of men. However, they also reported that female pairs talkedmore than any other type of dyad. Clearly, the absolute number ofinterruptions (as well as tag qu estions, disclaimers, hedges, and othertypes of speech) should increase as the am ount of speaking increases.Unfortunately, a number of researchers reporting unpredicted or n on-significant results failed to report a test for the amount of speech (seeDubois Crouch, 1975; Lapadat Seesahai, 1978).

2 Some researchers have suggested that tag questions can reflect asocial-emotional orientation rather than tentativeness, because, forexample, tag questions can b e used to encourage others to speak (Fish-man, 1980; Johnson, 1980). Tag questions used in this way functionmuch m ore as questions than as statements and are sometimes codedas a type of question (Johnson, 1980). If questions do serve a socia l-emotional function, then gender differences in asking questionsshould be reported in studies of interaction processes, particularlyamong subjects interacting in same-sex groups. However, gender dif-


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GENDER, LANGUAGE, AND INFLUENCE 943

tinue speaking. As such, th eir function may be similar to that ofpositive social behaviors and agreements in task-orientedgroupscreating a more social or group-oriented interaction(Meeker & Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). Although intens ifies, suchas vastly, so , and awfully, have been considered tentative, theyare probably used by speakers to provide emphasis rather thanto express uncertainty (McMillan et al, 1977). It is possible,then , that gender differences in the use of inten sifies an d ver-bal reinforcers m ay not b e due to th e status difference betweenmen an d w omen, but rathe r to a gender difference in th e orien-tation that men and w omen have toward others.

A num ber of researchers have noted th at, in general, womentend to exhibit a social-emotional or relational orientation ininteractions with others, whereas men tend to exhibit a moreindependent and unemotional orientation (Chodorow, 1978;Dinn erstein, 1977; Eagly, 1987; Gilligan, 1982; M iller, 1976).This difference is often attribu ted to stable personality charac-teristics acquired through the different socialization of menand women. However, if this gender difference is intrinsic tomale and female personalities, women should consistently ex-

hibit a greater social-emotional orientation toward both menand women across a wide variety of situations. However, re-search has revealed that this is not the case; this gender differ-ence occurs primarily for same-sex interactions. That is,women tend to be particularly social and emotional in interac-tions with other w omen, and men the least so in interactionswith other men. For example, the friendships of wom en emp ha-size intimacy an d em otional expressiveness, the friendships ofmen emphasize shared activity (Aries Johnson, 1983; Aukett,Ritchie, Mill, 1988; Barth Kinder, 1988; Bell, 1981; Rubin,1985), and cross-sex friendships te nd to be less sex stereotypedthan same-sex friendships (Buhrke & Fuqua, 1987). Womenexhibit more positive social-emotional behavior than men insame-sex groups; in mixed-sex groups, bo th m en and womenbehave more like members of the opposite sex (Carli, 1989;Piliavin & Martin, 1978). In a study examining vocal cues inthe conversations of same- and mixed-sex dyads, interactionswere rated as most pleasant and least businesslike amongwomen, least pleasant and m ost businesslike among m en, andbetween these two extremes in mixed-sex interactions (Hall &Braunwald, 1981). This same pa ttern o f findings has been alsorevealed in reviews of research on nonverbal behav iors, such assmiling and touching (H all, 1984), and cooperativeness (Carli,1982). It appears, then, that different norms do operate insame-sex interactions than in mixed-sex interactions, and thatthese no rms lead to a pa ttern of behavior that is most social ingroups of women and least social in groups of men.

