The three “waves” of compliment and compliment response research

Since the seminal studies carried out by Wolfson and Manes (1980) and Wolfson (1981, 1984), compliments have long attracted scholarly attention. Similarly, Pomerantz's (1978) pioneering study on compliment responses set the ground for interest in this related speech act. It could be argued that there are four different reasons for this fascination. First, compliments (and their corresponding responses) are extremely important in the construction of social rapport. Secondly, research has proven that they are far from simple despite their “formulaic” character. Third, contrastive research has found that there are remarkable cross-cultural differences, which often lead to misunderstandings or pragmatic clashes in intercultural exchanges. Finally, the increasing presence of digital communication has led to new ways to compliment and respond to compliments, based on the media affordances and constraints. This raises the question: what remains to be done in the study of compliments and compliment responses? The aim of this paper is, on the one hand, to present a comprehensive state of the art, which I argue can be divided into three main overlapping ‘waves’. This will be accompanied by a discussion of the main results and methodologies found in each wave. On the other hand, it intends to provide readers with some pointers to future research. • The article provides a state-of-the-art review of compliment research, dividing it into three main overlapping waves. • The three waves are identified as monolingual studies; cross-cultural, variational pragmatics and L2 pragmatics; and digital communication. • The paper provides pointers for future research in the field of compliments. • Sociological variables like age or educational background are presented as underdeveloped areas in compliment research.