Grice on Irony: "He is a fine friend"

Speranza

Commentary on K. Bromberek-Dyzman's "Affective Twist in Irony Processing"

Grice was never intersted in irony. But his best friend, Rogers Albritton, was. Albritton was the operative behind Grice's getting to deliver the "William James Lectures" at Harvard, since Albritton, whom Grice had met at Oxford, was Chair of Harvard and the one who decided who the next "Philosophical" lecturer would be (remember that in those days, the lectures were held bi-annually rotating between the Department of Philosophy and the Department of Psychology -- James being what he awas.

In the first "Logic and Conversation" lecture Grice makes fun of the ways philosophers (who should know better) get confused about multiplying senses of words. He does not quote himself in "Meaning", where he writes that "mean" has two "senses"!, but he quotes himself in "Causal Theory of Perception", regarding the meaning of "seems". In the second lecture, he concocts "conversational implicature" to account for the anti-proliferation of senses (his modified Occam's razor).

As the classicist he was (of the Cliftonian school, to boot) he realised that his notion of conversational implicature shared some features with what classicists call a "figure of rhetoric", such as irony. His example is then to prove that

"He is a fine friend" ---> IMPLYING, "he is a scoundrel" -- or in general: BY uttering "p", Utterer, via irony, MEANS ~p --

fits his schema. And it does!
If it were NOT for the fact that Albritton was seated on the first row, and made commentaries after the second lecture.

The result -- unique in a philosopher  (Kant would NEVER do this) -- shows the geniality of Grice. In his third William James Lectures, he provides a refinement to his analysis of "irony", just to deal with the alleged Albritton counterexamples:

"He is generally a fine friend, even though he could, on this occasion, be seen more of as a scoundrel".

Or, my favourite:

"That car has all its windows intact", as we pass an automobile with a crashed window.

Grice finds that his schema can be refined by merely paying attention to the Greek root in the notion of 'irony', which makes a reference to 'affection', and 'affective' attitudes.

Traditionally irony has been researched as a verbal mode of
communicating non-literal meaning.

Yet, the extant literal/non-literal
meaning oriented research provided conflicting evidence and failed to
explain how irony vs. non-irony is processed.

The dominant literal/nonliteral
meaning approach hasn’t accounted for the role of attitudinal
non-propositional contents so crucially involved in irony
communication and comprehension.

Employed to communicate
indirectly, on top of non-literal meaning, irony serves to convey implicit
attitudes: emotional load non-propositionally attached to the
propositional contents.

The role of emotional contents implicitly
communicated by irony has not been acknowledged in irony research so
far.

This essay reviews irony and attitude research, focusing on the nonpropositional,
emotional contents, aiming to bridge the propositionalnon-
propositional meaning gap in irony research. Neuroimaging and
behavioral evidence showing that emotional load profoundly influences
communicative contents processing, priming its computation and
determining its processing patterns, is presented, and its role for irony
processing is highlighted.

Keywords: attitude; non-propositional meaning; emotional contents;
affective load; valence.



It seems obvious that everyday human communication is imbued with
emotions. On top of what we say, we smuggle how we feel, what are our
attitudes, preferences, biases.

There are numerous ways to convey emotional contents.

Most effective and efficient are the nonverbal means: facial mimicry,
smile-to-frown range of (micro)expressions, emotional prosody, rich
repertoire of gestures, and body postures. These ‘tell’ more than words.
Emotion-wise that is.

They communicate feelings and attitudes. Emotional
contours always tinge verbal interactions, yet remain as pervasive as
unexplored. Accumulative experimental evidence shows that emotional
contents attached to a message, beyond verbal code (smiling-frowning range of
facial work, affective prosody) plays a significant key role in message
comprehension, facilitating or delaying the intended meaning grasp. Though
deeply interrelated with communication, nonverbal emotional contents, and its
impact on verbal contents processing, remains largely unexplored. Language
researchers have not developed effective methods to capture the pervasive, yet
elusive (nonverbal) affective “matter” attached to the verbal “matter”. Even the
language repertoire for communicating attitude and affect by a spectrum of
explicit and implicit means, is not well understood.

It seems highly
commendable to change this inauspicious state of affairs. Language-emotion
interface offers to elucidate a range of communicative phenomena. Irony is but
one of the intriguing phenomena that might benefit from being explored in
language-emotion interdisciplinary framework.

How does irony, so far
explored by linguistic methods as a linguistic phenomenon, belong to emotion
research? This paper attempts at showing that irony is a verbal, though implicit
means of conveying attitude.

Attitude conveyed by ironic comments, has been
recognized as substantial for irony comprehension

-- e.g. Sperber & Wilson,
1981; 1986; 1991; Wilson & Sperber, 1992; Clark & Gerrig, 1984; Kreuz
& Glucksberg, 1989; Barbe, 1995; Kumon-Nakamura et al., 1995; Kotthoff,
2003; Partington, 2007).


Yet, despite this recognition, implicit affective
evaluation communicated by irony, has not been explicitly explored.

Factoring
attitude in the experimental research, favors a recognition that emotions are on
board. They are on board anyway, however their presence remains
unaccounted for. Recognizing emotional contents in irony, might only be
beneficial for irony research. It might also help in explaining the inconclusive
results obtained so far in the extant irony processing studies.


