Gendered Discourse Practices in Instant Messaging
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Transcript of Gendered Discourse Practices in Instant Messaging
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Gendered Discourse Practices
in Instant Messaging
Gisela RedekerUniversity of Groningen, The Netherlands
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Example (1): Instant message exchange (from Lee 2003)
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Outline of this Lecture
• Instant messaging as a CMC* genre• Gender differences: conflicting results• Corpus: 60 IM conversations• Topics & Amount of talk• Openings & Closings• Humor & Expressives• Conclusions & future research
* CMC = computer-mediated communication
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Instant Messaging as a CMC Genre
IM as a medium– Interactive (unlike websites, blogs)– Synchronous (unlike discussion lists, email)– One-to-one (unlike discussion lists,
chat)
IM as a mode of communication (usage):– Sustained (friends, colleagues at work)– Supplementary (+ face-to-face, phone, sms)
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Gender Differences
Men WomenInformation Social facilitation
Competitive Cooperative
Assertive Qualifying, justifying
More & longer turns Fewer & shorter turns
Short openings & closings Elaborate openings & closings
Sarcasm, teasing, joking Laughter; humorous anecdotes
Strong language Hedges, emotional language
Adversarial Supportive, polite
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But:• Results not always replicated (no difference or reversal)• Findings depend on familiarity of participants, gender
composition, and activity (meta-analysis by Leaper & Ayres 2007)
• This argues against an ‘essentialistic’ view of gender differences and for a social constructionist model.
• Most CMC genres involve mixed-sex groups of strangers• We need to (i.a.):
– study interactions among friends– compare same-sex vs mixed-sex interaction
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Studies of Gender in Instant Messaging
Baron (2004): 18 same-sex conversations of US undergraduates– Women’s conversations were longer than men’s.– Women took on average 9.8 turns to close a
conversation, men 4.3.– Women used more emoticons than men.– Men used more contractions than women.
Fox et al (2007): 212 same-sex & mixed conversations of US undergraduates– Women used more ‘expressiveness’ features
(emphasis, laughter, emoticons, adjectives).– Messages to women contained more references
to emotion.
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Corpus*• 60 private IM conversations among close friends,
solicited from 10 male and 10 female advanced university students (average age: 24)20 conversations of pairs of male friends20 conversations of pairs of female friends20 conversations of male-female pairs
• Total 21,947 words (min 79, max 1,201),3,620 turns (min 21, max 181)
* from den Dulk (2006); used by permission
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Hypotheses
1. Men use IM for informative, women for social purposes
2. In mixed dyads, men produce more words and more and longer turns than women; for same-sex dyads, the difference is reversed (Baron)
3. Men produce shorter openings and closings than women
4. Men produce more other-directed humor, women more humorous anecdotes
5. Men use fewer expressions of emotions than women, at least in male-male dyads (Fox et al)
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Variables in this Study
1. Main / initial topic of the conversation (focus on information or on the other)
2. Number of words and turns, words per turn
3. Openings (use of greeting a/o name)
Closings (number of turns from leave taking)
4. Humor (frequency and kind)
5. Expressives (verbal renderings, emoticons)
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Topics
• Focus on relationship with the otherInquire about a known activity or concern of the other (e.g. “How was your exam?”)
• Focus on informationTell news, ask a question, request information
• PlanningPropose or arrange a joint activity
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• Women use more relational topics than men in mixed (mf) and female-female (ff) dyads
• Men tend to give or ask information or make plans more often than women in same-sex and mixed dyads
Topic
0
20
40
60
80
100
m in mf mm w in mf ff
proc
ent
relation information planning
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Amount of Talk
• No differences in number of words • No differences in number of turns• No gender difference in turn length,
only:– Men produced shorter turns in mixed than in
male-male conversations (5.3 vs 6.5 words/turn)
– For women, the difference was smaller and not statistically significant (5.6 vs. 6.4 words/turn)
– Baron (2004) reports 5.2 and 5.3 words/turn
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Openings
• No opening (example 2)• Greeting (“hi”; “hey”, “ey” “good afternoon” in example 3)• Name or nickname (“Danny”, “dude” and “mister” in
example 3)
(2) Sara: how did it go???
(3) Jan: hey Danny Jan: dudeDanny: ey, good afternoon mister!
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• Men more often than women add a (nick)name to their greeting, esp. in the male-male dyads
• Both men and women use names less often in the mixed (mf) dyads
Opening
010203040506070
m in mf mm w in mf ff
perc
ent
none greeting name
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Closings
• Leave taking “gotta run”, “I’m gonna take a shower”
• Reference to future contact “See you this afternoon!”
• Bye “bye”, “[see y’] later”, “kisskiss”
Example (4) shows a 12-turn closing sequence:
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(4) Marlies: hey, but I’ll go take a shower, meeting someone for coffee in town
Marianne: I’ll have a cup of tea on the couchMarlies: oh wonderful, in this weather!Marlies: have a nice weekend! and til TuesdayMarianne: watching videos, of all my progrms Ihaven’t been able to watch this weekMarianne: see you TuesdayMarlies: oh that’s completely top of course!Marianne: and have a very nice weekendMarlies: bye!!!Marianne: ByyeMarlies: byMarlies: byee
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Female-female dyads produce longer closing sequences than male-male or mixed dyads (= Lee 2003, Baron 2004 for mm vs ff, but Lee 2003 also finds longer closings for mixed dyads)
Length of Closings
0123456789
10
mf mm ff
med
ian
num
ber o
f tur
ns
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Humor
1. Self-directed humor
2. Other-directed humor (teasing)
3. Humor about external referent
These will be illustrated in example (6)
4. Wordplay (example 5)
(5) Jasper: hey Francis pencis Francis: hey Jasper lasper
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TARGET:(6) Fran: I’m always free on Wednesdays.
