The Internet is in many cases our primary source for communication. As more communicative options online are introduced and become a part of our life, the language of the Internet, so called Netspeak, becomes a part of our language. The aim of this paper was to find out whether there is a difference in the use of Netspeak between teenagers and adults. The investigation was based on two message boards, one where the majority is teenagers and one where the majority is adults. Four different features of Netspeak were studied: exaggerated use of punctuation; exaggerated use of capital letters; abbreviations; and emoticons. All features are substitutes for paralanguage. The results show that teenagers are more likely to use features such as exaggerated use of punctuation and capitals, and abbreviations. Adults are, however, more likely to use emoticons than teenagers.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:kau-3418 |
| Date | January 2009 |
| Creators | Lundell, Hanna |
| Publisher | Karlstads universitet, Estetisk-filosofiska fakulteten |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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