1. What does language research tell us about irony processing?

Philosophers have attempted to grasp and explain the nature of irony for the
last two thousand years (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Sophocles, Quintilian
and last but not least Herbert Paul Grice).

With limited success.

The predominant rhetorical account centered
around indirect criticism function of irony (Cutler, 1974; Muecke, 1970;
Booth, 1974; Grice, 1989).

Irony was seen as a power tool, affording one with
the liberty to criticize publicly, without being committed to the literal value of
the words.

Precious deniability, on the one hand.

A verbal means legitimizing
polite impoliteness, on the other hand.

Ascribing to this tradition, language
oriented philosophers (e.g. Grice, 1975; Searle, 1979) pictured irony, as an
anomalous, deviant use of code, convenient to smuggle in (implicitly)
unwelcome messages, veiled meanings.

Irony was ‘explained’ by substitution
where the explicit (polite) needs to be substituted with the implicit (impolite),
the literal with the non-literal.

What the speaker literally says should be taken
to mean ‘something else’, conveniently assumed to be the exact, or relative
opposite of what is said.

Yet, except for few conventionalized cases, irony
communicates no readymade, one-to-one substitutable meaning. Irony, does
not work on one-to-one basis: says ‘x’ hence means ‘~x’. Rational as it seemed,
substitution approach put paid to ‘explaining’ irony and unmasking the
inferential infrastructure involved in its comprehension.


Processing oriented irony research chose not to abandon the literal/nonliteral
meaning substitution as the overarching distinction, and aimed at
finding out whether irony comprehension takes longer, shorter, or as long as
non-irony comprehension.

Crucially, the goal was to test if irony is
comprehended in two stages, as opposed to literal meaning, which is a onestage
attempt.

Two major accounts to irony processing took the experimental
stage:

(i) two-stage account (e.g. Grice, 1975, 1989; Giora, 1997, 2002,
2003),

(ii) one-stage account (e.g. Gibbs, 1986, 1994; Sperber & Wilson,
1986/1995).


Both chose different ways and employed different mechanisms
to explain irony.


These accounts differ significantly in how they assess the role
of literal (salient or coded) meaning and the role of context in irony processing.
Both supply empirical data to corroborate their claims.

The experimental
results are as incompatible as the theoretical claims.
Two-stage account assumes that literal (salient or coded) meaning is
interpreted in the first stage. If the interpretation makes no sense in the
current context, it is rejected.

Contextually congruent interpretation is
pursued in the second stage.

This account, strongly anchored in rhetorical
tradition, pictures figurative meaning (as in the case of irony) as a derivative of
literal meaning, considered as the default standard meaning.

Non-literal
meaning is pictured as a deviation from the norm, an “anomaly” that can only
be grasped and explained by some special mechanism (i.e. implicature) (Grice,
1975).

The two-stage account argues that irony processing always takes longer
than literal meaning processing.

The comprehender arrives at the figurative,
context-fit reading only after processing and rejecting the literal meaning as
out-of synch. Extra time involved in irony processing-rejecting and reprocessing
is not needed for literal/coded meaning comprehension.


Hence,
irony takes longer to grasp when compared to the code-based, literal
interpretation. Standard Pragmatic Model (Grice, 1975; Searle, 1979), and
Graded Salience Hypothesis (Giora, 1995, 1997, 1999; 2003) are the two
main models advocating the privileged status of code-based (literal, salient)
meaning interpretation.


A number of experimental irony studies support twostage
processing assumptions and demonstrate that irony processing takes
longer than non-irony processing does (e.g. Giora et al., 1998; Giora & Fein,
1999, Giora, et al. 1998; Dews & Winner, 1999; Schwoebel et al., 2000).
One-stage account advocates context-dependent interpretation in the first
and only stage.


It holds that comprehenders are not bogged by the literality or
the non-literality of message meaning. They care about the intended, contextembedded
meaning. This attempt makes no processing distinctions for the
literal or non-literal meaning.


No special, privileged status is ascribed to the
literal meaning. Literal meaning is a constituent of pragmatic meaning, next to
other contextually cued meaning constituents. No special or extra mechanism
is postulated to govern non-literal meaning processing (Sperber & Wilson,
1986). Both literal and non-literal meanings are processed in parallel manner
(Gibbs, 1986; 1994).



What matters in this account is the (degree of) context
supportiveness. Supportive context facilitates the intended ironic
interpretation. Unsupportive (or non-supportive enough) context slows the
comprehension down. Irony processing takes no longer than the literal
equivalents processing does, provided irony-supportive context (e.g. Gibbs,
1986, 1994, 2001, 2002; Sperber & Wilson, 1986/1995). These claims
have been empirically supported by a number of empirical studies showing that
irony comprehension is not more time consuming than literal meaning
comprehension (e.g. Gibbs, 1986; 1994; Colston, 2002; Colston & O’Brien,
2000; Gerrig & Goldvarg, 2000; Ivanko & Pexman, 2003).
These two accounts providing conflicting results on irony processing,
legitimize questions about the nature of irony and the essence of ironicity. If it
is not the literal/non-literal meaning that generates the processing time
difference, then literality/non-literality does not constitute the essence of
ironicity, as it has been stipulated. What then makes the essence of ironicity?
What cues, features, properties make irony up and influence its processing
speed?

