Cuaderno #23 - Undergraduate Research Papers in Discourse Analysis

CUADERNOS DE INVESTIGACIÓN INSTITUTO DE INVESTIGACIONES INTERDISCIPLINARIAS UNIVERSIDAD DE PUERTO RICO EN CAYEY

UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH PAPERS IN DISCOURSE ANALYSIS

Edited by Sally J. Delgado, Ph.D.

Cuaderno 23 Año 2019

En la serie Cuadernos de Investigación del Instituto de Investigaciones Interdisciplinarias de la Universidad de Puerto Rico en Cayey se presentarán resultados parciales y preliminares de algunas de las investigaciones auspiciadas por el Instituto, versiones preliminares de artículos, informes técnicos emitidos por nuestras(os) investigadoras(es) así como versiones finales de publicaciones que, por su naturaleza, sean de difícil publicación por otros medios.

Los objetivos de la serie Cuadernos de Investigación son: a. Permitir la comunicación ágil y eficiente de los progresos, resultados, hallazgos, metodologías, producciones artísticas y otros productos de los proyectos de investigación y de creación que auspicia el III. b. Facilitar que los(as) investigadores(as) apoyados por el III, así como otras personas interesadas, puedan hacer referencia a sus trabajos aún antes de que hayan sido publicados en revistas arbitradas, libros u otros formatos de publicación. c. Que los Cuadernos sirvan a sus autores para compartir su trabajo, aunque sea en forma preliminar, con otros(as) colegas, agencias financiadoras y un público más amplio.

Los(as) autores(as) son responsables por el contenido y retienen los derechos de publicación sobre sus respectivos Cuadernos.

Copias de los Cuadernos se pueden obtener solicitándolos por teléfono, por correo regular o por correo electrónico al Instituto. También se pueden descargar de nuestra página electrónica en formato pdf.

Instituto de Investigaciones Interdisciplinarias Universidad de Puerto Rico en Cayey PO Box 372230 Cayey, PR 00737-2230 Tel. 787-738-2161, exts. 2615, 2616 Fax 787-263-1625 Correo electrónico: instituto.investigacion@upr.edu Página web: http://www.upr.edu/iii-cayey/ Diseño de Portada: Prof. Harry Hernández Encargado de la serie de cuadernos: Dr. Errol L. Montes Pizarro Directora Interina del Instituto: Prof. Vionex M. Marti ©

UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH PAPERS IN DISCOURSE ANALYSIS Edited by Sally J. Delgado, Ph.D.

Contents 1. Introduction

by Valeria Rodríguez Merced 2. English Music Improves Language Comprehension and Interactivity in The ESL Classroom

by Carlos G. Hernández Santiago 3. Women Use More Sexually Explicit Lyrics in Rap Music

by Isamar Cotto Rivera and Mónica M. Vidal Franco 4. Verbal and Nonverbal Communication Negatively Affects Audience Reaction to Youtubers’ Apologies

by Briana I. Molina Roldán and Vilmarie Nazario Gascot 5. The Sexualization of Female Characters in Mortal Kombat 9 Shows the Patriarchal Stance of its Target Audience

by Valyanne Castro Sánchez, Carlos J. Ortiz Centeno and Pedro D. Rivera Ramírez 6. Role Playing Video Games Improve Language Learning

by Adrián R. Torres, Yadiel Carrasquillo and José Pagán 7.

Multilingualism Improves Third Language Acquisition

by Marcia M. Santana and Diana M. Rivera

8. Puerto Ricans Do Not Reject English

by Alexandra Colon Ortiz, Stephanie Ortiz Perez and Jesmarie Tapia Febus

9. Puerto Rican Nationality Promotes the Learning Process of English

by Kathiana Mejías Martínez and Alanis Nicole Rodríguez Ramírez 10. Preference for Political Correctness Increases with Age: A Study of Obama’s and Trump’s Political Discourse

by Alexandra Carolina García Aponte and Jan Manuel Cubero Jiménez 11. Catholic Mental Models Strongly Influence Puerto Ricans’ Perception of Social Issues

by Alejandro A. Roig, Jacqueline M. Rivera and Brandon Camacho

INTRODUCTION

by Valeria Rodríguez Merced

With the goal of learning more about discourse and grammar in a class given by professor Sally Delgado of the English Department at UPR Cayey, one outstanding opportunity for publication appeared for undergraduate students. In this class, the students learned about the oral and written grammar of English used in their everyday lives and established links between discourse and grammar theories, research findings, and classroom practice. The students developed grammar and discourse competencies through a variety of techniques beyond that of explicit instruction, including collaborative participation in an original research project based on some aspect of discourse analysis. The undergraduate students were challenged to uncover perspectives about the construction of English grammar and discourse used by native and second language speakers through the design of an investigative pilot study that would be written to the standards of publication. To begin their assignments, the students conducted a brainstorm of ideas for possible themes and then formed into small groups based around shared interests. With a central theme of study selected and a tentative hypothesis formulated, based on a review of the literature and current attitudes, students defined the scope of their study and began data collection and analysis. For many, the hardest task was presenting the data in a research paper written in formal English (a second language for most) that communicated clear concepts, findings and conclusions. This volume brings together the best students’ work from two semesters of the Discourse and Grammar class covering both the 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 academic years and demonstrates the quality of student work in original research at the undergraduate level conducted in the English Department of the UPR Cayey.

Given the freedom to choose their own research focus, these research papers cover many different types of discourse that students encounter in their daily lives. The papers in this collection are grouped according to four main topics that engaged many students: music, computer communication, language and learning, and hot topics in social affairs. Regardless of their choice of focus, all the undergraduate students developed a hypothesis and gathered data to test it before analyzing their results and organizing their written work as a formal research paper.

Overall, students chose to analyze the discourse of a wide variety of themes and discovered some surprising findings that sometimes contradicted their initial assumptions.

Students that investigated music may have been influenced by the fact that music is something we hear constantly no matter where we are, and many say that music helps them to concentrate as they study. Carlos G. Hernández Santiago, author of the paper entitled “English Music Improves Language Comprehension and Interactivity in The ESL Classroom,” was determined to understand how listening to music with English lyrics might help in the participation of students in the English classrooms. His classroom observations helped him conclude that students listening to English-language music have a higher possibility of participation in and understanding of English in their basic or advanced English classes. The sexualization of music lyrics and its effects, particularly popularized by the genres of rap and trap, are also themes that increasingly interest young people. Isamar Cotto Rivera and Mónica M. Vidal Franco, co-authors of the paper entitled “Women Use More Sexually Explicit Lyrics in Rap Music,” were intrigued by how rap music often contains sexually explicit lyrics; they investigated differences between how much popular female and male rappers sexualize their music. Although they originally devised a hypothesis that male rappers sexualize their songs

more than female rappers, they discovered that their original assumptions were not supported by the data they collected.

Students working with computer-based communication were interested by video games and popular social media platforms such as YouTube and Twitter. Briana I. Molina Roldán and Vilmarie Nazario Gascot, co-authors of the paper entitled “Verbal and Nonverbal Communication Negatively Affects Audience Reaction to Youtubers’ Apologies,” responded to the rising popularity of YouTube celebrities. Their study focuses on two Youtubers who posted disrespectful content and experienced public backlash to apparently insincere apologies.

Addressing conflicting opinion on video games, some students focused on how gaming might be socially damaging in terms of the sexualization of gaming avatars, yet others focused on how it might positively influence second language learning. Valyanne Castro Sánchez, Carlos J. Ortiz Centeno and Pedro D. Rivera Ramírez, co-authors of the paper entitled “The Sexualization of Female Characters in Mortal Kombat 9 Shows the Patriarchal Stance of its Target Audience,” were interested in how characters in a popular video game are sexualized. They uncovered data that showed how both male and female characters are represented according to patriarchal stereotypes that appeal to male consumers. Contrastively, Adrián R. Torres, Yadiel Carrasquillo and José Pagán co-authors of the paper entitled “Role Playing Video Games Improve Language Learning,” highlighted the educational advantages for gamers. These students acknowledged the controversy of gaming and its effects on young people and discovered that role play in video games can develop reading skills by helping players understand and learn new vocabulary.

Students focused on attitudes towards language and learning were interested in how Puerto Ricans engage with English as an explicit marker of U.S. culture and how this intersects with issues of identity, nationality and multilingualism. Marcia M. Santana and Diana M. Rivera,

co-authors of the paper entitled “Multilingualism Improves Third Language Acquisition,” were interested in how students’ knowledge of English and Spanish might help them learn French.

They conducted research with bilingual UPR Cayey students and learned that bilingualism is an asset in language learning. Alexandra Colon Ortiz, Stephanie Ortiz Perez and Jesmarie Tapia Febus, co-authors of the paper entitled “Puerto Ricans Do Not Reject English,” approached the subject of bilingualism with caution given that in the associated U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, a Spanish-speaking island, people might distance themselves from English as a political statement.

However, despite their expectation that Puerto Ricans, particularly in rural areas, might resist learning English because of its connection with an imposed U.S. political agenda, they encountered contrary viewpoints from many participants. Kathiana Mejías Martínez and Alanis Nicole Rodríguez Ramírez, co-authors of the paper entitled “Puerto Rican Nationality Promotes the Learning Process of English,” continued earlier work on how Puerto Ricans identify with English as a second language and expected to find that Puerto Ricans have a love-hate relationship towards English. They engaged with the discourses of nationality and language and learned that that Puerto Rican nationality positively influences the learning experiences of students in the English classroom.

Many students were drawn towards controversial themes in social discourse, and papers presented in this collection address hot topics like politics and religion. Not only did students working with these subjects have to identify and address their own potential bias when dealing with these subjects, but they also needed to work sensitively with participants who often expressed strong opinions. Alexandra Carolina García Aponte and Jan Manuel Cubero Jiménez, co-authors of the paper entitled “Preference for Political Correctness Increases with Age: A Study of Obama’s and Trump’s Political Discourse,” investigated how different age groups feel

about political correctness. Using Obama and Trump’s political discourse, they anticipated that younger audiences would prefer political correctness, yet conclusions were different from what they imagined, showing that young people reject political correctness and often identify with conservative messages they may recognize as disrespectful. Alejandro A. Roig, Jacqueline M. Rivera and Brandon Camacho, co-authors of the paper entitled “Catholic Mental Models Strongly Influence Puerto Ricans’ Perception of Social Issues,” tackled a subject overwhelmingly associated with Puerto Rican identity. These students carefully navigated a research project that investigated how a Catholic religious context can influence how people react towards social issues and other individuals. They discovered that Catholic mental models have the potential to negatively influence social discourse.

In summary, even though this assignment might have been very hard for some of the participating students, they always got a helping hand from their professor, research partners and classmates. The research assignment helped widen students’ understanding of discourse and grammar and how a general audience might perceive a unique topic; they also strengthened their writing skills in English for academic purposes. Although I was not a student of this class, I got the opportunity to work with professor Sally J. Delgado as she prepared this collection for publication and even had the opportunity to write this introduction. The collection is not only evidence of the great undergraduate research that happens in the English Department but also shows how much our professors here at UPR Cayey are working to support undergraduate research. Working on this collection was a learning experience not just for the students but for me as well and I hope that reading the individual papers may also help others learn about the range of topics presented.

ENGLISH MUSIC IMPROVES LANGUAGE COMPREHENSION AND INTERACTIVITY IN THE ESL CLASSROOM

Carlos G. Hernández Santiago University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

1 Abstract This investigation tests the hypothesis that ESL students who are more exposed to music with English lyrics are more socially aware and extroverted in an English classroom setting than their peers. The study focuses on students’ skills in the English classroom taking into context variables related to their knowledge of the language and how they access English music as a supportive learning strategy. Data was generated through high-school classroom observations and a survey with questions about English in students’ lives and how and when students listen to music. I observed thirty-one students in two high school English classes (advanced and Basic English). Results show that the advanced class demonstrated increased focus on English and that their access of and interest in music with English lyrics helped improve these students’ knowledge of the language. In general, students’ interest and participation in English class correlates with engagement with English music. Overall, the results from the observations and survey support the hypothesis regarding language comprehension and engagement with music with English lyrics. Additionally, this study indicates that the music platforms used by students could be further promoted in the high school community to generate students’ interest in English.

Keywords: ESL, Music, Ability, English, High School Introduction Exposure to English music can be a tool for enhancing the English language for high school students who are learning English as a Second language (ESL). Each student has their own way to access and interact with music and their own preferences for different genres, and such diversity can stimulate classroom activities. Research by Dwayne Engh backs up this idea of how Music can be an important asset for language learning. He states, “cognitive research

2 investigates the anatomic structure of the brain and its neural functions, suggesting that language and music have important points of convergence and/or overlap.” (Engh 2013, p. 115). This overlap can connect with how Students acquire interest in learning a second language. My goal for this research is to observe how English language music correlates with a student’s performance and interactivity in an English classroom. The underlying premise of the study is that language acquisition through music can help students excel in the classroom and serve as an effective motivational instrument.

In this investigation I predict that ESL students who are more exposed to English music are more socially aware and extroverted in an English classroom setting. The study assesses the students’ skills in the English classroom taking into context variables related to their knowledge of the language and how they access English music as a supportive learning strategy. Additional variables relate to the type of music students listen to, when they listen to the music and the amount of interest in English that students have based on self-perceptions and observations of participation in class. The two research questions addressed in this study are: 1) Do students who are immersed in English language music participate more in English classes? and 2) Does the music they listen to influence their English speaking skills? This study also gathers data on what music platforms students use on a frequent basis. I expect to find that students who are more interested in English language music are more engaged and self-motivated to learn English as a second language and participate more in classroom activities.

Methodology Data was generated through high school classroom observations accompanied by a subsequent student survey. I observed a total of two high school English classes, one advanced English group with ten students in total and the other Basic English group with a total of twenty-

3 one students. This survey instrument was designed for the students of the classroom observation to answer post-observation. The questions on the survey asked participants about their music interests, music platforms used, preferred genres and if they used music as a tool to strengthen their academic work in English. These methods generated qualitative data on the subject, mostly from class observations, and quantitative data, mostly from student surveys. The analysis of the information was conducted by taking the survey results and processing the answers according to specific categories of response to deduce patterns that might show general tendencies for ESL students and their language learning. The results from each classroom observation were also analysed to detect any patterns in English acquisition in classrooms that are streamed according to the students’ ability levels.

Results Classroom observations.

The observations and subsequent comparison between the advanced and the basic English class showed that the students in the advanced class were a lot more extroverted and interacted more with the teacher. More than half of the group responded to the topics presented by the teacher in English, and students also commonly communicated with each other in English.

On various occasions, students assisted the teacher by giving more examples related to the topic under discussion. The observation of the basic English classroom showed students to be regularly distracted with only a minority of students working on task according to the teacher’s instructions. During the basic classroom observation, there was not a single example of a student answering in English, and overall the students appeared eager for the class to finish. In this same basic class, many students were engaged with their phones and were not visibly paying attention to the teacher for significant periods of time. However, it is interesting to note that the students

4 who did demonstrate interest in the class and interacted with the teacher (although this interaction was in Spanish) were female.

Student perception surveys.

The students placed in the advanced English class demonstrated predominantly affirmative responses to the survey questions about whether they focus on lyrics in English language songs, if exposure to English language songs has helped improve their knowledge of the language, and if the participant listens to English language music while studying. A total of 25 reponses, representing 83% of the total responses from the advanced English class, answered “yes” to all three questions. All ten students in the advanced English class (100%) responded in the affirmative that they believe exposure to English language songs has helped improve their knowledge of the language. A majority of eight students (80%) indicated that they listen to music while they study, and seven students (70%) responded that they focus on the lyrics of English language music, see Figure 1.

Figure 1: Advanced English class survey responses (n=10) to questions about lyrics, music as a learning tool, and listening to music during study time.

5

The students placed in the basic English class demonstrated more variation and thus produced more mixed results for their responses to the same three survey questions about whether they focus on lyrics in English language songs, if exposure to English language songs has helped improve their knowledge of the language, and if the participant listens to English language music while studying. A total of 25 reponses, representing 40% of the total responses from the basic English class, answered “yes” to all three questions. Similar to the responses for the advanced English class, the question with the most affirmative responses was the one related to whether exposure to English language songs has helped improve knowledge of the language.

A majority of 13 students in the basic English class (62%) responded in the affirmative that they believe exposure to English language songs has helped improve their knowledge of the language.

Although numbers of affirmative responses are not as heavily weighted as the responses collected from students placed in the advanced English class, students in the basic English class

6 also responded favorably to the other two survey items, although not in majority. Only nine students (43%) indicated that they listen to music while they study, and eight students (38%) responded that they focus on the lyrics of English language music. Overall, about half of the participants from the basic English class answered “yes” to the three questions while the other half were divided between “Sometimes” and “No” and one participant did not answer all of the three questions, see Figure 2.

Figure 2: Basic English class survey responses (n=21) to questions about lyrics, music as a learning tool, and listening to music during study time.

One question on the student survey that generated significant variation asked participants how they listened to music and prompted them to indicate which music platforms they used from a selection. In both the advanced and the basic English classes, there was a preference for online and freely accessible music streaming platforms. The most used application among students were indicated to be YouTube, with a total of 27 student responses indicating this preference, Sound

7 Cloud, with a total of 17 student responses indicating this preference, and Spotify with 14 students indicating preference. Other less statistically significant preferences included Pandora 11 preferences, the Radio 10 preferences and less than 10 preferences for I Tunes, CD’S, Apple Music and unspecified “Other”, see Figure 3.

Figure 3: Advanced and Basic English class survey responses (n=31) to a question about music platform preference.

Discussion The observations made in both Advanced and basic English classrooms supported my hypothesis about English language music exposure being connected to classroom performance.

8 The students from the advanced classroom were interactive in the class, speaking aloud in English and in some cases answering other students’ questions. These extroverted classroom behaviors can be linked to the students’ survey answers about using English music as a learning tool because it is possible that increased exposure to English and increased orientation towards it generated increased confidence in an English language environment. It is also possible, although not directly attestable, that how they mentally composed and presented their answers may correlate with how they focused more on English music in their studies. The students in the basic English classroom were a more distracted group overall and did not participate in many of the classroom activities. Thus, the basic classroom students did not seem to have an equally positive attitude towards English in the classroom, and the same conclusion can be derived from their attitude towards English language music. It is possible that their ineffective classroom participation is connected to their more ambivalent attitudes to English language music overall, even though the majority recognize that English language music can be a useful tool to increase knowledge of the language. On other words, a correlation appears to connect how the majority of the students who did not connect to English language music also do not connect with English as an instructional tool in the classroom and resulted in many not being focused or on-task during the time in the classroom. Mixing culture and music together can be a tactic to avoid disinterest by using music as a English learning method. In her research on South African students learning language through music, Hilda F. Israel’s asserts that “[i]t is common knowledge that African peoples have a natural sense of rhythm. For the South African ESL educator, this strength should be exploited and developed into a teaching tool that supports the learning of language” (Israel, 2013, p. 1364). This influence in culture can be applied as well with Puerto Rican learners, using culture as a tool for language learning as well. In general, the results of this small-scale

9 study show that students’ involvement in classroom interactions has a correlation with their interaction with English music and this might interest educators who are seeking ways to engage students in diverse ways both in and outside of the classroom.

The survey that was administered at the end of the class observation illustrated the contrast in classroom participation between the two groups that were observed. The ten students from the advanced English classroom all had overwhelmingly positive responses with regards to English music and the exposure of the language in their life. They all answered “yes” on question three of the survey regarding their own perception that they have improved their language through music; this engagement was reflected in their high levels of target-language classroom participation. On the other hand, the twenty-one students in the Basic English classroom had mixed responses on the topic of exposure to English music as a tool to improve their language and had low levels of target-language classroom participation. Additionally, participants’ interest in music can be considered in terms of two aspects, firstly related to motivation and secondly to comprehension, and it is important to note that these two aspects are reciprocal. This can link to Andrea Hall’s studies on socio-cultural cognitive learning, using the concept of cognitive apprenticeship as a way to view interactions in the classroom while using Lev Vygotsky as reference for the author’s ideas. This theory based on having a “master” be a model for the learner can be separated into categories. Hall explains, “[m]odelling concerns providing examples of expert behavior that include explanations; coaching concerns encouragement, diagnosis and direction; and scaffolding is the provision of structure or prompts in the learning environment.” (Hall, 2007, p.101). These examples are seen throughout the students’ learning processes and can link to the teacher’s method of coaching as well. This theory, alongside music as a learning tool can be what caused the group assigned to the advanced

10 class to be more involved with the class and English music equally. The more that students learn, the more they are motivated to listen to music in English and thus learning continues. As students continue to learn English because of the music they are exposed to, their comprehension increases and they are likely to enjoy the music more as they can access the meaning in the lyrics to a greater degree. So, although the limited amount of data collected on this subject in this small-scale study cannot determine whether music exposure affects classroom interaction or vice versa, the correlation is certainly evident and is linked to motivation, and so, logically, if one variable increases, then so would the other.