A reasonable conclusion based on the literature is that the

ferences in asking questions have not been found in studies of interac-tion style in sam e- or mixed-sex groups (Carli, 1989; Piliavin & Martin,1978), and asking questions has not been considered a social-emo-tional behavior in Bales's (19S0) model of group interaction. Peoplemay ask questions for many different reasons, for example, to obtaininformation, to test the knowledge of others, to assist others in formu-lating their ideas, or even to express disagreement (see Carli, 1989). Forthe purpose of this study, questions added to the end of statementswere considered tag questions when the statements that they followedwere known to reflect the subject's opinion.

gender difference in so cial-emotion al orientation is a functionof expectancies and behavior norm s that depend , in p art, onthe gender com position of the group in which subjects interact,and not on gender differences in personality. The sex composi-tion of groups may affect the salience of gender as a socialcategory; this, in tur n, m ay trigger gender-linked schemas lead-ing to different gender-related expectancies and behaviors(Deaux & Major, 1987). It is likely that different schemas andexpectancies are associated with same-sex interactions thanwith mixed-sex interactions. Because gender belief systems(Deaux & Kite, 1987), which are the set of beliefs that peoplehold about the characteristics and behaviors of men andwomen, typically include the stereotype that women are moresocial and expressive than men (Broverman et al, 1972; Wil-liams & Best, 1982), subjects may expect a high amount ofsocial-emotional behavior in interactions among women andvery little in interactions among men; these expectancies maybe self-fulfilling. Subjects may also enter mixed-sex interac-tions expecting sex-typed behavior from those of the oppositesex. Because norm s governing their behav ior may be less clear

than in same-sex interactions, individuals may, as a result, ex-hibit behavior that is more similar to that which they expectfrom the opp osite sex.

Gender-related expectancies may be clearer for same-sexgroups because sex segregation is common in American cul-ture. From preschool on, children interact primarily in same-sex groups (Lockheed Klein, 1985; Maccobx 1988; Maccoby Jacklin, 1987). Although this pattern w eakens somewhat dur-ing adolescence and adulthood, sex segregation during thesedevelopmental stages is characteristic of friendships (Ver-brugge, 1977), occupations (Reskin, 1984; Reskin & Hart-man n, 1986; R oos, 1985), and activities (Berk, 1985; Hartmann,1981).

If the use of inten sifies and verbal reinforcers d oes reflect asocial-emotional orientation to a group interaction, thengender differences in their use should occur in same-sex inter-actions, but to a lesser extent, if at all, in mixed-sex interactions.On th e other han d, if the gender difference in the use of tenta-tive versus assertive language is a function of the status differ-ence between the sexes, then gender differences in the use ofinterruptions, tag questions, hedges, and disclaimers shouldoccur in mixed-sex interactions but not in same-sex interac-tions.

Few o f the previous studies that have obtained gender differ-ences have included c omp arisons of the gender differences inmixed-sex interactions with those in same-sex interactions.However, those tha t have, have repo rted that the gender differ-ence in interruptions (McMillan et al , 1977; Octigan Nieder-man, 1979; Zimmerm an West, 1975) was larger in mixed-sexinteractions and the gender difference in use of verbal rein-forcers (Hirschman, 1974) was marginally larger in same-sexinteractions, providing some support for the argument devel-oped above.3

3 One study (Crosby Nyq uist, 1977) found n o effect of sex com po-sition on language. H owever, in this study researchers combined polite-ness, tag questions, and hedges to create an index of tentative languagerather than testing each behavior separately. A second (Mulac, Wie-mann, Widenmann, Gibson, 1988), found larger gender differences


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944 LINDA L. CARLI

Hypothesis 1. Gend er differences in the use of tag questions,hedges, and disclaimers, w ith a higher amo unt of each behaviorexhibited by w omen, w ill be larger in m ixed-sex tha n same-sexgroups.

Hypothesis 2. Gen der differences in interruption s, with ahigher amount of interruptions and successful interruptionsexhibited by men, will be larger in mixed-sex than same-sexgroups.

Hypothesis 3. Gen der differences in the use of inten sifiesand verbal reinforcers, with a higher amount of each behaviorexhibited by women, will be larger in same-sex tha n mixed-sexgroups.

