Edited by María Elena Placencia and Zohreh R. Eslami
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 313] 2020
► pp. 49–72
Compliments and compliment responses are a frequent topic of study in face-to-face interactions (see Chen 2010 for an overview), and are gaining traction in online interactions. This study builds on works on compliment responses online; particularly work by Placencia, Lower, and Powell (2016), by examining compliment responses given by Ecuadorian males on Facebook (FB). The sole focus here is male behavior: how males respond to compliments from other males. Largely ignored in compliment research as a whole, this study demonstrates that Ecuadorian males frequently engage in compliment response behavior on FB, and, appear to be guided by face needs and constraints when responding. Despite the ubiquitous nature of emoticons in online communications, their use in compliment responses by Ecuadorian males on FB was totally absent.