Student responses to the survey can also be divided between the two classrooms in terms of how participants used language and critical thinking in their responses. The majority of the students from the advanced class answered their questions in complete sentences even though it was not required. The survey was administered in Spanish and so most participants answered in that same language but used complete sentence structures. These same students also seemed to be more socially aware of their surroundings in class too, using critical thinking in their responses to open questions and adding relevant details to support their statements, an example of this is a student saying: “I mostly listen to music with deep lyrics and that are more emotional.

Also, that will let me vent my feelings since I am a dancer”. This student found a way to relate to English music through a hobby and also made connections with meaningful lyrics and emotional health. Participants placed in the advanced classroom who used complete sentences and critical reflection in their responses demonstrated motivation and engagement with music in a way that was linked with standardized sentence construction. The reflective way that they answered open questions in Spanish or English was also the way that they participated in English in class, and thus suggests that the advanced class placement does not relate uniquely to students’

11 English ability but also potentially their maturity in terms of critical reflection. Furthermore, the responses from the students placed in the basic class supports this finding. The students placed in the basic class responded with more varied statements, of which many more were monosyllabic (yes/no) responses. The disinterest in the question correlated with their lack of interest in English music and seeing it as a useful tool. These students also acted disinterested in class, not paying attention and making it hard for the teacher to give class and meet learning objectives. So, music as a learning tool, whether used in the classroom or as a supplementary resource outside of the of English classroom, may help motivate disinterested students and could even have a positive impact on their academic achievement as it relates to critical thinking skills.

The music platforms used by the students are important because of what those applications can offer the student. The three most used platforms among student in both the advanced and basic classes were YouTube, Sound Cloud, and Spotify. YouTube has potential for language learning not only because of the range of its freely accessible English language music, but because of the visual stimulus and the message threads generated by the English language communities who access and comment on the videos. Each video is accompanied by a comment section which, if the student reads or participates in, can enable language learning in addition to increased awareness of discourse structure among the threads. Sound Cloud is mostly used for independent artists who upload samples of their music to be streamed. This platform could motivate students to be part of a community of self-published artists; it also promotes interaction with online creators and thus increases the likelihood of English as a lingua franca among international artists. YouTube and Spotify offer options for adding lyrics to the song being streamed and this option could help the student increase vocabulary to understand the song in English and increase motivation to hear and use language at native speed. Given that these music

12 streaming applications are preferred among high school students, they could be effectively integrated in class to motivate disinterested students.

Acknowledgments I want to thank the Benjamin Harrison Vocational High School in Cayey and its principal Prof. Juan Torres Pérez for permitting me to conduct this research on their premises and in their classrooms. I would also like to thank two English teachers from the school, Mrs. Sandy González and Mr. Jonathan Avíles for welcoming me into their classrooms. Lastly, I want to thank David Lindsay for the clarity of his book “Scientific Writing = Thinking in Words” (2011) that helped me create each section of this research paper.

References Engh, D. (2013). Why use music in English language learning? A survey of the literature.

English Language Teaching 6(2), 113-127. https://doi:10.5539/elt.v6n2p113 Israel, H. (2013). Language learning enhanced by music and song. Literacy Information and Computer Education Journal, 2(1), 1360-1366. https://doi:10.20533/licej.2040.2589.2013.0180

Hall, A. (2007). Vygotsky goes online: Learning design from a socio-cultural perspective. In Learning and socio-cultural Theory: Exploring modern Vygotskian perspectives international workshop, 1(1), 94-107.

Lindsay, D. (2011). Scientific writing = Thinking in words. CSIRO Publishing: Collingwood, Australia. doi:10.1071/9780643101579 Sources of Funding

13 This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2017-2018 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

WOMEN USE MORE SEXUALLY EXPLICIT LYRICS IN RAP MUSIC

Isamar Cotto Rivera Mónica M. Vidal Franco University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

Abstract This research paper tests the hypothesis that rap songs from male artists have more sexual content than rap songs from female artists. Three male artists and three female artists were selected and the lyrics of their most downloaded songs analyzed. The extent of sexual content was divided in three categories: implicit, explicit and extremely explicit. After collecting the data, tables and a graph were made to compare sexual content in the songs. After the analysis of lyrics, a survey was done with fifty individuals attending the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey to see if the comparison of male and female sexual content in lyrics align with the perception that men will have more sexual content. The data from the analysis of lyrics show that female rapper’s songs have more sexual content than male rapper’s songs, and the results of the survey revealed more people thought females would have more sexual content in lyrics, which aligned with the data but not our original perceptions. In conclusion, our hypothesis was not supported as the data it produced indicate that female rappers’ songs have more sexual content than male rappers’ songs and this aligns with the perceptions among student populations.

Keywords: Sexual lyrics, Rap Music, Male and Female, Perceptions Introduction Music is perhaps the number one leisure activity. Furthermore, it has been suggested that almost everyone is exposed to music daily (Rideout, Roberts & Foehr, 2005). Rap, as a genre of music, has a significant impact on society that is often considered in negative terms.

Previous studies have demonstrated a correlation between violent attitudes and exposure to rap music (Johnson et al., 1995). Moreover, it is well known that rap typically incorporates sexual content, often integrated as lyrics that suggest or describe sexual behavior and in music videos in which such acts are similarly alluded to in dance or in graphic imagery. The sexual behavior referenced in rap may be explicit, implicit, or coded into double meanings that audiences who

are familiar with the genre will readily recognize and often manifest in lyrics that contain sexual language and euphemisms (Laramie, 2005). Some studies even suggest that the popularity of rap artists may influence fans to adopt imitable attitudes and precarious sexual behaviors (Cohen et al., 2000). Building on these articles, our study will focus on the extent of sexual content in the genre of rap. More specifically, it will gather data to address the question of whether there is a difference in the extent of sexual content between songs from male rappers and songs from female rappers. We hypothesize that rap songs from male artists have more sexual content than rap songs from female artists based on the associations of rap music with the objectification of women and its reputation for misogynistic lyrics. This study investigates the following research questions: 1) How frequently do male rappers use sexual content in their songs? 2) Do female rappers use more or less sexual content comparable to male rappers? And, 3) Does the comparison of male and female sexual content in lyrics align with anticipated perceptions that men will have more sexual content?

Methods Analysis of song lyrics.

The most popular artists were determined by reference to Billboard’s Top 100 songs on April 3, 2019. We selected the top three female rappers in order of most popular and the same for male rappers (see Table 1). For the selection of songs, we searched the most downloaded song from Spotify for each artist on April 16, 2019 (see Table 2). Then, we obtained the lyrics of each song from the website Genius Lyrics and began the search and coding of sexual content.

To determine the intensity of the sexual content, we established three categories: implicit, explicit and extremely explicit. Furthermore, we used a color legend for each category, green for implicit, blue for explicit and purple for extremely explicit. We highlighted phrases that had sexual content according to the color that corresponded. Then, we counted the phrases for each

category. Finally, we compared the data of each category between male and female songs using Microsoft Excel.

Table 1: Artists selected from Billboard’s Top 100 songs Females

Males

Cardi B

J Cole

City Girls

Blueface

Nicki Minaj

Meek Mill

Table 2: Most downloaded song in Spotify of each artist Artist

Song

Number of downloads

Cardi B

Money

187,024,465

City Girls

Act up

23,753,043

Nicki Minaj

Woman like me

187,559,549

J Cole

Middle child

231,769,691

Blueface

Thotiana

139,558,831

Meek Mill

Going Bad

304,289,86

Perception survey.

To develop the survey, we first searched the image displayed of each artist in the music application, Spotify (See Appendix). Then, we presented each image to 50 individuals within the community of the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey. Followed by the question: Which group of rappers (females or males) have more sexual content in their songs? Lastly, we compared the perception of the participants with the data obtained from the lyric’s analysis.

Results1

1

Any reader who is interested in accessing the raw data for this study is welcome to contact the authors or the editor of this volume to see the identification and coding of lyrics as implicit, explicit or extremely explicit.

In answer to the first research question regarding the frequency of male rappers using sexual content in their songs, Table 3 shows that the vast majority of references were implicit or suggested. Nearly all of the 44 total sexual references we identified were implicit (n=41, 93%). Only 2 references were explicit (5%) and one was extremely explicit (2%).

Table 3: Frequency of sexual content in songs from male rappers Sexual Content

Implicit

Explicit

Extremely Explicit

J Cole

0

2

0

Blueface

40

0

1

Meek Mill

1

0

0

Total

41

2

1

For the second research question regarding the comparison of female rappers using sexual content in their songs, Table 4 shows that there was a greater distribution of references across all three categories: implicit, explicit and extremely explicit. We identified a total of 45 sexual references, of which 20 were implicit (45%) 10 references were explicit (22%) and fifteen were extremely explicit (33%).

Table 4: Frequency of sexual content in songs from female rappers Sexual Content

Implicit

Explicit

Extremely Explicit

Cardi B

11

5

6

City Girls

3

3

9

Nicki Minaj

6

2

0

Total

20

10

15

However, given the sexual nature of the material, raw data is not included as an appendix. Instead, the summative data is presented in table and graph format.

After collecting all the data and organizing the tables, this same data was then used to create a graph of the comparative data, see Figure 1. The graph shows the comparison between the sexual content found in the lyrics of male and female rappers and clearly presents the bigger distribution of sexual content in the three different categories on female rapper’s lyrics. It also demonstrates clearly that for both male and female rappers, most of the sexual content is implicit and not explicit in nature.

Figure 1: Male and female rappers’ use of sexual content in song lyrics

Data from the survey of 50 participants is summarized in Table 5 showing that most participants (78%) anticipated that female rappers would have a higher sexual content in rap songs. Only 11 participants (22%) thought that male rappers would have a higher incidence of sexual reference in their lyrics.

Table 5: Perception of individuals on sexual content in females and males rap songs

Females have higher sexual content

Males have higher sexual content

Total

39

11

50

Discussion In terms of sexual content in male rappers’ songs, it was interesting that most reference were implicit. In this category there was a total of 41, 40 for the artist Blueface and 1 for Meek Mill. For explicit we found a total of 2, belonging to J Cole. And for extremely explicit we only found 1 phrase in Blueface’s song, for a total of 1. Overall, the data from the lyric’s analysis shows male rappers did not have a high frequency of sexual references in their lyrics and this was surprising given that we predicted high levels of sexual content in male rappers songs based on the reputation of rap music to objectify women and tend towards misogynistic lyrics.

Further study might attest to this as a general trend and indicate that rap music is either changing, or does not deserve its reputation as sexually objectifying women in explicit ways.

However, and certainly, for the small-scale sample that we used, the findings were the opposite of what we had predicted: male rappers did not use many sexually explicit lyrics. The high number of implicit references is also explained because we counted repetitions of phrases, and particularly in Blueface’s song repetition of phrases with implicit sexual meaning was frequent.

This means that, if we had not counted implicit repetitions, the number of references would have been even lower and in even greater contrast with our expectations. Perhaps our hypothesis was based on the false logic that male rappers had high explicit sexual content because the genre is often condemned for its sexually explicit lyrics, and popular artists of the genre are traditionally male. Yet, it seems that the style of the specific artist (and his/her writer, if applicable) might have more to do with the sexual content of the lyrics than their gender.

The sexual content found in female rappers’ song lyrics was much greater in number (and without repetition). There was a total of 20 phrases containing implicit sexual content, 11

for Cardi B, 3 for City Girls and 6 for Nicki Minaj. In the explicit category we found 5 for Cardi B, 3 for City Girls and 2 for Nicki Minaj for a total of 10. For extremely explicit we found a total of 15 phrases, 6 for Cardi B and 9 for City Girls. To our surprise, the female rapper’s songs in our small sample were profuse in sexual content, and that content was much more explicit than the males’ reference to sexual imagery or acts. There was more distribution of sexual content over the three categories (implicit, explicit and extremely explicit) for the female artists and this is an interesting finding that might suggest female rappers are making a pointed effort to out-sex their male counterparts (and thus own the sexual imagery). Another explanation might be that female artists are over-sexualising their lyrics in an attempt to shock and expand their influence among those audiences who seek to identify with sexual imagery, often male listeners in their teens or twenties with whom they can create a fan base. However, as we have already stated, the style of the artist might be a much better indicator of sexual content than their gender, for example, based on the data, we could predict that Cardi B might replicate a high frequency of sexual content in other song lyrics than other rappers. However, a study that incorporated multiple songs from the same artist would be needed to provide data to support such a claim.

The perception survey among members of the community of the University of Puerto Rico also contradicted our original hypothesis, showing that 39 of the 50 individuals predicted (correctly) that females were going to have more sexual content in their songs while 11 individual answered males. This result shows that the perception of these individuals aligns with the data gathered from the analysis of lyrics and might suggest a good intuitive knowledge of rap artists and their sexual content among the participants. However, we feel compelled to mention that, with only 6 songs considered in this small-scale study, the results of both the analysis of lyrics and the perception survey could be significantly affected by the popularity (and thus airplay and streaming frequency) of whichever artists are popular at the moment in time. For example, if a particular male artist was trending at the time of the survey and he was

widely known (and potentially criticized) for sexually explicit lyrics, then there might be an increase in the perceptions of community members who considered male artists to have more sexual content. The nature of the images shown to participants (see appendix) might also have impacted their perceptions. All three female rappers’ images include fairly obvious sexual suggestions (the heavy use of lipstick with an open or partially open mouth in the close up of the faces of Cardi B and Nicki Minaj, the partially exposed breasts of City Girls, and the direct gaze of Cardi B and the City Girls). Yet only one of the male rappers’ images includes an exposed torso (Blueface) and none of the images show a visible direct gaze towards the camera.

The use of a darker color palette (all artists) and urban background imagery (Blueface) in male rappers’ images may also minimize suggestions of sexual content when compared to the indoor backgrounds, excessive gold jewelry (Cardi B), silken and fur textures (City Girls) of the clothing of the female artists. An interesting further study might make correlations between artistry and sexual content in songs among rap artists.

References Cohen, J., & Weimann, G. (2000). Cultivation revisited: Some genres have some effects on some viewers. Communication Reports, 13: 99.

Johnson, J. D., Jackson, L. A., & Gatto, L. (1995). Violent attitudes and different academic aspirations: Deleterious effects of exposure to rap music. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 16(1-2), 27-41.

Laramie, D. (2005). Effects of visual and verbal sexual television content and perceived realism on attitudes and beliefs. The Journal of Sex Research. Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 42(2): 130-137.

Rideout, V., Roberts, D., & Foehr, U. (2005). Generation M: Media in the lives of 8–18 yearolds. Menlo Park CA: Kaiser Family Foundation.

Acknowledgements

We thank the participants of the survey who participated directly, and the artists whose images and lyrics were used to conduct this survey. We owe a special recognition to an excellent educator, Professor Sally Delgado. Thank you for all the help, advice and mentoring.

Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

Appendix: Images of artists from Spotify use for the survey Female Artists:

Male artists:

VERBAL AND NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION NEGATIVELY AFFECTS AUDIENCE REACTION TO YOUTUBERS’ APOLOGIES

Briana I. Molina-Roldán Vilmarie Nazario-Gascot University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

1 Abstract This research tackles the public apologies of two famous Youtubers, Logan Paul and Laura Lee, following their public scandals. We reasoned that viewers reject public apologies if Youtubers' word choices and body language imply self-exoneration. The two research questions are: 1) Do Youtubers' word choices and body language imply self-exoneration? And 2) If so, how and does it affect the way the audience perceives the authenticity of their apology? Lee’s and Paul’s written apologies were extracted from their Twitter accounts and their video apologies from their Youtube channels. Tables were created for identifying effective apology language and filler text in the written apologies and for body gestures in their video apologies.

Results indicate that, in their written apologies, both Lee and Paul used a significant amount of filler text, while only Lee used effective apology language, and, in the videos, Lee was a lot more expressive with her body language than Paul. The use of filler text negatively affected the authenticity of their written apologies, while their body language impacted how sincere the audience found their video apologies.

Keywords: Apology, Social Media, Sincere, Discourse, Body Language Introduction The Internet has become an essential part of our daily lives as we access it often for information, communication, and entertainment. The Internet allows for its users to connect with millions of other people around the globe and, in many cases, this happens through means of entertainment platforms such as Youtube or Twitter. However, the magnitude of these platforms and their accessibility for the general public makes it harder to supervise and review all the content that is posted in comparison to more controlled platforms such as Netflix and Instagram.

A paper published in 2015 indicated that Youtube manages over 400 hours of content uploaded

2 every single minute (Wojcicki, 2015) and a report published in 2018 indicates that Twitter manages 360,000 tweets per minute (Sayce, p.1). The prolific nature of YouTube and the relevance of Twitter in a U.S. political context have only likely increased these numbers in more recent years. The vast scope of what may be freely unloaded on such platforms often leads to content of a problematic nature finding its way into most of our social media feeds, much of which prompts public criticism and, consequently, similarly public apologies.

This research tackles the public apologies of two famous Youtubers following their scandals: Logan Paul, a 24 year-old internet personality, actor, and musician whose vlog content has no single focus but is usually about the random things he does in his daily life, and Laura Lee, a 30 year old make-up artist and blogger whose video content is predominantly about makeup tips and makeup tutorials. These Youtubers were chosen because they both have a large subscriber count. Lee, as of May 2019, has 4.4 million subscribers (Laura Lee Youtube, 2019) and Paul has 19 million (Logan Paul Vlog Youtube, 2019). The apologies that each personality issued relate to scandals in 2018. Logan Paul made a vlog in early 2018 in the Aokigahara Forest in Japan, known as “The Suicide Forest,” in which he filmed the body of a man who had recently committed suicide. The content of this vlog included Paul laughing with friends and close up shots of the hanging man. In 2012, Laura Lee posted a series of racist tweets about Black and Asian people and tweets intended to shame overweight people that resurfaced in mid 2018. After public criticism, both Youtubers issued video and written apologies that garnered further backlash because many believed them to be insincere. We reasoned that viewers may have rejected these public apologies because the Youtubers' word choices and body language implied self-exoneration. This research paper addresses two research questions: 1) Do Youtubers' word choices and body language imply self-exoneration? And 2) If so, how and does it affect the way

3 the audience perceives the authenticity of their apology? We expect to find that because the Youtubers used verbal and nonverbal communication to distance themselves from their sense of culpability, their apologies were interpreted as insincere.

Methods Data selection and preparation.

Lee’s and Paul’s written apologies were extracted from their Twitter accounts, @Laura88Lee and @LoganPaul, and their video apologies from their Youtube channels, Laura Lee and Logan Paul Vlogs. The written apologies can be found in Appendix A, and links to the video apologies in Appendix B. Three tables were created for identifying trends and gestures in the apologies. The first table was used to identify the parts of the written apologies which fell into the five categories of an effective apology as defined by Thomas (2015). For example, two of Thomas’ categories “References to being sorry” and “References to their humanity and character” account for indirect feelings of remorse and mistakes common to human nature, such as not thinking one’s actions through before executing them. One of Thomas’s categories of effective apologies that was not applicable to the data was removed and two new categories were added, those being “Reference to the people they offended or affected” and “Explaining what they did wrong” to create six categories in total, see Table 1.

