Sociopragmatics of compliment-responding behavior in Taiwanese Mandarin

Abstract This study examined whether and, if so, how Taiwanese Mandarin speakers’ compliment-responding behaviors are related to their gender and the gender and relative social power of their addressees. The data of the current study were collected from a discourse completion test. Forty-eight Taiwanese Mandarin native speakers participated in this study. The coding scheme encompassed seventeen microstrategies, which were further categorized into four macro-categories, including ACCEPTANCE, AMENDMENT, NONACCEPTANCE, and EVADING. Results showed that the controlled variables were all significant to the participants’ compliment response use. There are also some interactive effects between these variables on the complimentee’s compliment-responding behavior. Different microstrategies were employed to react to the given compliments according to the social expectations on the complimentees in different social positions and of different biological gender identities as well as the complimentees’ psychological perceptions of the given positive remarks. Moreover, the results also found that acceptance-oriented responses had a wider distribution in the present database. This might be attributed to that people in Taiwan nowadays place more emphasis on positive politeness and the value of prioritizing the self rather than the traditional Confucian value of humility.