Gender, Language, and Influence

According to Lakoff (1975), the use of u ncertain or tentativelanguage limits women's ability to express themselves and putsthem at a disadvantage when interacting with others. In fact,individuals who speak tentatively are evaluated less favorablythan those w ho speak assertively (Wiley Eskilson, 1985) and

are considered less credible and attractive (Erickson, Lind,Johnson, & O'Barr, 1978). Moreover, women who speak tenta-tively are considered less intelligent and knowledgeable thanmen who speak tentatively (Bradley, 1981), so the use of tenta-tive speech would app ear to interfere w ith a woman's ability toinfluence others more than a man's.

However, it is possible that tentative language may also befunctional for women, particularly when they are interactingwith men. In interactions with men, women are not only ex-pected to be less comp etent, but they are also expected to showrelatively little com petitiveness or dom inance (Meeker Weit-zel-O'Neill, 1977). Exhibiting competitive or d om inant behav-ior can be construed as an attempt to gain status or influence,

and such attempts are considered inapprop riate in people whoare low in external status, regardless of their level of compe-tence (Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). Such people must dem-onstrate an altruistic desire to help the group before the ir con-tributions w ill be accepted by high status mem bers; moreover,for low status individuals, displaying behavior that is grouporiented and not self-enhancing may be even more importantthan appearing competent (Hollander Julian, 1970; Meeker& Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). Because women may find it difficultto influence men if they behave too assertively (Lockheed &Hall, 1976; Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977), they may insteadhave to rely on more sub tle and less direct strategies to induceinfluence (Johnson, 1976). One subtle approach to influencemay be the use of unc ertain or tentative language.

Women, and people who possess little power, do rep ort usingmore indirect influence strategies than men and more power-ful individuals (Cowan, Drin kard , MacG avin, 1984; Falbo Peplau, 1980; Gruber & W hite, 1986; Howard, Blumstein, &Schwartz, 1986; Offermann & Kearney, 1988; Raven, Centers,& Rodrigues, 1975). For example, women report that they relyon being likable or pleasant (Falbo Peplau, 1980; Offermann& Kearney, 1988; Raven et a l, 1975) and cry or hint to get their

in same-sex groups, but, again, combined all behaviors to create anoverall measure of gender differences in language.

way (Falbo & Peplau, 1980; Howard et al, 1986). Althoughthere is no evidence that an indirect strategy is more^ effectivefor women than being direct, women interacting with menwould probably be more influential by speaking tentatively,even though they would probably be perceived as less compe-tent.

However, there may be little benefit for women to speaktentatively to other women. In same-sex interactions, genderdoes no t act as a diffuse status characteristic (Berger & F isek,1974), so there would be no need for a wom an to behave deferen-tially under such conditions. Moreover, women are generallyassumed to be less competent than men (Lockheed & Hall,1976; Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977), and the ir use of tenta-tive language further reduces their perceived competence(Bradley, 1981). Consequently, a woman using tentative speechwith another woman may not be seen as competent enough tobe persuasive and may actually be less influential than awoman speaking assertively.

Hypothesis 4. Women will be more influential with menwhen speaking tentatively th an when speaking assertively, and

more influential with women when speaking assertively.

Study 1

Method

Pretest. A pretest questionnaire was administered to 229 under-graduates in introductory psychology classes at a state university. Theywere contacted at the beginning of the semester and asked to completea questionnaire on which they would indicate their opinion on a vari-ety of topics. Subjects were informed that comp leting the question-naire would provide them with an opportunity to participate in a studylater in the semester. The questionnaire included 27 topics, 2 of whichhave been found to be sex neutral in previous research (Carli, 1989): The drinking age should be lowered to 18 in this state (Massachu-setts) and The federal governm ent should provide free day care forworking parents. Subjects indicated th eir agreement with each itemon a scale ranging from completely disagree (1) to completely agree (10),their interest in each item on a scale ranging from no interest (1) toextremely high interest (10), an d the ir knowledge of each item on a scaleranging from no knowledge (1) to extremely high knowledge (10).