Table 1: Classification for the language of effective apology Effective Language Categories

Source:

Reference to being sorry

Thomas (2015)

Reference to holding themselves accountable

Thomas (2015)

Reference to growing up or maturing as a person

Thomas (2015)

Reference to working on fixing the problem

Thomas (2015)

Reference to the people they offended or affected

New category

Explaining what they did wrong

New category

4

A second table was used to identify common trends in the written apologies that didn’t fall into the aforementioned categories of an effective apology and was therefore labeled as “filler text,” see Table 2. Seven categories were created by looking at common trends in audience comments between Lee’s and Paul’s apologies with a consideration of what things respondents considered to sound disingenuous. Samples of some of the tweet replies that helped to motivate the categories can be found in Appendix C. Table 2: Classification of filler text, determined to indicate ineffective apology Filler Text Categories Reference to their humanity and character Reference to the good people that surround them Reference to their views, their reach or their power Reference to external factors as a cause of their wrongdoings Reference to the past or themselves as an outsider References to having good intentions Exophoric references when talking about their wrongdoings

A third table for the video apologies was created to classify distinct and meaningful acts of body language that were consciously demonstrated to the viewer. These body language acts were categorized according to a set of eight criteria presented by Barry Franklin (2015) that suggest that a speaker is lying, see Table 3. For example, the category “Looking off camera” accounted for times when the speakers’ eyes were closed for extended periods of time, and “Head movements” and “Hand movements” for gestures that were meaningful with what they were saying, such as nodding, making hand gestures, and covering their eyes.

Table 3: Classification of meaningful body language which may indicate lack of sincerity

5 Body Language Categories (based on Franklin, 2015) Sobs Shaky/Deep breaths Hand movements Head movements Looking off camera Turning camera On or Off Stares into camera Pauses

Data analysis tables were created using Google Spreadsheets and graphs were composed with comparative data. After identifying and classifying each act of verbal language and body language that fell into the predetermined categories, the results were analysed using guidelines described in Chapman’s (2006) The 5 Languages of Apology and DiSalvo’s (2011) “How to tell if someone is lying to you.” Additionally, audience reactions were sourced directly from the comments thread of YouTube and the tweet replies to help guide analysis of how the audience perceived the Youtubers apologies.

Results Written apologies from Twitter.

Overall, Laura Lee’s written apology contained significantly more effective language of apology than Logan Paul with 28 examples of effective language in Lee’s apology compared to only three in Paul’s apology. Language use in Lee’s apology includes five out of the six categories of effective apologies, with the most significant being “reference to growing up or maturing as a person” (8 examples) followed by “reference to holding themselves accountable” and “reference to working on fixing the problem” (each with 6 examples). Paul’s written apology only demonstrated effective language of apology in two of the categories, and both of those to a

6 minor degree: “reference to being sorry” (2 examples) and “reference to holding themselves accountable” (1 example). Neither of the apologies included language in the category of “explaining what they did wrong.”

Figure 1: Effective language of apology in Paul and Lee’s written apologies

Both Paul’s and Lee’s apologies had a significant amount of ineffective filler text, see Figure 2. Overall, Logan Paul’s written apology contained more filler language than Laura Lee, with 26 examples of ineffective language in Paul’s apology compared to 18 examples in Lee’s apology. Paul’s apology included examples of every category of filler text, with the most prominent being “Exophoric references when talking about their wrongdoings” (7 examples) and “Reference to their views, their reach or their power” (6 examples). Although Lee’s written apology did not contain any examples of the two categories “Reference to their views, their reach or their power” or “Reference to having good intentions,” she exhibited a high amount of

7 “Exophoric references when talking about their wrongdoings” (8 examples) and this category, overall, was the most significant for both apologies.

Figure 2: Ineffective filler language in Paul and Lee’s written apologies

Video apologies from Youtube.

The first four body language indicators that signal insincerity are significantly more pronounced in Lee’s video (75 examples) compared to Paul’s video (6 examples), see Figure 3.

Laura Lee video shows frequent examples of sobs (8), Shaky/Deep breaths (14) and Hand movements (30) in the first three categories while Logan Paul does none of these. Both Youtubers make conscious head movements, but again, Lee’s movement is significantly more pronounced than Paul’s with a comparison of 23 examples to six.

Figure 3: Body language indicators that signal lack of sincerity in Paul and Lee’s video apologies (indicators 1-4).

8

The second four body language indicators that signal insincerity are also more frequent in Lee’s video (56 examples) compared to Paul’s video (37 examples), although the difference between the two is not so significant, see Figure 4. Laura Lee looks off camera three times more frequently than Logan Paul does (45 examples compared to 15) and Youtubers both touch the camera infrequently (Paul 2, Lee 1). Paul stares into the camera almost five times the amount that Laura Lee does (9 examples compared to 2) and both make pauses, although Paul does this more than Laura Lee (11 examples compared to 8).

Figure 4: Body language indicators that signal lack of sincerity in Paul and Lee’s video apologies (indicators 5-8).

9

Discussion Results found that filler text, based mostly on audience reactions in the comment sections of their tweets, played a big role in implying self-exoneration. Participants in the comment thread frequently called out both Lee and Paul for making references to external issues as causes of their mistakes and some of the tweets used for this analysis can be found in Appendix D. Paul said that filming vlogs “every single day” caused him to get caught up in the moment, while Lee references the fact that she’s from Alabama and did not have the same cultural education or exposure back then as she does now. Comments in Paul’s thread also noted that he never addressed the victim who he filmed, but instead addressed his comments to a collective he refers to as “The Internet.” This affected the authenticity of his apology as it was clearly written for a general audience of his fans rather than the people he directly affected. An interesting trend in both Youtubers’ apologies was their use of exophoric references to talk about their mistakes instead of directly addressing them. Paul uses seven exophoric references to refer to the video of

10 the hanging man, using “this” “it” and “the video”, but never directly explains its content. Much like Paul, Lee uses eight exophoric references to talk about her racist and body-shaming tweets, using phrases such as “those” “the tweets” “this” and “them”. The use of exophoric references assumes that every reader of the apology is aware of the video and the tweets both of these Youtubers are talking about, and also potentially minimizes any risk of further backlash by repeating the content. Thus, the apologies are clearly aimed at fans that are familiar with the original posts and who potentially wrote critical comments. For Paul’s apology, many readers noted that he bragged about his views and power multiple times throughout the apology, at one point using a catchphrase made famous by the Spiderman franchise: “with great power comes great responsibility.” Lee demonstrated a tendency to refer to herself in past tense, saying things such as “That girl who tweeted that isn’t who I am today” and emphasizing that her tweets were six years ago. The audience may have felt this was insincere because she was already 23 years old in 2012, and her being from a traditionally conservative state may not have seemed enough to excuse her “lack of cultural education” in a modern world connected by mass media. The scope and quantity of filler text, indicative of a lack of sincerity, suggest self-exoneration in both apologies and the audience generally deemed both to be insincere. It’s important to note that Lee’s written apology received more backlash for her timing of the statement, due to a bigger scandal going on in the makeup community at the time, and her hypocrisy in an attempt to outspeak another Youtuber rather than for the contents of the apology itself, whereas Paul faced bigger backlash for the contents of the apology itself as well as the content of the vlog he was apologizing for. This is interesting because Paul’s written apology demonstrated every category of (insincere) filler text and only two categories of the language typically employed in effective

11 apologies, while Lee’s apology demonstrated high results for both filler text and the language of effective apology.

Results related to body language support the assertion that both Laura Lee and Logan Paul’s video apologies were self-exonerating in that they were full of body language and facial movements that are known to be indicative of insincerity. For example, Laura Lee’s video demonstrated a significant amount of hand movements (30 examples) and head movements (23 examples) during the apology, which aligns with the theory that when a person is lying they tend to twitch or move around and can't sit still. According to Jalili (2018) people who are lying, “will often gesture to themselves and engage in ‘grooming behaviors’ like playing with hair [and] gestures toward oneself correlate strongly with deception.” Another common gesture used in body language to signify some level of dishonesty is when a person cannot maintain eye contact or looks away while they are in the middle of speaking. Moreover, staring directly at a person is also a gesture of dishonesty. Both of these eye gestures are performed by the Youtubers. Logan Paul looks off camera 15 times and stares into the camera 9 times and Laura Lee looks off camera 45 times and stares 2 times. The interpretation of such behaviour as dishonest is supported by DiSalvo (2011) who explains that “people sometimes look away briefly when lying.” However, a study conducted in 2015 at the University of Michigan also found that “those who lied were more likely to stare than those who were truthful” (DiSalvo, 2011). Thus, excessive staring or evasion of eye-contact could be indicative of dishonesty and might therefore be gestures that are more prone to subjective interpretation. Laura Lee demonstrates sobbing eight times during her apology, and when this occurs and she is not moving to cut the video feed, there is a fluctuation in her tone of voice. Often, when Lee begins to cry, her voice gets squeaky and high pitched before suddenly going to a flat pitch with a disinterested tone. The high-pitch of

12 Lee’s voice, far from indicating emotion, may also be a sign of dishonesty. Jalili states, “When people are nervous, the muscles in the vocal cords might tighten up, leading the voice to sound very high-pitched” (2018). Thus, Lee’s pitch contour may be a sign of her anxiety rather than her sincere emotion. In sum, the analysis of body language indicators in both apology videos support our hypothesis that Youtubers’ body language indicates self-exoneration for both speakers rather than sincere apology.

Body language also affects the way the audience perceives the authenticity of these two Youtubers’ apologies, and examples of sceptical reactions are exemplified in the comments listed in Appendix E. Many viewers commented on the fact that in such a short video, Logan Paul kept looking to the side of the camera (15 times), and because he does this so many times, they accused him of reading from a script. Although there's no other evidence that Paul read from a physical script, viewers may have begun to perceive his apology as less authentic specifically because so much of his work is supposedly live and unscripted. Some of the comments that support criticism of Paul’s body language in this respect are: “Notice how he keeps looking to the right side. Definitely scripted” and “Logan: reads script...im sorry”. In Laura Lee’s video comment thread, the most prominent and recurring accusation related to her body language was that she was being fake, specifically acting out her supposedly-sincere apology poorly and fake crying. Some of the comments seen in response to her video were: “It’s 2019 and I’m still looking for her tears”, “She’s, for real, SO BAD, at acting. Kim K’s Butt is more realistic”, and “No one: Laura Lee: rubs face profusely fake cries for 4 minutes ‘retweets’”.

Although both Logan Paul and Laura Lee’s video comment threads included some positive comments, critical comments seemed to be significantly more frequent prompting us to question how effective these videos were if indeed their purpose was to apologise. However, given that

13 both of these figures support their careers with exposure on social media, it is not overlysceptical to rationalize that the intent for both ‘apologies’ was, in fact, to maintain their audience and extend their reach among viewing audiences.

Future directions for this research might include audience perception surveys and a more in-depth analysis of comment threads in order to gauge normalized trends in audience reactions.

An extension of the analysis and comparison with more Youtubers, such as James Charles, Cody Ko, Trisha Paytas could also be useful to evaluate potential recurring patterns identified in this pilot study.

Acknowledgements We’d like to acknowledge our English Professor Sally J. Delgado for guiding us through this task and helping us pick our way through “the mushroom field” of data, as she once said.

While it wasn't a simple task, it was certainly an interesting one. Thank you, Professor Delgado, for not giving up on us and helping us when we were the most stressed!

References Brouwer, B. (2015, July 26). YouTube now gets over 400 hours of content uploaded every minute. Retrieved from https://www.tubefilter.com/2015/07/26/youtube-400-hourscontent-every-minute/ Chapman, G. (2006). The 5 Languages of apology: How to experience healing in all your relationships. Chicago: Northfield Publishing.

DiSalvo, D. (2011). How we know you're lying. Psychology Today. Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/neuronarrative/201106/how-we-knowyoure-lying.

14 Franklin, B. (Ed.). (2015). Top 10 signs that someone is lying. Forensics Colleges. Retrieved from College.https://www.forensicscolleges.com/blog/resources/10-signs-someone-islying Grabmeier, J. (2016, April 12). The 6 elements of an effective apology according to science.

Ohio State News. Retrieved from https://news.osu.edu/the-6-elements-of-an-effectiveapology-according-to-science/ Jalili, C. (2018, Dec 3). How to tell someone is lying to you, according to body language experts.

Time. Retroeved from https://time.com/5443204/signs-lying-body-language-experts/ Sayce, D. (2018). Number of tweets per day? Retrieved from https://www.dsayce.com/socialmedia/tweets-day/ Thomas, J. (2015, June 20). Getting the last word [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiiPNPLWXSM Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

Appendix A Logan Paul’s Twitter Apology Dear Internet, Where do I begin...

Let's start with this – I'm sorry.

This is a first for me. I've never faced criticism like this before, because I've never made a mistake like this before. I'm surrounded by good people and believe I make good decisions, but I'm still a human being. I can be wrong.

I didn't do it for views. I get views. I did it because I thought I could make a positive ripple on internet, not cause a monsoon of negativity. That's never the intention. I intended to

15 raise awareness for suicide and suicide prevention and while I thought "if this video saves just ONE life, it'll be worth it," I was misguided by shock and awe, as portrayed in the video. I still am.

I do this sh*t every day. I've made a 15 minute TV show EVERY SINGLE DAY for the past 460+ days. One may understand that it's easy to get caught up in the moment without fully weighing the possible ramifications.

I'm often reminded of how big of a reach I truly have & with great power comes great responsibility... for the first time in my life I'm regretful to say I handled that power incorrectly.

It won't happen again.

I love everyone. I believe in people. I'm out here. Peace #Logang4Life Source: https://twitter.com/LoganPaul/status/948026294066864128 Posted: 1 Jan 2018 Laura Lee’s Twitter Apology I want to apologize for the comments of mine that recently surfaced from six years ago.

The insensitive retweet and tweets I made are inexcusable and I apologize from the bottom of my heart to anyone affected by them.

I deactivated my twitter last night because I was mad at myself for the ignorant tweets that I made back in 2012. That girl who tweeted that isn’t who I am today. I now understand the seriousness behind those tweets. As a small town girl from Alabama I wish I had the cultural education six years ago that I have now. Those tweets aren’t humourous in any way to me today and I am truly sorry to everyone I have hurt and offended. I feel so disgusted about this and want you to know from the bottom of my heart I am incredibly grateful for this community. Social media has taught me so much about the injustice, bullying and inequality people face daily. I’m at a place of more understanding now, but there’s always room for me to learn and grow. I’m thankful for my subscribers, this community and my husband who all continue to help me on that journey.

With all this in mind, I want to make sure that I’m not only apologizing for my words but following up with action. I want to make sure that ignorance like this is being left in the past not just for me, but for everyone. With that, I will be focusing on getting involved with foundations that focus on educating the importance of equality and social justice. These “jokes” relate to awful realities so many people face and I want to work with organizations focusing on changing that. I have a few in mind, but if you all have any to recommend, I am all ears and would love to hear what organizations you all love and support.

Personally, I will continue to work on myself. I am not perfect, but I know I am better than this. I’m holding myself and my actions accountable – to use this as a learning moment. I sincerely apologize to you all and I hope with time, I am able to earn your respect back.

– Laura Source: https://twitter.com/laura88lee/status/1029181058623787008

16 Posted: 13 Aug 2018 Appendix B Logan Paul Apology Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwZT7T-TXT0 Laura Lee Apology Video (REUPLOAD): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9uNpjj9tuoE Appendix C Examples of Tweets Used to Create Filler Text Categories @NaomiBieber94 Replying to @KennyOmegamanX @LoganPaul No shit Logan.if you wanted to make a “positive ripple” you and your “good people” wouldn’t be laughing and amused that you found a dead body...you went across the world to irritate people you don’t even know and make everything look like a joke. @itsbeenbri Replying to @LoganPaul this is an apology? all I got from this was I get views, I make a 15 minute tv show everyday & #/Logang4Life. where’s the apology to the man & his family at? hmu when this guy stops obsessing over himself and finally swallows his pride #loganpaulisoverparty @michey013 Replying to @LoganPaul It’s one thing to be human and make mistakes, but it’s on another level to go to another country and deliberately disrespect the people and culture while making a fool out of yourself. @rosecupnarry Replying to @Laura88Lee Do not blame ur racist past on Alabama as someone who lives in Alabama I can tell u by doing things like this u are perpetuating a stereotype that the rest of the world believes Alabama is NOT a racist place the ppl who raised u & the ppl u surrounded yourself with must have been @beegraceeexo Replying to @beegraceeexo @Laura88Lee ... it can’t be “yeah he apologized but he hasn’t changed, don’t listen to that” and then “I’ve changed, so sorry, believe me, cause I really have changed” it’s way to hypocritical.

If you really feel both of those ways, then you need to explain WHY, why should we believe you but… @Megan60270351 Replying to @Megan60270351 @Laura88Lee @JeffreeStar

17 I also love how all they are saying “6 years ago” “the tweets I made in 2012” “the tweets I made when I was 15” it literally makes no difference. I’m 18 years old and I know it’s fucking wrong to be racist, insensitive and to make humour out of other people due to their skin.

Appendix D Examples of Laura Lee’s Twitter Apology Replies @issajokeduh Replying to @Laura88Lee Do you expect people to forgive you? You legit just tried to shame someone for their past mistakes they apologised for. And now you got the back lash and this is all they get? Not good enough hun. THE HYPOCRISY @harri22_tri Replying to @Laura88Lee Imagine only apologizing because you got caught? CAN'T RELATE @bexdoesmakeup Replying to @Laura88Lee You don't get to play the victim and act like being from a sheltered town made you like this. This is you, boo. Deleting your twitter and starting again doesn't negate that. It also doesn't negate what you did to THE MAN THAT HANDED YOU YOUR BRAND ON A SILVER PLATTER. @weird_cvnt Replying to @Laura88Lee Laura Lee's apology on Twitter is like when you're in 4th grade and you have to write an apology letter to that kid you fought but aren't sorry lmao @sarahsyrup666 Replying to @Laura88Lee Imagine being so fake and not actually taking responsibility for your actions and deleting everything because you got caught. #CantRelate Examples of Logan Paul’s Twitter Apology Replies @KennyOmegamanX Replying to @LoganPaul Anything you say or do comes off as completely disingenuous. You abuse your internet celebrity and inspire people to be as rotten as you. But hey, if you make a buck, who cares, right? Please remember you’re not even close to untouchable and karma is a bitch. @chelseawilt1 Replying to @LoganPaul

18 I wish there was a dislike button. @UperesaEFL Replying to @LoganPaul How is posting a video of a man hanging "awareness" and trying to prevent your viewers from doing so? I don't know where to start. Umm, BULLCRAP! If you just posted a personal video of you on the camera speaking about your experience, that would've been better. #ShameOnLoganPaul @TobyDuff Replying to @LoganPaul The way he ended the “apology” was complete bs. His ego is way too big. He needs to be banned from YouTube @nadatodos Replying to @LoganPaul You can't just do what you did and then say that you're a human who can be wrong sometimes. You're 22, you must know that filming a dead body and laughing at it with you're friends and then publishing it on the internet is stupid as fuck Appendix E Examples of Laura Lee Viewers’ Comments Cherry Anne Mabini2 months ago It’s 2019 and I’m still looking for her tears Br at1 month ago You can apologize without crying. And make it sincere.

Soap fan6 months ago She’s, for real, SO BAD, at acting.

Kim K’s Butt is more realistic.

Rowan Cootes1 month ago How tf can she possibly post this without realising how bad her acting is Gillian Marie1 month ago No one: Laura Lee: rubs face profusely fake crys for 4 minutes "retweets" Ishika Hazra5 months ago Why is she wiping her nonexistent tears ????

Examples of Logan Paul Viewers’ Comments

19 Andrey Makhotkin1 month ago This video in a nutshell: Oh whoops I accidentally laughed at a dead body and uploaded it for money, sorry guys ghailey1 year ago (edited) What's disturbing to me is that you (or whoever edits your videos) had to look at this man's uncensored dead body for so many hours while editing and still decided to post this video. How can you watch yourself act so disrespectful in front of this man who took his life and not feel enough empathy or respect to cut that part out. You had so many chances. Please get help Kendull5 months ago (edited) "i made a mistake" yes because he accidentally recorded it and accidentally edited it and then accidentally published it to youtube alex aguilera1 day ago Bro why did this video get so many dislikes he already said he's sorry Legend_Playzzz -nome1 month ago Haha lol. Notice how he keeps looking to the right side. Definitely scripted Aiden Seibel1 year ago (edited) Stop saying that he’s human and everybody makes mistakes. You wanna know who else is human? The man he filmed hanging off a tree. This is pathetic.