Across a range of domains, irony communicates more than it says,
apparently by exploiting one feature: dichotomy. Barbe (1995) singles out
dichotomy as “the” constitutive feature of irony. Irony is used to serve various
communicative functions (e.g. funniness, implicit emotion display,
exaggeration, politeness, etc.) and may employ various verbal and non-verbal
means to do the “doublespeak”: communicate two dichotomous levels of
meaning. Barbe (1995) distinguishes three potential levels of dichotomy in
irony: (i) semantic and pragmatic incongruity – literal and intended meaning
dichotomy (cf. Colston, 2002; Coston & O’Brien, 2000; Gerrig & Goldvarg,
2000; Ivanko & Pexman, 2003); (ii) linguistic meaning and behavior
incongruity (cf. Gibbs, 1986; Jorgensen et al., 1984; Kreuz & Glucksberg,
1989; Kumon-Nakamura et al., 1995; Sperber & Wilson, 1981,
1986/1995); (iii) linguistic meaning and affective evaluative incongruity (cf.
Sperber & Wilson, 1981, Kreuz & Glucksberg, 1989).

Literal meaning vs.
affective meaning dichotomy, sounds a worthwhile line of investigation,
especially that irony markers, all of them, conspire to manifest affective load, to
boost ironic reading.


A range of irony markers may be employed to signal literal
meaning/affective meaning dichotomy (e.g. range of facial expressions,
affective prosody). These markers signal affective dichotomy by extra-linguistic
affective cues.

They are not irony specific. Rather, they might be employed to
manifest contrasts and mark incongruity between meaning levels in all forms of
communication (e.g. Bryant & FoxTree, 2002; Bryant & FoxTree, 2005;
Attardo et al., 2003). Markers facilitate irony recognition and comprehension.
Yet, irony calls for subtle marking. Over-marking ironic intent is detrimental
to the funniness, or poignancy of ironic message. Over-marked, irony loses its
expressive impact (cf. Cutler, 1974, p. 117). Ironic markers of affective
dichotomy such as non-anatomic, non-propositional structures, vary and
depend on a range of subtly manifested extra-linguistic properties. These
subtle, non-linguistic effects call for communicative granularity and finesse in
ostensive manifestness on the one hand, and inferential granularity, on the
other hand. Their elusive, non-propositional nature escaped propositionalmeaning
driven research so far.


Exclusive focus on the linguistic input, to the exclusion of extra-linguistic
cues, co-manifested in ironic messages, failed to account for irony vs. non88
irony differential speed processing patterns. Visibly, there is more to irony
than the literal/non-literal distinction. To account for this “more” and improve
the limited, deficient picture of irony comprehension, a closer look at context
and extra-linguistic cues manifesting ironic contents, might help. Irony cannot
be grasped without context. Ironic non-propositional cues are contextually
manifested. Yet, what makes irony context is not obvious. It seems beneficial to
examine how the linguistic context: what is said, the socio-situational context:
who-to-who, where, when, in what manner, blend with mental context, i.e.
what the speakers/hearers assume, anticipate, feel about what they say/hear.
The mental set up, and especially the feelings, attitudes implicitly manifested,
may turn out as relevant a context for irony, as the linguistic context. This
possibility though, has not been much tested.

In communicative interactions in general, people care a lot about emotional
contents: feelings and attitudes they share. In irony people care about implicit
modal contents: the critical or praising attitudinal load they communicate on
top of what they explicitly say.

Leggitt, Gibbs (2000) emphasize that empirical
research has not so far accounted for the implicit emotional layer in irony,
despite its crucial significance. This affective, modal, non-propositional
communicative content that evidences how we feel about what we say,
constitutes the backbone of human interpersonal interaction (e.g. Tomasello
et al., 2005; Tomasello, 2008). Affective load in interpersonal communication
is the core ingredient of social interaction. While one can easily imagine
complex affective communication without words, it is difficult to image humanto-
human communication devoid of affective load.

Damasio (1994) observes
that we are never (unless in a comma) devoid of affect (background affect
constitutes the most basic affective milieu that prompts feelings and emotions).
It underpins human action and thought. It permeates communication.
Affective code is more ancient than language code.


That might be the reason
why the ever present affective load has so far escaped linguists’ attention (cf.
Zajonc 1980). It has been taken for granted. If pragmatics is to account for the
gap between what people say and what they mean, it needs to account for how
they manifest their attitudes and how these shape communicative
comprehension.

According to Sperber & Wilson (1986/1995) we manifest
meanings, rather than merely provide propositions, which trigger
metarepresentational contents. When we communicate we embed the
propositional meaning (linguistic evidence) within the non-propositional,

affective cover. These two combined, propositional and non-propositional
contents, make the pragmatic meaning (cf. Moeschler, 2009).

