Compliment Response Behaviour on Facebook: A ...

International Review of Pragmatics 7 (2015) 244–277 brill.com/irp

Compliment Response Behaviour on Facebook: A Study with Iranian Facebook Users Zohreh R. Eslami Texas a&m University, usa [email protected]

Nasser Jabbari Texas a&m University, usa [email protected]

Li-Jen Kuo Texas a&m University, usa [email protected]

Abstract Although the literature on compliments and compliment responses is abundant, very few studies have examined complimenting behaviour and the influence of gender on complimenting behaviour in Persian language. More scarce is the number of studies that investigated speech act behaviour of Persian speakers in cyberspace in general and in social networking sites such as Facebook in particular. This research on Iranian Facebook (fb) users’ complimenting response behaviour was carried out in order to broaden the scope of studies in pragmatics to include non-Western languages and to extend the scope of speech act studies to cyberspace. The study probed into Iranian fb users’ compliment response behaviour in same-gender and cross-gender interactions. The current research also sought to explore the extent to which compliment response behaviour on Facebook resembles its counterpart in face-to-face interactions. The findings revealed that online medium of communication and technological affordances on Facebook have brought new norms of communication into existence. The findings also suggested that some emerging sociocultural factors such as cyber-feminism might have impacted the participants’ preferences for more egalitarian patterns of language use when responding to compliments from an opposite gender. More importantly, the findings showed how marginalized groups such as women in Iran benefit from virtual spaces such as fb to assert a linguistic identity of self that is not easily possible to share publically in real life settings. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2015 | doi: 10.1163/18773109-00702005

compliment response behaviour on facebook

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Keywords online compliment – online compliment response – Facebook – Iranian Persian speakers

Introduction The advent of the Internet has revolutionized conventional patterns of face-toface communication in the world. Social networking sites (snss)—as emergent online communication settings—have made available some unique communication tools that have influenced conventional face-to-face communication patterns in many respects. Facebook (fb)—as one of the most popular snss in the world—is no exception. With around one billion active users (Facebook, 2013), Facebook has provided a virtual platform for its users to expand the borders of their face-to-face communications. Using this platform, they take advantage of online communication in its both synchronous and asynchronous forms. For instance, posting photographs on Facebook or tagging fb friends’ postings provides opportunities for online socializing as well as maintaining the relationship with friends and family members. Photographs posted on Facebook attract various types of responses including compliments; and these compliments receive a wide variety of responses. As the following snapshot1 from a female Facebook profile owner (Figure 1) shows, Facebook users are innovative in formulating their compliments and compliment responses by using various online communication tools and affordances. Successful use and interpretation of compliments and compliment responses require a high level of socio-linguistic and socio-pragmatic competence on the part of interlocutors. Thus, the analyses of compliments and compliment responses (crs) like other speech acts could provide sociolinguists with insights into “the social structure and value system of the target speech community” (Wolfson, 1983: 93). To investigate the social structure and value system of communication in social networking sites, the current study— as a part of a bigger study—examines Iranian Facebook users’ compliment responses. In public spaces in Iran, cross-gender face-to-face socialization is under the influence of traditional, cultural, and institutional forces. Consid-

1 In Figure 1, letter f represents female complimenter. Numbers 1, 2 and 3 indicate that there are three different female complimenters.

International Review of Pragmatics 7 (2015) 244–277

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figure 1

eslami, jabbari and kuo

A Female profile picture on Facebook with compliments. crs transliteration: f1: “My dear and beautiful sister.” f2: “Very beautiful!” f3: “My darling …. What a beautiful picture it is …! Run and come to my arms.”

ering these forces, studying Iranians’ socialization patterns in online social settings from a cyber-pragmatics perspective provides significant insights into how they manage or reformulate their social communication patterns. Compliment responses—as prevalent speech acts on Facebook—are treated as verbal and nonverbal responses to the compliments received from Facebook friends. There are several studies on complimenting behaviour in face to face interactions in Persian and in other languages (e.g., Allami and Montazeri, 2012; Boori, 1994; Farghal and Al-Khatib, 2001; Holmes, 1988; Golato, 2002; Lorenzo-Dus, 2001; Maíz-Arévalo, 2012; Migdadi, 2003; Mohajernia and Solimani, 2013; Ruhi, 2006; Sharifian, 2008; Tang and Zhang, 2009; Wolfson,



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1983). However, as far as our literature search revealed, there is only one study (Maíz-Arévalo, 2013) that investigated Spanish speakers’ compliment responses on Facebook and two other studies (Maíz-Arévalo and García-Gómez, 2013; Placencia and Lower, 2013) that focused on Spanish and English speakers’ compliments on Facebook. Considering the increasing popularity of online communication, it is valuable to examine how, if at all, compliment response patters change when language users respond to compliments in online communication settings. The contextual features in online communication settings are different from what characterize face-to-face interactions. Prevalence of written communication channels, lack of unintentionality in every meaning communicated, asynchronicity and lack of facial cues are just a few to name. Building on previous work on compliment response behaviour and computer-mediated communication (cmc), the current study sought to offer a description of types and patterns of compliment responses among Persian speaking Iranian Facebook users. More specifically, we looked at the forms compliment responses take in Facebook online environment. In addition, we investigated the role of gender and sociocultural values in the realization of this speech act in the context of Facebook. We also examined the extent to which compliment response behaviour on Facebook is similar to or different from what has been described in previous literature using elicited or authentic face-to-face interaction. Below, we first provide an overview of some relevant literature on computer mediated communication (cmc) and Facebook as one of the most popular social networking sites. Following that, we present a brief consideration of complimenting behaviour focusing mainly on compliment responses.

1

Theoretical Framework

1.1 Computer Mediated Communication and Social Networking Sites Immediately after the Internet made computer-mediated communication easily accessible, along came social networking sites (snss), which enabled one to construct a profile that can be used to bring old friends together and give possibility for new friends to meet online. Among all social networking sites, such as MySpace, Twitter, Bebo and YouTube, Facebook is indeed one of the most popular social networking sites that attracts users of different nationalities all over the world. Comments, information and interactions left on sns have provided researchers with fascinating information on how language users from different cultural and social backgrounds interact with each other. Researchers with a particular interest in social, cultural and linguistic aspects of online commu-