THE SEXUALIZATION OF FEMALE CHARACTERS IN MORTAL KOMBAT 9 SHOWS THE PATRIARCHAL STANCE OF ITS TARGET AUDIENCE.

Valyanne Castro Sánchez Carlos J. Ortiz Centeno Pedro D. Rivera Ramírez University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

1.

Abstract We hypothesize that the Mortal Kombat games have objectified and sexualized female characters’ attire to appeal to the patriarchal mental models of their predominantly male consumers. We compared the outfits of the female character, Mileena, and the male character, Scorpion, in Mortal Kombat 9 followed by a survey to see if participants thought that the characters were being sexualized. Results show that Mileena’s character in Mortal Kombat 9 has a very voluptuous appearance with a very revealing outfit that exposes her body. Scorpion’s costume in Mortal Kombat 9 shows almost no skin as he is fully clothed in armor, having guards in his forearms and legs and metallic plates in his shoulders although the costume accentuates his muscular physique. The majority of the participants think that Mileena is sexualized but had mixed opinions about Scorpion. Analysis shows that both Mileena and Scorpions’ attire and physique align with stereotypical expectations. Both characters exemplify the exaggerated patriarchal representations of their gender: Mileena is slim yet voluptuous and Scorpion is muscular with an athletic appearance. Participants found it easy to recognize the sexualization of the female character yet were undecided about the male character, potentially suggesting the covert nature of male stereotypical representation.

Keywords: Sexualization, Female characters, Stance, Mortal Kombat, videogames, Maneaters.

Introduction Gaming has traditionally been a male dominated community, and “When playable female characters do appear in video games, they are typically overtly sexualized and portrayed wearing promiscuous dress and engaging in seductive acts”. (Behm-Morawitz, 2009, p. 809). One game in particular, Mortal Kombat, created a character that falls into the expected characteristics of a man-eater, described by Robertson (2015) as characters who “will be considered thematically through the themes of a monstrous sexual appetite;

2. deceptive beauty and the actions of men; the vagina dentata; and the maternal body and nature.” (p. 162). The purpose of this study is to analyze two characters from the Mortal Kombat franchise, specifically Mileena (female) and Scorpion (male) as they appear in Mortal Kombat 9. The study will investigate the characteristics that each character demonstrates and to what extent these characteristics are representative of stereotypical sexualized representation. Our hypothesis is that the Mortal Kombat games have objectified and sexualized female characters’ attire to appeal to the patriarchal mental models of their predominantly male consumers. Our three research questions are: 1) What stereotypically sexualized characteristics do Mileena and Scorpion have? 2) What do the stereotypical characteristics suggest about the female and male characters? 3) Do actual or potential consumers of the game think that Mileena and Scorpion are being sexualized? We expect to find that Mileena is dressed in a more revealing and stereotypically sexualized way to appeal predominantly male players by promoting perceptions of female objectification.

Methods Video game analysis.

Firstly, using the Google search engine, the phrase “Mileena Mortal Kombat” was typed and, navigating to the page mortalkombat.fandom.com/wiki/Mileena, the origins of the character and her appearances throughout the games were examined. From Mortal Kombat 2, the first appearance of Mileena, and 7 more main games until to Mortal Kombat X (10) her most recent representation, her costumes were scrutinized to gather data on her overall appearance and representation. Using Google again, the phrase “Mileena MK9” was typed and search results were refined by selecting only “Images.” Using this method to retrieve and consider various images of the character, one image Mileena in Mortal Kombat 9 was chosen as a typical representation of the character based on previous repeated characteristics in her portrayal and costumes. This same method of searching for information and images was also

3. used for the male character of Scorpion. Using the Google search engine, the phrase “Scorpion Mortal Kombat” was typed and navigation was followed to the page mortalkombat.fandom.com/wiki/Scorpion, we examined the information related to this character and similarly scrutinized his costumes. The phrase “Scorpion MK9” was used to retrieve images and select a typical representation of the character to compare with Mileena.

Perception survey.

A survey was created incorporating the two images chosen to represent the characters.

This survey asked participants to what extent they agreed with the following two parallel statements: 1) Mileena’s character and the attire she uses is sexualized in the Mortal Kombat game, and 2) Scorpion's character and the attire he uses is sexualized in the Mortal Kombat game. For the two statements mentioned, the participants were able to choose if they strongly agreed, agreed , felt neutral, disagreed or strongly disagreed. The survey was distributed to 25 university-level students between the ages of 19 and 30 years old. There was no question given to measure if the participants had or didn’t have knowledge about Mortal Kombat or if they were participants in the gaming community. The results of the survey were charted in graphs, one showing the profile of the people who were surveyed and one comparing the results obtained from the two statements mentioned above. We observed the data to determine any trends between the two statements.

Results Sexualized characteristics of Mileena and Scorpion.

Figure 1: Mileena, as depicted in Mortal Kombat 9

4.

Mileena’s character in Mortal Kombat 9 has a very voluptuous appearance, see Figure 1. The skin-tight outfit includes a pair of thigh-high boots, a one piece lilac bikini composed of two strips of fabric which lacks the front and back, leaving her almost fully exposed. Her breasts are exposed almost completely. She also wears a pair of gloves that reach past her elbows. The body shape of Mileena consists of large breasts, a muscular abdomen and long legs. A half-mask covers the bottom portion of her face below her eyes. Her hair is shoulder-length, black and is shown falling over her face in a way that obscures one eye entirely. Her one exposed eye appears to shine with white light. She carries no weapons or defensive armour.

Figure 2: Scorpion, as depicted in Mortal Kombat 9 Scorpion’s attire in Mortal Kombat 9 shows limited portions of his skin, see Figure 2. He is fully clothed in armor with guards in his forearms and legs and metallic plates on his shoulders. The only parts of his bare skin visible are his upper arms (from elbow to shoulder) and a portion of his face that is uncovered, showing his eyes in a strip below his forehead. Both if his eyes appear to shine with white light. His hair is not visible, and he wears a mask covering the lower portion of his face. He carries weapons associated with ninjas, such as the tanto and a mugai ryu and wears a belt with a cloth draped in front of his pants, serving as a guard.

His costume is tight and accentuates a muscular physique.

5.

Stereotypical characteristics.

Mileena in this game uses a skimpy lilac bikini-like costume as her primary fighting attire and carries no weapons or defensive armor. This costume is not a realistic portrayal of any type of clothing for combat purposes and magnifies the unrealistic ways in which she is portrayed overall. Mileena is dressed in revealing clothes that accentuate her body, which is slim but muscular and voluptuous, demonstrating an unlikely combination of distinct body types. She possesses stereotypically large breasts and has stereotypically long legs. On the other hand, the male character, Scorpion is fully clothed, much like other male characters with the exception of one or two who are shirtless. All male characters are very muscular, but aside from part of their arms or exposed torsos these characters don’t show as much skin as the female characters do. Scorpion carries a large sword, pointed directly upwards in the image, and wears considerable defensive armor which has ridges and spikes in various places. Scorpion’s portrayal of masculine dominance through muscular strength and use of resources facilitating attack and defense is also stereotypical, but in ways that are markedly differentiated for gender when compared to his female counterpart. The stereotypical colours of lilac for Mileena (very close to pink) and very dark blue (almost black) for Scorpion plays into stereotypical color expectations associated with gender. The fact that both characters’ costumes also include highlights of yellow-gold and are in immaculate condition (despite their presumed use for combat) may suggest wealth and status, thus making them potentially more desirable.

Most participants considered that Mileena was sexualized but there was no consensus about Scorpion, see Figure 3. In this graph, we can observe that for Mileena, 84% of participants agreed or strongly agreed with the statement that she is a sexualized character while only 16% remained neutral. For Scorpion, we can see more distribution of the results across the scale of agreement to disagreement. Only 36% of participants agreed or strongly

6. agreed that Scorpion was being sexualized in the game, 24% of the participants remained neutral, and 40% of participants disagreed or strongly disagreed that Scorpion is a sexualized character. Overall, more participants disagreed that he is a sexualized character than agreed.

Figure 3: Participants’ response to statements that Mileena and Scorpion are sexualized (N=25)

Discussion Mileena and Scorpion are both portrayed in stereotypical ways considering their attire and physique. Both characters appear to confirm stereotypical representations of what patriarchal mental models promote for female and male bodies, both are muscular, athletic and very defined. She is intended to be desirable, and this intent is apparent even in her name, which derives from “Milena”, a girl’s name in Czechoslovakian and Slavic meaning “favored”. Yet, Mileena has an overtly sexualized body, with her large and almost exposed breasts. The anatomically unlikely combination of her muscular, slim and voluptuous torso combined with long legs renders her a work of fiction more than a realistic portrayal of women in combat. Her pink, skimpy costume without armor or weapons also renders her an extremely unlikely representation of a realistic female in a combat situation. Mileena appears

7. to be a highly fictionalized representation of the combined (and often conflicting) characteristics that patriarchal mental models have imposed on women in combat: she is physically strong yet slender and soft with a costume that suggests that her sexual appeal is more important than her combat-preparedness. Scorpion's attire, although much less exposed, also shows patriarchal expectations of a male body, with exaggeratedly large and muscular arms and masculine dominance represented through his weapon and spiked defensive armour.

His posture of attack shows combat preparedness and his raised weapon suggests imminent violence. This posture also aligns with his namesake, a predatory arachnid known for its claws and raised stinger. Although the body mass and muscular representation of Scorpions physique do appear to be anatomically possible, they are certainly not realistic for people outside of communities focused on bodybuilding. In sum, both Mileena and Scorpion are unrealistic representations of human body types whose appearance is seemingly not intended to be realistic. Indeed, both characters are portrayed with eyes that appear to shine with white light as if they were not human. In terms of physical appeal, both characters are intended to appeal to predominantly male players: Mileena’s characteristics appear to be overly sexualized, a representation of male desires, whilst Scorpion's characteristics are more probably intended to represent an ideal of physical strength expected of men.

Mileena has a very specific set of characteristics that are sexualized. The apparent purpose her outfit is to expose most of her body and make her appear physically desirable, not to facilitate combat in any way. Her large breasts, slim abdomen and long legs draw attention to the character in a very sexualized way. However, the same might be said about Scorpion, his character also has the traits of a desirable male. The ancient Greeks believed that the male was the superior sex in terms of overall beauty, and Scorpion exhibits all of the characteristics that made the male figure so appealing to the ancient Greeks and celebrated in sculpture and artwork. He has large muscles, a toned abdomen, apparent height above

8. average and a “perfect” body in terms of muscular definition and bulk. In these ways, he is also idealized. However, the extent to which he is sexualized is debatable. If he is, indeed, portrayed as an ideal of masculine form, then sexualization might suggest narcissism amongst a predominantly male, and presumably heterosexual player demographic. However, video game designers and marketers are increasingly targeting female players and also potentially male players who might find the character of Scorpion desirable as a sexual partner. If the two characters are both sexualized, this may suggest some kind of equality as neither is treated as a realistic or fully-rounded human being but both become objects of the players’ desiring gaze. Although research into the intent of idealized male character portrayal leaves a lot yet to be researched and discussed, ultimately, we determined that Mileena’s character is incredibly sexualized, her characteristics are almost-certainly intended to draw attention to her physical desirability, and so this supports our hypothesis that Mortal Kombat games have objectified and sexualized female characters’ attire to appeal to the patriarchal mental models of their predominantly male consumers. A further hypothesis that suggests itself is whether the same is true for male characters, and if so, whether the sexualization of male characters is intended to target the narcissistic desires of heterosexual males or to appeal to a wider female or LGBTQ gaming community.

Data collected from participants shows that the statement about Mileena being sexualized had a decreasing trend in which 84% of the participants strongly agreed or agreed that this character is being sexualized in the game. On the other hand, for the statement regarding whether scorpion is sexualized, it is interesting that we had a much more linear distribution. There was almost the same amount of participants that agreed and disagreed with the statement of scorpion being a sexualized character. We think this may be due to the fact that the character doesn’t present the same amount of exposed body and does not demonstrate exaggerated sexual characteristics as Mileena does. It was interesting that

9. participants found it easy to recognize the sexualization of the female character yet were undecided about the male character, potentially suggesting the covert nature of how male stereotypical representation appeals to narcissistic desires among heterosexual males.

Overall, according to the participant survey data, public perceptions appear to support our hypothesis that Mortal Kombat games have objectified and sexualized female characters’ attire to appeal to the patriarchal mental models of their predominantly male consumers.

For future project investigations, we would like to increase the number of participants and divide them in terms of gender and sexual orientation, making comparison of their opinions in order to determine what group of people agree or disagree with the statements about sexualization of male and female characters. Another future study might integrate the story behind the game, including the different reasons to why these characters may be portrayed in this manner and if this information changed the perspective of the participants.

References Behm-Morawitz, E., & Mastro, D. (2009). The effects of the sexualization of female videogame characters on gender stereotyping and female self-concept. Sex Roles,61(11-12), 808-823.

Dietz, T. L. (1998). An examination of violence and gender role portrayals in video games: Implications for gender socialization and aggressive behavior. Sex Roles, 38, 425– 442.

Felstead, J. (2012). Man-eaters and fan-dancers: Exploring gender representation, the female “other” and geek-girl alienation. Monash University. (224-233).

Kondrat, X. (2015). Gender and video games: How is female gender generally represented in various genres of video games? Journal of Comparative Research in Anthropology and Sociology, 6(1), 171-193.

10.

Robertson, K. (2015). Ladies who lunch: Man-eating femmes fatales in contemporary visual culture. Australasian Journal of Popular Culture,4(2), 161-175.

Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

1

ROLE PLAYING VIDEO GAMES IMPROVE LANGUAGE LEARNING

Adrián R. Torres Yadiel Carrasquillo José Pagán University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

2 Abstract In Puerto Rico, many children are growing up playing different video games, most of them in English, while at the same time being taught English as a second language. We have often asked ourselves if and how video games might have helped us learn English. We hypothesize that video games, specifically those of the role-playing genre, reinforce the learning of English language reading and vocabulary skills. We created an online survey and distributed it among 100 ESL individuals between the ages of 18 and 24. They were asked several questions about their English skills, video games preferences, if any, and what skills they may have learned from those games. Results show that gamers, most of them favoring role playing games, can make inferences about the meanings of unusual words based on how they are used in a sentence.

Additionally, we found that many of the participants would recommend playing video games to help learn English and, more importantly, most of them believed video games had improved their English skills greatly. Results support our hypothesis, indicating that ESL students that favored role-playing games could apply context clues to acquire new vocabulary and so improve reading comprehension, thus reinforcing language learning.

Keywords: ESL, gaming, reading comprehension, English acquisition Introduction The concept of virtual entertainment, most typically experienced in the form of video games, as a tool of learning has been a rather controversial topic throughout the years. Many reject the premise that video games can give players opportunities to gain knowledge or develop intellectual capacity and instead typify games as, at best, a waste of time and, at worst, a mentally damaging pastime. However, Verner’s (2012) research suggests that video games improve concentration and knowledge retention. In fact, Moffit (2016) used the popular game

3 “Chrono Trigger” to teach Japanese as a second language to eleven language learners, supporting his hypothesis that, with the proper educational structure, video games can be a valuable resource for second language acquisition.

In Puerto Rico, increasingly large numbers of children are growing up accompanied by different games and consoles. Many of the commercially available games in Puerto Rico have default English language settings and may constitute an important part of that child’s language exposure and learning processes. We, the authors, are all self-identified ESL (English as a Second Language) learners and gamers. We have often asked ourselves if and how video games have helped us learn English throughout our lives. Based on our personal experience and in response to the controversy that surrounds this subject, we hypothesized that video games, specifically those of the role-playing genre, improve the learning of reading and vocabulary skills and are therefore beneficial to the language learning context.

A survey was designed on the website freeonlinesurveys.com, which was comprised of 18 questions. The questions, most of which were designed to be answered with a simple “yes” or “no” response or a selection from multiple choice options. The first part of the survey addressed perceptions around how the participants believed video games may have helped them learn English, if at all. Open questions asked participants which games they preferred and what skills they may have learned from these games. The second part of the survey was designed to assess reading skills related to the acquisition of new vocabulary. Participants were asked to read a short journal entry extracted from a popular role-playing game, “The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion,” in which the invented compound word “frostwyrm” was presented as an adjective in the noun phrase “her Frostwyrm bow” embedded in an English-language narrative (see full text and source details in Appendix 1). In the text excerpt, the invented word is used as an adjective

4 to describe a special type of bow which has no further specifications. Participants were then asked to assign a meaning to the word within a series of options that were provided. The survey was distributed via the social media platforms Facebook and Whatsapp to students who were known to the researchers as gamers and undergraduate students with English as a second language, all of whom were between the ages of 18 and 24 years of age. The survey gathered the responses of 100 participants and the data was processed by trend-analysis and comparative statistics.

Results The data regarding video games as a source of ESL learning shows that, out of one hundred participants between the ages of 18 to 24, a majority of 85% consider themselves Englishspeakers. It is worth noting that 80% of the total number of participants (equating to 94% of those who self-identify as English speakers) claim that video games helped them learn English and more than half of all participants (equating to about two thirds of those who self-identify as English speakers) think that video games have helped improve their English grammar. Of the game genres presented to participants, the clear favorite among 48% of the participants was roleplaying games, followed by 21% of the participants who favoured puzzle games, see Figure 1.

Figure 1: Game type preferences among participants (n=100).

5

Results show that just under three quarters of participants (74%) would recommend others to play video games to help their English learning, see Figure 2. Results also indicate that English competency was considered by the majority of participants (84%) to enhance the gaming experience in terms of making it easier to be immersed in games, allowing a better understanding of concepts and the virtual world that surrounds them, see Figure 3. Slightly more than half of the participants (56%) claim to have met people who learned English mainly through video games, see Figure 4.

Figure 2: Participants’ likelihood of recommending video games for ESL learning (n=100).

6

Figure 3: Participants’ perceptions that English competency enhances gaming experience (n=100).

Figure 4: Participants’ claims to have met people who learned English through video games (n=100).

7

Participant responses to the second part of the survey addressing reading and vocabulary acquisition skills showed a wide distribution pattern across the four options presented. The most prominent options selected were “Frozen Arrow” (33%) and “Ice Dragon” (31%), see Figure 5.

Based on comments in the open question that accompanied this exercise, most of the participants seem to have understood the word as a description of the kind of prey the bow is designed to shoot or the type of arrow that the bow shoots, with few participants considering the adjective as a word describing the way the bow was created or where it was acquired from.

Figure 5: Participants’ interpretation of the word “Frostwyrm” (n=100).

8

Discussion Results show that most participants expressed that the way they have learned English has been positively affected by their use of video games, supporting our hypothesis that video games improve language learning. The fact that most participants favor role-playing games indicates that they are receptive to narrative components in gaming, and this aligns well with language competencies. Additional benefits of using gaming as a learning strategy is that the gamers’ attention is focused on the enjoyment of the game and not learning, and so the strategy is likely not only to reach students who resist traditional methods of language instruction, but also to engage those for whom knowledge of English increases enjoyment of the game, such as the majority of participants who reported that their English competency enhances their gaming experience. The fact that most of our participants would recommend gaming as a strategy in learning ESL and that more than half knew someone who had learned English through gaming indicates the scope of gaming as a learning tool.

Interestingly, and despite participant consensus on the acquisition of reading and grammar skills, many of the participants reported that they do not believe playing video games has any impact on how they speak English. It appears that, for most of our participants, a

9 preference for reading rather than listening to the unique ways role playing video games develop plots using coherent and understandable dialogue has led to reading rather than phonological skills. This may correlate with widespread preferences for English subtitles when watching TV shows or movies in English and may, in fact, hinder listening competencies in English as consumers of English-language media can often determine meaning from text more quickly and confidently that from audio, and so they come to rely on this strategy. Future studies on textbased and audio-based language exposure and preferences in English-language video gaming and media might substantiate this claim.