2. What does attitude processing research tell
and how is it relevant for irony?
Attitude is tightly intertwined with communication and language in ways not
well understood. Attitude construct is central to social psychology (e.g. Eagly
& Chaiken, 1993) due to its prime and crucial impact on social interactions.
Interest in how attitude affects communication has not generated much
research in language studies (with a notable exception of Hunston, Thompson,
2000; Martin & White 2005). Yet, language/attitude relations, and especially
how attitude enters linguistic contents, and whether it preempts verbal
contents processing (e.g. Zajonc, 1980, 1984; LeDoux, 1996) seems crucial
for pragmatics.

Since Thurston’s definition (1931, p. 261) of attitude as “affect for or
against a psychological object”, attitudes have been researched as
favorable/unfavorable feelings about, evaluative characterizations of, and
action predispositions toward stimuli. This approach reflects empirical
evidence showing that attitudes are reducible to the net difference between the
positive and negative value they convey (cf. Allport, 1935; Lewin, 1935; Ito et
al.,1998; Ito, Cacioppo, 2000; Ito, Cacioppo, 2001; Ito, Cacioppo, 2005).
Eagly & Chaiken (1993, p. 1) notice that evaluative tendency triggered by
attitude stimuli is “expressed by evaluating a particular entity with some degree
of favor or disfavor.” Evaluation is a basic, core ingredient of any attitudinal
disposition and refers to overt, covert, cognitive, or affective response to
evaluative contents. Evaluative dispositions are “a type of bias that predisposes
the individual toward evaluative responses that are positive or negative.” (Eagly
& Chaiken, 1993, p. 2). Attitudinal responses are evaluative, and evaluation is
connected with the imputation of some degree of goodness or badness to an
entity (e.g. Lewin, 1935; Osgood et al., 1957; Thompson & Hunston, 2000).
Cacioppo and Gardner (1999) emphasize that environmental stimuli are
diverse, complex, multidimensional, and seemingly incomparable. Yet,
perceptual systems evolved to be tuned to the most significant (survival
oriented) environmental features that might be represented on a common
metric: good vs. bad. Recent studies of the conceptual organization of emotion
support the view that people’s knowledge about emotions is hierarchically

organized to respect a super-ordinate division between positivity and
negativity (e.g. Ortony et al., 1988; Lang et al., 1990; Cacioppo & Gardner,
1999). Cacioppo and Berntson (1994) add that attitudes as positive/negative
affect towards stimuli, generate two basic dispositions: attraction and aversion
(cf. Shizgal, 1999; Davidson et al., 1990). Attitudinal dispositions are
underpinned by biological mechanisms, physiological biases and
predispositions triggered by emotionally competent stimuli. Attitudes cannot
be fully understood without considering their biological and neural substrates.
The biological, biochemical, and neural substrates of emotion, as well as
neuropsychological aspects of emotional expressions should constitute a
constant point of reference for attitude research, and should be recognized as
viable meaning components in irony processing research.

Processing oriented attitude research recognizes valence as a basic form of
valuation: assessing whether something is good or bad, helpful or harmful,
rewarding or threatening at a given instant in time (Barrett, 2006, p. 36).
Valence is considered an elemental property of emotions (Barrett et al., 2007,
p. 183), a semantic primitive (Osgood et al., 1957), a special semantic feature,
accessed before activation of other semantic features (Zajonc, 1980, 1984),
and a core ingredient of meaning (e.g. Barrett, 2006; Barrett, Bar, 2009).
Valence refers to intrinsic attractiveness (positive valence) and aversiveness
(negative valence) of an event, situation, object, or stimulus (cf. Lewin, 1935;
Damasio, 1994). Van Berkum et al. (2009) notice that language researchers
disregard valence as a semantic primitive and a core ingredient of meaning.
Yet, if valence of a concept is encoded as part of its meaning (cf. Barrett, Bar,
2009), the affective valuation corresponding to goodness and badness, needs
to be viewed as an integral part of meaning. All individuals “read” the
environment in terms of valence, and sense it as a basic feature of their
experience (Lewin, 1935; Barrett, 2006).

These readings concerning
goodness/badness of stimuli or events, shape the perception and
interpretation of the incoming stimuli (communicative as well). The growing
body of evidence demonstrates that valence is an invariant property of
emotionally competent stimuli (e.g. Bargh, Chartrand, 1999; Bargh,
Ferguson, 2000; Bargh, 2007). People continually and automatically evaluate
situations and objects for their relevance and value, assessing whether or not
they signify something relevant to well-being (e.g. Bargh, Ferguson, 2000;
Ferguson, 2007; Brendl, Higgins, 1996; Tesser, Martin, 1996; Duckworth et
al., 2002). Lang and colleagues (1990) propose that emotional valence is a

general information-processing category that permeates brain/mind
organization and activity. If this is so, it seems only commendable to find out
how attitudinal valence impacts irony processing.


