Asking burdensome questions to complete strangers: Two naturalistic tests of politeness theory

When do we decide to be polite? Politeness theory states that social distance, degree of imposition, and perceived power dynamics shape the politeness of discourse, but few studies have used naturally occurring data to test this influential linguistic theory. This paper explores the theory’s applicability to text-based interactions on online platforms, focusing on data from Stack Overflow and Amazon. Analyzing over 60,000 Stack Overflow and over 2 million Amazon questions and answers, the study investigated whether the power dynamics inherent to question-askers dependence on their addressees caused questioners to be more polite than answerers. We observed some evidence consistent with politeness theory, but also identified situations in which answers were, in fact, more polite than questions. The study underscores the importance of testing psychological and linguistic theories in more naturally occurring settings, and provides a nuanced understanding of the dynamics of politeness across contexts.