ABSTRACT
Speakers use sarcasm and verbal irony to achieve a number of communicative and persuasive functions: to bond, to be funny, and to criticize or compliment indirectly. This kind of indirect language is challenging for children, and they typically don’t begin to convey and appreciate ironic intent until the early school years. The author synthesizes results from previous research which has established how children’s use and appreciation of ironic language and its functions develop over a fairly long developmental window, and are related to aspects of their cognitive development (including theory of mind) and social and linguistic experiences. The humour function of this kind of language is particularly challenging for children to recognize, and several potential explanations are considered. Given the complex cognitive and social inferences involved, most children’s full participation in ironic language and its persuasive potential will occur quite late in middle childhood.