Numerous attitude priming studies show that attitudes (affective valence) are
processed rapidly and pre-consciously. The main finding of attitude priming
paradigm is that attitude congruence facilitates evaluative processing, while
attitude incongruence hinders it. The extant studies corroborate this robust
finding in conscious processing condition, when subjects are asked to evaluate
target stimulus as “good” or “bad”, as well as in unconscious processing
condition, when affective stimuli are subliminally presented, or the task is to
name/pronounce the target (e.g. Fazio et al., 1986; Bargh et al., 1992; Bargh
et al., 1996; Chaiken & Bargh 1993). Bargh and colleagues demonstrated that
all environmental stimuli are subject to a constant and automatic evaluation.
The constant pressure to rapidly tell apart the threatening from the
nonthreatening and respond immediately and appropriately, produced
automaticity in evaluative processing (e.g. Bargh, 2007; Barrett, Bar, 2009).
Attitude priming automaticity has been found for lexical stimuli (Bargh et al.,
1992; Bargh et al.,1996; Fazio et al., 1986; Chaiken & Bargh, 1993;
Hermans et al., 1994), pictures (Giner-Sorolla et al., 1999; Fazio et al., 1995;
Hermans et al., 1994 ), odors (Hermans et al., 1998), faces (Murphy &
Zajonc, 1993). The effect of affective priming has been found for explicit and
implicit evaluative tasks (Bargh et al., 1996; Duckworth et al., 2002), and
motor responses (Chen & Bargh, 1999; Duckworth et al., 2002; Wentura,
2000). The priming effect has also been obtained for subliminal priming
(Greenwald et al., 1989; Greenwald et al., 1996; Murphy & Zajonc 1993;
Ferguson et al., 2004). These results show that affect competent stimuli are
processed rapidly. Attitude-congruity generates faster response times than
does attitude-incongruity.


The consistency of experimental results obtained in attitude priming paradigm
evidences but one aspect of valence processing the facilitated processing of
valence-congruent stimuli, and inhibited processing of valence-incongruent
stimuli. The observed facilitated valence congruence and impeded valence
92 Humana.Mente – Issue 23 – December 2012
incongruence processing does not exhaust affective valence processing
mechanics. Quite distinct valence processing effects have been observed for
positive versus negative valence processing paradigm, researched as positivity
offset and negativity bias (e.g. Cacioppo & Berntson,1994; Cacioppo et al.,
1997).


Positivity offset refers to enhanced positive valence processing.
Negativity bias indexes inhibited negative valence processing (Ito et al., 1998;
Ito & Cacioppo, 2000; Ito & Cacioppo, 2005). Positivity offset/negativity
bias paradigm attests to the working of default affective infrastructure
responsible for the differential processing of positive and negative valence
(Lang et al., 1990; Cacioppo & Berntson, 1994; Cacioppo et al., 1997;
Cacioppo et al., 1999; Cacioppo, 2004; Berntson & Cacioppo, 2008).
Positivity offset and negativity bias effects have been evidenced in differential
chronometry, physiology and neuroarchitecture of evaluative processing.
Valence chronometry is impressive. Within the range of mere 100-150
milliseconds, the brain already knows whether the activated stimulus
“translates” into benefit or harm (e.g. Kawasaki et al., 2001; Pizzagalli et al.,
2002; Schupp et al., 2004; Smith et al. 2003; Grandjean & Scherer, 2008).
This astoundingly swift discrimination between affect competent and affect
neutral stimuli is reflected in further processing stages. Positive and negative
valence are processed by separate, or non-overlapping neural systems
(Davidson, 1994, Cacioppo et al., 1999; Barrett, Bar, 2009) with varied
speed (Smith et al., 2003; Kawasaki et al., 2001; Ito et al., 1998) and intensity
(Ito & Cacioppo, 2000, 2005; Kawasaki et al., 2001). Positivity offset and
negativity bias effects have been observed at the biological (Cacioppo et al.,
1997; Davidson, 1994), structural (Damasio, 2010), functional (LeDoux,
1996; Panksepp, 1998), physiological (Davidson, 1992) and neural level
(Cacioppo, Gardner 1999; LeDoux 1995; Damasio 1994; Cacioppo &
Berntson 1994).These effects seem to wield too strong an impact on
brain/mind dynamics to be ignored in irony communication and
comprehension research.


Positively valenced stimuli are processed swiftly and smoothly. Why so? First
of all, positive valence translates into benefit. No threat – no need to respond,
and mobilize to action. Disposition to approach elicits leisurely response (e.g.
Shizgal, 1999; Davidson,1994). Peeters et al. (1971, 1989, 1990) notice
Affective Twist in Irony Processing 93
that positively valenced stimuli are processed swiftly and less intensely than the
negative ones because of sheer frequency. Positive stimuli predominate. They
are more ubiquitous. To account for the privileged processing of positive
information, Unkelbach et al. (2008) proposed the density hypothesis.
According to the density hypothesis, positive information is processed faster
due to its high associative density in memory network. Positive information is
more alike in general, and therefore intensely interconnected. Negative
information, on the other hand, is not even relatively alike. Therefore, much
less interconnected.


Lack of highly interconnected associative network
elongates processing, and demands higher processing cost. The density
hypothesis holds that the more dense the associative network the faster and
smoother the processing. Negative information associative density is lower
than positive, hence slower processing. Ashby et al. (1999) proposed to
explain the enhanced processing of positively valenced stimuli by dopamine
hypothesis, positing that positive affect is connected with increased brain level
of dopamine. Increased dopamine level (in the anterior cingulate cortex) has
been found to impact increased speed and efficiency of processing. Positive
affect induced by positive valence augments dopamine level, which impacts
directly the processing fluency and creativity (e.g. Estrada et al., 1994; Isen et
al., 1985), and facilitates access to positive information network (Isen et al.,
1978). This systematically enhances the speed and quality of decision making
(Isen et al., 1988; Isen et al., 1991). The insights this neurophysiological
theory offers show the importance of positive affect (boosted dopamine level)
in facilitated verbal contents processing, hence the mechanisms it captures and
evidence it offers, seem directly relevant for theories dedicated to explaining
the role of attitudinal contents in contextualized meaning comprehension.