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nication face a wide range of questions worth being investigated. Wilson and Peterson (2002: 459) highlighted some of these questions: “How are the tools of new media changing the contexts and frames of communicative practices? …. How does technology enhance or displace discourses and practices of tradition?” Communications and socializing on the platform of snss have grown as inseparable parts of people’s lives in the digital age. As Standage explained: Accessing social-networking sites is now the single most popular online activity worldwide: four out of five Internet users, or around 1.4 billion people, use social sites of one kind or another to post status updates, share photos and links, leave comments, and engage in discussions. 2013: 17–18

fb offers a multimodal system of communication as it allows for different channels and modalities of communication. Users can choose to write posts on their own or on their friends’ profile, and comment on different posts or photographs or click on the “Like” function as a response. snss are also characterized by their “high oral quality” (Yus, 2011: 118) and the possibility for using both synchronous and asynchronous modes of communication. Although images and audio-visual links constitute the main part of everyday social networking practices, most forms of interaction remain primarily textual. As Schwarz (2010: 174) pointed out, “[m]ore than being mere promotionalist self-advertisements, they (images) are conversation pieces, necessary starters for the exchange of compliments-qua-gifts, which enable not only the formation of relations, but also their maintenance”. Complimenting and responding to compliments are pervasive in snss like fb; because a key component of social networks is their mostly phatic character (interactivity) that is valued over knowledge (Miller, 2008). The impetus behind the current research was the desire to explore how responding to compliments by male and female Iranian fb users is instantiated in this new media and how it might differ from their face-to-face complimenting behaviour. 1.2 Compliment and Compliment Responses (crs) Compliments and responding to compliments are phatic speech acts that “grease the social wheels” (Wolfson, 1983: 89). A compliment, as Holmes (1988: 446) defined, is “[…] a speech act which explicitly or implicitly attributes credit to someone other than the speaker, usually the person addressed, for some ‘good’ (possession, characteristic, skill etc.) which is positively valued by the speaker and the hearer”. In Holmes’ (1988: 462) terms, “As positively affective



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speech acts the most obvious function they serve is to oil the social wheels, paying attention to positive face wants and thus increasing or consolidating solidarity between people”. An extensive body of research—utilizing both discourse completion tasks (dcts) and natural data collection procedures— has been devoted to the study of compliments and crs. These studies have been conducted in different languages such as American English (Wolfson, 1983; Holmes, 1988), German (Golato, 2002), Spanish (Lorenzo-Dus, 2001; MaízArévalo, 2012), Turkish (Ruhi, 2006), Jordanian Arabic (Farghal and Al-Khatib, 2001; Migdadi, 2003), Chinese (Spencer-Oatey and Ng, 2001; Tang and Zhang, 2009; Yuan, 2002; Yu, 2004) and Persian (Allami and Montazeri, 2012; Boori, 1994; Mohajernia and Solimani, 2013; Sharifian, 2008). Compliment responses, though not as much as compliments, have similarly received attention by different researchers and in various languages (e.g., Heidari, Rezazadeh, and Eslami Rasekh, 2009; Herbert, 1989; Holmes, 1995; Maíz-Arévalo, 2012; Pomerantz, 1978; Sharifian, 2008; Wolfson, 1983). crs reflect sociocultural norms of different cultures and reveal “rules of language use in a speech community” (Yuan, 2001: 273). Different frameworks have been developed for categorizing crs. The ones developed by Pomerantz (1978), Wolfson (1983), Herbert (1986) and Holmes (1995) are the most prominent frameworks. Pomerantz (1978) identified two paradoxical alternatives for responding to a compliment: to agree with the complimenter or to avoid self-praise. Using the first alternative, the receiver of the compliment accepts the compliment using different forms of appreciation tokens such as thank you. In the second alternative, the receiver of the compliment seeks to avoid self-praise by adopting two strategies: downgrading the value of the object(s) being complimented and shifting the credit or value away from him or herself. In the framework suggested by Herbert (1986), compliment responses are divided into three broad categories of agreement, non-agreement, and other interpretations with twelve subcategories. In the framework suggested by Holmes (1995: 492), “other interpretations” in Herbert’s (1986) classification, is substituted by a more specific category—that is deflecting/evading. Holmes introduced three broad compliment response strategies that are accepting, rejecting, and deflecting/evading. These three broad strategies are comprised of twelve sub-strategies as listed below: Accepting the compliment: – Appreciation or agreement token: e.g., thanks, yes or smile. – Agreeing utterance: e.g., I think it’s lovely, too.


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– Downgrading or qualifying utterance: e.g., it’s not too bad, is it? – Return the compliment: e.g., you’re looking good, too. Rejecting the compliment: – Disagreeing utterance: e.g., I’m afraid I don’t like it much. – Question accuracy: e.g., is beautiful the right word? – Challenge complimenter’s sincerity: e.g., you don’t really mean that. Deflecting /Evading the compliment: – – – –

Shift credit: e.g., my mother knitted it. Informative comment: e.g., I bought it at that Vibrant Knits place. Ignore: e.g., it’s time we’re leaving, isn’t it? Legitimate evasion: e.g., sure, sure, now let’s talk about serious things, shall we? – Request reassurance/repetition: e.g., do you really think so? 1.3 Compliment and Compliment Responses on Facebook Despite the extensive research on compliments and compliment responses in face-to-face interactions, there is a paucity of studies of online complimenting behaviour. Only a few recent studies (Das, 2010; Maíz-Arévalo, 2013; MaízArévalo and García-Gómez, 2013; Placencia and Lower, 2013) have analyzed compliments and crs exchanged among individuals in web-based social networks. Das (2010) examined the impact of social distance on the behaviour of Bengalis—who are living in the United States—in terms of compliments, greetings, and thanking in Orkut as a social networking site. Drawing on Wolfson’s (1988) Bulge Theory, which predicts that relationships that are toward the centre (e.g., friends) in a social distance scale show differences from the extremes (e.g., intimated, acquaintances), with the centre being more intensely polite, Das found that his online data do not correspond with the pattern of speech act use suggested by Bulge Theory. His findings suggest that Wolfson’s (1988) Bulge Theory does not always hold true when considering different modalities of communication and different cultural backgrounds. Placencia and Lower (2013) examined complimenting behaviour directed at members of a network of family and friends on Facebook in the United States. Placencia and Lower offered a characterization of Facebook compliments in American English in terms of the forms compliments take, common objects of complimenting and the key function(s) they perform. They also explored



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the extent to which complimenting behaviour on Facebook resembles usage that has been described for American English in face-to-face interactions. Their findings indicate some differences between online and face-to-face complimenting behaviour. They mainly attribute the discrepancies to the medium of interaction and various features of technology that give rise to variations of talk and social practices. Similarly, Maíz-Arévalo and García-Gómez (2013) investigated how Facebook users made compliments to evaluate others and strengthen social rapport in English and Spanish. They analysed their sample (50 compliments in each language) quantitatively and qualitatively using a systemic functional framework. Their analysis revealed that several communication tools and options accessible on Facebook helped users to encode their compliments from various perspectives. They also explored that compliments in the two languages follow different frequencies of use, which reflects deep cultural differences. Maíz-Arévalo (2013) investigated compliment response patterns in a community of Spanish Facebook users. She used Maíz-Arévalo’s (2012) system of Spanish crs in face-to-face conversational exchanges to investigate how far the participants (complimentees) would transfer face-to-face cr patterns to their Facebook interactions. The results revealed that Spanish cr patterns in faceto-face conversational exchanges cannot explain 71.3 % of the cr patterns used on Facebook. Maíz-Arévalo (2013) attributed this phenomenon to distinctive features of cmc affordances in snss such as Facebook. Maíz-Arévalo’s (2013) findings revealed that 30% of the compliments were left with no response— either verbal or non-verbal. She also found that 41.3 % of compliments on Facebook received non-verbal responses (e.g., smileys, emoticons, onomatopoeia or “Like” option on Facebook). Our study, similar to Maíz-Arévalo’s (2013) research focuses on online compliment responses. We extended the scope of existing research by focusing on Iranian Persian fb users’ compliment response behaviour; and more importantly, we further examined the relation of gender on compliment response patterns in same-gender versus cross-gender dyadic types. We sought to address the following research questions: (a) What cr strategies are used most often by Iranian Facebook users? (b) Do the complimentees’ cr strategies on Facebook differ according to gender? and (c) Is there any difference in cr strategies used in two different settings of communication—face-to-face versus Facebook?