Vera: that’s true, aren’t you always free…..:P OTHERFran: heeheeVera: hahahFran: the good life SELFVera: and hows theoFran: rich guyFran: heeheeFran: lets look for a rich guy for you tooFran: heehjeeFran: heeheeVera: yyyyyFran: can we go shopping and do fun things togetherVera: yes, he’d be welcome, cause I don’t own a cent SELFVera: and drink champagneFran: (wink)Vera: as long as he’s not from heereveen, hahaha EXTERNAL
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• Men tend to use more humor than women• Men and women tend to use more humor in
mixed dyads than in same-sex ones
Humor
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
m in mf mm w in mf ff
per 1
00 tu
rns
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• Men use more self-directed humor in the mixed dyads (= Lampert & Ervin-Tripp 2006)
• Men and women use more other-directed humor in mixed than in same-sex dyads.
• Men engage in wordplay in the male-male dyads, and less so in the mixed dyads.
Target of Humor
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
m in mf mm w in mf ff
per 1
00 tu
rns
self other external wordplay
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• Verbal renderings of laughter “haha”, “heehee”
• Interjections “wow”, “oh”, “hmmm”
• Emoticons smile, happy, kidding laugh or big grin tongue out, being silly sad, depressed
Expressive Elements
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Expressive Elements
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
m in mf mm w in mf ff
per 1
00 tu
rns
Men and women use more expressive words and icons in the mixed dyads than in the same-sex dyads.
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• Men use fewer verbalizations of laughter in the male-male dyads, but as many as the women in the mixed dyads.
• Men and women make much more use of interjections in the mixed dyads.
Laughter and Interjections
02
468
10
1214
m in mf mm w in mf ff
per 1
00 tu
rns
haha interjections
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• Men and women use more smileys than other emoticons (= Baron 2004)
• Men use more smileys in the mixed dyads (= Lee 2003)
Emoticons
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
m in mf mm w in mf ff
per 1
00 tu
rns
smiley other emoticons
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Conclusions • Expectations from ‘classic’ gender differences
were confirmed for:– Topic (information vs relation)– Closings (longer for female-female dyads)
• but not confirmed for:– Length (words, turns, turn length)– Humor– Expressives
• The most striking differences were found between the same-sex and mixed dyads:– Longer turns, fewer names in openings, much more
humor, more expressives• This supports the view that gender is
constructed situationally and interactively.
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Future Research
• Expand current study– Other stylistic features (affect, intensifiers, strong
language)
– Topic management
– More material
• Compare to email, sms, phone, face-to-face
• Expand beyond Western college students– Other cultures, educational levels, ages
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ReferencesBaron, Naomi S. (2004). See you online. Gender issues in college student use of instant messaging.
Journal of Language and Social Psychology 23(4): 397-423.Baron, Naomi S. (2008). Always On: Language in an Online and Mobile World. Oxford University Press.den Dulk, Fenja (2006). Gender en het gebruik van humor tijdens informele IM-conversaties [Gender and
the use of humor in informal IM conversations]. Unpublished M.A. Thesis, University of Groningen, Netherlands.
Fox, Annie B., Danuta Bukatko, Mark Hallahan & Mary Crawford (2007). The Medium Makes a Difference: Gender Similarities and Differences in Instant Messaging. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 26(4): 389-397.
Guiller, Jane & Durndell, Alan (2007). Students’ linguistic behaviour in online discussion groups: Does gender matter? Computers in Human Behavior 23: 2240–225.
Hancock, Jeffrey T. (2004). Verbal irony use in face-to-face and computer-mediated conversations. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 23(4): 447-463.
Herring, Susan C. & John C. Paolillo (2006). Gender and genre variation in weblogs. Journal of Sociolinguistics 10(4): 439-459.
Koch, Sabine, Mueller, B., Kruse, L., & Zumbach, J. (2005). Constructing gender in chat groups. Sex Roles 53(1-2): 29-41.
Lampert, Martin D. & Ervin-Tripp, Susan A. (2006). Risky laugher: Teasing and self-directed joking among male and female friends. Journal of Pragmatics 38(1): 51-72.
Leaper, Campbell & Ayres, Melanie M. (2007). A Meta-Analytic Review of Gender Variations in Adults' Language Use: Talkativeness, Affiliative Speech, and Assertive Speech. Personality and Social Psychology Review 11(4): 328-363.
Nardi, Bonnie (2005). Beyond bandwidth: Dimensions of connection in interpersonal interaction. The Journal of Computer-supported Cooperative Work 14: 91-130.
Schiano, D., C. Chen, J. Ginsberg, U. Gretarsdottir, M. Huddleston and E. Isaacs (2002): Teen Use of Messaging Media. Extended Abstracts of ACM CHI 2002 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 594–595). NY: ACM.
Thomson, Rob (2006). The Effect of Topic of Discussion on Gendered Language in Computer-Mediated Communication Discussion. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 25(2): 167-178.