How to Look Ironic With Your Face and Your Voice (and Should You?)

When you start a conversation with someone, an implicit expectation is that they will tell you veridical things. And yet, in everyday life, false statements, which state things that do not conform to reality, are legion! This include lies, pretense, genuine errors, figures of speech, and fictional discourse. Sometimes false statements are blatantly false as in the case of metaphors such as "Tom's lawyer is a shark." But most often, false statements are not intrinsically false and we identify falseness because we have information about reality that allows us to conclude, for example, that Iraq does not have weapons of mass destruction, that your 10-year old niece is only pretending to be a schoolteacher, or that the chocolate is not in the blue container but actually in the red container.

How About Nonverbal Clues?

Our special interest is the situation where the speakers themselves provide nonverbal clues that their statements are false. Generally, people want their nonverbal expressions to support their words (for instance, in lying or role play), but there is an exception: when the speaker is being ironic.

Being ironic is a strange move: it consists of saying the opposite of what you think or what happens while simultaneously conveying what you really think! For example, Mark can say "As usual, you're perfectly on time" to Tom who arrives 1 hour late. How do speakers imply what they really think, in such a way that most adults will immediately understand?

To answer this question, we filmed about 100 speakers saying the sentence "Honestly, it was really great" while imagining a certain context (a day at Disneyland). For half of the speakers, the context involved saying the sentence ironically (because actually the day was a fiasco), while for the other half of the speakers, the context involved saying the sentence sincerely (because the day was a success). Importantly, we did not give them any further instructions on how to play their roles. As long as they respected the text, they could act it out in a totally free way.

Ironic Versus Sincere: What Makes The Difference?

First of all, it was very easy for observers to tell them apart: 75% of ironic speakers were recognized as "ironic" and 83% of sincere speakers as "sincere." This shows that people know how to convey these two different attitudes with nonverbal cues.

Furthermore, ironic speakers were still distinguishable from sincere speakers when there was only the image of the speakers (no sound), and when there was only the voice of the speakers (no image)!

When we compared discrimination between ironic and sincere speakers in the voice-only versus image-only conditions, accuracy was better when there was face but no voice. This is interesting because linguists and psycholinguists have talked about an “ironic” tone of voice for several decades, but concerning facial expressions, science says almost nothing! And yet, facial expressions were more reliable in guiding irony judgments than tone of voice.

By analyzing nonverbal behaviors in detail, we observed that ironic speakers differ from sincere speakers in many ways, both in the vocal channel and in the facial channel. The strongest cues were these:

  • Ironic speakers spoke more slowly and made more pauses
  • They smiled less and produced more mouth movements such as twisting the mouth or tightening the lips
  • They looked less at their addressee and produced more “eyebrow flashes” (very rapid raisings of the eyebrows)

Thus, speaking slowly, looking away, and producing eyebrow flashes and unusual mouth movements make up a repertoire of nonverbal cues that ironic speakers can use. This list is probably not exhaustive because irony can be used in many different contexts. While in our study, ironic speakers mainly conveyed disappointment, irony can also be used to convey anger, weariness, disgust, complicity, etc. There are certainly many ways to be ironic.

Now that you know some ways to sound ironic with your face and voice, the question remains: should you? Irony is a device to communicate meaning implicitly. Sometimes it is more fun not to use nonverbal cues to irony and let the other person wonder for a few seconds if you mean it or not… But then, beware of misunderstandings!


For Further Reading

Aguert, M. (2022). Paraverbal expression of verbal irony: Vocal cues matter and facial cues even more. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 46(1), 45‑70. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-021-00385-z

Colston, H. L. (2015). Using figurative language. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781316226414
 

Marc Aguert is an associate professor of developmental psychology at Caen-Normandy University. His main research interest is the development of figurative language comprehension throughout childhood and adolescence.

 

Why Is Sarcasm so Difficult to Detect in Texts and Emails?

This sentence begins the best article you will ever read.

Chances are you thought that last statement might be sarcasm. Sarcasm, as linguist Robert Gibbs noted, includes “words used to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning of a sentence.” A form of irony, it also tends to be directed toward a specific individual.