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Methodology

Following Maíz-Arévalo (2013), we used discourse analysis approach and the two related concepts of “turn” and “move”. In this study, each conversational exchange includes a compliment and a compliment response. Thus, a single compliment-response exchange is regarded as an independent or “the basic unit of interaction” (Sinclair, 1972: 64). Therefore, each unit of analysis is an integrated conversational exchange that consists of two turns. The first turn is taken by the interlocutor who gives a compliment; and, the second turn belongs to the receiver of the compliment who may or may not respond back. In the conversational exchanges we collected from Facebook, the first turn consists of one move that is the “initiating” move of complimenting. The second turn, if taken by the receiver of the compliment, consists of one or sometimes more than one move. The second turn can consist of one or a combination of two and three moves of responding, initiating and following up. The current research focuses on responding moves (i.e., compliment responses) in Facebook conversational exchanges and ignores initiating and following-up moves in the analyses. We extended the scope of Maíz-Arévalo’s (2013) research by further identifying the type and degree of modifiers used by Iranian Persian speakers in their fb compliment responses. For this purpose, we gained insights from Blum-Kulka et al.’s (1989) categorization scheme for internal and external modifiers and Placencia’s and Lower’s (2013) framework for analyzing Facebook compliments. Below, we have presented our coding scheme for internal and external modifiers used in this study. External modifiers a. Alerters – Title – Surname – Nickname – First name – Endearment term – Offensive term – Pronoun – Attention getter – Combination of all above b. Extra head act/supportive move c. Emoticons



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Internal modifiers a. b. c. d. e. f.

Intensifying adverbials (e.g. very, terribly, so, really, awfully, …) Emotional expressions/exclamations (e.g. Oh, Oh Lord, God, …) Double intensifiers or repetition of intensifying adverbial Capital letters Vowel lengthening Multiple exclamation marks

2.1 Data Collection One of the researchers collected compliments and their corresponding responses from his Facebook friends’ profiles. The participants (27 males and 18 females) were selected from the Facebook friends of one of the researchers using stratified random sampling. The male profile owners are between 24 and 34 and the female profile owners are between 23 and 39 years old. In order to preserve anonymity, any reference to the complimenters’ and complimentees’ identity such as names and photographs are removed from the data. The researchers utilized a coding system in which name, gender, and other features were coded for every individual complimenter and complimentee. The profile owners were informed through email of the study’s purpose and data collection procedure. Their consents were obtained formally through the consent forms sent to them through Facebook messenger. In order to attain a manageable data set for the purpose of the current study, we randomly selected only one out of several pictures complimentees had shared as their Facebook profile pictures. More specifically, only those profile pictures containing the complimentees’ own portrait (i.e., not relatives’, pets’ or other’s pictures) were selected. Thus, the subject of all compliments was the complimentee’s appearance. We recorded a total number of 497 compliments plus their corresponding responses from 45 profile pictures on Facebook. 2.2 Data Analysis We applied both qualitative and quantitative (descriptive) methods to analyze the data and report the results. The data includes both verbal and non-verbal responses to compliments. Compliment responses were categorized based on the taxonomies offered by Holmes (1986) for face-to-face context and MaízArévalo’s (2013) adaptation of it for online context. In addition, internal and external modifiers (supportive moves) were analyzed using the combination of frameworks suggested by Blum-Kulka et al. (1989) and Placencia and Lower (2013).


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figure 2


Compliment response system on Facebook

To ensure the validity of our data analyses, we implemented investigator triangulation procedure. The data was initially coded by one of the authors. Then, 20% of the data was randomly selected for recoding by the other author as the second rater. The inter-coder reliability was calculated and revealed to be r = 0.89. 2.2.1 Taxonomy of Compliment Responses We adopted two models for classifying and analysing compliment responses. In the first model suggested by Holmes (1986), compliment responses in English language are classified into three main and twelve sub-categories. The second model was designed by Maíz-Arévalo (2013) to investigate types of compliment response strategies used by Spanish Facebook users. Based on the aforementioned models, we developed the following taxonomy for categorizing and analyzing compliment responses in the current study: Verbal and non-verbal compliment responses were tallied, compared and analysed for both male and female complimentees in four dyadic types including same and cross-gender interactions.

3

Results and Discussion

3.1 Compliment Response Rate and Strategies As presented in compliment response system on Facebook (Figure 2), communicators on Facebook have a complex system of response choices as they


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compliment response behaviour on facebook table 1

Compliment response rate

Presence of response Gender of complimentee Male Female Total

table 2

No

Yes

41 (16%) 210 (84%) 40 (16%) 207 (84%) 81 (16%) 417 (84%)

Total 251 247 498

Verbal versus non-verbal compliment responses

Types of responses Gender of complimentee Male Female Total

Verbal

Non-verbal

Total

67 (32%) 143 (68 %) 210 53 (26%) 154 (74 %) 207 120 (29%) 297 (71 %) 417 (100 %)

receive compliments. One of these choices is not responding to a compliment. This choice is not likely to be made in face-to-face conversations, where a compliment—as an initiating move—is expected to be followed by a response; and its absence is marked and can be interpreted by the interlocutor as a sign of impoliteness. However, on fb, where communications are mainly asynchronous and it might take some time for users to check their fb comments, non-response is not considered a marked strategy or impolite but rather a natural effect of the asynchronous nature of the communication channel. Another explanation is that the complimentee seeks to solve the paradoxical situation identified by Pomerantz (1978)—that is agreeing with the complimenter or avoiding self-praise. Choosing not to respond to a compliment, the complimentee probably tries to avoid self-praise. As shown in Table 1 above, the complimentees did not respond to 16 % of the compliments they received. Additionally, verbal responses to compliments constituted only about 29 % of the compliment responses (see Table 2 above). The most frequently used compliment response strategy was clicking Like (66 %), a convenient strategy provided on fb. In our analysis of crs, we regarded the use of Like function


