Are Explicit Apologies Proportional to the Offenses They Address?

Abstract

We consider here Goffman's proposal of proportionality between virtual offenses and remedial actions, based on the examination of 102 cases of explicit apologies. To this end, we offer a typology of the primary apology formats within the dataset, together with a broad categorization of the types of virtual offenses to which these apologies are addressed. We find a broad proportionality between apologies and the offenses they remediate when the offenses to be remediated are minor; however, this relationship is not sustained among larger apologies and offenses. In the latter cases, relational and contextual contingencies are important intervening factors influencing apology construction.

Notes

This article was accepted under the editorship of Michael Schober.

¹ The use of the uncontracted copula verb in this context is rare. Contracted copula usages were 50 times as common as the uncontracted format.

² Although it is certainly possible to imagine that a stand-alone “I'm [intensifier] sorry” format is commonly present in conversational data, in fact this format rarely occurs in the present dataset except adjacent to additional apology components that name the offense and/or account for it.