Complimentary Language and Gender - Same-gender Compliments

Same-gender Compliments

Compliment patterns appear to be quite different when the complimenter and complimentee are the same gender from when they are different genders, and differences between males and females still arise even within same-gender interactions. In data from New Zealand, it was noted that women tended to compliment each other considerably more often than men complimented each other. This statistic is reflected in further data that showed that women gave two-thirds of the recorded compliments and received three-quarters of them. Compliments between men comprised a mere 9 percent of the data. Similar patterns have been noted in studies of English speakers from other regions as well.

In written discourse, too, such patterns arose, as women tended to compliment other women more often than they complimented men, and more often than men complimented either each other or women. In one study, compliments between females numbered almost 250, while compliments between men did not even reach 50.

Janet Holmes suggests that the discrepancies in male-male and female-female complimentary language may be due to differences in perception concerning the purpose of compliments. The hypothesis is that women use compliments to build affiliations, while men use compliments to make evaluative judgments. Deborah Tannen attributes female linguistic behavior to the purpose of rapport-building, so, assuming compliments are being used as such a means, the data of complimentary language between women seems to suggest this tendency to create and strengthen affiliations is strongest between women.

Compliments are usually classified into one of four categories, depending on what they refer to: appearance, ability and performance, possessions, or personality. In New Zealand data, it is shown that women tend to compliment each other based on appearance most often. While 61 percent of the compliments between women were found to be appearance-based, only 36 percent of the compliments between men were found to compliment each other based on appearance. Additionally, only 22 percent of the compliments based on appearance that were received by men were also given by men.

Men were found to compliment each other based on possessions more often than they compliment women based on possessions. Men rarely complimented each other based on appearance in both the New Zealand and American data, but in the American data it seemed compliments based on appearance were less commonly received by men from women than in the New Zealand data.

Also in New Zealand data, apparent variation between the genders was noted among English-speakers. While women are found to use the compliment pattern, "What !" (as in, "What a nice shirt!") more often than men, men are found to use a more minimal pattern of, " " (as in, "Nice car."). Thus, it is not surprising that compliments between males very rarely are found to adhere to the "What !" pattern. In data of American English, only women were found to use the emphasized form, "I love…" rather than, "I like…" and this pattern was most prevalent when women were complimenting other women. Women also used intensifiers such as "really" and "very" in their compliments more than men, and women primarily used these intensifiers when addressing other women.

A study of Mandarin-speakers in Kunming, China indicated that males tend to use implicit compliments more often than females, and females tend to provide explanations and justifications for their compliments. Another study of Chinese-speakers found similar results. At 80.5 percent, females opted for explicit compliments with other females, while 57.2 percent of the compliments paid by males to other males were explicit. Conversely, males used implicit compliments for other males, at 9.5 percent, while females used implicit compliments for other females only 2.3 percent of the time. Males also chose no response, rather than accepting or declining a compliment, 28.5 percent of the time, while females chose no response only 12.8 percent of the time.