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figure 3


A male profile picture on Facebook with compliments. crs transliteration: m1: Body (It refers to the profile owner’s body that is athletic.) m2: … your liver … (That is a slang expression that shows strong endearment.) f: … Wow, what an artistic and beautiful picture

as showing acceptance when it was used alone (66 %) or in combination with emoticons (3%). However, when it came with verbal compliment responses (before or after), we considered it as an external modification. The analyses revealed that the patterns for the use of compliment responses on Facebook are similar across gender groups, χ² (1) = .002, p = n.s. The following snapshot (Figure 3) shows an example where Like is clicked by the owner of the picture (complimentee) as a compliment response. In Figure 3, letter m represents a male and letter f represents a female complimenter. m1 and m2 represent two different male complimenters. In face-to-face interactions, many non-verbal responses (e.g., laughs, blushing, and eye gaze) are commonly produced unintentionally by the interlocutors. Thus, this group of responses cannot be assigned to have illocutionary forces. In contrast with face-to-face conversation exchanges, the responses


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Compliment response (cr) strategies

Strategies Gender of complimentee Male Female Total

Accept

Evade

Reject

Combination

Total

194 (92%) 203 (98%) 397 (95%)

10 (5%) 2 (1%) 12 (3%)

4 (2%) 1 (0.5%) 5 (1%)

2 (1 %) 1 (0.5 %) 3 (1 %)

210 207 417

Note: combination = using two or more cr strategies in a response formed in cmc are considered as being intentional and thought upon (Yus, 2011). Therefore, they should be analysed as such (Maíz-Arévalo, 2013). Our analysis (see Table 2) revealed that 29% of the compliment responses are verbal and 71% are non-verbal. There is a slight difference between male and female complimentees in their choice of verbal versus non-verbal compliment response strategy. Female complimentees used slightly less (26 %) verbal strategies compared with their male counterparts (32 %). After deciding to respond to a compliment, speakers need to decide to accept, reject, evade, or use a combination of these three strategies. For each of these options they can opt for verbal strategies, non-verbal strategies or combinations of both. As indicated in Table 3, accepting was the most frequently used compliment response strategy (95%, n=397). Chi-square analysis revealed that the interaction between type of compliment response and gender approaches the level of significance, χ² (3) = 7.65, p = .054. Male are five times more likely to evade responses than females do. We also found that evading and rejecting cr strategies were hardly used by the complimentees (3 % and 1 % respectively) and that male complimentees used these two strategies more than females (7 % vs. 1.5%). Among non-verbal strategies (see Table 4), the most frequently used strategy was clicking Like (93%) followed by clicking Like+emoticon (4 %), and using just emoticons (3%). Accepting a compliment opens up a complex system of different sub-strategies for responding to a compliment. In the following section, we will define and provide examples for the sub-strategies classified under the overarching acceptance strategy. Examples appear in Persian with both literal and pragmatic translation in English. To keep the complimenters and complimentees anonymous, we substituted their names by letter u—standing for user—


258 table 4

eslami, jabbari and kuo Non-verbal compliment response (cr) strategies

Strategies Gender of complimentee Male Female Total

table 5

Clicking “like”

Clicking “like” +eEmoticons

Emoticons

Total

132 (92%) 144 (94%) 276 (93%)

8 (6%) 5 (3%) 13 (4%)

3 (3 %) 4 (3 %) 7 (3 %)

143 153 296

Accepting sub-strategies

Sub-strategies Gender of complimentee Male Female Total

Verbal

Non-verbal

14 (7%) 143 (74 %) 6 (3%) 153 (75 %) 20 (5%) 296 (74.5 %)

Combination Total 37 (19 %) 44 (22 %) 81 (20.5 %)

194 203 397

Note: Combination = verbal accepting strategies accompanied by emoticons or clicking “like” function followed by a number that refers to their positions as interlocutors in a conversational exchange. u1 refers to the complimenter who initiates the dialogue by complimenting and u2 refers to the complimentee who responds to the compliment. Additionally, letters m (for male) and f (for female) specify the interlocutors’ gender. Care is also taken to reproduce the oralization marks (e.g., capital letters and repetition of characters) in the translation of the data. As Table 5 demonstrates, purely verbal acceptance responses (i.e., without clicking Like or using emoticons) constituted only 5 % of the data. Nonverbal strategies including clicking Like and using emoticons, on the other hand, are much more frequently used to accept a compliment than verbal or combination of verbal+non-verbal strategies (74.5%, 5 % and 20.5 % respectively).


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Verbal accepting sub-strategies

Sub-strategies Gender of Appreciation Agreeing Downgrading Returning Combination Total complimentee utterance compliments Male Female Total

27 (53%) 32 (64%) 59 (58%)

6 (11%) 3 (6%) 9 (9%)

3 (6%) 1 (2%) 4 (4%)

10 (20%) 7 (14%) 17 (17%)

5 (10%) 7 (14%) 12 (12%)

51 50 101

Note: This table includes the analysis of data presented in two columns of verbal and combination (of verbal and non-verbal) in Table 5.

3.1.1 Accept: Appreciation/Agreement Token Under the broad category of accepting strategy, appreciation/agreement token (Holmes, 1995) is the most frequently used sub-strategy among both male and female complimentees. Thanking the complimenter for the compliment accounts for 53% of male and 64% of female accepting responses (see Table 6). As the following example demonstrates, by using appreciation strategy, the recipient appreciated the compliments using formulas such as “thanks” and “thank you”. Users may apply non-verbal strategies to increase the intensity of their appreciation (e.g., smileys, clicking Like, character repetition, etc.). We will discuss the use of these extra strategies—that accompany the head act under the section of internal and external modifiers. Example 1 (Case 9) u1 (m):

Ruye māheto æz næzdik didim belæxære refigh! Face moonlike-your from close saw-we finally buddy! ‘Finally, I saw your moon-like (beautiful) face closely buddy!’

u2 (m):

Chākeræm dāsh Behnām! Servant-(I) am brother Behnam! ‘Thanks brother [informal] Behnam!’

3.1.2 Accept: Agreeing Utterance Seldom did speakers express their acceptance of the compliment by agreeing with the complimenter. In example 2, the recipient of the compliment, who was a young girl, had a very short haircut. Accepting the compliment, she agreed


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with the complimenter on what she did to improve her appearance. Besides, she suggested the complimenter do the same thing. Example 2 (Case 245) u1 (f):

xeili jālebe … xoshæm umæd … behet miād. Very interesting it is … like-me came … to-you is coming. ‘It is very interesting … I liked it … it looks good on you.’ ☺

u2 (f):

xeiliiii xube, toam bayad in karo bokoni. Veeeeery good-it is, you-too must this work do-you. ‘It is veeeeery good. You must do it, too.’