Results show that players of video games can draw conclusions on the meanings of unusual words based on how they are used in the context of the game. After reading a short excerpt from a video game journal entry, most participants could assign a meaning to the word “frostwyrm”. While many of our participants chose the most logical definition of the word, “ice dragon”, a greater number of participants believed that its meaning was closer to the metaphorical interpretation of a “frozen arrow”. Both interpretations would suit the adjectival purpose of the word (one indicating type of prey and the second indicating type of bow) and furthermore reinforce the English grammar rule that adjectives precede nouns in simple nounphrase constructions. Given that “frostwyrm” is a word invented for the context of the game and has no dictionary definition, it could mean anything. The fact that our participants could analyze how the word was used in the game to give it a coherent meaning that aligned with its usage as a modifier indicates that video games require the use of context and critical thinking for the narrative to be fully understood, thus supporting our hypothesis that video games improve the learning of reading and vocabulary skills and are therefore beneficial to language learning contexts. We conclude with our own recommendations for video gaming to be considered as a

10 learning tool and call upon those who reject gaming to review recent studies (e.g., Moffitt, 2016) and teachers’ testimonials (e.g., Verner, 2012) or conduct their own investigations on the positive outcomes of gaming in an ESL context.

Acknowledgements We would like to extend our sincerest gratitude to all the participants who completed the survey involving video games as a source for acquiring English as a second language. Without their insight, patience and time, none of this research would have been possible. We would like to thank the people at freeonlinesurveys.com for facilitating the administration of our survey. We would like to thank Bethesda Studios and the creators of “The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion” (March 20, 2006) from which we sourced the text for part two of the survey. Last, but not least, we would like to acknowledge Eastern Michigan University for allowing us access to their records and specifically Moffit’s 2016 study on gaming and language acquisition.

References Verner, S. (2012). What good is a video game in the ESL classroom? Busy Teacher. Retrieved from https://busyteacher.org/9449-what-good-is-a-video-game-in-the-esl-classroom.html

Moffitt, M. (2016). Role-playing games and second language application. Digital Commons @ Eastern Michigan University [Senior Honors Theses] Retrieved from http://commons.emich.edu/honors/486 Appendix Excerpt: This was the excerpt used in part two of the survey, related to reading and vocabulary skills: The reason for their appearance in Dive Rock (a marked location on the player character’s map on the highest peak of the Jerall Mountains, northwest of the region of Cyrodill). Is to hunt for a

11 creature, known as the Underfrykte Matron (troll-like creature able to blend with the snowy environment) that has terrorized their home settlement time and time again, leaving Agnar’s wife, Svenja, traumatized. With no other option, both Agnar and Svenja leave for Cyrodill to track down and kill the monster once and for all. Unfortunately, both Agnar and Svenja are slain at the hands of the monster, with Svenja swallowed whole with her Frostwyrm bow and Agnar trying to come back to rescue her.

Context: “Frostwyrm” name of a bow belonging to the deceased couple. The text is used in the journal of an NPC (Non-Playable Character) named Agnar, who speaks of their reason to travel.

Source: “The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion” (March 20, 2006) created by Bethesda Studios.

Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2017-2018 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

MULTILINGUALISM IMPROVES THIRD LANGUAGE ACQUISITION

Marcia M. Santana Diana M. Rivera University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

1 Abstract Previous studies show that third language acquisition is possible with minimal negative interference from the first and second languages, and that bilingualism helps to develop phonological and lexical awareness. We hypothesize that the students' knowledge of Spanish and English can provide the necessary language structures for third language acquisition. We tested this hypothesis in a pilot study with ten bilingual students from the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey who are currently studying a third language. The process began with a questionnaire regarding the subjects’ background and learning strategies and one open question. Results show that some subjects consider that English and Spanish caused interference with French pronunciation. However, others claimed that being bilingual was helpful because French has connections with the other languages. Results also show that music was the main learning aid and most subjects dedicated hours to study and practice French to enhance their language competency and performance. We concluded that a third language is easier to acquire with related languages and that several learning preferences are influenced by bilingual status. We concluded that previous related languages benefit third language learners by enhancing their awareness and understanding of the target language.

Keywords: Language learning, bilingual, third language, interference Introduction For many years, researchers have studied how learners acquire a second language.

However, there has been a recent interest in how bilingual learners acquire a third language and how the previously acquired languages affect their learning process. Some of these studies suggest that, for the learner, using more than one previously acquired language may provide a quicker learning process of the target language. Wieqiang’s studies show that third language acquisition is

2 possible without having any interference from L1 and L2 and bilingualism helps to develop phonological and lexical awareness. Moreover, the emergentism theory by John Stuart Mill suggests that “the complexity of language emerges from relatively simple developmental process when it is being exposed to a massive and complex environment.”

The purpose of this small-scale study is to see the connection between the first and second languages (L1 and L2 respectively) and the third language (L3) in a country where the majority of undergraduate students are already bilingual in various degrees of competency. We hypothesize that the students’ L1 and L2 can provide the necessary language structures for effective third language acquisition. The questions that guide our research are: 1) Do the structures of L1 and L2 make it easier or more difficult to learn a third language? 2) What ways do the L1 and the L2 influence the acquisition of the third language? And, 3) What are the bilingual techniques that learners use to acquire the third language more efficiently? We expect to find that using more than one previously learned languages makes it easier to understand and learn a new language.

Methodology Selection of subjects.

We selected ten college students from the University of Puerto Rico in Cayey. The subjects are studying for majors either in the Humanities Department or the English Department and, at the time of the study, they were taking an introductory, intermediate or advanced French course. The subjects were all between the ages of nineteen to twenty-five and have Spanish as a native language and English as second language.

Data gathering instrument.

For this research, we used a questionnaire to determine the subject’s background and their linguistic competency in their L1 and L2 (Spanish and English, respectively). This

3 instrument consisted of twenty questions regarding to the learner’s experience with language learning and the learning methods they use for their third language acquisition (French).

Data gathering process.

We contacted the subjects in order to coordinate a date in which we would be meeting with each one of them individually. In the meeting we handed subjects the questionnaire and explained to them the questions that they would be answering. We answered any doubts that the subject had both before and during the administration of the questionnaire. After the subjects had completed the questionnaire, we asked if they would agree to an interview. Four participants of a total of ten subjects (40%) agreed to the interview. The interview consisted of answering one open question: given that you know both English and Spanish, do you think these languages makes it easier or more difficult to learn French? We recorded the comments of the interview participants for analysis and comparison.

Analytical methods.

The quantitative results obtained from the questionnaire were processed to determine any trends between how the students acquired their third language and if there is a pattern in the language learning process among participating students. Data from the questionnaire was also processed to identify learning techniques and how they may correlate with third language proficiency. Qualitative results from the interview were processed to identify trends among subjects’ opinion of L1 and L2 influence on L3. The interview data was also used to identify characteristics of bilingual language acquisition such as codeswitching and language transfer and whether this was determined to be positive or negative transfer.

Results

4 We found that all ten participating subjects agreed that English and Spanish make it easier for them to learn French, see Figure 1. Although subjects explained that there were difficulties in French acquisition, none of the subjects claimed that prior knowledge of English and Spanish were the sole cause of these difficulties. Instead, subjects commented on both positive and negative interference from Spanish and English related to their learning of French.

Figure 1: Participant perceptions of how English and Spanish make learning French easier.

In general, we found that all four interviewed subjects considered that knowing Spanish and English helps with French acquisition. According to the subjects, knowing Spanish and English is helpful because French has connections with the two languages. Each of the four interviewed subjects explained how their previously learned languages influenced their acquisition of French in positive and negative ways, see Figure 2. One of the subjects explained that Spanish pronunciation negatively interferes with the acquisition of French1. However, another claimed that French acquisition was difficult because of the absence of cultural knowledge and not from the interference from the previous learned languages. Three of the subjects agreed that spoken and written French rules are difficult to understand. All four subjects made statements related to how written French was challenging because French grammar rules tend to become confused with comparative Spanish and English grammar rules.

1

All students’ comments and translated and paraphrased by the authors from original Spanish

5

Figure 2: Participant perceptions regarding the positive and negative influence of English and Spanish in French acquisition.

Figure 3 presents the preferences of how subjects preferred to engage with French. The majority, six subjects, prefered to listen to French rather than to write, speak or read French.

Three of the subjects preferred reading in French, two subjects preferred writing in French, and two preferred speaking in French.

Figure 3: Participant preferences for engaging with French

6 Data shows that that the subjects preferred to use music as the main strategy for reinforcing French lessons outside of class time, see Figure 4. Translators, movies, YouTube and reading and writing in French (outside of class) were used by fewer subjects to enhance French language skills. Dictionary and apps were used mostly as reference for quick answers.

Figure 4: Participants use of learning strategies to help French acquisition.

We found that seven out of ten students dedicated at least one hour to studying French on a weekly basis, see Figure 5. Two mentioned that they dedicated only minutes to French practice and one reported no practice at all.

Figure 5: Amount of time students dedicate weekly to practicing French outside of class

7

Six subjects stated that they were learning French because they want to learn a new language, see Figure 6. The other four subjects claimed that they were taking the French course as a requirement for graduation.

Figure 6: Reasons why the subjects are taking the French course

Discussion Results indicate that the acquisition of a third language is easier when a student knows related languages. Specifically, data support the claim that subjects’ native Spanish and second language English proficiency help them with the acquisition of French. Learners experience both positive and negative transfer from Spanish and English in their acquisition of French. For

8 example, one positive transfer relates to cognates that Spanish and English share with French that prove to be a helpful lexical base. One example is how one subject learned the French word “pharmacie” by relating it with the words “pharmacy” in English and “farmacia” in Spanish. On the other hand, some phonetic elements affecting pronunciation and accent caused negative transfer for the subjects. This finding aligns with Brown’s (2007) claim that during third language acquisition, many learners tend to perform interlingual transfer. This type of transfer can be a source of error when the language structure of one learned language is passed into the target language unsuccessfully. Nevertheless, regardless of negative transfer problems that challenged the subjects, the bilingual learners of French in this study share the perception that Spanish and English help with French acquisition in general terms.

Results indicate that learning styles and preferences may be influenced by the interlingual transfer the subjects face during the acquisition of French. From the analysis of the questionnaire, we discovered that listening (e.g, music, videos and movies) and reading (e.g., lyrics, subtitles, books and apps) in French were the two activities that the subjects liked to use as strategies to reinforce French lessons. This data suggests that the subjects want to build their receptive comprehension of French before attempting to produce it. Additionally, since false cognates and pronunciation issues affecting the production of fluent Spanish, English and French can cause confusion, perhaps subjects orient towards listening to French language music and French language YouTube videos to become more familiar with pronunciation. Using translators, reading in French and writing in French were the subjects’ least preferred learning strategies, and speaking and writing skills were chosen by only one subject. This data suggest that the subjects first develop phonological preference rather than lexical preference. Indeed, Wieqiang (2011) claims that being bilingual enhances phonological and lexical awareness, which

9 supports the subjects’ preference to enhance their familiarity with French phonology as a learning priority. Future studies may determine the extent of phonological learning preferences among bilingual learners of a third language, but this present study suggests an increased preference for phonological over lexical acquisition by bilingual learners compared to monolingual learners.

Practice time was an essential tool for the subjects’ French acquisition. From the questionnaire we saw that many students dedicate hours to practice French. Some subjects practiced for an hour. Others for two or even three. Consequently, these subjects would be expected to reach a higher level in their production of and competency in French. Yet, Brown (2007) explains that length or frequency of practice does not matter much if activities are not meaningful to the students since students who are learning a second or third language learn better if there is a personal motivation behind their language acquisition. However, we determined that there was sufficient meaning behind the French language acquisition of this study’s subjects; although some took the French course as a requirement, a majority elected to take the course because they wanted to. The reason identified by 60% of participants, “motivation to learn a new language” could offer the meaning that subjects need to motivate their acquisition of French. A more detailed investigation into reasons behind language acquisition in a multilingual context could be a research topic for further analysis.

We conclude that the results support our hypothesis by showing that the level of competency in third language acquisition is highly affected by previously learned languages that are related to the target language. Questionnaire data attest to subjects’ perceptions that grammatical structures taken from English and Spanish helped the subjects understand French structures better. Data also suggest that learning strategies preferred are potentially influenced by

10 the interference that English and Spanish can cause in French acquisition. Additionally, we discovered that meaningful practice time is essential for learning a third language. In sum, we conclude that a learners’ prior languages, if they are related to a third target language, benefit language learners by enhancing their phonological awareness and increasing their capacity for lexical associations of the target language despite some negative transfer related to grammatical constructions in the different languages.

Acknowledgements Firstly, we would like to thank the students that participated for giving their time to answer the questionnaires. Secondly, we would like to thank Dr. Nadya Alsina for her willingness to let us observe one of her French classes. Lastly, we would like to thank David Lindsay for his book “Scientific writing = Thinking in words” for it help us organize our information for the research.

References Brown, H. D. (2017) Principles of language learning and teaching. New York: Pearson Education.

Palinkašević, R. & Palov, M. (2014) The influence of bilingualism on cognition and third language acquisition. The English Language Teachers' Association Journal, 2(2), 82-93.

Schepens, J. J., Slik, F. V., & Hout, R. V. (2016). L1 and L2 distance effects in learning L3 Dutch. Language Learning, 66(1), 224-256. https://doi:10.1111/lang.12150 Stavans, A., & Muchnik, M. (2008). Language production in trilingual children: Insights on code switching and code mixing. Sociolinguistic Studies,1(3). https://doi:10.1558/sols.v1i3.483 Weiqiang, A. A., (2011). The effect of bilingualism on the acquisition of a third language.

Retrieved from

11 https://www.academia.edu/6050076/The_Effect_of_Bilingualism_on_the_Acquisition_of _a_Third_Language Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2017-2018 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

PUERTO RICANS DO NOT REJECT ENGLISH

Alexandra Colón Ortiz Stephenie Ortiz Pérez Jesmarie Tapia Febus University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

1 Abstract This pilot study was created to determine Puerto Rican attitudes towards English as it relates to urban or rural context. Previous studies suggest that “a clear sense of menace attached with the presence of English on the island” (Clampitt, 1995, p. 143). Therefore, we anticipate that Puerto Ricans resist learning English because of its imposed U.S. political agenda, and this may be especially prevalent in rural communities. To gather the data, we administered a questionnaire on participants’ ability, orientation, and value associated with English. The questionnaire targeted participants that live in both rural and urban zones and was administered in commercial malls, at the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey and in residential communities around the Cayey area.

Despite our original assumptions that people in rural areas would reject English to a greater degree, data show that most participants, regardless of background, feel that English is important, even if they don’t participate much in expressions of U.S. culture. Few participants reported that they fully understand or consider themselves fluent in English and most of our participants reported that they engaged with English through music and TV programs.

Keywords: English language, Puerto Rico, orientation, rural/urban, language threat Introduction We live in a country in which the English language exists in an uncomfortable diglossia with the vernacular Spanish. Puerto Ricans have historically resisted English, not only because it is considered foreign, and therefore has the capacity to intimidate people, but also because it could be a symbol of oppression. Clampitt’s 1995 doctoral dissertation on the spread of the English language in Guam, Puerto Rico and the Philippines explains: “There was a clear sense of menace attached with the presence of English on the island by the time of a colonization period” (p. 143) primarily because it was connected with an imposed U.S. political agenda and Anglophone

2 administration of the island. The English language was imposed by the United States government following the acquisition of Puerto Rico from Spain in 1898 when the Treaty of Paris negotiated the terms of ending the Spanish-American war. When U.S. administrators took over, policy established that Puerto Ricans should be educated in English only. Administrators tried for some time, but the initiative was eventually disabled due to resistance from Puerto Ricans. The focus of this study was determined to evaluate the extent to which Puerto Ricans still reject English to this day and if their rejection of English is manifested in a resistance to learn the language. The background context of the study was informed by Clampitt’s 1995 study on the history of English being imposed as a foreign language in Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines after the SpanishAmerican war; and Pousada’s 2017 anthology that collates students’ perspectives on bilingualism and acquiring English at the University of Puerto Rico.

This research will focus on the reasons behind the resistance and rejection Puerto Ricans have towards acquiring English and the extent of this rejection. The study asks, do Puerto Ricans resist English? And if so, why do they resist English? Research questions also evaluate the extent to which Puerto Ricans from urban and rural contexts resist English? And asks, what aspect of U.S. culture Puerto Ricans resist? Before conducting the study, we anticipated to find that Puerto Ricans resist learning the English language because they feel threatened by imposed U.S. culture.

We expected to find different reactions between the participants from the two different rural and urban areas. From the rural participants, we expected a resistance of the language or “American”1 culture and from the urban participants, more acceptance of the language or American culture.

1

The term “American” is employed throughout the remainder of the study in reference to U.S. culture as this is the accepted adjective among Puerto Ricans to refer to the United States. However, we accept that the term is ambiguous in that it could potentially refer to both the North American and South American continents and not just the Anglophone United States.

3 Methodology Regarding instrument selection and design, the only physical equipment used in the process of data collection was a paper-based questionnaire. After demographic questions to determine rural or urban context, the content items in the questionnaire and wording of items were informed by Clampitt (1995) and Pousada (2017) and were designed to be answered using a 5-point Likert scale with the descriptors, “always,” “sometimes,” “undecided,” “rarely,” and “never” in order to generate quantitative data. To administer the research instrument, we approached prospective participants at the University of Puerto Rico’s Cayey campus and in one nearly commercial center Plaza Cayey Mall, and four different rural communities in Caguas, Cidra, Las Piedras and Barranquitas. We presented the project and our intent to process all data anonymously and respect all divergent opinions. If participants were interested, we proceeded with the administration of the questionnaire. A total of 105 questionnaires were completed by participants, 43 from rural areas and 62 from urban areas and collected information was processed using percentage statistics. Since some of the locations consisted of small populations (e.g., district locations and rural communities) and others had larger populations (e.g., the mall and university), the number of participants in each location was counted and normalized in the process of studying the collected data. Normalized percentages were processed using pie charts according to three general categories: ability in English (ability), orientation towards English (orientation) and value of English (value). These categories were determined by combining the data from distinct questions. For the “Ability” category, data were taken from three questions: Do you understand English? How often do you speak English? and, Is the English language hard for you to use? For the “Orientation” category data were taken from two questions: Do you feel uncomfortable with the English language? and To what extent do you participate in American cultural expressions? For the “Value” category data

4 were taken from two questions: Do you agree that the English language is important to learn? and, Has the English language ever been beneficial for you? The data were interpreted by comparing our findings to other publications that address Puerto Rican’s perspectives on the language situation on the island, for example, Clampitts’s 1995 Dissertation entitled, Nationalism, Native Language Maintenance, and the Spread of English in Guam, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico; and Pousada’s 2017 edited volume, Being Bilingual in Borinquen: Student Voices from the University of Puerto Rico.

Results The figures below present the results of the questionnaire divided into three categories: ability, orientation and value. For the ability category, both participants from rural and urban zones rate their own ability in English favorably, a majority of participants (58%) answered that they either “always” or “sometimes” engage with and understand English, see Figure 1. There was a slight but notable increase in self-perceptions of ability among urban participants.

Figure 1: Participant self-perceptions on English ability based on responses to questions about comprehension, frequency of use, and perceived difficulty (n=105).

5

For the orientation category, about half of the participants (51%) responded negatively regarding orientation, answering that they either “always” or “sometimes” feel uncomfortable with the English language, see Figure 2. Negative responses were more significant among rural participants; urban participants demonstrated more variation on the scale of answers between having discomfort towards the language and not having discomfort at all. The data also show that the majority of the rural zone participants engaged in American culture, including listening to English-language music by U.S. artists, watching English-language TV shows on U.S. networks, and taking vacations in the U.S. Comparable engagement activities were demonstrated in the urban zone participants’ data, although with a slightly lower rate of engagement.

Figure 2: Participant perceptions on orientation towards English based on responses to questions about feeling comfortable with English and participation in American cultural expressions (n=105).

6

For the value category, the rural zone results show that the vast majority of the participants (89%) agree that learning the English language is important and that for them, in the past, the language has been beneficial to them, see Figure 3. This category not only showed the most favorable responses, but also the extent of the most positive response was higher, with 76% of participants responding “always” to both questions and a much lesser 13% responding “sometimes.” There was no statistical difference between urban and rural zone participants.

Figure 3: Participant perceptions on the value of English based on responses to questions about whether English is important and whether English is beneficial (n=105).

