On: 'Negative intensification bias' and unintended meaning

[taxcoder]

Honest question. What offense do I cause by using punctuation? The lack of it bothers me - it seems sloppy.

I tend to stay away from one word replies, and if I need to confirm use 10-4 or wilco. Are either of those offensive?

[mananaysiempre → taxcoder]

I can’t say anything useful about short-form email (I have never been comfortable with it, to be honest), but in IM the termination requirement feels to be already satisfied by the built-in separation between messages—in longer messages, I frequently end up using periods as statement separators rather than terminators. The only reason to use a final period, then, becomes to attach a feeling of additional abruptness or finality to the last sentence, which easily reads as (passive-)aggressive or dismissive. (I’m not saying “offensive” as that’s really more about the perception of the recipient, but these two are about the intent of the originator.)

[strken → taxcoder]

The conventions for formal messaging and informal messaging are different, and punctuation is a contextual marker for formality. Receiving a reply to a physical letter that read, on company letterhead and with a physical signature

    Taxcoder, regarding your proposed changes,
    
    Ok.
    
    Sincerely, Jim Bossman

would be a bit alarming, because it's clear that the letter is a very formal one, but it deliberately omits everything you'd normally put in a letter. If you instead found your proposal mailed back to you with

    OK - Jim Bossman

written on the bottom in red pen, you wouldn't be at all worried, although depending on the context you might be insulted by the informality.

I think if a message without punctuation seems sloppy, the situation is formal enough to write a full sentence or paragraph. The combination of little to no feedback and attention to detail is what worries people.

[MauranKilom → taxcoder]

"Ok" is ever more informal than "Ok." The decision whether or not to add the period is of course not always a matter of trying to sound more assertive, but in a three character message that potential cue will necessarily be "scaled up".

[kayodelycaon → taxcoder]

It depends on the message. A longer form message with punctuation is fine. In short messages, the period is read as an aggressive sudden stop.

[taxcoder → kayodelycaon]

Thanks for the response. As SquareWheel also commented, the lack of punctuation seems disinterested or dismissive to me. I suppose my criticism of lack of punctuation is not different than others criticism of its inclusion.

[SquareWheel → kayodelycaon]

I read it completely differently. I see a sentence without punctuation as disinterested, as if they don't even bother to complete the sentence. Maybe acceptable in an IM, but not an email.