☺ ☺

As the data showed, agreeing with the complimenter is not a preferred option (only 9%) among Iranian Facebook users. One plausible explanation for the low percentage of accept-agreeing utterance sub-strategy is the high regard for modesty when responding to compliments. Agreeing with a complimenter can be regarded as a lack of modesty on the side of a complimentee. Most of the agreeing examples (see example 3) in the data exhibit an ironic, playful character. Example 3 (Case 204)

☺ ☺

u1 (f):

ækse siyah sefid xeili be ruhiyæt miād! Photo black white very to spirit-your is-coming! ‘Black and white photo fits your spirit.’ ☺

u2 (f):

Be khoda! Ruhiyæm xeili hæsāse Sara. To hæm In God! Spirit-my very sensitive Sara. You too have fæhmidi? :D found out-you? :D ‘I swear in God! My spirit is very sensitive Sara. Have you, too, found it out?’ :D

In example 3, the recipient of the compliment agreed—in a jocular way—with the complimenter by swearing in God. In addition, she asked the question, “Have you, too, found it out?” to substantiate her claim that her spirit is sensitive. Adopting a playful and ironic style in her verbal response, the recipient of the compliment seems to be creating a balance between modesty and agreement.


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3.1.3 Accept: Downgrading the Compliment Adopting this strategy, speakers try to create a balance between modesty and agreement principles. While accepting the compliment, the recipient downgrades the force of the compliment by adding some other comments. Example 4 illustrates the application of this strategy. Example 4 (Case 306) u1 (f):

Vāāāāāāāāy! Moohāsho! cheghædr bolænde! lāghær Wooooooow! Hairs-her! how long-it is! Slim shodiā khoshgel khānoom. have-become-you Beautiful lady. ‘Woooooow! Look at her hair! How long it is! You have become slim, beautiful lady.’

u2 (f):

Sara jān, in ækse 4 sāl pishe. Sara dear, this photo-of 4 year before-it-is. ‘Dear Sara, this photo was taken 4 years ago.’

In example 4, the complimenter complimented the recipient’s long hair and slim body. The recipient accepted but downgraded the compliment stating that her photo was taken four years ago. 3.1.4 Accept: Returning the Compliment Returning compliments was the second most frequently applied accepting substrategy in our data. It accounted for 19.5% and 14% of the total share of accepting strategies used by male and female complimentees respectively. By using returning compliment strategy (see example 5), the recipient of the compliment performed two functions of accepting and returning the compliment for the same or a different commendable attribute. Example 5 (Case 379) u1 (f):

eshghæææææm, zibāo doost dāshtænii ♥. Loooooove-my beautiful-and love able ♥. ‘My loooooove, beautiful and loveable ♥.’

u2 (f):

Parisa jun, cheshāt ghæshæng mibine. Parisa soul, eyes-your beautifully see-it. ‘Dear Parisa, your eyes see beauty.’ ☺

☺ ☺


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Example 5 exhibits one of the most common formulas (“Your eyes see beauty.”), used by Iranians for returning a compliment. As seen in this example, verbal strategies are often accompanied with non-verbal appreciation and acknowledgement tokens such as emoticons (e.g., ♥) or Like function ( ). In example 6, the recipient used a combination of two accepting sub-strategies (i.e., appreciation token and returning compliment) to respond. Example 6 (Case 187) u1 (m):

Aghā, mesle hæmishe xoshtip! Begu Mā shāʾ Sir, as always handsome! Say whatever Allāh!2 Allah (God) wills! ‘Sir, (you are) handsome as always! Keep the devil eye away!’

u2 (m):

Erādætmændim dāsh Mehran, cheshāt xoshtip Sincerely-yours-we are bro Mehran, eyes-your handsome mibineh bærādær. sees-it brother. ‘Thanks [formal] brother (informal) Mehran, your eyes see beauty brother [formal].’

Additionally, as it will be discussed in the section of modifiers below, the use of other strategies such as Like function and emoticons can clarify interlocutors’ positive intent and prevent misunderstandings in cases where a compliment and/or its response can be misinterpreted. 3.1.5 Evading the Compliment In their verbal responses to compliments, the recipients had another response strategy at their disposal—that was evading the compliment. On average, evading compliments comprised 3% of the data with males having a higher percentage (5%) than females (1%). Female complimentees used more accept-

2 Mā shāʾ Allāh (‫ )ﻣﺎ ﺷﺎء ﷲ‬is an Arabic phrase that expresses appreciation, joy, praise or thankfulness for an event or person that was just mentioned. It also serves as a reminder that all accomplishments are considered by Muslims to be achieved by the will of Allah. In Iran, people may utter this phrase in the belief that it may help protect them from jealousy, catching the evil eye. (Summarized from Wikipedia. Retrieved January 3, 2015, from http://en .wikipedia.org/wiki/Masha%27Allah).



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ing strategies while male complimentees preferred more evading and rejecting strategies in their responses. Evading and rejecting cr strategies are closely linked to the modesty maxim. Example 7 (Case 88) u1 (f):

Wow … che ækse jālebiiii …. Wow … what a photo amazing (it is) …. ‘Wow … what an amazing photo ….’

u2 (m):

kāre dæste xānoom Sælmānie dige! ☺ mā ke Work-of hand-of Ms. Sælmāni-is anyway! ☺ We that soooje shode boodim! :D subject had become-we! :D ‘This is Ms. Salmanie’s skill anyway! ☺ We had just become the subject [of the photograph!]’ :D

In example 7, the recipient of the compliment used an evading sub-strategy—that is shifting the credit to the photographer for her skills in photography. 3.1.6 Rejecting the Compliment The third response strategy a recipient of a compliment can adopt—when replying verbally—is to reject the compliment (see example 8 below). On average, rejecting accounts for only 1% of the cases in our data corpus. Males were more likely to reject compliments (2%) than females (0.5 %). Rejecting a compliment can be face-threatening in an online setting, where the users, posted their photos themselves. Typically, users post the pictures they believe they look good in them; thus, rejecting the compliments they receive can be contradictory to the premise underlying their posting a picture on their Facebook profiles. However, as shown by Maíz-Arévalo (2013), choosing this option contributes to creating a banter effect among interlocutors and can reinforce the sense of solidarity among the participants. Example 8 (Case 365) u1 (f):

Næsim! Pærishæb Ārezoo ro didæm væ kolli poshte Næsim! Two-nights-ago Ārezoo saw-I and a lot back-of særet æz jæzzābiæthāt tæ’rif kærdæm væ head-your from attractiveness-your compliment did and


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æz romooze zibāii væ xosh heykælit porsidæm. Xeyli from secrets-of beauty and good physique-your asked-I. Very xoob chizi shodi be xoda. Morāghebæt kon doxtær good thing have-become-you in God. Care take girl jān. ☺ dear. ☺ ‘Nasim! Two nights ago, I met Arezoo and complimented your attractiveness behind your back. I asked her about the secrets of your wellshaped physique. You have become a good thing in God (I swear). Take care of yourself dear girl. ☺’ u2 (f):

To yeki æz bozorgtærin rævāniā hæsti. Inā You (informal) one of biggest psychopaths you-are. These hæmæsh ækse. To bebin væ bāvær nækon. all photo-is. You (informal) see and believe do-not-you. :)) :)) ‘You are one of the biggest psychopaths. These are all photos. Look at them but do not believe. :-))’

In example 8, the respondent used disagreement to reject the compliment. She also supported her disagreement by stating that what the complimenter perceived as beautiful were all elusions depicted in the photographs. The respondent used emoticons seeking to clarify the positive tone of the message and thereby prevent possible misunderstanding. 3.2 Internal and External Modifications As we explained in the methodology section, we also investigated the number and types of modifiers used in the compliment responses. We first identified the head acts—that are the most explicit parts of compliment responses. Then, we identified internal and external modifiers that accompany the head act (see example 9 below). Example 9 (Case 293): u1 (f):

vāyyyyyyyy Sæææhrrrāāāāāā, yæni jigær boodi jigærtær Woooooow Sæææhrrrāāāāāā, it means liver were-you liver-more shodi, hæmejoore zibā o delrobāii. have-become-you, all-aspects pretty and enchanting-you-are.


