Even Close Friends Don’t Know When You’re Being Sarcastic in a Letter.
Sarcasm is difficult to capture in text because there are no other cues to push off, such as tone of voice or body language. This is why it is better to save it for people with whom you have close relationships , rather than for professional correspondence. Even so, recent research suggests that friends and family probably won’t get it.
The study, published in the journal Human Connection Research , found that even the study participants’ closest friends were unable to appreciate the emotional tone of their emails. In fact, they interpreted the sarcasm no better than the random person on the street who didn’t know the sender at all. The researchers note that most of us take it for granted when it comes to communicating with our friends and close family members, for example, by assuming they will know when we’re being sarcastic and other people aren’t. But this is not the case.
The study suggests that no matter how well the recipient knows you, there is a good chance they will not hear your jokes or sarcastic remarks in your written messages. This can lead to serious misunderstandings under certain circumstances, or at least a waste of time explaining things. While email was the only communication method tested in the study, the same can probably be said for text messaging. So you can keep sarcasm for personal communication, or at least consider using emojis whenever possible .
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