The purpose of the questionnaire was to identify sex-neutral topics ,those for which there are no sex differences in interest, knowledge, oropinion. T he use of sex-biased top ics could lead to artifactual genderdifferences; th e use of topics th at favor one sex results in greater verbalassertiveness and power by members of tha t sex (Dovidio et al , 1988;Kelly, Wildman, & Urey, 1982) and greater influenceability amongthose of th e opposite sex (Sistrunk & McD avid, 1971). The drinkingage and day-care topics were again found to be sex neutral and, inaddition, opinions on these topics were found to be quite variable,ensuring that subjects could be paired w ith partners w ith whom theydisagreed.

Subjects. Respon dents expressing relatively neutral opin ions, re-porting scores of 5 o r 6 on the opinion scale, were eliminated from th esample of 229. The subjects, 59 men and 59 w omen, were selected atrandom from the remaining pretest subjects.

Procedure. Subjects were recruited by telephone about 6 weeksafter com pleting the pretest and asked to schedule an appointmen t toparticipate in th e study. They were scheduled in pairs, half with same-sex pa rtners and half w ith opposite-sex par tners, resulting in 58 sub-jects in mixed-sex pairs, 30 in female pairs, and 30 in male pairs.Pairings were made randomly, with the exception that partners always


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were paired so that they disagreed with one another on both topics.The amount of disagreement varied randomly among the pairs.

Because subjects had b een assigned pa rtners at ran dom , the differ-ence in opinion between partners was not expected to vary across thethree types of sex composition (mixed-sex, male, or female). One-wayanalyses of variance (ANOVAS) on the difference scores revealed no ef-fect of sex composition for either topic, F < 1. Levene's (1960) test to

detect heterogeneity of variance revealed no difference between thegroups, F < \ .Before the experiment began, partners were informed that they

would be discussing a controversial topic with one another and thatthey would be videotaped during the discussion. Subjects were thengiven an opp ortunity to withdraw. None did .

A random selection of approximately half of the p airs was then pre-sented with the drinking age topic and half with the day-care topic,4

and these subjects were asked to discuss the topic for 10 min. Theexperimenter then left and videotaped th e discussion from an adjacentroom through a one-way mirror. After the discussion, subjects wereseparated from their partners and asked to indicate their opinion onthe topic they had just discussed on a scale ranging from completelydisagree (1) to completely agree (10). Subjects were then fully debriefedand excused.

Results

The top ic of the discussion had no effect on any of the resultsand was eliminated from the analyses. Because gender wasboth a within-group variable for the mixed-sex dyads and abetween-group variable for the same-sex dyads, separate AN OVAS were required for these two type s of dyads.' For the mixed-sex dyads, a 2 X 29 (Gender X Dyad) repeated-measures ANOVAwas conducted because each dyad contained both a male and afemale subject. For th e same-sex dyads, a 2 X 15 (Gender XDyad) ANOVA was conducted, with dyads nested within genderbecause some dyads were exclusively male an d some exclusively

female.6

1 followed a procedure that has been used previously(Carli, 1989) to combine the two data analyses; this involvedcomputing a linear combination of the means as well as a linearcombination of the between- and within-groups error terms.The analysis yielded t tests of the following effects: m ain effectof gender, main effect of sex composition, and the interactionof gender and co mpo sition. For example, to test the hypothesisthat the size of the gend er difference is larger in mixed- than insame-sex dyads, the interaction te rm , I performed the followingcontrast:

- Mf, + ( l)

in w hich Mt o is the m ean for wom en in mixed-sex groups, A4,m

is the mean for men in mixed-sex groups, M

b is the mean forwomen in same-sex groups, and A4, is the mean for men insame-sex groups. M S is the pooled error term, which com-bines the error term for gender from the repeated-measuresanalysis with that from the between-groups analysis; n{ is thenumb er of observations on which each mean was based.