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Frequency of internal and external modifiers

Modifiers Gender of complimentee Internal Male Female Total

External

8 (6%) 122 (94%) 13 (9%) 128 (91%) 21 (8%) 250 (92%)

Total 130 141 271

Xeylii khoshgele, xeyli sexye xeylliiii :-* māch bā Very beautiful-it-is, very sexy-it-is veeeery :-* kiss with bæghæl. hug. ‘Woooooow Sæææhrrrāāāāāā, you were sweet (idiomatic and informal) and have become much sweeter (idiomatic and informal). You are all beautiful and sexy. It (hairstyle) is very beautiful, very sexy veeeeery much. :-* Kiss with hug.’ u2 (f):

merciiiiiiii Bæhār junæm. Thaaaanks Bæhār soul-my. ‘Thaaaanks my dear Bæhār.’

As example 9 demonstrates, the recipient accepted the compliment by using appreciation token sub-strategy. She also applied both internal (vowel lengthening) and external (the endearment term “dear”, first name “Bæhār” and Like function) modifiers. 3.2.1 Frequency of Internal and External Modifiers As presented in Table 7 below, male complimentees used a total number of 130 (8 internal and 122 external) modifiers and female complimentees used a total number of 141 (13 internal and 128 external) modifiers in their verbal compliment responses. The ratio of modifiers per cr was 1.9 for males and 2.6 for females. We found that the majority of the modifiers used were external (92%) and the ratio of external modifiers was similar between males (94 %) and females (91%).


266 table 8

eslami, jabbari and kuo Types of internal modifiers (used in verbal crs)

Internal modifiers Gender of Intensifying Emotional Vowel Multiple Total complimentee adverbials expressions lengthening exclamations Male Female Total

table 9

3 (37.5%) 1 (7.7%) 4 (19%)

0 3 (23.3%) 3 (14.3%)

2 (25%) 9 (69%) 11 (52.4%)

3 (37.5%) 0 3 (14.3%)

8 13 21

Types of external modifiers (used in verbal crs)

External Modifiers Gender of complimentee Male Female Total

Title

First name

8 (7%) 15 (12%) 5 (4%) 26 (20%) 13 (5%) 41 (16%)

Endearment Supportive Emoticons Total term move & “like” 27 (22%) 36 (28%) 63 (25%)

4 (3%) 2 (2%) 6 (3%)

68 (56%) 122 59 (46%) 128 127 (51%) 250

3.2.2 Types and Frequency of Internal Modifiers An interesting finding was that the number of oralization marks (e.g., vowel lengthening and multiple exclamation marks), which were used as internal modifiers, was twice as much as the number of verbal ones (14 vs. 7). We also found that females on average used more internal modifiers per cr (0.24) compared to males (0.12) (see Table 8). Among the five types of external modifiers (see Table 9 below) used in compliment responses, the use of emoticons and Like, first name and endearment term are the first, the second and the third most frequently used modifiers respectively. Emoticons and Like were the most pervasive external modifiers (51%) that accompanied verbal compliment responses in this study. The results also revealed that the external modifiers (i.e., first name and endearment terms) were mainly used in combination. Furthermore, females used more external modifiers per cr (2.37%) compared to males (1.82 %). The use of first name was more prominent among females (20 %) compared to males (12%). Similarly endearment terms were used more by females (28 %)


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Cross-gender analysis of internal and external modifiers

Modifiers Gender (complimenteecomplimenter) m-m m-f f-f f-m Total

Verbal responses

Internal

External

Total

45 22 42 12 121

3 5 10 3 21

76 46 109 19 250

79 51 119 22 271

compared to males (22%). However, males used higher percentage of emoticons and Like (56%) than females (46%). 3.2.3 Cross-Gender Analysis of Internal and External Modifiers As indicated in Table 10, the ratio of modifiers per compliment response used in male to male (m-m) crs was 1.75 compared to 2.83 for female to female (f-f) compliment responses. In contrast, males used more modifiers in their crs to females (2.31%) compared to the modifiers used per cr by females to males (1.83%). On average, females used more modifiers per cr (2.61) compared to males (1.9). The majority of the modifiers used were external (92 %) and the ratio was similar between males (94%) and females (91 %). In contrast, males used more modifiers in their crs to females (2.31) when compared with the number of the modifiers used by females to males (1.83). Opposite to this, females used more modifiers per cr in their responses to females (2.83) than the ratio used by males when responding to compliments by males (1.75). These results corroborate previous research findings that females in general use more intensification and supportive moves to enhance the effect of their intended illocution. However, some questions need to be further investigated; questions such as why do males use more modifiers in their responses to the compliments they receive from females? and why do females use more modifiers when they respond to females? 3.3 Gender and Compliment Responses In order to investigate cross-gender interactions in using compliment response strategies, we cross-tabulated the data by the gender of the complimenters and


268 table 11

eslami, jabbari and kuo Compliment response strategies in cross-gender categories Response

Explicit/verbal crs Gender

Accept

Reject

Evade

3 (2.1) 1 (0.9) 4 1 (0.5) 0

Total

39 (27.3) 12 (11) 51 39 (19.2) 11 (25.6) 50

1

3 (2.1) 7 (6.5) 10 1 (0.5) 1 (2.3) 2

Totals

101

5

12

m-m m-f Total f-f f-m

Noresponse

Total

21 (14.7) 20 (18.5) 41 36 (17.7) 4 (9.3) 40

143

Implicit/non-verbal crs

Combination

0

“Like”