Negatively valenced stimuli generate asymmetric processing patterns
(negativity bias) reflected in longer and more intense processing. This effect is
manifested in behavioral, psychological and physiological patterns. The high
processing intensity is connected with the physiological mobilization to rapid
and concentrated response to adverse stimuli. It pays to attend to and rapidly
respond to potential threats (Baumeister et al., 2001; Rozin & Royzman,
2001; Taylor, 1991; Pratto & John 1991). Negative, threatening stimuli claim
more intense processing than positive, non-threatening stimuli, because
94 Humana.Mente – Issue 23 – December 2012
negative stimuli signify immediacy of responding. Threat works as an alarm
that activates physiological know-how to respond (e.g. Taylor, 1991). This
ancient mechanism has evolved to secure survival and wellbeing, by focusing
processing resources on salient stimuli (LeDoux, 1996; Damasio, 1994).
From the evolutionary perspective negatively valenced input, irrespective of
modality (audio, visual, olfactory, tactile), constitutes the highest priority. The
mechanism at work has been perfected for millennia of evolution to manage
adversity and support decision making, and to do it with flawless automaticity
(LeDoux, 1996; Panksepp, 1998; Damasio, 2010; Shizgal, 1999). The alarm
is activated by all sorts of emotionally competent stimuli, perceptual, cognitive
and linguistic (Baumeister et al., 2001; Barrett & Bar, 2009). Ito and
Cacioppo (2000) emphasize that negative stimuli processing is more intense
because the immediacy and necessity to respond absorbs more processing
resources (e.g. Cacioppo et al., 1994; Ito et al., 1998; Ito et al., 2000). A
range of physiological, all body involving responses get activated. Kawasaki
and colleagues (2001) observed a characteristic for aversive stimuli neural
pattern: a short-latency, transient inhibition followed by a prolonged
excitation.

Neutral and pleasant stimuli exhibit a strikingly different processing
pattern. Baumeister and colleagues (2001) emphasize that negative valence
plays a fundamental role in calibrating emotional system. Its main purpose is to
mobilize one to the challenges of the environment. Positive valence, to the
contrary, serves to stay the course and to explore the environment. These
positive and negative valence processing patterns have been observed for
explicit and implicit attitudinal meaning processing in studies on irony
processing (Bromberek-Dyzman, 2010; Bromberek-Dyzman forthcoming;
Ivanko & Pexman 2003). Therefore, valence processing mechanism and
patterns so widely evidenced in attitude research, deserve a more thorough
investigation and recognition in irony research.


Recent neuroimaging research points to proactive anticipatory processing of
the brain infrastructure as an explanation of speed and efficiency of even
cognitively complex pieces of information processing. Recent accumulating
evidence shows that the brain specializes in generating context-tailored
predictions cued by the incoming even most rudimentary, gist evidence (Bar,
2007, 2009, 2011; Bar & Neta, 2008). This evidence seems relevant for
irony research as it provides insight into how linguistic and extra-linguistic
cues interact in affect-loaded meaning processing. Research has demonstrated
that we routinely, if unconsciously use the predictive skills to predict what
other people might do (Frith & Frith, 2003, 2010) or say (Sperber & Wilson,
2002). There is a growing support for the realization that brain is proactive,
and evolved to predict and respond to the environment (Bar, 2007; 2009; Van
Berkum, 2010). Communication processing in general and irony
comprehension in specific, seem to thrive on this evolutionarily evolved
prediction mechanics. Any bit of manifested evidence, i.e. a word, tone of
voice, facial expression, posture displayed while speaking, contributes to
contextualized meaning making. This default predictive mode of verbal input
processing, alters significantly irony processing picture. If the affect driven
anticipatory default network plays a significant, if implicit, role in verbal irony
processing, determining the speed and intensity of its processing, it should
enjoy more explicit research interest. For one, it would mean moving beyond
the literal/non-literal meaning dictum to more explicit focus on extralinguistic
cues.