Coding ofvideotapes. A m ale and a female rater, unaware ofthe h ypotheses or pu rpose of the study, analyzed all of he video-tapes an d recorded for each subject the frequency o f the follow-ing behaviors: disclaimers, hedges, tag questions, interrup tions,successful interrup tions, intensifiers, and verbal reinforcers.7 Arecord was also m ade of the num ber of arguments presented byeach subject and the total number of words spoken by each

subject. P earson co rrelation coefficients were used to test th ereliability of the raters. Because subjects' responses could notbe considered independent of their partners', the 59 pairs ofsubjects were randomly divided into two gro ups of 59 subjectsand the analyses were performed separately for the two groups.The average of the correlation coefficients for the two groups,comp uted separately for each type of behavior and for the totalnumb er of words, ranged from r(57) = .82, p < .001, to r(57) =.96, p < .001. The judgments of the two raters were highlyreliable.

Effect of gender and sex composition on language. A totalmeasure of subjects' use of tentative language was computed bysumming each subject's number of qualifiers, hedges, and tagquestions. A nalyses were conducted on each of the three behav-iors separately, as well as on th e total m easure and the num berof words spoken by each subject. There were no m ain effects o rinteractions for the number of words spoken by each subject,F< 1; there were no differences in the amou nt that men andwomen spoke in either the mixed- or same-sex dyads. A maineffect of sex composition was found for the n umb er of hedges,

?(56) = 2.38, p < .05. There were more hedges in mixed-sex th anin same-sex dyads (M = 15.64 vs. 12.15, respectively). A main

4 Fifteen of the mixed-sex pairs, eight of the female pairs, and eightof the m ale pairs were assigned the drinking-age topic.

5 The sources of variance an d degrees of freedom for the mixed-sexdyads were as follows: dyads on 28 degrees of freedom, gender on 1degree of freedom, and the interaction of gender with dyads on 28degrees of freedom. The sources of variance and degrees of freedomfor the same-sex dyads were as follows: gender on 1 degree of freedom,dyads nested within gender on 28 degrees of freedom, and subjectsnested w ithin dyads on 30 degrees of freedom.

6 A 2 (Sex o f Subject) X 2 (Sex of Partner) analysis of variance (ANOVA)would require arbitrarily assigning one m ember of each dyad to be thesubject and the other to be the partner. The means for each genderwould then be based on only one half of the actual subjects in eachcondition. For example, although there were a total of 30 men in th esame-sex dyads, the mean w ould be based on the 1S men assigned to besubjects. The analysis used in this study allows all subjects to be in-cluded in the analysis.

7 Examples of each o f the behaviors are given later. Disclaimers wererecorded when they immediately preceded a statement or opinion andincluded I'm no expert, I may be wrong, I'm not sure, I don't know, Isuppose, I mean, and / guess. Adverbs or adverb phrases used in themiddle of statements were coded as hedges when they conveyed eithermoderation or no particular meaning at all, as in Drinking and driv-ing is like dangerous, and included kind of, sort of, you know , m aybe, or

whatever, and like. Q uestions such as isn't it?aren't they?don't you think?wouldn't you say? you knew? an d right? were coded as tag questionswhen they were added to the end of statements that were consistentwith a subject's original attitud e, for example, It's unfair to prevent18-year-olds from drinking when they can be drafted and killed inwars, isn 't it? Interrup tions were recorded whenever a subject at-tempted to make a statement while his or her partner was speaking.They were coded as successful when the person doing the interruptinggained the floor immediately after interrupting. Adverbs used in themiddle of statements were coded as intensifiers when they were used toconvey emphasis or intensity, such as so, very, really, awfully, and truly.Adverbs indicating agreement were coded as verbal reinforcers whensubjects used them while or immediately after the ir partn er spoke, forexample, right, yeah, yes, mm-hmmm, sure, and uh-huh.