“Like” + emoticon 3 (2.1) 5 (4.6) 8 5 (2.5) 0

0

73 (51) 59 (54.6) 132 119 (58.6) 25 (58.2) 144

2

276

13

2 (1.8) 2 0 0

5

Emoticon

1 (0.7) 2 (1.8) 3 2 (1) 2 (4.6) 4 7

81

108 251 203 2 43 246 497

the gender of the complimentees (or respondents). The cross tabulation yields a total of four types of complimenter–complimentee dyads (see Table 11 below). They are a) m-m: a male complimenter with a male complimentee; b) m-f: a male complimenter with a female complimentee; c) f-f: a female complimenter with a female complimentee; and d) f-m: a female complimenter with a male complimentee. Chi-square tests of independence were performed to examine the relationship between the complimenters’ and the complimentees’ gender and the following compliment response strategies: (a) accept, (b) Like, and (c) no response. Descriptive statistics were used for the analysis of all other response strategies as the numbers of responses in these categories were relatively low and using inferential statistics would not be appropriate. As presented in Table 11, males did not respond to 14.7 % of the compliments they received from their male friends. Neither did they respond to 18.5 % of the compliments they received from their female friends on Facebook. In contrast, females did not respond to 17.7% of the compliments by their female friends compared to 9.3% of the compliments they received from their male



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friends. Therefore, not only did Iranian women receive compliments on their appearance (profile pictures) from their male friends but they also responded more frequently to their male than female Facebook friends. Additionally, the results showed that males accepted their male friends’ compliments more than twice as much (27.3%) as they did for their female friends’ compliments (11 %). On the other hand, female complimentees accepted the compliments from their male friends more frequently (25.6%) than from their female friends (19.2%). Similarly, males rejected compliments from males twice as much as from females (2.1% vs. 0.9 %); and females rejected the compliments from their female friends more frequently compared to the compliments from their male friends (0.5% vs. 0.0%). In contrast, males showed more inclination to evade their female friends’ compliments compared to their male friends’ compliments (6.5% vs. 2.1%). Similarly, females evaded their male friends’ compliments more frequently (2.3%) than they their female friends’ compliments (0.5%). Regarding non-verbal compliment response strategies, the results indicated that there was a similar number of likes in all dyads: m-m (51 %), m-f (54.6 %), f-f (58.6%), and f-m (58.2%). The use of other non-verbal strategies was similar across the four dyads as well. Concerning the presence of compliment responses in our data, the relationship between the gender of the complimenters and the gender of the complimentees was significant, χ² (1) = 69.76, p < .001, with a high Phi coefficient of .40. Males responded to 85% of the compliments made by their male friends and to 82% of the compliments made by their female friends. Quite differently, females responded to 83% of the compliments made by their female friends and to 91% of the compliments made by their male friends. With respect to accepting compliments, there was a statistically significant relationship between the gender of the complimentees and the gender of the complimenters, χ² (1) = 31.66 p < .001, with a high Phi coefficient of .55. Males verbally accepted compliments from males more than twice as much (27%) as the ones from females (11%). In contrast, females accepted compliments from males more (25%) than the ones from females (19%). In regard to the response strategy “Like”, the relationship between the gender of the complimenters and the gender of the complimentees was statistically significant, χ² (1) = 44.66, p < .001, with a high Phi coefficient of .40. To sum up, our study elucidated the fact that females and males, contrary to the traditional values and gender roles in Iran, complimented each other on appearance. They also responded frequently to each other’s compliments. More interestingly, females responded more to the compliments received from males (91.7%) than the ones received from females (82.3%). However, males


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responded to compliments received from males more (85.3 %) than to the ones received from their female friends (81.5%) on Facebook. Furthermore, males accepted less compliments from the females (11 %) than their male friends (25.6%). In the cross-gender comparison with regard to the use of Like function, females—compared to males—turned out to use Like function more frequently to accept compliments from their friends of opposite gender. Our analyses showed an obvious trend in Iranian female fb users’ behaviour with regard to responding and accepting compliments on Facebook. They not only responded to compliments from males more often but also demonstrated more acceptance of the compliments from males both verbally and non-verbally. These findings are in sharp contrast to the interaction style between males and females in face-to-face communication in Iran. It should be noted that cross-gender compliments in general and compliments on appearance in particular are not socially and culturally acceptable in the Iranian culture unless there is an intimate close family relationship (e.g., parents-children, siblings, husband-wife and in general between Maharem3) between a complimenter and a complimentee. Due to this restriction, we were not able to find any studies that have analyzed cross-gender compliment or compliment responses in face-to-face interactions. What we observed in our fb data, however, highlighted the language practices of females that is rarely displayed in offline interactions. As stated by Amir-Ebrahimi (2008), in Iran, where public spaces are under the influence of traditional and restrictive culture or institutional forces, the internet has become a means to resist the restrictions imposed on these spaces. From this perspective, an analysis of online behaviour and language use is important for studying socio-cultural norms that are hidden in everyday life but are overtly practiced in the virtual world. Today, cyberspace has emerged as a key social space that affords its citizens with opportunities for rediscovering their selves, socializing, having a free dialogue, and creating an unrestricted social life that—for various social, cultural, religious, and political reasons— does not often exist in real public spaces. Thus, virtual social spaces in Iran are spaces for shaping repressed identities in all their simple and complicated forms (Amir-Ebrahimi, 2008; Karimi, 2015). Through their language use choices (e.g., complimenting behaviour), the marginalized individuals (e.g., females)

3 In Islamic sharia legal terminology, a mahram (Arabic ‫ )ﳏﺮم‬is an unmarriageable kin with whom sexual intercourse would be considered incestuous, a punishable taboo. Current usage of the term covers a wider range of people and mostly deals with the dress code practice of hijab. ((In Wikipedia. Retrieved January 3, 2015, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahram).



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affirm a side of their self that is hardly possible to reveal in real public spaces. In these emerging virtual spaces, women have the opportunity to make their voices heard and through making linguistic choices freely, they can reveal who they really are and what they really think. 3.4 Facebook versus Face-to-Face Compliment Response Strategies This research also sought to investigate the difference between Facebook and face-to-face Iranian Persian speakers’ compliment response behaviour. A number of studies (Boori, 1994; Sharifian, 2005, 2008; Zarei, 2011; Mohajernia and Solimani, 2013) examined Iranian Persian speakers’ compliment responses using elicited and natural data. Since our data was naturally occurring (not elicited), we decided to compare the results of the current research with the findings from Boori’s (1994) study. Boori is the only researcher who collected his data (838 crs) through participant observation. Drawing on Pomerantz’s (1978) and Herbert’s (1986) frameworks, he came up with 18 types of compliment responses with the macro categories of acceptance, non-acceptance, and non-agreement. In Boori’s classification, non-acceptance category corresponds to what we—based on Holmes’ (1986) classification—categorized as evading. And his non-agreement category corresponds to our rejecting category. Boori’s findings showed 48% acceptance, 28.9 % non-acceptance (or evading), and 22.5% non-agreement (or rejecting). However, our findings are very different in that we had 95% acceptance, 3% evading, and 1 % rejecting. The acceptance rate was twice as high on fb as in face-to-face data. In a sharp contrast, as the results of the current study showed, is the complimentees’ moderate to weak inclination to reject or evade compliments in their Facebook interactions. Male complimentees rejected only 6% of the compliments while female complimentees did not reject any compliment. Similarly, male complimentees evaded 15% and female complimentees evaded only 4 % of the compliments they received on Facebook. Moreover, in our data 84% of the compliments received a response (see Table 1); and from these responses, 71% were non-verbal (see Table 2). More interestingly, Boori’s (1994) analysis revealed that only 50.4 % of the responses are accounted for by ten formulas. This is hardly the case in our fb data corpus. The fb users in our study were highly creative in their responses. They used a variety of implicit and explicit strategies to respond to compliments. As explained before, not responding to a compliment is unlikely to occur in face-to-face interactions. Because, as an adjacency pair, the initiating move— that is the compliment—needs to be followed by the second move—that is the response. However, leaving a compliment with no response in an online setting is not considered inappropriate or offensive; since most of the interactions may


