Were you ever threatened as a pre-teen that your Mum would wash your mouth out with soap if she ever caught you saying the f-word in front of your younger sibling again? And has what was once naïve childhood cheek grown into a full-blown habit that finds you constantly turning your shits into sugars in front of grandparents and workmates. Well bite your tongue no more, studies have concluded that those who swear are more honest than their holier-than-thou counterparts.
According to the recent study to be published in the Journal of Social Psychological and Personality Science*,* people are more likely to curse when expressing themselves and their emotions, rather than to harm or upset others; and those with a greater penchant for profanity, are more likely to be honest than those who do not curse.
Attempting to debunk the long-standing load-o-bollocks that those who swear are more likely to carry other bad habits, such as lying, researchers examined almost 300 subjects, measuring their general, day-to-day use of profanity, as well as their honesty, with profanity being outlined as all obscene and inappropriate language including – but not limited to - blasphemy, sexual references, vulgarity, offensive slang – basically anything that would make your grandmother wince.
The study found that those who liked swearwords, and used them most often, were least likely to lie, suggesting they do so to express their genuine and sincere feelings rather than aiming to insult or intimidate others.
Co-author David Stillwell, from University of Cambridge, says:
‘They are not filtering their language so they are probably also not putting their stories about what is going on through similar filters which might turn them into untruths. People who use the language that comes to mind first are less likely to be playing games with the truth.'
A second part of the study analysed the status updates of over 73,000 Facebook users, measuring for both profanity and honesty. The study reports that those who swore less on Facebook, were more prone to dishonesty; most prominently self-promoting social deceit, aiming to make themselves look better to their online audience.
This research continues a recent trend of positive publicity for the potty-mouthed amongst us. A 2016 study published in the Language Sciences Publication, found that those who swear more have a higher verbal intelligence, concluding that swear word fluency is positively correlated with overall fluency, completely shitting on the age-old idea that swearing is a sign of a limited vocabulary.
So, there it is. Scientific proof that those who swear more are more honest and more intelligent than those who don’t. And if anybody tries to tell you otherwise, you have my permission to tell them to fuck off.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.