7

Overall, all 105 participants (regardless of urban or rural background) showed similar responses. The data show a slight contrast in the negative evaluation of the English language between zones, mostly seen in the orientation category, the urban zone possessing a higher orientation than the urban zone. However, both urban and rural populations kept a very close range in their answers overall.

Discussion Given the focus of this study on the extent and reasoning behind anticipated rejection of English, the results relating to ability, orientation and value are discussed in terms of the potential resistance or rejection that Puerto Ricans have towards acquiring English. For the ability category, the rural zone responses kept a constant range in the majority of the answers. Responses from participants with a rural background suggested that rural populations may resist English based partially on their self-perceptions of weaker language abilities. Many may potentially not understand English, but do not necessarily reject it. This data may suggest that English is not rejected in principle but is not a preference among rural populations who will choose to engage with material and to express themselves in the vernacular Spanish much more than English. We

8 interpret that the rural participants would use English if they did not have a choice, otherwise they would not. Their answers on self-perceived ability in English in terms of comprehension ranged between “sometimes”, and “rarely.” Among the urban participant population, their questionnaire answers more commonly fell into the “sometimes” column, indicating increased self-perceptions of language ability which corresponded towards a more general positive response towards English overall.

For the orientation category, rural zone participant responses showed the most variety of answers. Results indicate that participants may restrict their engagement with the English language because they are uncomfortable with it. This interpretation is supported by the comment section in the questionnaire, in which participants were given a space to mention the reasons they feel uncomfortable with English. In this section, most responses focused on the production of the language in terms of speaking and writing. However, with regards to the consumption of American culture, participants indicated an increased engagement and orientation towards English. Because language is the medium through which culture is communicated, and participants reported that they engage with the music and TV programs of American networks, we determine that cultural approximation impacts orientation towards English significantly, and this is likely increased by vacations and contact with family members among the Puerto Rican diaspora. Overall there is a slightly higher orientation demonstrated in the answers of the urban participants compared to the rural zone participants, and this might be accounted for as it relates to the accessibility of and engagement with U.S. culture, music and programs in metropolitan centers. The potential frequency of interaction with English-speaking visitors is also higher in urban areas, and this may also positively impact orientation towards English in these regions.

9 For the value category, there was alignment between the responses from rural and the urban zones. Both zones share a high percentage of results concerning the importance of learning the English language and the benefits of knowing the language. This data suggests that although some participants seem to resist the English language, the majority accept that it is important to acquire it and that it will benefit them. The similarity of results between urban and rural zones indicates that this is a common sentiment among Puerto Ricans.

After analyzing the questionnaire responses, dividing them into categories and processing the data, we believe that the results do not support our hypothesis that Puerto Ricans resist learning English because it is connected with an imposed U.S. political agenda. Instead, participants showed a discomfort towards the language but not a rejection. In conclusion, we believe that time and exposure to English has changed Puerto Rican perceptions towards English to become more accepting of the acquisition and importance of the English language and the U.S. culture through which it is most commonly mediated.

Acknowledgements First and foremost, we would like to thank our professor Sally J. Delgado; for introducing us to this new exciting world of investigation which we never in our wildest dreams thought we would be a part of. We would also like to thank all of our participants from the different regions in which we collected the data for this research: the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey, Plaza Cayey Mall and the different communities we visited; Caguas, Cidra, Las Piedras and Barranquitas. To David Lindsay, thank you for writing a book that helped guide our writing process through the entire time the investigation was running, “Scientific Writing = Thinking in Words” (2011). We owe a special thanks to professor Awilda Caraballo, and her TAOF sections for their collaboration in our data collection activities. Finally, to Marcia Santana and Diana

10 Rivera, thank you for your constructive criticism on our experimental design and your advice on what to incorporate and what to modify.

References Clampitt, S. (1995). Nationalism, native language maintenance and the spread of English: Guam, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/279998415_Nationalism_Native_Language_M aintenance_and_the_Spread_of_English_Guam_Puerto_Rico_and_the_Philippines Lindsay, D. (2011). Scientific writing = Thinking in words. CSIRO Publishing: Collingwood, Australia. doi:10.1071/9780643101579 Pousada, A. (2017). (Ed.). Being bilingual in Borinquen: Student voices from the University of Puerto Rico. England: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2017-2018 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

PUERTO RICAN NATIONALITY PROMOTES THE LEARNING PROCESS OF ENGLISH

Kathiana Mejías Martínez Alanis Nicole Rodríguez Ramírez University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

1 Abstract This study examines how Puerto Rican nationality has an effect on the English learning experience of Puerto Rican university students. The quantitative data was collected through a questionnaire which was answered by 28 participants enrolled at the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey. The collected data was analyzed using techniques of discourse analysis to determine mental models by focusing on word choices and discourse structure (Van Dijk, 2006). The results show that the Puerto Rican nationality promotes the acquisition of English due to the islands’ political status as a territory of the United States and the influence of American culture in Puerto Rico. However, the native Spanish vernacular of Puerto Rico does affect the way Puerto Ricans communicate in English, most evidently in terms of pronunciation and the use of anglicisms. Findings additionally suggest that teaching strategies based on receptive language skills (reading and listening) are considered the most useful approaches to help learners acquire English, potentially indicating higher preference for receptive skills rather than active production of English. Moreover, findings indicate that a variety of factors motivate Puerto Ricans to learn English, most notably encouragement from parents, choice of career path, and compulsory English classes.

Keywords: Puerto Rican, Nationality, ESL, Language aquisition Introduction The seeking of better opportunities and globalization have encouraged people to move outside of their countries, forcing them to integrate their culture and nationality into a new country’s norms. According to the International Migration Report of the United Nations (2017) “The number of international migrants worldwide has continued to grow rapidly in recent years, reaching 258 million in 2017, up from 220 million in 2010 and 173 million in 2000”. Various studies present the connection between nationality and the learning experience, some of which focus on how the children of immigrants outperform their peers because of the “immigration

2 paradox”, which occurs despite their social and economic backgrounds (Crosnoe & LopezTurley, 2011). However, the relationship between Puerto Rican nationality and the effect it has on English as a second language (ESL) has yet to be studied in depth.

We hypothesize that Puerto Rican nationality has an effect on the English learning experience of Puerto Rican students. In this research paper, we posed two questions to test this hypothesis: 1) Does Spanish as a native language affect Puerto Ricans’ process of learning English? 2) How do learner expectations of teaching strategies affect the acquisition of ESL in Puerto Rico? Although every individual has a unique response to contexts of teaching and learning, we anticipate that due to the proximity of the United States, both physically and metaphorically, Puerto Rican mental models likely facilitate the process of acquiring English.

Methods Participants.

A total of 28 individuals participated in this study. These participants were all university students enrolled in the University of Puerto Rico, at Cayey from 7 different majors, see Table 1 for breakdown of participants by discipline and by percentage. The age average of participants was between nineteen to twenty-two years old (21 participants), fewer participants were older than twenty-three (5 participants), and only one participant was eighteen or younger. The significant majority of participating students were born in Puerto Rico, except one that was born in the United States; twenty-seven of the participants identified as Puerto Ricans and one who was born in the United States identified as non-Puerto Rican. However, all participants currently reside in Puerto Rico.

Since the study was conducted in an institution of higher education among the student population, we assume that all of the participants had completed K-12 compulsory instruction in English. The questionnaire was administered in English and posted on the University Facebook page. Peers were identified and asked to participate. Most of the answers were

3 received in English; however, there was one participant who answered in Spanish. Therefore, that participant’s responses were translated to English and the translation was used for the analysis and discussion to facilitate comparable data.

Table 1: Academic majors of study participants Major

Percentage (number of participants)

Natural Sciences

28.6% (8)

Pedagogy

21.4% (6)

Arts

17.9% (5)

Humanities

17.9% (5)

Hispanic Studies

7.1% (2)

Mathematics-Physics

3.6% (1)

Business

3.6% (1)

Data collection and analysis.

A questionnaire was created using Google Forms, see Appendix. It was composed of ten (10) questions, which were divided into three (3) categories: native language, nationality and learning strategies. Participant responses were based on a 5-point Likert scale: strongly agree, slightly agree, neither agree nor disagree, slightly disagree, and strongly disagree. The open question “why” was included after each question. All of the questions were written in English but participants were not instructed to answer in English.

For the data analysis, the answers were gathered through percentages in which the categories of agreement (strongly agree and slightly agree) and disagreement (slightly disagree and strongly disagree) were summed. A trend analysis was then conducted on the summarized percentage data. Strategies of discourse analysis were used to look for patterns in the qualitative data provided by the participants in response to the open questions. To determine participants’ mental models, we relied upon Van Dijk’s definition of mental models in his work “Discourse

4 Context and Cognition” (2006). Using this approach, the analysis of qualitative data was specifically focused on word choice and discourse structure used by the participants.

Results Native language affects the process of learning English.

All of the participants marked Spanish as their first language. However, fourteen (14) participants also marked English as their first language as well, and 10 participants mentioned that they speak other languages like French, Korean and Portuguese. Most participants reported that their native language affects their pronunciation of English, see Figure 1. The participants’ acceptance of the statement “ my native language affects my pronunciation of English” (either strongly agree or slightly agree) was 67.8% of answers. In contrast, only 17.9% of answers expressed disagreement and 14.3% answered that they neither agree nor disagree. The majority agreement with this statement on the Likert scale was complemented by the open question, in which most of the participants acknowledged what was described as a “Puerto Rican accent”.

Specifically, one participant mentioned how Spanish has affects language at a systemic level and not just specific words: “My Puerto Rican Spanish is always present in my English. It’s present in the style, intonation, modulation, and vocabulary”.

5 Half of all participants agreed that Puerto Rican nationality is an advantage in the participants learning process of English, and another quarter remained neutral on the issue, see Figure 2. Exactly 50% of all participants agreed, and more than half of that number (28.6%) strongly agreed that being a Puerto Rican was an advantage in acquiring English; those who disagreed were only 17.8%. Interestingly, the midpoint of the scale had more than a quarter of the answers, with 28.6% participants answering that they neither agree nor disagree. In response to the open question asking why, the majority of the participants specifically mentioned statements that talk about Puerto Rico’s political status. For example, “Because of the political status of Puerto Rico, Puerto Ricans are more in contact with the language than other countries may be”. Other participants’ answers expressed that the advantage can be seen in the words that are used in Puerto Rican Spanish that have an influence from English. Specifically, one individual stated: “Thanks to ‘anglicismos’ and our exposure to the language, i'd say it's easy”.

One participant responded, “I am not Puerto Rican”.

Learner expectations of teaching strategies affect the acquisition of ESL. Learning strategies Participants overwhelmingly reported that they often practice writing, reading, listening and speaking as part of their learning process, see Figure 3. In all of these areas, strong

6 agreement was predominant; however, a minority of the participants expressed a slight disagreement in the areas of writing and speaking and comments connected this with limited time to practice. Additionally, a large number of the participants stated that the most useful activities for them were: reading in general, listening to the class, listening to music, and

watching TV shows and movies. In response to the question that asked which methods participants used to help them learn English, music and television were the overwhelmingly highest responses, with 92% and 100%, respectively. The next most common method of learning was books, which received 78.6% of the total participant response. Speaking with friends or family and school were the least selected, yet still received 57.1% and 50% of participant responses, respectively. In addition to these options, many participants added other methods in the comment section, such as video games, podcasts, and audiobooks. With respect to using media resources that were not assigned in class, one of the participants stated, “It was a learning experience that I enjoyed, not that stressed like school and university”.We asked the participants if they specifically focused on grammar (books) while they were learning the language. A higher percentage of participants, 74.1%, agreed with this statement with only 18.5% of the participants expressing a slight disagreement; only 7.4% of participants chose a neutral response, that they neither agree nor disagree.

7 Motivations Parental motivation was reported to be the most significant factor affecting motivations for learning English, followed by career path and English classes, see Table 2. However, some participants also mentioned that the core for their personal motivations for learning English were TV shows and music. One of the motivations that we presented to the participants was inherited motivation from their parents. We specifically asked if their parents attitudes towards English discouraged them from learning or using English. Most participants (85%) disagreed with this statement, only a minority of participants agreed (11.1%), while very few (3.7%) said that they neither agree nor disagree. Many participants commented that their parents encouraged them to learn the language. Some also said that although their parents don’t know or speak English, they still encouraged their child(ren) to learn the language.

Table 2: Factors that motivated the acquisition of English Factor

Percentage (number of participants)

Parents

85.7% (24)

Career paths

64.3% (18)

English classes

66.7% (19)

Regarding the motivation associated with a career path, most participants (64.3%) agreed that their choice of career motivated them to study English. Only 21.5% disagreed with the statement that career path motivated them to learn the language and 14.3% stated that they neither agree nor disagree. Regarding formal English classes, a similar majority of participants (66.7%) agreed that classes motivated them. Only 22.2% disagreed that classes motivated them and 11.1% stated that they neither agree nor disagree. In the comment section, some of the participants stated that because of the motivation they achieved in their classes, they now have more opportunities for career paths, others said that learning English in classes opened new alternatives of learning. Others said they weren’t interested in the classes, some explaining that

8 this was because of too much work or they felt that the teachers didn’t motivate or teach them enough.

Discussion Native language affects the process of learning English.

Results indicate that native language affects the learning process of English, specifically in pronunciation, as shown in the self-perceptions of Figure 1 and comments such as: “My native language affects my pronunciation of English”. Overall, more than half of the participants agreed that their native language affects the pronunciation of English and this perception may have been caused by some of the participants’ awareness that intonation and vocabulary in English is often transferred from Spanish. Also, as Spanish speakers, Puerto Ricans tend to give emphasis to certain syllables and follow grammatical rules that do not correspond to expectations in standard English. Transferring patterns of stress and grammatical rules from Spanish creates an interesting and recognizable type of speech commonly referred to as the Puerto Rican accent. However, even though many participants recognized that they transferred pronunciation and grammar rules from Spanish, they also identified with English as a second language or sometimes even a native language. For example, one participant stated: “My Puerto Rican Spanish is always present in my English. It’s present in the style, intonation, modulation, and vocabulary…”. The use of the possessive “my” when referring to both Spanish and English suggests that this individual feels ownership of both languages. Additionally, this participant seems aware that his/her English is different from others’ English, even from other Puerto Ricans’ English. This might be as a result of the unique differences in transfer that occur between Spanish and English, and potentially a result of the desire of the individual to identify strongly with both languages. In conclusion, it appears that Spanish does affect the learning process of English among Puerto Ricans because the participants, in order to have a better understanding of the newly acquired language, use previously acquired Spanish pronunciation

9 and grammar rules to realize it, and this strategy builds a unique and identifiable Puerto Rican English.

In relation to the perception of the participants towards Puerto Rican nationality and how they view if this nationality had an advantage in the learning process of English, half of the participants agreed that being a Puerto Rican is an advantage in learning English. This, perhaps, is a consequence of the political status of Puerto Rico and close association with the United States. For example, one participant explained, “Because of the political status of Puerto Rico, Puerto Ricans are more in contact with the [English] language than other countries…”.

This quote expresses the participant’s stance on how being a Puerto Rican might have a positive effect on learners of English due to the status of the island as a free associated territory.

Moreover, the same participant stated that “Puerto Ricans are in more contact with English compared to other countries”, suggesting that s/he also believes that the influence Puerto Ricans have from American society also influences orientation towards the English language. Another participant stated, “Thanks to ‘anglicismos’ and our exposure to the language, I'd say it's easy”, referring to the learning process of English. Thus, we conclude that, due to the political status of the island and its increased exposure to English through American culture, Puerto Ricans have an advantage juxtaposed with other Latin American countries, which may have the same native language but do not possess political and cultural relationships similar to the relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States.

Learner expectations of teaching strategies affect the acquisition of ESL. Results demonstrated that learner expectations affect the acquisition of English. We found that the participants learned and practiced English using different strategies, specifically receptive or ‘passive’ strategies like reading and listening. The questionnaire asked about the activities and methods that helped the individuals practice English, and both reading and listening were the most predominant responses. The methods the participants used can be

10 classified going from the most traditional ones, such as books, television and music, to some newer approaches, such as podcasts, audiobooks and video games. These strategies were most likely selected to ease the process of acquiring the language and make learning enjoyable for individuals who already feel strong orientation towards the language. Also, it was evident that most of the participants felt that they effectively acquired the English language and focused on traditional methods such as formal English classes and grammar books, stating that it helped them with their vocabulary and pronunciation. This data, coupled with the participants’ preference for passive learning strategies over production of English may suggest that an ESL or learner mentality resonates with many Puerto Rican speakers of English, even when they consider themselves bilingual or fluent in English. The scope of this small scale study does not lend itself to make any conclusive statements on this subject, but may provide direction for future research. In conclusion, The results show that the factors that motivated the participants to learn the language are essential in the learning process of English. Ely, Gardner, Scarcella & Oxford (as cited in Lu, 2008) explain: “Motivation is an important element in language learning. Research showed that learning motivation influences many factors in learners’ L2 learning, such as learners’ learning strategies, interaction with native speakers in the target language, input of receiving in the target language being learned, and performances on test.” The majority of the participants indicated that English has been present as a learning goal in their lives, presumably from a young age, due to their parents encouragement towards them to learn the language. This encouragement aligns with the expectations of formal education in Puerto Rico, in which English instruction is required K-12 and is an expectation (and requirement) at the university level. To conclude, the results show that the participants’ orientation towards English coupled with motivation by their parents and career paths has a strong effect on learning English. The majority of participants also engaged with traditional receptive methods of learning such as

11 listening media in English and using grammar books in English classes to reinforce their knowledge of the language. In conclusion, the data support our expectation that the proximity of the United States and Puerto Rican mental models facilitate the process of acquiring English.

Acknowledgements We would like to thank, from the bottom of our hearts, our professor and mentor Sally Delgado, who led us in all moments throughout this journey. This study would not have been possible without her support and advising. We would also like to thank the participants for their engagement in this research and our family for their unconditional support.

References Crosnoe, R., & Turley, R. N. (2011). K-12 educational outcomes of immigrant youth. The Future of Children, 21 (1), 129-152. doi:10.1353/foc.2011.0008 Dijk, T. A. (2006). Discourse, context and cognition. Discourse Studies, 8 (1), 168-170. doi:10.1177/1461445606059565 Lu, Y. (2008). ESL learners’ learning motivations and strategies. The International Journal of Learning: Annual Review, 15(1), 17-24. doi:10.18848/1447-9494/cgp/v15i01/45567 United Nations (UN). (2017). The international migration report 2017 (Highlights). United Nations: New York. Retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/migration/publications/migration report/docs/MigrationReport2017_Highlights.pdf Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

12 Appendix A: Questionnaire

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15

PREFERENCE FOR POLITICAL CORRECTNESS INCREASES WITH AGE: A STUDY OF OBAMA’S AND TRUMP’S POLITICAL DISCOURSE

Alexandra Carolina García Aponte Jan Manuel Cubero Jiménez University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

Abstract Since 2000, there has been a shift from a tradition of political correctness in politics to the rejection of PC language, as evidenced by the support President Trump has received since 2015. Research links preferences in political correctness to political ideologies and age. Our hypothesis is that younger audiences prefer political correctness due to more liberal political preferences. We ask how age and political affiliation correlate with stance on political correctness and how language use affects positive perceptions of the speakers. Sixteen participants, divided into 3 age groups, answered a survey in which they evaluated their own political knowledge, ideology and opinions about political correctness using a blind text and a video of two speakers (Obama and Trump). Results show an interesting trend of generally uninformed young people rejecting political correctness and aligning with conservative messages they may recognize as disrespectful. Participants in their twenties were equally divided for and against political correctness in principle, were more approving of liberal argumentation, and most likely to be affected by prejudgments. The oldest group were the most in favor of political correctness in politics, were least affected by prejudgments, and— contrary to the hypothesis—most preferred political correctness in political discourse.

Keywords: Political Correctness, liberal and Conservative, Political Discourse, Age Introduction In recent years there has been a marked change in audience perceptions on political correctness. The 2016 elections marked the seemingly decisive transition from a tradition of political correctness (also known as PC) to its rejection by a significant percentage of the population. According to Folsom (2016), political correctness is “the collective tendencies toward inclusion, pluralism, contrition and tolerant speech” (p.2). These tendencies began in the early 1980s declined in 2000 to give way to “a new normal of exclusion, polarization, impenitence and more wide-open speech” (p.2). The “new normal” seemed to reach peak

levels in 2015 as evidenced by Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. In 2015, Trump remarked, “I am tired of this politically correct crap” in a campaign rally in South Carolina.