However, it’s not always easy to figure out if a writer is being sarcastic – particularly as we march ahead in a digital age that has transformed the way we communicate, with texting, emailing and online commentary replacing face-to-face chats or phone conversations.

In writing, the signal of sarcasm can be muddied. For example, say you’re texting with a friend about meeting at the movies:

Friend: I’m waiting at the front. Movie starts in 5.

You: I’m on my way now. Should be there in 10.

Friend: I’m glad you were watching the clock today.

Was the friend being sarcastic or sincere? The later you are, the more upset they’ll likely be, and the higher the probability their response is a sarcastic jab. But if your friend knows you’re usually much later, they could be sincere.

So there’s one thing to look for: How well does the attitude the writer is conveying agree with the situation and the person?

Nonetheless, the struggle to interpret written sarcasm is real.

Studies have shown that people realize that they have a tough time interpreting sarcasm in writing. Studying the use of email, researchers found writers who think they’re being obviously sarcastic still confuse readers.

Sarcasm thrives in ambiguous situations – and that’s the main issue.

When delivered in person, sarcasm tends to assume a cutting, bitter tone. But written messages don’t always get that attitude across or give you much else to go on. We still need more information.

Signals that go missing in texts

Studies have examined the use of sarcasm in a variety of everyday situations, whether it’s at work to give criticism or praise, or in situations where social norms get violated. (Be on time to movies, people!)

The problem is that a lot of previous studies of sarcasm have been done on spoken sarcasm, which tends to give listeners cues.

When you have a conversation with someone face-to-face (or FaceTime-to-FaceTime) and they say something sarcastic, you’ll see their facial expression, and they may look slightly bemused or tense. Equally or more helpful, the tone of their voice will likely change, too – they may sound more intense or draw out certain phrases.

You’ll also be firmly grounded in the real-time context of the situation, so when they say, “Man, nice job ironing your clothes,” you can look down – and see your wrinkled shirt.

All of these cues have been researched, and we know enough about them that we have the ability to artificially make a sincerely spoken statement sound sarcastic.

And yet when we text, a lot of that information goes missing.

There are no facial cues, no vocal tones and maybe even a delayed response if a person can’t text you back immediately. And if you don’t know the person all that well, there goes your last potential cue: history.

Emojis to the rescue?

So after what you thought was an unexceptional first date – exactly how do you interpret the following flurry of texts?

Date: I had a great time. (12:03 a.m.)

Date: That was the most fun I’ve had in years. (12:05 a.m.)

Date: Really, it could not have gone better. (12:30 a.m.)

Was the date really that good? Did they really seem like they had that much fun? Or are they just a jerk lamenting the wasted time? All valid questions. And the recipient could come to a lot of conclusions.

Fear not. The digital age has developed some ways to mitigate some of the tortuous ambiguity. You can probably include an emoji to make it clearer to a reader something was meant sarcastically.

Date: I had a great time. (12:03 a.m.)

Date: That was the most fun I’ve had in years. (12:05 a.m.)

Date: It really, could not have gone better. (12:30 a.m.)

Ambiguity reduced, and facial expression taken care of. Probably not headed for date #2.

If we’re talking about email, we also have modifications that that can be made to text. We can italicize or bold words to change the way that a reader interprets the message.

Lastly, social media platforms like Twitter have given writers even more tools to allow people to communicate their intent. A study that included sarcastic tweets found that tweeters who include the hashtag #sarcasm tend to use more interjections (wow!) and positive wording for negative situations in their sarcastic tweets.

Algorithms have actually been built to determine the presence of sarcasm and rudeness in tweets, user reviews and online conversations. The formulas were able to identify language that’s outright rude pretty easily. But in order to correctly detect sarcasm, researchers found that algorithms need both linguistic (language) and semantic (meaning) information built in.

In other words, sarcasm’s subtlety means that the algorithms require more specification in their coding – unless you #sarcasm, of course.

The ConversationWith so many options to choose from, it’s time to make sure that text you send at 2:30 a.m. really gets your point across.


Sara Peters, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Newberry College

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.