Theorizing Communicative Styles on Social Media: An Etymological Shift

Distinct polarities of gender stereotypes ascertain that communicative styles demonstrated by men and women are fundamentally disparate. Numerous researches have established varying communicative styles and methods involved in interpersonal communication, predominantly in the analysis of conversational styles as well as etymological strategies. Nevertheless, the widespread of social media has contributed to a pivotal, fascinating shift in the utilization of lexes, encompassing less conventional gender-based articulacy and distinctness amongst youths within virtual setting. Drawing on the data from both disseminated survey and purposive observations on sampled Twitter accounts, this study probed on the correlation between gender stereotypes, communicative styles and linguistic features, manifesting the aggressive, assertive, passive-aggressive and passive traits which are associated with gender-based, stereotypical communicative styles. The findings yielded dominating percentages of males against females in which males possess and exhibit all four traits of communicative styles whereas the observations revealed that both genders demonstrate passive-aggressive and assertive traits.