Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T21:25:53.920Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Investigating satirical discourse processing and comprehension: the role of cognitive, demographic, and pragmatic features

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2019

STEPHEN SKALICKY Open the ORCID record for STEPHEN SKALICKY [Opens in a new window]
STEPHEN SKALICKY*
Affiliation:
School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies, Victoria University of Wellington
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Satire is a subtle type of figurative discourse and is still relatively under-studied from the perspective of figurative language researchers. The purpose of this study is to investigate cognitive, demographic, and pragmatic factors previously suggested to influence satire processing and comprehension but which have yet to be studied using behavioral methods. Specifically, this study examines Need for Cognition (NFC; the desire to engage in cognitively difficult tasks), general knowledge, demographic measures such as language background, and affective perceptions of humor, sincerity, and positivity. Sixty-one participants (32 non-native English speakers) read satirical and non-satirical news reports taken from The Onion and Science Daily, respectively, both published in the United States. Perceptions of sincerity, humor, and positivity, reading times, and written interpretations of the intended meaning for each text were recorded. Results from statistical analyses suggested NFC significantly influenced satirical text reading times. Moreover, language background and perceptions of sincerity significantly influenced satire comprehension. These results highlight an interplay between individual differences during satire processing and comprehension, and work to validate some, but not all, theoretical predictions for satire processing and comprehension.

Keywords

satirehumorfigurative languageNeed for Cognitionaffective perceptions
Type
Article
Information
Language and Cognition , Volume 11 , Issue 3 , September 2019 , pp. 499 - 525
Copyright
Copyright © UK Cognitive Linguistics Association 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

references

Bates, D., Mächler, M., Bolker, B. & Walker, S. (2015). Fitting linear mixed-effects models using lme4. Journal of Statistical Software 67(1), 1–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boukes, M., Boomgaarden, H. G., Moorman, M. & de Vreese, C. H. (2015). At odds: Laughing and thinking? The appreciation, processing, and persuasiveness of political satire. Journal of Communication 65(5), 721–744.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cacioppo, J. T., Petty, R. & Kao, C. F. (1984). The efficient assessment of need for cognition. Journal of Personality Assessment 48(3), 306–307.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Coltheart, M. (1981). The MRC psycholinguistic database. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 33(4), 497–505.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crossley, S. A., Kyle, K. & McNamara, D. S. (2016). The tool for the automatic analysis of text cohesion (TAACO): automatic assessment of local, global, and text cohesion. Behavior Research Methods 48, 1227–1237.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Davies, M. (2008). The corpus of contemporary American English. BYE, Brigham Young University.Google Scholar
Ferstl, E. C., Israel, L. & Putzar, L. (2017). Humor facilitates text comprehension: evidence from eye movements. Discourse Processes 54(4), 259–284.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fleischhauer, M., Enge, S., Brocke, B., Ullrich, J., Strobel, A. & Strobel, A. (2010). Same or different? Clarifying the relationship of need for cognition to personality and intelligence. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 36(1), 82–96.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Furnham, A. & Thorne, J. D. (2013). Need for cognition: its dimensionality and personality and intelligence correlates. Journal of Individual Differences 34(4), 230–240.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, A., Del Rio, E. & Kemmitt, A. (2010). Missing the joke: a reception analysis of satirical texts. Communication, Culture & Critique 3(3), 396–415.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaakinen, J. K., Olkoniemi, H., Kinnari, T. & Hyönä, J. (2014). Processing of written irony: an eye movement study. Discourse Processes 51(4), 287–311.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuperman, V., Stadthagen-Gonzalez, H. & Brysbaert, M. (2012). Age-of-acquisition ratings for 30,000 English words. Behavior Research Methods 44(4), 978–990.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kuznetsova, A., Brockhoff, B. & Christensen, H. B. (2016). lmerTest: tests in linear mixed effects models. Retrieved from <https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=lmerTest>.Google Scholar
LaMarre, H. L., Landreville, K. D. & Beam, M. A. (2009). The irony of satire: political ideology and the motivation to see what you want to see in The Colbert Report. International Journal of Press/Politics 14(2), 212–231.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LaMarre, H. L., Landreville, K. D., Young, D. & Gilkerson, N. (2014). Humor works in funny ways: examining satirical tone as a key determinant in political humor message processing. Mass Communication and Society 17(3), 400–423.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mackey, R. (2015). Ex-FIFA official cites satirical article from The Onion in his self-defense. The New York Times. Retrieved from <https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/01/world/americas/ex-fifa-official-jack-warner-cites-onion-article-in-defense.html>.Google Scholar
Miller, P. W. & Chiswick, B. R. (2005). Linguistic distance: a quantitative measure of the distance between English and other languages. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 26(1), 1–11.Google Scholar
Mitchell, H. H., Graesser, A. C. & Louwerse, M. M. (2010). The effect of context on humor: a constraint-based model of comprehending verbal jokes. Discourse Processes 47(2), 104–129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nakagawa, S. & Schielzeth, H. (2013). A general and simple method for obtaining R2 from generalized linear mixed-effects models. Methods in Ecology and Evolution 4(2), 133–142.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olkoniemi, H., Ranta, H. & Kaakinen, J. K. (2016). Individual differences in the processing of written sarcasm and metaphor: evidence from eye movements. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 42(3), 433–450.Google ScholarPubMed
Pfaff, K. L. & Gibbs, R. W. (1997). Authorial intentions in understanding satirical texts. Poetics 25, 45–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prichard, C. & Rucynski, J. (2019). Second language learners’ ability to detect satirical news and the effect of humor competency training. TESOL Journal 10(1), e00366. doi.org/10.1002/tesj.366CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Revelle, W. (2017). psych: procedures for personality and psychological research. Retrieved from <https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=psych> Version = 1.7.5.Google Scholar
Simpson, P. (2003). On the discourse of satire: towards a stylistic model of satirical humour. Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins Publishing.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Skalicky, S. (2018). Lexical priming in humorous satirical newspaper headlines. Humor – International Journal of Humor Research 31(4), 583–602.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Skalicky, S. & Crossley, S. A. (2019). Examining the online processing of satirical newspaper headlines. Discourse Processes 56(1), 61–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Swales, J. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Swales, J. (2004). Research genres: explorations and applications. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
The Onion (2015). FIFA frantically announces 2015 summer World Cup in United States. Retrieved from <https://sports.theonion.com/fifa-frantically-announces-2015-summer-world-cup-in-uni-1819577826>..>Google Scholar
Tremblay, A. & Ransijn, J. (2015). LMERConvenienceFunctions: model selection and post-hoc analysis for (G)LMER models. R Package Version 2.10. Retrieved from <https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=LMERConvenienceFunctions>.Google Scholar
van den Broek, P. & Helder, A. (2017). Cognitive processes in discourse comprehension: passive processes, reader-initiated processes, and evolving mental representations. Discourse Processes 54(5/6), 360–372.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van Mulken, M., Burgers, C. & van der Plas, B. (2011). Wolves, confederates, and the happy few: the influence of comprehension, agreement, and group membership on the attitude toward irony. Discourse Processes, 48(1), 50–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Skalicky supplementary material

Skalicky supplementary material 1

Download Skalicky supplementary material(File)
File 26.3 KB