A Preliminary Investigation of Obscene Language

Both classical anthropological evidence and recent psychological research suggest the possibility that obscene language is both a linguistic universal and one of man's most frequent types of linguistic expression. The report here is of the initial results of what will be a comprehensive research project concerned with the use, function, and personal-cultural-linguistic significance of obscene language within English and in a variety of other languages. In the present study of a college student sample, an empirically derived set of linguistic obscenities was obtained, the effects of sex and production mode upon the quantity of production were assessed, and the obtained obscenities were categorized with respect to the denotative domains of experience to which they referred. In addition, a questionnaire survey of attitudes toward and use of obscenity was taken among the producing Ss. It was found that while production mode (oral vs. written) did not affect the quantity of obscenity produced, males significantly outproduced females. Furthermore, the obtained obscenities were meaningly classifiable into a rather limited number of categories of social-psychological experience. Those categories containing the most exemplars seemed to reflect certain cultural attitudes toward the domains of experience represented by these categories. Finally, general analyses of questionnaire responses revealed that Ss (a) generally used obscenity freely, although they would limit usage around children and their own parents; (b) indicated restrictive reactions-particularly punishment-on the part of their parents when Ss used obscenity during their upbringing; and (c) gave the reason of emotional release as their primary motivation for using obscene language. Implications of the present research for future investigation-particularly across languages-were discussed.