研究：講髒話無關階級 還能緩解疼痛

美國斯坦福大學一位文學博士在新出版的書中指出，講髒話其實並不是教育水平低下階層的專利，上層階級的大佬們也很喜歡講髒話，講髒話最少的是中產階級人士。她還指出，大部分兒童在完全會講話之前就已經會罵人了。此外，她還發現，講髒話在生活中也是有一些實際用途的。比如，你不小心撞到腳趾的時候，罵一句髒話可以幫助你緩解疼痛，這在之前的研究中已有證明；同時，講髒話還能幫助建立友誼，比如，幾個工人在一起聊到他們的經理時，說說髒話可以增進感情，讓彼此有歸屬感。這位博士的分析數據顯示，一位普通的英語國家人士每天說的話裏有0.7%帶有髒字，也就是說，他們每說140個字，就有一個是髒字，這與第一人稱代詞的使用頻率相當。

Using swearwords is often thought of as the preserve of the thoughtless and uneducated - but new research suggests that this may be nothing more than a myth.

A language expert has published a new book about the history of swearing, and discovered that the practice is a lot more common - and a lot less useless - than most people imagine.

Among Melissa Mohr's revelations are the fact that most children learn how to swear before they even know the alphabet, and that some swear words date back to the time of the Romans.

The author told Time that her book, Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing, sets out to correct some of the misconceptions held by many people about swearing.

While you might think that less educated working-class people are more likely to swear than others, in fact the upper classes are just as keen on blue language.

In contrast, the group least likely to use bad language is the middle class, according to Dr Mohr.

'This goes back to the Victorian era idea that you get control over your language and your deportment, which indicates that you are a proper, good person and this is a sign of your morality and awareness of social rules,' she said.

Additionally, many claim that swearing is a sign of mental laziness, but the evidence shows that it does in fact have some practical uses.

If you are subjected to acute pain such as stubbing your toe, swearing can be cathartic, providing relief from the agony - studies have shown that swearing sometimes has a genuine physiological effect on the body.

Swearing also helps to form social solidarity - for example, when workers use swear words while talking about their managers, it builds an 'in-group' which aids social and professional interaction.

Dr Mohr told Time that an analysis of the words used by an average English-speaking person over the course of a day reveals that around 0.7% of our language consists of swear words.

That means that one in 140 words we use is obscene - roughly the same proportion as the first-person plural pronouns such as 'we', 'us' and 'our'.

The surprising preponderance of swearing in everyday language explains why the majority of children know at least one swear word by the age of two.

Many toddlers not yet old enough to learn the ABC are so exposed to swearing that they use bad language themselves.

Dr Mohr, who holds a PhD in Renaissance literature from Stanford, has also revealed that swearing is nothing new.

But there are different trends in swearing down the centuries - for instance, in the Middle Ages scatological words were considered much less offensive, but religious oaths such as 'by God's bones' were believed to be so potent that they did physical harm to Jesus Christ.