Recently Regel and colleagues (2010) set to test when/how listeners
integrate extra-linguistic and linguistic information to compute the intended
meaning. They wanted to find out whether/how the implicit knowledge about
the speaker’s communicative style (ironic vs. non-ironic communicative style)
activates predictions and, how these reverberate in brainwave patterns. In two
sessions they manipulated the speakers’ use of irony (70% vs. 30% irony
frequency) to see how irony frequency implicitly cues anticipation for irony.
The study showed that unexpected irony produced by the non-ironic speaker,
resulted in an increased P600, and both ironic and literal statements made by
the ironic speaker, elicited similar P600 amplitudes. Session two, conducted
one day later, featured balanced irony use, yet the ERPs showed an ironyrelated
P600 for the ironic speaker (thwarted anticipation), but not for the
non-ironic speaker. This finding indicates that implicit knowledge about
speaker’s preference for explicit/implicit attitude communication, does affect
language comprehension in early processing (200 ms after the onset of a
critical word), as well as in the later stages of comprehension (500-900 ms
post-onset). Bits of pragmatic, extra-linguistic information about the speaker’s
communicative style preferences (attitude display), have a direct bearing on the
neurophysiology (brainwaves) of inferential processing. The study shows that
predictive processing triggered by the style of attitude communication,
determines brainwaves patterns in anticipated vs. unanticipated
communicative contents processing. The implicit, extra-linguistic cue
manifested by the frequency of ironic/non-ironic comments, shows to play a
significant role in modulating brainwaves and processing patterns. This finding
attests to the predictive default brain activity. Implicit cues about a speaker’s
communicative style modulate expectations and alter brainwaves patterns.
Regel and colleagues’ findings show that ironic and literal meanings were
processed differently, depending on whether anticipation for irony or literal
comment was implicitly triggered. Electric activity brain patterns differed as a
function of implicit anticipation, and not literality/non-literality.
The impact of extra-linguistic cues on communicative contents processing
has also been posited by Higgins (1998). According to Higgins individuals by
default rely on feelings, experiences, memory, or any non-specific bit of
information that gets evoked while specific contents is being processed.
Higgins emphasized that the influence of incidental, extra-linguistic,
experiential information, reflects the operation of a tacit aboutness principle.
Accordingly, while we process a cue, all the memory deposited contents
associated with the cue (about the cue) gets activated and is co-processed.
Research seems to belittle the role and impact of non-propositional, extralinguistic
cues on the propositional contents processing. There is a widespread
assumption that the mental contents: thoughts and feelings that appear while
we process messages, get evoked by the propositional contents. The extralinguistic
cues are subtle, vague and usually taken for granted. So much so that
they remain “invisible” to conscious experience, and experimental research.
Yet, their impact on message processing is as much inestimable as unexplored.
Winkielman and colleagues (2002, 2003) put forward hedonic fluency
hypothesis to account for a wide range of preference phenomena in terms of
their processing dynamics. They propose that a range of non-specific features
(e.g. extra-linguistic cues), next to the traditionally researched propositional
contents of the message, impact fluency of processing. According to hedonic
fluency hypothesis, perceptual and cognitive input processing depends as
much on the specific, target related, as the nonspecific cues, which often
influence processing dynamics before the specific features are extracted from
the stimulus. Winkielman and colleagues emphasize that evaluative contents
processing, hinges on two basic sources of information: (i) declarative
information, such as features of the target, and (ii) non-feature based
experiential information, such as the interpreter’ affective state, accompanying
feelings, biological, physiological markers consciously or subconsciously
experienced at the moment of processing, and a wide range of situational nonspecific
factors. Traditionally, only the declarative (propositional) information
about the target has been explored as relevant for the target processing.
According to Winkielman and colleagues, current research is in no position to
decide how the propositional (stimulus specific) and the non-propositional
(stimulus non-specific) merge to influence the processing patterns. Extralinguistic,
“incidental” cues might render the target specific cues more salient,
more accessible, and hence might directly impact the processing dynamics.
Various biological markers, such as neurotransmitter levels, electrical brain
activity, body posture or facial expressions underpin affective states expression
as non-specific cues, and “invisibly” affect the propositional contents
processing. These non-feature-based cues are routinely evoked by affect
competent stimuli to be indiscriminately interpreted as “about” the target (cf.
Higgins, 1998). Winkielman and colleagues (2003) provide evidence that
affective, non-specific cues are accessed before individuals fully process stimuli
features (cf. Zajonc, 1980, 1984; Murphy & Zajonc, 1993), and hence impact
further target processing (cf. Bar & Neta, 2008; Bar & Barret, 2009).
Winkielman & Huber (2009) emphasize that processing fluency concerns not
only perceptual fluency reflected in the ease of low-level, perceptual operations
driven primarily by stimuli surface features. Parallel effects have been observed
in conceptual fluency, reflected in high level stages of processing, concerned
with identifying the meaning of the stimulus. Hedonic fluency hypothesis
emphasizing equal significance of non-specific (non-propositional) and
stimulus feature specific (propositional) cues, might be taken to promote the
balance between propositional and non-propositional contents in irony
processing research.