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happen asynchronously or with a delay in an online setting. For instance, fb users may check their fb from time to time depending on how actively they are involved with this social networking site. Another reason for not responding back to a compliment could be modesty. Responding to compliments on fb with degrees of intentionality for either verbal or non-verbal responses can be face-threatening due to the conflict between the two maxims of agreement and modesty. Using the Like function that is accessible conveniently by fb is a highly prevalent choice by the fb users to respond to compliments while keeping some level of modesty. As stated by Maíz-Arévalo (2013), using non-verbal response is an implicit way to respond to compliments rather than typing a response. Other non-verbal responses such as emoticons were rarely used. We believe that the reason behind it is the fb system and the higher level of accessibility of Like function vs. using emoticons. Using Like function is exceptionally popular due to its convenience and the fact that it acknowledges both the reception and appreciation of a compliment. In conclusion, our findings revealed that fb users strategically take advantage of the affordances offered by fb (e.g., non-verbal resources) to respond to compliments. Additionally, they may use the asynchronous nature of communication strategically for not responding to the compliments they receive. Our findings indicated that compliment responses on fb are formulated much more creatively compared to their counterparts in face-to-face interactions (e.g., Boori, 1994). It should be highlighted that none of the studies on complimenting behaviour have examined cross-gender interactions. However, some studies that used elicited data (Heidari et al., 2009) considered gender as a variable in their analysis and confirmed that females are different from males in their compliment response behaviour. Heidari et al.’s findings showed that the female speakers used more rejecting and evading but less accepting strategies than the male complimentees. Their study also indicated that female speakers tended to use more implicit accepting strategies compared to males. Females possibly showed more modesty and ‘self-praise avoidance’ that are in line with subordination positionality. Although not openly expressed in mostly male-dominated Iranian society, modesty and subordination are expected from females. As Heidari et al. (2009) claimed, implicit acceptance of compliments, evading and rejecting are viewed for females as self-effacement and therefore virtuous. Male complimentees did not show such tendencies. Instead, they displayed a more powerful self-image when responding to compliments. As indicated above, our findings are in sharp contrast to what Heidari et al. reported in their research.



4

273

Conclusion

The current study intended to find out: (a) what linguistic and non-linguistic tools and strategies Iranian Persian speakers apply to respond to compliments on Facebook, (b) whether there are any gender differences in the use of cr strategies, and finally (c) how patterns of cr strategies differ on Facebook versus in face-to-face interactions. The results demonstrated that features such as disembodiment, asynchronicity and affordances provided by Facebook have a crucial say in how interlocutors responded to compliments. This led to the popularization of some strategies among others and resulted in a different system of responses. Our findings disclosed that computer-mediated communication tools on Facebook have made it possible for users to adopt some novel and at times creative cr strategies, which are totally absent or socially inappropriate in face-to-face interactions. For instance, as the current study showed, non-verbal response (i.e., using emoticons and clicking Like) and no-response strategies are more favored on Facebook than other types of cr strategies. Furthermore, we found that very few complimentees preferred to evade and reject compliments on Facebook while evading and rejecting strategies are commonly practiced by Iranian Persian speakers in their face-to-face interactions. In other words, more agreement and less rejection strategies are growing as common cr strategies among Iranian Facebook users, who behave very differently in their face-toface social interactions. It can be claimed that the cultural schema of shekastehnafsi—that “motivates the speakers to negate or scale down compliments, downplay their talents, skills, achievements, etc., and return the compliment to the complimenter” (Sharifian, 2008: 55)—does not seem to be materialized when responding to compliments online on snss as opposed to face-to-face interactions. More research needs to be conducted to investigate how far Iranian socio-cultural norms and values might have been affected by the advent of computer-mediated means of communication in social networking sites. Gender differences in complimenting behaviour on fb compared to faceto-face interactions yielded to very important findings. Contrary to the traditional values and culturally and politically defined gender roles in Iran, females and males complimented each other’s appearance on fb and responded to each other’s compliments with a high rate of acceptance. Remarkably, females responded more to the compliments they received from their male friends on fb. They also demonstrated—both verbally and non-verbally—more acceptance of the compliments from males. These findings diverge tremendously from the interactional style between males and females in face-to-face communication in Iran.


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In Iran, women’s public presentation—both physically and linguistically— is highly restricted by tradition, culture, and state driven forces (AmirEbrahimi, 2008; Karimi, 2015). This research elucidated that cyberspace in general and fb in particular has afforded Iranian women with an open space in which they can shape and share their real identity. This phenomenon, as the current research revealed, is reflected partly in female participants’ linguistic choices that were made free from the pressures imposed by a maledominated society. Therefore, it can be speculated that technology has created new forms of communities with novel language practices and resources that provide opportunities for personal empowerment and liberation. The current study suffers from a number of limitations that need to be acknowledged here. To probe more into the reasons behind the use of specific cr strategies by the complimentees, a systematic and in-depth interview is warranted. It can provide more insights into a number of variables (e.g., personality, social and cultural norms, religious or ethical principles, attitudes towards technology, etc.) that play key roles in their choice of cr strategies on Facebook. Focusing on the appearance of the participants as the only subject of compliment is another limitation of this study. It can be improved by widening the scope of subjects for complimenting (e.g., personality, skills, achievements, possessions, etc.) and studying the cr strategies the participants may adopt to respond to these types of compliments. Social networking sites can be used to promote intercultural communication, cultural awareness and understandings. snss such as such as Facebook provide excellent platforms for language learners and teachers to get authentic information about different cultures and be informed about the role of women in different societies. These sites can be used to encounter stereotypical views that exist in mediate or the ones reflected in institutional discourse about women in certain societies such as the Middle East. Learners can become language researchers and asked to collect and analyse language use data that are available in social networking sites and share their own cultural norms and values with speakers of different languages and cultures. Relatively few studies to date have investigated English language learners language use and language learning on snss (Lam, 2000). Future researchers can include the use of snss in their curriculum and have students examine gender and cultural differences in language use. Observing and analysing authentic language use would likely promote noticing regional differences and cultural norms reflected in performing different speech functions. Use of snss such as Facebook would allow students to interact with, learn about, and observe the target language and culture.



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