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946 LINDA L. CARLI

Table 1Effect of Sex Composition a nd Gender on Use of Tentative Languagean d Interruptions in M ixed-Sex Dyads

Sex

WomenM en

'(56)

Disclaimers

7.552.41

4.36**

Tag questions

0.830.31

2.38*

Hedges

18.5912.69

2.83*

Total

26.9715.41

4.42**

Interruptions

6.287.79

0.91

Note. The numbers reflect the mean for each behavior. Total refers to the total amount of tentativelanguage. Tests are one-tailed.* / > < . 0 5 . * * / > < . 0 0 1 .

effect of gender was obtained for the number of disclaimers,f(56) = 2.73, p < .05, and the total am oun t of tentative language,t(56) = 2.79, p < .05. Women used m ore disclaimers than men(M = 6.25 vs. 4.04) and spoke more tentatively overall (M =21.99 vs. 16.98). No other main effects were obtained.

To test Hypothesis 1, that women's speech would contain

more tentative language and that th is gender difference w ouldbe more pronounced in mixed-sex dyads, I compared thegender differences in mixed-sex p airs with those in same-sexpairs. As predicted, significant o ne-tailed interactions were o b-tained for the num ber of disclaimers, t{56) - 3.49, p < .001; tagquestions, *(56) = 1.70, p < .05; hedges, ?(56) = 2.25, p < .05; andfor the total am oun t of tentative language, f(56) = 3.52, p < .001.In each case, the gender difference was larger in mixed-sexdyads. Contrasts revealed tha t in m ixed-sex dyads, women ex-hibited more of each type of tentative behavior than men (seeTable 1). There were no gender differences for the same-sexdyads, p > .25.

Analyses conducted on the num ber of interruptions and the

numb er of successful in terruption s revealed no m ain effect ofgender or sex composition and no interactions for either vari-able. The number of times men interrupted was larger than th enumber of times women interrupted (Af = 7.10 vs. 5.81), butthis difference was not significant, {(56) = 1.48. In addition , as afurther test of Hypothesis 2, a contrast testing the predictedgender difference in interru ptions in mixed-sex dyads was con-ducted. A s is shown in Table 1, there was no gend er differencein interruptions in mixed-sex dyads.

Analyses were conducted for the num ber of intensifiers a ndthe num ber of verbal reinforcers. No m ain effects of gender orsex composition were obtained. The third hypothesis, thatwomen would use a greater number of intensifiers and verbalreinforcers and that these gender differences would be morepronounced in same-sex dyads, was then tested by comparingthe gender differences in m ixed- and same-sex dyads. As pre-dicted, significant o ne-tailed interactions were obtained for thenum ber of intensifiers, t(56) = 1.75, p < .05, and verbal rein-forcers, f(56) = 1.79, p < .05. In both cases, the gender differ-ence was larger for sam e- than for m ixed-sex dyads. One-tailedcomparisons revealed that in same-sex dyads, women usedmore intensifiers (M = 2.83 vs. 1.52), t(56) = 2.21, p < .05, an dverbal reinforcers (M = 23.90 vs. 19.76), .25.

Analysis of he opinion measure. To compute the amount of

attitude change, I subtracted subjects' opinion ratings on thequestionnaire from their initial pretest opinions. Attitudechange scores in the direction of the partners' opinion wereassigned a positive value. Scores ranged from - 2 to 9. Levene's(1960) test of heterogeneity of variance revealed no differencesbetween m en an d w omen in variability of influence scores, F .25.


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subjects did not know each other well enough or have enoughtime to get to know one another. It is possible that when interac-tions are more formal, as may have been th e case in the presentstudy, the overall amou nt of interru pting is reduced, creating afloor effect and obscuring any gender difference.9

Finally, support was obtained for the third hypothesis. Insame-sex dyads, women were more likely to use intensifiers andverbal reinforcers than men, whereas no gender differencesemerged in mixed-sex dyads. Women's greater use of these tw oforms of speech may reflect their tendency to exhibit moresocial and emotional behavior when interacting with otherwomen and the tendency of male dyads to emphasize task-oriented behavior (Carli, 1989). These results indicate that ste-reotypical gender differences in language may occur for rea-sons unrelated to status. Consequently, a careful exam ination ofother such differences wou ld be needed before concluding tha ta pa rticular form of speech is less powerful simply because it isfavored by women.