Recent neuroimaging research shows that affective load is recognized very
early on in the comprehension process (e.g. Kawasaki et al., 2001; Smith et
al., 2003; Barrett & Bar, 2009). There is evidence showing that affective
contents of verbal input is processed pre-consciously, unlike the semantic
contents, which requires conscious access to stimulus information (e.g.
Zajonc, 1980; Murphy & Zajonc, 1993; Bargh et al., 1996; Greenwald et al.,
1989; Greenwald et al., 1996). Murphy and Zajonc (1993), testing the
affective primacy hypothesis (Zajonc, 1980, 1984), found that positive and
negative affective reactions can be evoked with minimal stimulus input and
virtually no cognitive processing involved. Barrett and Bar (2009) proposed
the affective prediction hypothesis, in which they demonstrate that recognition
of affective valence of a stimulus is not a separate, subsequent processing
stage, initiated only after the stimulus has been recognized, but runs parallel to
its identification and significance recognition. Barrett and Bar (2009) provide
empirical data showing that the brain routinely anticipates the affective value of
the incoming stimuli, and affective load (stimuli positivity or negativity)
influences the processing style (speed, intensity), and chronometry. Affective
load of perceptual and cognitive stimuli has been found to impact directly
perception, identification, recognition and valuation in a top-down manner.
Affect-dedicated neural circuitry has evolved to handle valence in the brain. It
comprises a network that includes primarily (stimuli and task depending)
amygdala, prefrontal cortex, insula, cingulate cortex, hypothalamus, nucleus
accumbens, and the brainstem (cf. Cacioppo et al., 2004; Dalgleish, 2004;
Damasio, 1994; Davidson & Irwin, 1999; Dolan, 2002; Ledoux, 2000). This
affect network is central to attitudinal contents processing, and evaluationembedded
decision making (Damasio, 1994). Language sciences cannot
ignore accumulating evidence showing that valence network recognizes
affective contents within a mere 100-150 ms (e.g. Grandjean & Scherer 2008;
Pizzagalli et al., 2002; Schupp et al., 2004; Smith et al., 2003; Kawasaki et al.,
2001). If affective load is so preferentially accessed and processed, valenced
cues need to be acknowledged as basic ingredients of meaning whenever
affective meaning is communicated.

Recent irony neuroimaging research shows that affective valence circuit
overlaps in some critical areas with theory of mind (ToM) circuit which handles
irony comprehension. How affective valence network cooperates with theory of
mind circuit in handling irony, needs to be further researched. Yet, recent
neuroimaging and lesion irony processing studies show that irony
comprehension is impossible when ToM is deficient.

Fully fledged theory of
mind faculty allows to comprehend others: their attitudes, intentions, affective
(what they feel) and cognitive (what they think) states. It also enables irony
comprehension (Frith & Frith, 2003, 2010; Wang et al.,2006; Wakusawa et
al., 2007; Uchiyama et al., 2006; Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2005a, 2005b;
Shibata et al., 2010). Shamay-Tsoory et al., (2005a) emphasize that emotions
and affective states are as crucial for irony communication-comprehension as
the cognitive states are. In a series of studies Shamay-Tsoory et al. (2005a,
2005b), Uchiyama et al. (2006), Wakusawa et al. (2007) examined how ToM
circuit navigates irony comprehension, and how cognitive and affective systems
Affective Twist in Irony Processing 99
are involved. These studies confirm the role of theory of mind in irony
comprehension and point to the role of affective ToM, to be as crucial for irony
comprehension as cognitive ToM ( Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2005 a,b).

Rhetoric tradition pictured irony as a figurative, non-literal meaning, a
substitute to literal meaning. This paradigm harnessed to empirical testing
produced inconclusive, conflicting results showing that irony can be processed
slower, as fast as, or faster than literal equivalents. The contradictory results
might be a side effect of not tapping the essence of ironicity and unaccounting
for it in research designs. Approaches striving to account for irony
comprehension, by relying exclusively on the traditional philosophical and
linguistic (language autonomy approach) methods, no longer suffice to explain
the emerging intricacies of mental and neural infrastructure employed for
pragmatic inferential tasks. New mounting evidence challenges the traditional
language-autonomy based accounts, and sets new research agendas striving to
master interdisciplinary goals by means of experimental methods in
multidimensional perspectives. Recent accumulative research shows that on
top of propositional meaning so far exclusively researched, irony
communicates non-propositional, implicit, attitude contents. This implicit,
evaluative load appears of key significance, processing-wise. Communication
serves to exchange the contents of our minds: what matters most. On top of
what we say, we piggyback attitudes, feelings, moods. Affective contents seems
to be the engine of human interaction. The linguistic meaning does not
exhaust the communicative potential of non-propositional contents. The
propositional contents of the “said” is but one level of the ironic message.
What we say matters, but how we say it, manifested by extra-linguistic cues, is
at least equally important.

Research needs to find out more specifically what extra-linguistic cues
manifested non-propositionally in communicative context, impact irony
comprehension and how this happens. Experimental pragmatics, with its
processing, variable-oriented experimental design, seems fit to tap the
propositional and non-propositional processing mechanics involved. It needs
to pin down the extra-linguistic, affective factors and mechanisms
underpinning irony communication and comprehension. Neuropragmatics
inspired by new research methods on mind and brain dynamics, offers quite
new insights into the mental and neural infrastructure of communicative
comprehension. Irony research has already been slightly redefined by the
insights offered by recent neuroimaging research (Shamay-Tsoory et al.,
2005a,b; Uchiyama et al., 2006;Wakusawa et al., 2007; Shibata et al., 2010;
Regel et al., 2010). Intriguing results observed for evaluative valence
processing seem to have a direct bearing on how irony is handled mind/brainwise.

The significance of valence circuit and ToM circuit overlapping, needs to
be explored at length. Language research cannot afford to ignore affective
valence, which boasts as rapid an activation time window as 100-150 ms.
Hence, traditional models on irony comprehension need to be revised to
accommodate for the attitudinal contents. Attitude is onboard. Specific
predictions as to the role of implicit attitude in irony processing, need to be
worked out and tested explicitly.

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