What vocal cues indicate sarcasm? By: Jack Dolan Rockwell, P. (2000). Lower, slower, louder: Vocal cues of sarcasm. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 29(5), Chicago

Introduction Sarcasm is commonly defined as: – Phrase of antithetical nature – Speaker’s intent is in opposition to the literal meaning – Speaker’s intent is negative intent but literal content is positive Proposed three step process to understand irony (Winner et. al): – Detecting speaker intent – Detection of the relationship between what is said and what is meant – Detection of the unstated meaning

Research Question What vocal features are used to detect sarcasm? How do such things as articulation, pitch, etc. affect sarcasm?

Hypothesis Certain vocal cues like intonation or speed, rather than just the literal meaning of the utterance, affect how listeners interpret sarcasm.

Materials 12 speakers recorded their voice using professional recording equipment – Talk show hosts, professionally trained actors, etc. – Recorded voices according to prepared utterances written on flash cards 2 cards had vignettes (context), sarcastic utterance didn’t Master tape created with 36 utterances recorded Questionnaire to fill out while listening – Likert scale was used on: 1=“speaker is not at all sarcastic”, 5=“speaker is very sarcastic”

Methods Procedure – Participants (n=127) were first informed of the nature of the study and then told what sarcasm was defined as. – Told to determine the how sarcastic each speaker was by the sound of their voice. – Tape was played as participants filled out the questionnaire Tape was paused at times if the participants needed more time to finish writing their results.

Results Three kinds of situations: – Non-sarcasm – Spontaneous sarcasm – Posed sarcasm Comparisons amongst groups – Significant difference (p<.001) between nonsarcasm and posed sarcasm None between nonsarcasm and spontaneous sarcasm (p<0.26) Comparisons of means – M=2.96 (nonsarcasm), M=2.91 (spontaneous sarcasm), M=3.34 (posed sarcasm) Posed sarcasm was interpreted as most sarcastic

Results Effect of order – Order of presentation was significant (p<.001) Nonsarcasm, spontaneous sarcasm, posed sarcasm Vocal differences in the three conditions – Tempo overall (p<.04) Tempo between nonsarcasm and sarcasm (p<.001), but not amongst sarcastic utterances (p<.18) – Intensity overall (p<.04) Intensity between nonsarcasm and sarcasm (p<.001) and sarcasm conditions (p<.05) – Pitch level (p<.03), not variation (p<.90) Pitch level nonsarcasm and sarcasm (p<.001) and amongst sarcasm (p<.15) Resonance (p<.61) and articulation (p<.67) not significant

Conclusion Sarcasm can be detected with moderate emotion and not really intense emotion (leading to insult) Sarcasm has presentation of vocal cues – Slower tempo – Lower pitch level – Greater intensity Sarcasm changed by level (i.e, not gradual change) – Implications not determined yet Suggests that verbal cues not deciding factor for understanding, but rather the three factors presented