(Folsom, 2016, p.9) and has since continued to express himself candidly and without apology. Trump has mocked the disabled, women and military personnel (Chira, 2017). Yet, despite the criticism Trump has received for his lack of political correctness, political analysts argue that he has succeeded because of it (Folsom, 2016). Trump’s predecessor, President Obama was well known for his restrained and polite rhetoric that Democrats align with their inclusive political platforms. In contrast, Trump often uses coarse and aggressive language in his political discourse that appeals to his working class base. Although the language choices of both speakers are politically driven, the different style in language use between Trump and Obama may also be due to the fact that Obama's academic preparation was much more complete and varied than Trump's. (Ritchie, Feliciano & Sparks, 2018, p. 248-9).

The polarization of political correctness in political discourse aligned with the two main political parties in U.S politics coincides with the polarization preferences among different age groups. According to the Pew Research Center (2018), people between 22 and 37 years of age tend to be the most liberal and democratic while those who are older than 37 tend to be more conservative. In surveys about each president’s first-year job approval ratings, data showed that Obama had a higher approval rating than Trump among 22-37 year olds (64% and 27% respectively). Older age groups approval for one or the other progressively leveled around 50%. Given this context of polarization in political discourse that correlated with PC language and preferences according to age group, our hypothesis is that political correctness in presidential discourse has a positive effect on young audience perceptions. Out of all the age groups, we hypothesize that the younger audiences prefer politically correctness due to their more liberal outlook on politics. In our research, we ask: 1)

How does age correlate with stance on political correctness? and 2) How does self-identified political affiliation correlate with stance on political correctness?

Methods Participant recruitment.

The participant sample was composed of undergraduate students in BA English Arts and BA English Education programs as well as faculty and administrative personnel ascribed to the English Department of the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey. The department secretary provided the email addresses of 86 students, faculty members and personnel and we sent all these potential participants an invitation to fill in the Google Form questionnaire between April 16th, 2019 and April 27th, 2019. There was a total of 16 participants across three age groups: three 18-20 year olds, nine 21-29 year olds, and four 30-59 year olds.

Data collection.

Data collection consisted of using a questionnaire that was created in Google Forms to be administered electronically. The questionnaire has six sections: the consent form, questions about participants’ personal information, and four sections to gather the participants perspectives on two transcripts and two videos. The consent form it included a general explanation of the research. The second part collected demographic data from the participants such as age, gender, fluency in the English language, how much they know of current US politics, political or ideological affiliations, and their general perspective about political correctness in politics. In the third and fourth sections, the participants answered questions after reading transcripts of the first three minutes of both former President Barack Obama’s and sitting President Donald Trump’s remarks to the United Nations General Assembly in 2010 and 2018 respectively. In order to reduce bias, the researchers omitted certain parts of the text to remove any mention of who the speakers are, when the speech took place, or the original audience to whom it was addressed. The fifth and sixth sections contained two

videos clips of the final three minutes of the same speeches, and an explanation of the speakers and the context of each clip. In sections three to six, the questions were the same.

First, the participant gave his/her opinion on each speaker’s respectful tone, appeal, message, honesty and humility on a Likert scale (0-Strongly disagree to 4-Strongly agree). Finally, the participant selected which political party or ideology they believe they identify with in a multiple-choice question.

Data analysis.

Analytical methods included the use of Google Sheets and Microsoft Excel to organize, categorize, and statistically process the data collected by converting it to percentages and identifying trends. A Positive Perception Index was created to evaluate the participant responses to the blind texts and video excerpts. This index was determined from the summed score of combined responses to five questions relating to whether the participant agreed with the text or speaker, and whether the speaker was respectful, appealing, honest/sincere, and humble. The higher the score on the Likert scale in response to these five questions, the higher the summed Positive Perception Index score out of a possible 20 points which represented 100% positive perception.

Results Political orientation and PC preferences of participants.

When asked to evaluate their own knowledge of U.S. politics, the percentage of participants who considered themselves well informed increased with age. The 18-20 range considered themselves least knowledgeable of all of the age groups; most participants said that they were either “Unaware” (66%) or “Aware” (33%) of U.S. politics. Confidence increased in the 21-29 age range with fewer considering themselves “Unaware” (11%), and most evaluating their knowledge as either “Aware” (66%) or “Well informed” (22%). In the 30-59 age range, self-evaluations were either “Aware” (50%) or “Well informed” (50%).

Within the youngest age group (18-20), 33% identified themselves as Democratic/ Progressive/ Liberal/ Left-wing while 66% indicated none or uncertain. The middle age group (21-29) was 44% Democratic/ Progressive/ Liberal/ Left-wing, 33% none or uncertain, and 22% withheld their answer. In the oldest age group 50% marked Democratic/ Progressive/ Liberal/ Left-wing, 25% none or uncertain, and 25% withheld their answers.

None of the participants in any age group admitted affiliation or belief in Republican/ Conservative/ Right-wing ideologies (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Participants’ self-identified political affiliation or ideology.

The data collected in our research showed that the 18-20 age group unanimously agreed that “political correctness has gone too far.” The 21-29 age group was divided with 44% indicating that “political correctness is completely necessary,” 44% indicating that “political correctness has gone too far,” and 11% indicating that “more political correctness is needed.” In the 30-59 age group, 25% indicated that “political correctness is completely necessary,” 50% that “more political correctness is needed,” and 25% that it has “gone too

far.” None of the participants believed that political correctness was unnecessary or irrelevant (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Participants’ stance on the politically correct environment in politics.

Participants had the opportunity to explain their stance on political correctness in politics (see Table 1). The 18-20 age group explained they believed political correctness has gone too far because it is fraudulent, excessively formal, trivial, and allows politicians to be prepared with specific word choices to avoid offense. Those in the 21-29 age group who also believed political correctness to have gone too far because it is limited, excessive and restrictive. However, those who believed it to be completely necessary said it was because politicians are careless, it reduces stereotypes, and it’s a sign of wisdom. The participant who marked that more political correctness is needed stressed that it allows people to be more aware of individual beliefs. The oldest age group (30-59) mostly believed political correctness to be completely necessary because it represents a respectful performance. They also believed politicians need to be more politically correct because they are occasionally too explicit, harsh, divisive, prejudiced and lacking in decorum, trustworthiness, and admirable rhetoric.

Table 1: Answers to the open question about stance on political correctness in politics Age Category 18-20

18-20 18-20 21-29

21-29 21-29

21-29 21-29

21-29 21-29

21-29 21-29

30-39 40-49

50-59 50-59

What do think of the political correct environment in politics?

I believe politics is a fraud and we need a change in political correctness, no need for extravagant money for them. They are there to help society, not to drain it.

Poltical awareness serves to mountain respect within all parties involved. However I believe that if you use the right terms to adress all the parties it is unnesesary to fall into exesive formalities. Currently, political awareness has fallen into the exesive part, worrying about trivialities in order to please everyone. Something we all know is imposible, as poeple wll take any argument and bend it iin the sense that most benefits them.

Because politicians have to always be prepared with specific word choices on order to not offend or piss people off.

Nowadays, politicians behave carelessly.

Thirty years ago, political correctness existed to the needs of conservatives, while nowadays, for the needs of liberals. The problem is that, even when needed, we should recognize its limits.

Actions should be more impotant Politicians often let personal or religious ideologies blind them. Everyone, not just politicians, should be more aware that their personal beliefs, aren't what everyone else believes and that doesn't mean others are necessarily right.

Is comlelte necessary to be corect when it comes to this The answer was the closest to my actual standpoint: political correctness can be taken too far. If political correctness is a criteria for keeping a job, then it goes too far.

However, in case of nurturing environments such as a K-12 school, I find it necessary.

So, I believe it depends on the context, but I'd refrain from delving too much into conjecture.

I think it is necessary because it reduces the stereotypes that can cause the ego to rise itself Political correctness has been pushed in some ocassions to the extreme, almost as to say that everything is politically incorrect. While it is necessary, it should be written and explained vastly to accommodate certain liberty and provide speech without a "restraint".

One expects for leaders to be wise enough to be politically correct.

As politicians, they should present a respectful look on society's perception because people are the one allowing them to occupy a political position, therefore they should perform in the best way possible.

There is a tendency, in current politics, where offensive language toward minorities and groups considered marginalized is being used.

Politicians have become polarized, divisive, biased, prejudiced, and racist, lacking in decorum, candor, honesty, trustworthiness, failing in exhibiting knowledge about identifying, addressing and resolving vital issues in both local and international realms; as well as having disregarded, abandoned, or lacking appropriate or admirable rhetorical methods of communicating with constituents.

In many ocassions they are too explicit and harsh.

Perceptions of Obama’s speech and video.

In the questions pertaining to the blind text, where the participants did not know the speaker was former president Barack Obama, positive perceptions generally increase with age, see Figure 3. Among the 18-20 age group, the majority indicated that the speaker was

respectful, appealing, and honest or sincere (66%). However, 66% did not agree with the message and 33% were uncertain whether they agreed or not. Most of the 21-29 year old participants agreed with the speaker’s message (66%), and that the speaker was respectful (88%) and appealing (77%). When evaluating whether he was honest or sincere, 22% agreed, 33% disagreed, and 44% were uncertain. Only 33% agreed the speaker was humble, 44% disagreed, and 22% were uncertain. Among the 30-59 year olds, most of the participants agreed that the speaker was respectful (75%), appealing (100%), honest (75%), and humble (75%). Exactly half, 50%, of participants agreed with the speaker’s message, 25% disagreed and 25% expressed uncertainty.

In response to the video, when participants were able to recognize Obama speaking, positive perceptions are fairly consistent after age 21 but much lower among the 18-20 age group, see Figure 4. The majority, 66% of the 18-20 age group agreed that the speaker was respectful and humble and 66% were uncertain if he was honest or sincere. This age group was equally divided in whether they agreed, disagreed or were uncertain about if Obama was appealing and if they agreed with his message. Most of the 21-29 year old participants agreed that the speaker was respectful (100%), appealing (77%), honest (77%), and humble (88%).

66% agreed with the speaker’s message. In response to the video, most of the 30-59 year olds agreed that the speaker was respectful (75%), appealing (100%), honest (75%), and humble (75%). All of the participants agreed with the speaker’s message.

Figure 3: Positive Perception Index of Obama’s Blind Text

Figure 4: Positive Perception Index of Obama’s Video Overall, the 18-21 age group were only able to correctly identify Obama’s political affiliation when they could see him as the speaker, all other age groups could identify the speakers’ political affiliation from the blind text and also the video, see Figure 5. Among the 18-20 age group, 66% were uncertain and 33% believed the unseen speaker was Republican/Conservative/Right-wing after reading the blind text, but when they saw Obama in the video, all of the 18-20 year old participants correctly identified the speaker as

Democrat/Liberal. All of the participants in the 21-29 and in the 30-59 age ranges correctly identified the speaker as Democrat/Liberal from the blind text and also in the video.

Figure 5: Perceptions of speakers’ political party in the blind text and in the video of Obama Perceptions of Trump’s speech and video.

In the questions pertaining to the blind text, where the participants did not know the speaker was former President Donald Trump, positive perceptions generally decrease with age, see Figure 6. In the questions about the blind text where the participants did not know the speaker was President Donald Trump, 66% of the 18-20 year old age group agreed the speaker was respectful, honest and humble. They were equally divided on agreeing, disagreeing, or being uncertain about the speaker's appeal and the message. Among the 21-29 year olds, 66% agreed that the speaker was respectful, 33% agreed that he was humble, and 44% agreed that he was appealing, honest and that they agreed with his message. Most of the 30-59 year old participants disagreed that the speaker was respectful (75%), appealing (75%), honest (100%) and humble (75%). All of the participants disagreed with the speaker’s message.

In response to the video, when participants were able to recognize Trump speaking, positive perceptions generally decrease with age and showed a significant drop among age groups over 21, see Figure 7. In the video where participants were able to see and hear Donald Trump speak, 66% of the participants in the 18-21 age range agreed and 33% disagreed that the speaker was respectful, honest and humble. Most of the participants (66%) were uncertain as to whether they agreed with the message while 33% did agree. There was no consensus on the appeal of the speaker as 33% agreed, disagreed and were uncertain.

Among the 21-29 year olds, 55% agreed he was respectful, 44% disagreed that he was appealing, 55% were uncertain they agreed with his message, 44% agreed and were uncertain about his honesty, and 77% agreed he was humble. Either all or most of the 30-59 age group disagreed with the statement that the speaker was respectful (100%), appealing (100%), honest (75%), and humble (100%). When indicating whether they agreed with his message or not, 50% disagreed, 25% agreed and 25% were uncertain.

Figure 6: Positive Perception Index of Trump’s Blind Text

Figure 7: Positive Perception Index of Trump’s Video Overall, the rate that participants were able to correctly identify Trump’s political affiliation increased with age if they could not see him, and all but one participant was unable to identify him as a Republican after watching the video, see Figure 8. After reading the blind text, the 18-21 age group were divided on whether the speaker was Republican/Conservative, Democrat/Liberal. One participant could not decide, but after watching the video, all of the participants in the 18-21 age range identified Trump as Republican/Conservative. Among the 21-29 year olds, 66% marked him as Republican/Conservative, 22% as Democrat/Liberal, and 11% were uncertain. After watching the video, the 21-29 year olds identified Trump as Republican/Conservative while 11% were uncertain. In response to the unknown speaker’s political or ideological affiliations, all of the participants in the 30-59 age group correctly agreed that the speaker was Republican. All of the participants also correctly identified the speaker as Republican/Conservative after watching the video of Trump.

Figure 8: Perceptions of speakers’ political party in the blind text and in the video of Obama

Discussion Political orientation and PC preferences of participants.

It became clear that in this study, participants in the youngest age group (18-20) knew the least about U.S. politics and that as age increased, so did awareness of the political situation in the U.S. This suggests that young people, in general, are either not very interested in either politics or politics of the U.S. Perhaps not surprisingly, as age increases, so does the awareness of the importance of politics, which may be motivated by a sense of individual responsibility as a stakeholder in the democratic process. The participants were almost equally divided between those who self-identified themselves as Democratic, Liberal and/or Left Wing and those who did not identify with any of the options, were undecided or withheld that information. Curiously, none of the participants self-identified with Republican, Conservative or Right Wing ideologies despite using conservative arguments such as personal responsibility, limited regulations, and freedom of the individual to support their stance on political correctness. For example, one participant claimed: “political awareness has fallen into the excessive part, worrying about trivialities in order to please everyone.

Something we all know is impossible.” Another participant agreed: “Political correctness has been pushed in some occasions to the extreme, almost as to say that everything is politically incorrect.” Due to the small sample size (16 participants), the fact that only three of those participants identified themselves in the 18-20 age range, and two of those indicated that their own political stance is “none or undecided,” identifying normalized trends among this age range was difficult. In the middle age group (21-29), almost half of the participants identified themselves as Democratic, Liberal and/or Left Wing, correlating positively with data that voters in their twenties lean equally to the left as to the right. In the oldest age group of participants (30-59), half of the participants identified as Democratic or Liberal and the other half were uncertain or withheld the information, somewhat contradicting statistics that show that people tend to be more conservative the older they get (Pew Research Center 2014, 2016).

Seemingly, stance on political correctness in politics varies gradually from one age group to another, independently of self-identified political or ideological affiliation. The 1820 year old participants presented conflicting stances on political correctness and political or ideological affiliations. They unanimously agreed that political correctness has gone too far, which does not support our hypothesis that political correctness in presidential discourse has a positive effect on young audience perceptions. Their stance aligns with recent tendencies, exemplified by President Trump, to reject political correctness in favor of frank expression.

However, the data gathered in this research contrasts with the statistics on attitudes and voting behaviors. While the new data identifies younger participants with conservative stances on political correctness, none identify themselves with Republican, Conservative or Right Wing ideologies. However, the data suggests an interesting trend among young people of rejecting political correctness using conservative arguments that might be further confirmed with a larger-scale study among this population. The 21-29 age group reflects the

current polarization the masses have about political correctness while contradicting statistical patterns in voting preferences. Almost half of the participants in this age group also rejected political correctness using conservative arguments. The other half indicated that political correctness was completely necessary and more was needed, using arguments that coincide with liberal views such as inclusivity, the need for structure, and equality. The use of liberal arguments align with previous data that people in their late twenties are still mostly liberal or democratic but with a slight increase in the percentage of conservative inclinations (Pew Research Center 2014, 2016). The 30-59 age group predominantly endorsed political correctness using liberal reasoning. Differently from the younger participants, they presented views such as respecting diversity and emphasizing the government’s role in solving local and international issues. One participant’s response was particularly eloquent and demonstrated a great deal of concern about how politicians address the public: Politicians have become polarized, divisive, biased, prejudiced, and racist, lacking in decorum, candor, honesty, trustworthiness, failing in exhibiting knowledge about identifying, addressing and resolving vital issues in both local and international realms; as well as having disregarded, abandoned, or lacking appropriate or admirable rhetorical methods of communicating with constituents.

Despite this participant’s clear and candid observations on current political behaviors, this participant marked “None or uncertain” when asked to identify her/his own political affiliation, potentially indicating a new trend among all voters to dis-identify and distance themselves from politicians who they believe do not represent them.

Perceptions texts and videos of Obama and Trump.

If we compare participant reactions in response to the written discourse (blind) and the video discourse in which they could identify the speaker as either President Barack Obama or President Donald Trump, generally speaking, positive perceptions of Obama

increased when participants could identify him and positive perceptions of Trump decreased when participants could identify him. This perhaps aligns with public approval ratings of each president among the general public and is potentially influenced more specifically by each of the presidents’ political positions on language policy, immigration from Central and South America, and racial identity, which strongly influence the perspectives of Hispanic speaking populations with well documented African heritage, such as Puerto Ricans.

President Trump’s heavily-criticized response to Hurricane Maria and re-assignment of disaster relief funds for construction of the infamous wall bordering Mexico may also have negatively influenced his perceptions among Puerto Ricans once he was identifiable in the video.

Positive perceptions of Obama based on the text of his speech alone averaged at 210 points out of a possible 320, determining a 65.6% approval rating for the speech alone. These figures shift to 244 points and a 76.3% approval rating for the video when participants could identify him. Interestingly, although all five categories of response indicated a more favorable evaluation from participants, the most notable increase was in the category that assessed if the speaker was humble, followed by perceptions of his sincerity and then the comment “I agree with the speaker.” This may suggest that although the politically correct language in speech itself was not a strong indicator of humility and sincerity itself, the speaker as a political figure and humanitarian advocate was. With respect to age, despite the overall trend among participants to favor Obama’s more when he was identifiable, the 18-20 age group actually reduced positive perceptions from a 12 point approval to a 10.3 between the blind text and the video. However, this shift seems to have been heavily affected by one participant who dramatically dropped positive perceptions of Obama once he was identifiable, the other two participants in this age range maintained the general curve. Among the 20-29 age group and the 30-59 age group, the most dramatic increase in positive perceptions occurred among

the 20-29 age group who shifted almost 4 points in positive perceptions compared to a 1 point shift among the 30-59 age group, potentially reflecting this generation’s voting behavior during the two terms of Obama’s presidency and their identification with the young AfricanAmerican president.

Positive perceptions of Trump based on the text of his speech alone averaged at 162 points out of a possible 320, determining a 50.6% approval rating for the speech alone. These figures drop to 135 points and a 42.1% approval rating for the video when participants could identify him. The most striking aspect of all the data is that although each of the evaluation categories relating to the speaker being respectful, appealing, honest, and humble dropped by between 6 and 9 points, the one category that evaluated participant’s reaction to the statement “I agree with the speaker” increased by one point. This may indicate that whilst participants recognize that Trump’s messages are often disrespectful, unappealing, insincere, and arrogant, participants nonetheless agree with those messages. This potentially explains why, despite his low approval ratings and extensive public criticism, Trump continues to appeal to a wide voter base that agree with his core messages. With respect to age, despite the overall trend among participants to decrease positive perceptions of Trump’s speech when he was identifiable, the 18-20 age group actually maintained the same positive perception index number, again proving to be the outlier group among participant trends, a phenomenon that might be explained by their self-acknowledged lack of political knowledge. Among the 20-29 age group and the 30-59 age group, the most dramatic change in positive perceptions again occurred among the 20-29 age group who dropped almost 3 points in positive perceptions compared to a minimal 0.5 point shift among the 30-59 age group.

