(Image: Andy Smith)
Our crudest outbursts can unravel ancient links between words and thoughts. They may even hint at our ancestors鈥� first utterances
IT WAS the first time one of us swore at Dad. My older sister was 13, and had been looking forward to the school trip to Washington DC for years. It was the pinnacle of middle school 鈥� a long bus ride to the capital, two days visiting important sites and an overnight stay in a hotel with her friends.
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But as I eavesdropped from the next room, I realised my parents were telling her she couldn鈥檛 go. A severe asthmatic, she had just recovered from pneumonia, and it wasn鈥檛 worth the risk. Their voices rose, and she pleaded, implored, screamed. Finally, she thundered past me and ran up the stairs. Dad followed, furious. Then something surreal happened. As he reached the bottom of the stairs, she whirled around to face him from the top: 鈥淔uck you!鈥� she said.
It was as if she had stopped time.
Few words can freeze the moment in quite the same way 鈥� yet researchers had been shy about studying swearing. Now, as they overcome their qualms, they are finding that our crudest outbursts could answer questions about the relationship between words and thought. They might even offer clues to humankind鈥檚 first utterances.
It has long been known that the brain processes swear words differently from more genteel vocabulary. As people lose aspects of higher cognition because of injury or neurodegenerative disease, their ability to issue volleys of profanity often remains intact. That may be because even though the cortex, which we rely on for more complex (and polite) speech, may be damaged, curses hunker down in areas such as the amygdala and basal ganglia, which are often left intact.
These areas emerged at an earlier point in evolution, and across many species they house automatic responses to stress; if you electrically stimulate this circuit in a cat it will cause an ear-splitting howl. But in humans, the same stimulation 鈥渞esults in rage accompanied by swearing鈥�, says psychologist at Harvard University. It鈥檚 as if we have overwritten our basic impulses with our saltiest language.
That might explain why curses can be so , sometimes in our favour. A study of public speaking, for instance, found that . 鈥淚f someone鈥檚 not listening to you, get some swear words in there 鈥� they say, 鈥楬ey, listen up!'鈥� says , a psychologist at Boston University.
That strategy is best used judiciously. When an expletive is fired at us, it can feel like a slap to the face. 鈥淚t鈥檚 almost like a physical act,鈥� says psychologist at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams. Surprisingly, that visceral feeling might explain another mystery of cursing 鈥� why we swear when we are in pain.
The insight came to in the maternity ward. The psychologist was beside his wife at the birth of their child. 鈥淪he was in agony, and she was swearing her head off,鈥� he says. But each time the contractions eased, she apologised to the doctors and nurses. She needn鈥檛 have, Stephens recalls. 鈥淪wearing is a completely normal part of giving birth,鈥� the hospital staff told them.
His wife鈥檚 outbursts prompted Stephens, of Keele University, UK, to ask why we eff and blind when we are in pain. So he asked some undergraduates to take part in an ice water test. They had to hold one hand in freezing cold water while reciting words from one of two lists 鈥� either polite descriptive words, or rude exclamations.
It turned out that . To rule out the possibility that the colourful language was simply distracting them, Stephens also measured heart rate 鈥� which increased when students were issuing aural affronts.
That suggests the swear words were triggering the body鈥檚 fight or flight response, which is what you might expect of words that tap into the brain鈥檚 鈥渞age circuit鈥�. If so, the physiological changes that normally accompany the fight or flight response, such as the surge of adrenaline, might explain the increased pain tolerance, as the body prepares itself for possible injury. Stephens鈥檚 most recent experiment, , showed that playing violent video games also increased pain tolerance in the same way 鈥� supporting the idea that the fight or flight response lies behind the effect.
But even our sharpest barbs can be dulled by overuse. ran the same ice water test on people who routinely swear, cursing was less effective at reducing their pain, compared with those who swore less often.
Probing the nature of swearing isn鈥檛 just an exercise in excusing potty mouths; comparing the effects of different swear words could illuminate the link between language and thought, for instance. Along these lines, Caldwell-Harris has investigated the way bilingual people curse. She has found that , as measured by changes in skin conductance, than those spoken in their second language 鈥� even though they were fluent. For this reason, she thinks the power of swear words comes from associations forged at a young age in the mother tongue. 鈥淲hen we use language, everything that is going on around us becomes associated with those phrases,鈥� she says.
Hostility and lust
A similar explanation might apply to the work of and his team at the University of Bristol, UK. He recently . They don鈥檛. 鈥淵ou can say the same thing by using a euphemism and it doesn鈥檛 offend you,鈥� Bowers says. 鈥淭he form of the word matters.鈥�
Caldwell-Harris and Bowers both think that this illuminates the role of language in the brain. In the past, many philosophers and scientists had thought that language is simply a kind of 鈥渕ental algebra鈥�, where words just stand in for ideas but are effectively interchangeable. But the fact that two words representing the same idea can produce different responses in our feelings and behaviour might suggest that the terms themselves are central to the underlying processes of thought.
If that seems a stretch, linking swearing to the origins of language is even more tenuous 鈥� though there are some arguments in its favour. Charles Darwin once speculated that our earliest vocalisations expressed hostility and lust 鈥� two of the things that we tend to use profanities for today. Linguists at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, and at the City University of New York take this argument further by suggesting that our ancestors鈥� crude tirades fuelled the construction of grammar.
鈥淥ur ancestors鈥� cruel tirades may have fuelled the construction of grammar鈥�
To understand why, consider a certain type of grammatical construction called an exocentric compound. This involves cramming a noun and a verb together to create a new term, but without one necessarily modifying the other. As Progovac puts it, 鈥淎 scatter brain is neither a type of scatter, nor a type of brain鈥�. Conjuring the idea of this person鈥檚 disorganised thoughts requires an extra leap in logic compared to a phrase like 鈥渘avy blue鈥� 鈥� in which 鈥渘avy鈥� more straightforwardly modifies the description of the colour. Exocentric constructions are rare now, but were thought to be more common in the past, leading some to consider them linguistic fossils of our first stabs at grammar.
But when Locke and Progovac examined these fossils in English and Progovac鈥檚 native Serbian, they found that they were often teasing or downright insulting. 鈥淔uckwit鈥� and 鈥渟hithead鈥� are two examples that survive in English, while they found insults like 鈥渟hit-sword鈥�, 鈥渇art-rabbit鈥� and 鈥渘o-wash-underpants鈥� in Serbian. As a result, the researchers wonder if the construction first evolved in verbal duels, as our ancestors competed to come up with more creative curses. 鈥淲hat we are saying is that the ability to build abstract words was enhanced by the creation of these types of insults,鈥� Progovac says.
They point out that the practice of 鈥渇lyting鈥� 鈥� exchanging humorous insults in public 鈥� has been recorded throughout history in works such as the Iliad and Beowulf. In some ways, they say, it is simply an extension of the vocal duels shown by other primates, in which the males size each other up with their calls. If the most creatively vulgar men were viewed as more dominant, sexual selection might have pushed us through further linguistic evolution.
Without strong evidence for the idea, it鈥檚 fair to assume that the bold hypothesis might provoke some linguists to turn the air blue. Still, the notion that swear words contributed to our linguistic success may lend a certain nobility to my sister鈥檚 utterance all those years ago. At least, that鈥檚 what she鈥檚 telling my dad.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淩ude awakenings鈥�
