Children's processing of written irony: An eye-tracking study

Olkoniemi, Henri; Halonen, Sohvi; Pexman, Penny M.; Häikiö, Tuomo

doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2023.105508

Cited by 7 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 74 publications

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“…Only one previous study investigated children's written irony comprehension and compared that to adults (Olkoniemi et al, 2023). This study found that comprehending written irony was more challenging for 10-year-old children than for adults, although it was more difficult than comprehending literal language for both groups.…”

Section: Eye-tracking Methodology Allows Detailed Analysis Of the Tim...mentioning

confidence: 85%

“…We hypothesized that irony training would improve irony comprehension for the training group so that at post-test, they would show more accurate comprehension and faster processing of ironic meaning than the controls. Olkoniemi et al (2023) found that more accurate irony comprehension in children was associated with faster first-pass reading time of the ironic target phrase and the spillover region. Therefore, the training group was expected to show improvement in these measures.…”

Section: Aims Of the Studymentioning

confidence: 89%

“…does not pose extra demands on the reader (Rayner, 2009). In recent years, it has been used to study irony processing in adults (see Olkoniemi & Kaakinen, 2021 for review) and, very recently, in children (Olkoniemi et al, 2023). Adults' eye-tracking studies have shown that when the irony is not familiar or strongly supported by context, processing takes longer than that of literal counterparts (e.g., Filik & Moxey, 2010).…”

Section: Eye-tracking Methodology Allows Detailed Analysis Of the Tim...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Moreover, it does not develop at the same pace among all children. Children's irony comprehension varies greatly, even in middle childhood when language and perspectivetaking skills should be sufficient for comprehension (Olkoniemi et al, 2023;Zajączkowska & Abbot-Smith, 2020). Irony comprehension is not only matter of language skills, as speakers use irony because it serves important social functions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Learning irony in school: Effects of metapragmatic training

Olkoniemi,

Häikiö,

Merinen

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Understanding verbal irony is a relatively late-developing skill and one that is challenging for children. This is not surprising as successful irony comprehension requires going beyond the literal meaning of the words. Several explanations have been proposed for the late development of irony understanding, for example, theory of mind development, executive functioning, vocabulary, and metapragmatic knowledge. In the present pre-registered study, we explored how teaching metapragmatic knowledge in classroom settings affects 10-year-old children’s processing and comprehension of written irony (n = 41) compared to children in a control group (n = 34). In the study, the participants read ironic and literal sentences embedded in story contexts while their eye movements were recorded. They also responded to a text memory question and an inference question after each story. In the training condition, children were taught what irony is and what cues to look for. In the control condition, children were taught about reading comprehension. After training, the reading task was repeated. The results showed that children’s irony comprehension improved after short metapragmatic training, suggesting that metapragmatic knowledge serves an important role in children's development of irony comprehension. However, the eye movement data showed that training did not change the strategy children used to resolve the ironic meaning. The results suggest that metaparagmatic knowledge can be easily trained in classroom settings. The results could be used to augment literacy teaching in schools and to help refine theories of irony comprehension.

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Section: Eye-tracking Methodology Allows Detailed Analysis Of the Tim...mentioning

confidence: 85%

Section: Aims Of the Studymentioning

confidence: 89%

Section: Eye-tracking Methodology Allows Detailed Analysis Of the Tim...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Learning irony in school: Effects of metapragmatic training

Olkoniemi,

Häikiö,

Merinen

et al. 2023

Preprint

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show abstract

“…The ability to comprehend irony among typically developing individuals starts to develop around the ages of five to six years, and this skill continues to advance through the middle school years, spanning ages 13 to 16 [ 12 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Irony Understanding in Children With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: A Comparative Analysis

Pinto Silva,

Mota,

Candeias

et al. 2024

Cureus

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Introduction: Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by persistent patterns of inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity that can significantly impact a child's daily life and academic performance. Some studies have noted challenges in social cognition among children with ADHD, specifically in aspects like emotion perception and processing, empathy, Theory of Mind, and pragmatics. One of the lesser-explored aspects of ADHD is its potential impact on higher-level language skills, such as irony understanding. Our goal in this study was to compare irony comprehension in two groups: schoolchildren with normal development and schoolchildren with ADHD. Methods: We performed a comparative cross-sectional study on a total of 35 children aged between 6 and 12 years: 17 with ADHD and 18 not neurodevelopmentally impaired. Irony comprehension was evaluated using an assessment method validated for the Portuguese population: Turtle on the Island - Battery of Assessment of Executive Functions in Children (TI-BAFEC). We also applied the EACE (Emotional Awareness and Coping in Children) scale. It is the Portuguese adaptation of the Assessment of Children's Emotion Skills and assesses children's emotional knowledge. Results: We obtained two comparable groups concerning sociodemographic data. The analysis of the data, using the Mann-Whitney U Test, showed that in all parameters, the control group consistently exhibited superior performance compared to the ADHD group. However, only TI-BAFEC (p = 0.005) and emotional behavior (p = 0.007) showed a significant statistical variance between the two groups. Conclusion: This article shows that children with ADHD encounter challenges in grasping irony. However, the underlying cognitive processes contributing to these difficulties warrant further investigation.

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Twenty years of experimental pragmatics. New advances in scalar implicature and metaphor processing

Bambini,

Domaneschi

2024

Cognition

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Children's processing of written irony: An eye-tracking study

Cited by 7 publications

References 74 publications

Learning irony in school: Effects of metapragmatic training

Learning irony in school: Effects of metapragmatic training

Irony Understanding in Children With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: A Comparative Analysis

Twenty years of experimental pragmatics. New advances in scalar implicature and metaphor processing

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