Among 18-20 year old participants, and in President Obama’s case, none of the participants could identify him as a Liberal Democrat after reading an extract of his speech, while after watching the video all the participants concluded that he was a Liberal Democrat.

In the case of President Trump, when reading the blind text, opinions were equally different: one considered that he was a conservative republican, one thought he was a liberal democrat, and the other was not sure what ideology President Trump aligned with. But when watching the video, all concluded he was a conservative republican. This indicates that watching a speaker in a video helps more than reading a speech to correctly identify political ideology, and this might illustrate the common trend among younger voters to respond to visual media rather than text. Contrastively, among 29-30 group and the 30-59 group, all of the participants correctly identified both the text and the video as representing a liberal/Democrat ideology, potentially reflecting their increased political knowledge and confidence compared to the younger age group. Here we see that the physical image of the speaker was not necessary for most participants over 21 to classify the speaker to their political ideology. We found almost exactly the same results for President Trump in both the blind text and the video except one participant age 21-20 who marked “don’t know” for both the text and the video.

In conclusion, and contrary to our hypothesis, young people are less tolerant of politically correct language in presidential speeches. They are also more tolerant towards negative characteristics of speakers. The results of our paper indicate that in order to get the attention of the youngest voters (18-20), political discourse should be accompanied by an image of the speaker or a video. Additionally, if we want to educate the youngest age group in terms of national and international politics, we should use audiovisual materials and potentially social media more than the written press or traditional news networks. In sum, although the findings of this small-scale study were revealing, we suggest that this study be repeated using a larger population, specifically including 18-20 year olds who are aware of the current political climate. It would also be beneficial to seek demographic information that might compare university educated participants and non-university educated participants.

References Chira, S. (2017). Who likes Trump's tweets and why. NY Times, Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/29/opinion/who-likes-trumps-tweets-andwhy.html Folsom, R. (2016). Why Trump, why now? The violent death of political correctness.

Socionomist, 1–14. Retrieved from https://www.socionomics.net/2016/05/why-trumpwhy-now-the-violent-death-of-political-correctness/ Obama, B. (2010). Remarks by the president to the United Nations General Assembly [Transcript]. Retrieved from https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-pressoffice/2010/09/23/remarks-president-united-nations-general-assembly Pew Research Center. (2016). 2016 Party identification detailed tables. Retrieved from https://www.people-press.org/2016/09/13/2016-party-identification-detailed-tables/ Pew Research Center. (2018). The generation gap in American politics. Retrieved from https://www.people-press.org/2018/03/01/the-generation-gap-in-american-politics/ Pew Research Center. (2018). Trends in party affiliation among demographic groups.

Retrieved from https://www.people-press.org/2018/03/20/1-trends-in-partyaffiliation-among-demographic-groups/ Ritchie, L. D., Feliciano, A., & Sparks, A. (2018). Rhetorical confinement, contrasting metaphors, and cultural polarities. Metaphor & the Social World, 8(2), 247–266.

Trump, D. (2018). Remarks by President Trump to the 73rd session of the United Nations General Assembly [Transcript]. Retrieved from https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-73rdsession-united-nations-general-assembly-new-york-ny/

Acknowledgements This research was made possible by the support professor Sally J. Delgado for expanding our knowledge and experience on research in discourse and grammar as well as providing instructions, suggestions, and corrections on the various drafts of this research paper. Special thanks to Jennie Merced, secretary of the English Department of the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey, and classmates from the Discourse and Grammar course during the Spring semester 2018-2019. Thanks to all the participants who made it possible to conduct this research paper, all of them part of the English Department at the University of Puerto Rico in Cayey.

Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.

CATHOLIC MENTAL MODELS STRONGLY INFLUENCE PUERTO RICANS’ PERCEPTION OF SOCIAL ISSUES

Alejandro A. Roig Jacqueline M. Rivera Brandon Camacho University of Puerto Rico at Cayey August 2019

1 Abstract Puerto Rico is mainly a Catholic country familiar with the general promotion of Catholicism's positive social effects. We seek to investigate the potential negative effects that Catholicism may have on people’s attitudes towards current social issues. Our focus relates to mental models that Catholic doctrines promote, their impact on behavior and potential damaging social effects. A survey consisting of questions about the socio-demographic profile of participants and five current social issues was presented to sixty-four participants, of which twenty-six self-identified as non-religious, fourteen were Catholics and eleven were atheists.

Thirteen identified with other Christian religions; one wiccan, and one agnostic. Many participants’ responses supported the hypothesis that basing relationships with others on Catholic doctrines may cause discomfort or conflict with people who do not identify as Catholics or have made lifestyle choices that oppose Catholic doctrines. However, results may be biased due to the majority participation of non-Catholics in a survey that was clear in its intention to evaluate the potential negative effects of Catholicism. We accept that these results do not likely reflect the opinions of many Catholics who associate their mental models with positive social outcomes.

Keywords: Catholic, Mental Models, Negative Social effects, Religious Doctrine Introduction Puerto Rico is a highly Christian country, where 96.7% of the people self-identify as Christians, according to a study conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life (Hackett, C. & Grim, B.J., 2012). Of this percentage, 75% are Catholics, estimated in 2000 by World Christian Encyclopedia, (Barret, 2001). These statistics position Catholicism as the predominant religion on the island. Catholic doctrine teaches its followers to believe that morality is determined by religious orientation and involvement as well as the belief in a Judeo-Christian deity, whose interpreted teachings directly influence their

2 judgement towards certain social issues. Many Catholics rely on the instruction of religious leaders and explicit commands or statements in the Bible in addition to the interpretation of metaphorical narratives to provide ideological foundations for their personal relationships and as guidelines for living a good life in general. Although we recognize that the Catholic Church may provide an environment conducive to social union and spiritual growth through the possibility of congregation and community action, it may also generate exclusionary and/or discriminatory attitudes towards those who may think or act differently that what Catholic doctrine promotes. The aim of this study is to investigate the claim that Catholicism may have a negative influence on people’s perceptions and attitudes towards social issues. We rationalize that basing relationships with others on Catholic doctrines may cause discomfort or conflict with people who do not identify as Catholics or have made lifestyle choices that oppose Catholic doctrines.

Considering the majority of Catholics in the island, it is reasonable to say that a general sample of Puerto Ricans may evaluate the negative or positive effects that Catholicism may engender. The study targets a general section of the population to collect data on three main research questions: 1) Who is willing to engage in critical discourse? 2)What mental models do Catholic doctrines promote? 3) Do Catholic mental models impact behaviors? Considering this data, we evaluate if the effects of behaviors connected to Catholic mental models might be socially damaging. Despite the personal and familial comforts that many find in the Catholic faith, we anticipate that the wider social effects of Catholicism may be predominantly negative.

Readers should note that it is not our intention to criticize the Catholic Church nor those who follow its doctrines. Instead, we intend to show the effects of certain Catholic doctrines in a way that might enable productive discourse and promote empathy and understanding on both sides of current debates around polemic social issues.

Materials and Methods

3 Design of survey.

A survey in Spanish was designed using Google Forms, consisting of five questions about the socio-demographic profile of participants and thirteen statements regarding five current social issues affecting interpersonal relationships in Puerto Rico: 1) self-identification with beliefs 2) abortion 3) discrimination due to sexual orientation 4) separation between church and state, and 5) male chauvinism and feminism. A final statement with an open answer was presented to gather participants’ opinion for qualitative purposes: “El país en general estaría mejor sin la religión metida en el gobierno”. (Translation: The country in general would be better if religion was not a part of the government).

Administering the survey and processing responses.

The survey was available to the general public and was promoted on one social network, Facebook, via different user profiles. Apart from being posted on each of our personal profiles, it was also posted on the Facebook sites of two religious groups (Universitarios Católicos de Puerto Rico and Católicos de Puerto Rico), one atheist/agnostic group (Ateistas de Puerto Rico) and one humanist group (Humanistas Seculares de Puerto Rico). In addition, people who we made aware of our research and showed interest in the survey received access to the survey via personal email or WhatsApp messages. The survey was open for sixteen days. It was created and posted on Friday, April 19th, 2019 and the results were computed on Sunday, May 5th, 2019. The total amount of participants answering the survey was 64. The Google Forms software used the administer the survey provided data for each answer individually and graphics for responses in general. From those data and graphics, we conducted a trend analysis and synthesized the most significant findings related to each research question with graphics generated using Microsoft Excel.

Results Who is willing to engage in critical discourse?

4 The survey was completed by more non-religious participants than those who identify with religious groups, and just over a fifth of participants (n=14, 21.8%) identified as Catholics, see Figure 1. The majority of participants indicated that they do not identify with any religious group, with 26 indicating “no religion” and 11 indicating “atheist” composing a total of 37 participants (57.8%). Fewer participants indicated that they identify with a Christian religious group, with 14 indicating “Catholic” and 13 indicating “Other Christian Religions” composing a total of 27 participants (42.1%). One participant identified as “agnostic” and one as “wiccan.”

Figure 1: Participants’ self-identification of belief system as religious or non-religious

What mental models do Catholic doctrines promote?

Participants responded that they believe patriarchal dominance and religion in the government were the two most common mental models promoted by the Catholic church, see Figure 2. A total of 58 participants (90.6%) considered that the Catholic church promotes patriarchal dominance and 53 participants (82.8%) believe that the Catholic church promotes religion in the government. With a significant statistical difference from the most popular two responses, 30 participants (46.8%) indicated that the Catholic church promotes the prohibition of abortion and 14 participants (21.8%) indicated that the Catholic church rejects homosexuality.

5 Figure 2: Participant recognition of mental models promoted by Catholicism.

Do Catholic mental models impact behaviors?

Just under half of the participants supported the statement that the country in general would be better if religion was not a part of the government, see Figure 3. From the 64 answers to the open question, results were grouped into those who support what was stated in the premise (n=30, 46.9%), those who expressed a different opinion (n=16, 25%), those who were non-responsive (n=12, 18.8%), and those who did not support the premise (n=6, 9.4%).

Figure 3: Participant responses regarding religion as a part of the government.

6 The aggregated data from the thirteen statements regarding five current social issues in Puerto Rico indicate that participants do not generally behave in alignment with Catholic mental models but do support legislation on reproductive controls. Figure 4 shows the selfperceptions of participants regarding their behaviours that align with Catholic mental models in which two behaviours are indicated by only 5 participants each (n=5, 7.8%), specifically the rejection of separation between church and state, and the acceptance of only men and women as couples. In sharp contrast, more than half of the participants (n=33, 51.6%) provided answers that supported legislation on reproductive controls, for example access to (or use of) birth control or bans on abortion practices.

Figure 4: Participants’ self-reported stance in alignment with Catholic mental models

The aggregated data from the thirteen statements regarding five current social issues in Puerto Rico indicate that many participants identify with beliefs that do not align with Catholic mental models. Figure 5 summarizes the data that show a majority of participants individually (and cumulatively) reject Catholic mental models relating to the separation between church and state (n=48, 75%). More than two thirds of participants (n=43, 67.2%) support equality between genders, just under two thirds (n=40, 62.5%) believe in individual choice over church mandates, and over half (n=38, 59.4%) support pro-choice perspectives on reproductive rights.

7 Figure 5: Participants’ self-reported beliefs that do not align with Catholic mental models

Discussion Who is willing to engage in critical discourse?

Based on our data, a majority of non-religious people and a limited number of either Christian and fewer Catholic participants are willing to engage with critical reflection in an investigative survey format, although we acknowledge that many more might be willing to engage in critical discourse of other types. Although the limited number of responses from religious people potentially biased the results, the majority of participants did not align their own beliefs with Catholic mental models and would be more likely to express their rejection and stance against Catholic religious doctrine through their interpersonal behaviors in society.

We accept that the limited number of Catholic participants may have been caused by the wording of certain items in the survey in which our intentions may have been interpreted as criticizing or negatively portraying the Catholic belief system. However, as previously stated, our research goal was based on the premise that basing relationships with others on Catholic doctrines may cause discomfort or conflict with people who do not identify as Catholics or have made lifestyle choices that oppose Catholic doctrines. Our intention was to show the social effects of certain Catholic doctrines in a way that might enable productive discourse and

8 promote empathy and understanding on both sides of current debates around polemic social issues. However, we do accept that the very act of opening Catholic doctrine to critical reflection is anathema to many who dedicate their lives to this faith system, and that act of questioning itself (regardless of intention) is likely to promote pushback from Catholic communities. We acknowledge that perspective and invite those who would criticise this study or its methods to engage with our research and/or create their own studies that address controversial issues that can cause social rifts.

We believe that only by working together and speaking openly and respectfully of issues that might divide us can we move forward productively. As such, measures that we put in place to encourage open and respectful participation included permitting each participant to select more than one of the answers provided on each statement of the survey and clear communication of our research goals. We also invited participants to communicate with us and our research supervisor should any participants wish to express their concerns or opinions in a more open format that the survey permitted. However, despite these measures, the study and its methods were often criticized in a manner that made both researchers and participants uncomfortable throughout the data-gathering process, to the extent that we limited earlier dissemination of the results for concerns over personal criticism. Having reflected on this process, one of our observations is that criticism of studies around social issues that index religious beliefs might potentially impede research and also potentially reinforce social divisions. We have aimed to address, and would encourage others to address polemic social issues in a respectful manner which permits ideological diversity and also moves towards social cohesion.

What mental models do Catholic doctrines promote?

With regards to our second research question about what mental models Catholic doctrines promote, participants indicated that the most common were: patriarchal dominance,

9 religion in the government, the prohibition of abortion, and the rejection of homosexuality. Yet, once again, we acknowledge that the majority of the people that answered the survey are nonCatholics and this may have affected the results. Nonetheless, and although our data is somewhat limited in that sense, it was surprising to see that even the answers of Catholic participants aligned with the trends in the non Catholic population, indicating a high degree of critical reflection from those Catholic participants who chose to complete the survey, even when it may have identified ideals that have come under public criticism. This awareness may indicate that both Catholics and non-Catholics are willing to challenge mental models regarding male chauvinism, political bias, aggressive controls over reproductive rights, and LQBTQ discrimination on the island in much the same way that they have been challenged in other regions of the U.S. and internationally. The fact that three of the four most commonly identified mental models that impact social cohesion in some way referred to womens’ expected domestic, reproductive or sexual roles (patriarchal dominance, the prohibition of abortion, and the rejection of homosexuality) is in alignment with the scale of the growing social and political issue in the U.S. at the moment. Traditional criticism of the Catholic church has voiced concerns that the religion tries to repress women, yet if church leaders could address such concerns directly, they may help to secure more liberty for women over their bodies as well as breaking with stereotypes for women and their roles in general. However, even if Catholic doctrines promote traditional gender-determined roles in a domestic setting, it should not try to impose this stance nor influence government decisions regarding laws or civil rights.

A significant majority of participants agreed that the country would be better if religion was not involved in government businesses. Although the wording of the premise “The country in general would be better if religion was not a part of the government” is loaded with value judgement, it concedes with what secularization stands for, the eradication of religious symbols and meanings in governmental politics. The main reason explaining participant agreement may

10 be due to the recognition that not every person follows the same religion, therefore, if the government favors one religious doctrine over others, there will not be an equal or inclusive way of guaranteeing that every citizen’s rights are to be respected and valued according to the law. Morality and values are not uniquely provided by any one religion, and the priority one person gives to one set of values is not going to be the same for everyone. We rationalize that morality and values are determined by context, traditions, mental models, ideological stance, experience, beliefs and many other highly-individualized elements. Moral perspectives on issues like abortion and sexual relationships should also accomodate for a range of diversity in the discourse surrounding legislation and not just one dominant perspective, religious or otherwise. What we believe should be protected in society, no matter a person’s religious identification, is human dignity and respectful dialogue that leads to equitable legal representation. These are probably the biggest concerns that should be taken into consideration when creating laws or safeguarding rights. Making such issues into religious arguments can only damage the social equity in a naturally diverse environment and the fact that many participants appeared to recognize this may suggest that Catholic mental models were not as influential as we were expecting them to be.

Do Catholic mental models impact behaviors?

With regards to our third research question about whether Catholic mental models impact behaviours, and specifically behaviours that might damage interpersonal relationships with those of other belief systems or lifestyle choices that oppose Catholic doctrines, data indicate that although many do not generally behave in strict alignment with Catholic mental models although they do support legislation on reproductive controls and issues affecting predominantly women. The current behaviors that we have witnessed in Puerto Rican society lately from diverse religious groups on the island oppose different groups supporting abortion, marriage between people of the same sex, non-binary gender identification and the separation

11 of church and state. These behaviours are mostly negative towards the supporters of the legislation in favor of granting increased personal freedom and ensuring civil rights, and such opposition may be the consequence of a dominant Catholic ideology in the island. We understand that a core concept of all Christian religions is to love one another and embrace difference, and this should include respecting other people's decisions, personal choices and preferred ways of living in society. However, many people appear to use religious doctrine as a justification when they want to criticize someone who thinks or acts differently from themselves or what their religious leaders endorse. Political activism with an explicitly religious motivation is also common among some religious groups who try to embed their religious views in government issues, often trying to manipulate the masses according to what they believe as a right thing to do in order to create laws to control and define what they perceive as correct. Certainly, every individual has a right and a civil duty to participate in the democratic process and the debates surrounding political issues, yet the overwhelming Catholic majority in Puerto Rico has created a situation which individuals who oppose political views explicitly connected with Catholic mental models can be intimidated and silenced. With the dominant majority of religious followers in Puerto Rico, we recognize the responsibility of the Catholic church to promote messages that safeguard the rights to free speech according to the Constitution, particularly in the recognition that the collective influence of the Catholic majority is significant. We recognize and applaud individuals who are willing to reject the imposition of religion in the government, making clear statements that not every citizen follows or believes one specific doctrine, therefore laws should not align with any religious stance in particular.

In addition to the three data-driven research questions, we aimed to use this data to evaluate the extent to which behaviours connected to Catholic mental models might be socially damaging, a perspective that might balance the already widespread religious consensus that

12 such behaviours are beneficial in society. Overall, it appears that the extent of support for Catholic mental models that specifically oppose women’s rights and liberties have the potential to significantly damage interpersonal relationships. However, it is notable that many participants, including those who identify as religious, express personal beliefs that reject the negative potential of Catholic mental models in society. This may be explained by considering that people in general, and Catholics in particular, recognize that religious belief systems should not control a person’s life and relationships in all respects, but instead should function as a spiritual compass for those who seek religious instruction. Identification with religious doctrines in non-fundamentalist contexts should be voluntary acts, not an imposed way of living for everyone in general, and we recognize the rights of all people to seek and express their religious beliefs. However, we also call upon all individuals, both religious and nonreligious, to respect differences, ensure civil rights and support a secular political system, in accordance with the founding principles of our democracy. In a truly democratic society, it is the responsibility of all citizens to listen to, respect the opinions of, and think about how legislation affects minorities and traditionally under-represented peoples who are always at risk of being affected by the dominant collective.

Acknowledgements As a team, we would like to express our gratitude primarily to Dr. Sally J. Delgado for the much-appreciated assessing and guidance that we received on her behalf throughout the whole process of investigation. Also, our special thanks to Atheists of Puerto Rico for providing the space and exposure required in order to gather data through our survey. Also, we would like to thank Abdiel Gonzalez, BSW (Social Worker, Army) for providing essential information on the terminology for the survey. Finally, we would like to sincerely thank everyone who participated in the survey and gave us the trust to carry out this task. We are proud to say that this experience was a completely cooperative endeavor, and we look forward

13 to engaging in the discourse and with the research of others to keep such critical issues at the forefront of our minds as we embrace our social and civic responsibilities.

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Smith, T. W. (1984). Catholic attitudes toward abortion. Conscience, 5(4), 6-7, 10.

Sources of Funding This article was completed as part of the INGL 4210 Discourse and Grammar course in the second semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. It was edited by the professor of that course, Sally Delgado, and received no financial support.