Although the results of this study dem onstrate a relationshipbetween the use of tentative language on the part of women andtheir ability to influence m en, this relationship may or m ay notbe causal. It is possible, for example, th at the w omen who spokemost tentatively to their m ale partne rs were also more pleasantor friendly than the more assertive women; th eir ability to influ-ence their partn ers may have been a function of their friendli-ness rather than their tentativeness. A second study was con-ducted to test whether the relationship between language andinfluence w as, indeed , causal.

Study 2

In th e first study, the use of tentative speech h ad n o effect on

how influential women were when interacting with otherwomen. It is possible that in interactions between individuals ofrelatively equal status, wom en interacting w ith women o r meninteracting with men, language is irrelevant. On the other h and,it is more probable that some other ch aracteristic of the interac-tions between the women in the present study eliminated theeffect of tentative language. For example, influence may havebeen affected by subjects' interaction style, which has alreadybeen shown to affect influence, and which is, in turn, affectedby th e sex compo sition of gro ups (Carli, 1989). Finally, the lackof an effect m ay have been d ue to the small num ber of femalepairs and the few degrees of freedom, resulting in too littlepower to detect the effect.

As stated earlier, women in general are considered to be lesscompetent than men, and the use of tentative language is likelyto further reduce perceived competence. In interactions withmen, this may not be a disadvantage because a woman's tenta-tiveness would then be consistent with her relative status. Ininteractions with other women, who are statu s equals, tentative-ness may have no particu lar advantage, but would still probablyreduce perceived competence. Consequently, the use of tenta-tive language may reduce a woman's ability to influence an-other woman.

In th e first study, the u se of tentative language had no effecton how influential men were. Being male may make one alegitimate leader (Meeker Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). As a result,

men may be assumed to be competent and knowledgeable, re-gardless of their speech.

Hypothesis 1. Women will be more influential with menwhen speaking tentatively and more influential with womenwhen speaking assertively.

Hypothesis 2 . Men will be equally influential, whether theyspeak assertively o r tentatively.

Method

Pretest. A sample of 34 male and 67 female introductory psychol-ogy students indicated their interest, knowledge, and opinion con-cerning each of 28 topics. R atings were made on 11-point scales rang-ing from no interest (1) to extremely high interest (11), no knowledge (1)to extremely high knowledge (11), and completely disagree (1) to com-pletely agree (11), respectively. The purp ose o f the pr etest was to iden-tify topics that revealed no sex differences and for which there waslittle variability in opinion. T he topic selected to b e used in the studywas The college bus system should charge a fare each time someoneuses a bus. All students in th e pretest felt strongly th at the bus systemshould remain free.

Subjects. Sixty m ale and 60 female und ergraduates were recruitedfrom psychology classes. Subjects received extra credit for participat-ing in the study.

Procedure. A persuasive message of approximately 500 words waswritten in suppo rt of charging a fare. Some of the arguments includedin the message were as follows: More buses could be pu rchased w iththe money, which would allow buses to run more frequently; themoney could be spent on add itional training foi drivers, which wouldincrease bus safety; the money could be used to help maintain thebuses and prevent breakdowns; students are already paying for thebuses through student fees, but not all students who pay student feesactually use the buses; people who are not students can take the buseseven though they pay no student fees; and add itional routes could beadded. This message without added tag questions, hedges, or dis-claimers constituted the assertive version of the message. A second,

tentative version was created by adding tag questions, hedges, anddisclaimers. The language used in this version was constructed to becomparable to that used by highly tentative subjects in Study 1. The twoversions were identical in every other respect.

Two male and two female confederates rehears ed bo th versions ofthe message until they were able to present them in a relaxed, nformalmanner. Separate audiotapes w ere made of the four speakers present-ing each of the two versions of the message, resulting n a to tal of eightdifferent speeches.

