The Myth of Impoverished Signal Dispelling the Spoken Language Fallacy for Emoticons in Online Commu

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The Myth of Impoverished SignalDispelling the
Spoken Language Fallacy for Emoticons in Online
Communication

• Naomi S. Baron
• American University Göteborgs
  Universitet Washington, DC USA Göteborg,
  Sweden
• Emotions and ICTs International
  Workshop
• Pordenone, Italy
• 25-26 October 2007

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Happy Birthday, Smiley Face!

• 25 years and counting -)

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Creation of Smiley by Scott Fahlman

• September 19, 1982
• 19-Sep-82 1144 Scott E Fahlman -)
• From Scott E Fahlman ltFahlman at Cmu-20cgt 
• I propose that the following character sequence
  for joke markers
• -)
• Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more
  economical to mark things that are NOT jokes,
  given current trends. For this, use
• -(

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What This Presentation is About

• NOT whether emoticons do or do not help clarify
  meaning in CMC
• RATHER, we will be looking at
• Sources of the presupposition that emoticons are
  needed to clarify CMC meaning
• Whether the relevance of this presupposition has
  shifted over time

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Media Reference

• 26 September 2007
• CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) Radio
  One, The Current
• Interviews with Scott Fahlman, Barry Wellman, and
  Naomi Baron

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Computing c. 1982

• ARPANET created 1968-1969
• First email sent 1971
• Word processing software c. 1982 was primitive
• Murray Turoff (NJIT) email should be only
• one screen-worth of text (probably c. 10-12
  lines)
• Computer screens c. 1982
• Osborne 1 Portable Computer (1981)

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Fahlmans Original Rationale for Emoticons

• Specific incident joke on bulletin board
  regarding imaginary elevator malfunction
• Carnegie Mellon University administrators assumed
  elevator should be taken out of service
• Much time wasted explaining what was a joke, what
  wasnt
• Actually, it is probably more economical to
  mark things that are NOT jokes, given current
  trends. i.e., much of early CMC was intended
  to be humorous

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Fahlman on Emoticons Sept. 2007

• Because we dont have time to write long and
  contemplative CMC messages, emoticons give us a
  shorthand for helping ensure our meaning is clear
• Emoticons are a way of humanizing an otherwise
  cold medium
• The alternative to emoticons is having enough
  time to write a longer and presumably clearer
  message

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Sources of Presupposition that Emoticons Are
Necessary to Clarify Meaning

• The Length Argument
• Fahlmans main argument
• The Speech by Other Means Argument
• Without visual and verbal cues, misunderstandings
  are endemic
• The Domestication Argument
• When a medium is new, we overcompensate to ensure
  clarity

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The Length Argument

• Some short writing is very powerful
• Haiku poetry, lines from Shakespeare
• Long writing is not necessarily clear writing
• Student papers
• Most people arent clear writers offline
• Early users of CMC were generally not noted for
  their skills in writing
• We need more thought, not more words
• Ambiguity is hardly unique to CMC
• That was a terrible business luncheon

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The Speech by Other Means Argument

• Common assumption CMC is written speech
• Therefore, we presumably miss the visual and
  facial cues of spoken language when doing CMC,
  and hence need emoticons to compensate
• Challenge Is CMC really just written speech?

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Linguistic Nature of CMC

• David Crystal (Language and the Internet)
• Netspeak has far more properties linking it to
  writing than to speech.Netspeak is better seen
  as written language which has been pulled some
  way in the direction of speech than as spoken
  language which has been written down. (200147)
• Naomi Baron (Always On)
• Analysis of IM (instant messaging) conversations
  of male and female American college students
• Results not clear-cut, but

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Written Qualities of IM Conversations

• Spelling, punctuation reasonable
• Sophisticated words substantial number
• Contractions fewer than anticipated
• E.g., cant rather than cannot
• Out of 763 cases in which users could have chosen
  a contraction Only 65 were contracted
• Compare informal speech c. 95 were contracted
  (different study)
• Examined other issues, e.g., where broke long
  utterances into multiple transmissions
• Isnt it nice
• to be in love
• Compared with corpora of spoken and written
  language

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Written Qualities (cont.)

• Emoticons 49 out of 11,718 words
• -) smiley 31 -( frowny
  5 O-) angel 4 -P sticking out
  tongue, with nose 3 -) winking
  2 (plus 4 miscellaneous)
• Abbreviations 31 out of 11,718 words
• 16 were k for OK
• Acronyms 90 out of 11,718 words
• 76 were LOL for laughing out loud

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Overall Profile of IM Speech or Writing?

• Speech seems to be winning
• Similar to Similar to
• Face-to-Face Speech Conventional Writing
• GENERAL DISCOURSE
• SCAFFOLDING
• average turn length yes no
• one-word utterances yes no
• conversational closings yes no
• LEXICAL ISSUES
• use of contractions somewhat somewhat
• CMC abbreviations,
• acronyms no somewhat
• emoticons yes no
• but

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Taking Gender into Account

• Male IM conversations have more in common with
  face-to-face speech
• Female IM conversations have more in common with
  conventional writing
• Examples
• Contractions
• Males contracted 77 of time was possible
• Females contracted 57 of time was possible
• Breaking long utterances into multiple
  transmissions
• Males breaks resemble pauses in speech
• Females breaks resemble written structures

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Is IM Speech?

• Bottom line
• No, though there are enough speech-like elements
  (especially in male IM conversations) to explain
  why it is natural to talk of IM conversations
• In the US, female writing skills in school are
  statistically better than those of males
• The longer people use CMC on a computer
• the wider their range of CMC styles becomes
• the more likely that emoticons, abbreviations,
  and acronyms drop out (factors usage plus
  maturity)
• If these lexical shortenings disappear, can they
  be necessary to clarify meaning?

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The Domestication Argument

• Domestication of the Landline Phone
• 1894 Philadelphia newspaper warned readers not
  to talk by phone with ill people (could contract
  disease)
• G.B. Shaw complained of people shouting on phone
  (cf. people shouting when dont share same
  language)
• Domestication of Mobile Phones
• Speaking on mobile phone vs. face-to-face louder
  on phone
• Sweden vs. US appropriate places for using
  mobiles
• Expanded Venues for CMC
• Formal memos by email
• US students see email as a formal medium
  (compare with IM)

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Conclusions

• Impoverished signal myth resulted from
• Nature of early computer hardware and software
• Nature of early users and uses of CMC
• Mistaken assumption that CMC speech
• Lack of domestication of medium in early days
• Because CMC was new medium, we overlooked fact
  that ambiguities and misunderstandings appear in
  face-to-face and offline writing as well
• Clearly of expression (especially in writing) is
  a valuable goal, regardless of the medium

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• Thank you!
• Naomi S. Baron
• nbaron_at_american.edu
• Always On Language in an Online and Mobile World
  
• Oxford University Press, Spring 2008