Subjects were randomly assigned to one version of the speech. Theywere told that the tape had been made of another student who hadbeen asked whether a fare should be charged for the use of the collegebus system. The experiment was conducted in a language laboratory,which made it possible for subjects to participate in groups and fordifferent versions of the speech to be presented simultaneously overheadphones.

After listening to one version of the speech, subjects rated theiropinion on the topic o n an 11-point scale ranging from complete dis-agreement (1) to complete agreement (11). They then rated the speakeron 11 -point scales indicating w hether he or she was not knowledgeable(1) or very knowledgeable (11), not interested (1) or very interested (11),high in confidence (1) or low in confidence (11), powerless (1) o r powerful

9 Cramer's (1946) test of skewness revealed that the d istribution ofscores was highly skewed to the right, sk = 5.87. The majority of sub-jects interrupted approximately 6 or 7 times; a small number of themshowed a higher amoun t of interruptions.


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948 LINDA L. CARLI

Table 2Measure of Agreement With Speaker

Gend er of subject

Speaker

MaleTentative languageAssertive language

FemaleTentative languageAssertive language

Male

4.133.80

5.002.93

Female

4.075.20

3.135.93

Note. Higher scores reflect greater agreem ent w ith the persuasive me s-sage.

(11), low in competence (1) or high in competence (11), trustworthy (1) oruntrustworthy (11), very likable (1) or not likable (11), low in intelligence(1) or high in intelligence (11), and not tentative (1) or very tentative (11).After completing the questionnaire, subjects were debriefed and ex-cused.

Results

There were no effects due to the individual speakers, so thisvariable was eliminated from the analysis. Levene's (1960) testto detect heterogeneity revealed no difference in variability forthe male and female speaker conditions, F < 1. A 2 (Gender ofSubject) X 2 (Gender of Speaker) X 2 (Type of Language) ANOVAwas conducted on the dependent variables. For the opinionmeasure, a Gender of Subject X Type of Language interactionwas obtained, F(l, 112)= 10.34, p < .01 . Women were in-fluenced more by assertive tha n tentative language (M = 5.57vs. 3.60), F(l, 112) = 8.04, p < .01, and men were marginally

more influenced by tentative than assertive language (A/= 4.57vs. 3.37), F(l , 112) = 2.98, p < .10. In addition, as predicted, athree-way interaction was obtained revealing larger languageeffects for female speakers, t(l 12) = 1.71, p < .05, one-tailed.Planned contrasts performed on the means, which are pre-sented in Table 2, provided support for Hypothesis 1. Femalespeakers were more influential with men when they spoke tenta-tively than when they spoke assertively, t \ 12) = 2.11, p < .05,one-tailed, and more influential with women when they spokeassertively than when they spoke tentatively, r(l 12) = 2.85, p ,25.

Subjects' ratings of the speaker were coded so that high scoresreflected a high am oun t of each characteristic, ANOVAS revealedmain effects of type of language for how tentative, confident,powerful, competent, intelligent, and knowledgeable thespeaker was perceived to be. As Table 3 shows, speakers whospoke tentatively were judged to b e more tentative and less con-fident, powerful, com petent, intelligent, and knowledgeable. Agender of sp eaker effect was also obtained for how knowledge-able the speaker was perceived to be, F (l, 112) = 6.57, p < .05.Male speakers were judged to be more knowledgeable thanfemale speakers (M = 8.75 vs. 8.03, respectively). In ad dition, aType of Language X Gender of Speaker interaction was ob-tained for ratings of the speaker's knowledge, F(l, 112) = 4.36,

p < .05, and marginally for ratings of how competent thespeaker was, F(l, 112) = 3.10, p < .10. Contrasts revealed noeffect of language on the perceived com petence or know ledgeof male speakers, p > .25. However, women speaking asser-tively were judged to be more competent, F( l, 112) = 13.97, p x>. 15 1-169). New York: Springer-Verlag.

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Revision received May 14,1990Accepted June 27,19 90

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