The science of AWKWARDNESS

THE SCIENCE OF AWKWARDNESS

Being distracted by a page's layout can be annoying. In contrast to using 'Content here, content here', Lorem Ipsum has a more-or-less normal distribution of letters, making it look like readable English. This is now used as the default model text in many desktop publishing packages and web page editors, and a search for lorem ipsum will reveal many still in their infancy websites. Not knowing what to do with your hands or how to shake someone's hand can be embarrassing. Forgetting someone's name can be frustrating. Not having anything worthy of conversation can be unenlightening. Not being able to take breaks so you don't get bored or get distracted from your work is disheartening. Being caught staring at someone--a stranger or someone you know--can be uncomfortable. And finally, telling too much about yourself or getting dragged into a conversation you don't want to have can feel mortifying.

Abnormality is a social behaviour that is uncomfortable to many people. It needs to be put in context with other forces that guide social behaviour, like norms, to really understand it. To understand awkwardness, we need to look at it from all angles, including the perspective of the entire family of forces that guide social behaviour. This sheet of cardboard represents all possible social behaviours, and they are not infinite because of the limitations of science and biology. You can't move faster than light or be in two places at once. But you can wear pants made out of molten lead!

There are legal limits to what you are allowed to do- laws of the state. These dictate what is not allowed, lest punishment come your way- such as murder, theft, or speeding. What is left is shaped by social expectations; it's not necessarily illegal to chew with your mouth open or sneeze on a bus, but it is frowned upon. Punished not by the police, but through social ostracism, public opprobrium. It can be awkward - smoother than touching a hot stove or getting a parking fine. But it's doable and often happens unintentionally. Losing friends because of it

c incidence that brains, which are susceptible to feeling occasional awkwardness, would become so common. They're successful at cooperating- at social life. Feeling awkward shows that you understand and are keen on smooth social exchanges. Now, too much or too little concern for social rules isn't healthy, but researchers found that just the right amount is great. When a person shows remorse or embarrassment or uncomfortable discomfort, when appropriate, others perceive them as being more trustworthy and their actions as more forgivable. And it's not just perception. Such individuals also tend to be more objectively prosocial when tested. Kinder, more generous. Even when a person is completely oblivious to a faux pas. Despite their commitment, discomfort still exis

People nearby may experience discomfort. Vicarious embarrassment is a result of empathy, which is the capacity to understand how others feel or will feel when or if they become aware of what they've just done. The more readily sympathetically embarrassed (or 'EEE') a person is, the harder it is for them to endure other people's embarrassing moments, even if they are fake, like in cringe humor. Researchers discovered that being pathetically and readily ashamed is not correlated with being more easily embarrassed.

Instead, it's connected to having greater empathy, which is a crucial quality for social creatures to possess. Perhaps then, our seemingly illogical attraction to watching embarrassing scenes like, say, bad American Idol auditions, is just a light form, curiously morbid. You might believe that awkwardness is entirely different from discomfort or overt teasing.

Your brain, however, would disagree. The secondary somatosensory cortex and the dorsal posterior insula, two brain regions also involved in the perception of physical pain, were found to be activated by social errors, among other brain regions. Similar neurological connections in our brains enable it to process both breaking bones and breaching social norms. The same sympathetic nerve system that prepares you for "fight or flight" in response to physical threats is also triggered by social problems when awkwardness or embarrassment may be at risk. like situations where you are acutely conscious of being observed.Having nothing to say on a first date, speaking in front of a group, or embarrassing yourself in front of observers.

An awkward pause...

You become overheated and perspire as a result of your blood pressure rising, breathing becomes more labored and digestion slows down as a result of the need for oxygen for fighting and running, you experience stomach butterflies and nausea.

You shake as you fight the natural tendency of your body to contract into a protective fetal position.Your fingers, toes, and nose get cold as a result of the blood veins in your extremities constricting to prioritize critical organs. Instead of making uneasiness go away, these symptoms make it worse.

But history is to blame for that, Before human social dynamics became complex enough to involve "is it one kiss or two?" or politics at Thanksgiving dinner, we evolved primitive responses to physical threats and haven't had enough time to evolve newer ones. After we've done something awkward, it can be difficult to shake the self-conscious anxiety. It's simple and challenging to stop dwelling on social gaffes.

Why did I feel so insecure, uncertain, and awkward? The chemical oxytocin may be partially to blame for this, Oxytocin is referred described as "the love hormone" because it influences prosocial emotions including attachment and trust. In fact, oxytocin nasal sprays are being utilized in couples therapy to boost trust and reduce anxiety and depression.

However, there are concerns that it might also be used to subtly boost trust and make someone more open to con artist schemes. However, oxytocin also reduces unfavorable social emotions like fear and anxiety. People are more adept at identifying the faces that show disgust and horror after taking it. It also affects the emotions that cause us to approach or avoid particular social cues.

Additionally, it might contribute to the salience of positive and negative social interactions in our memories, causing them to stand out more, capture our attention more, and cause us to reflect on them more. especially negative ones due to what psychologists refer to as negativity bias, Positive social interactions and emotions have a bigger effect on our mental states than negative ones, all other factors being equal.

In actuality, humans have a larger vocabulary and more words to express negative emotions than positive ones. Thus, it may be difficult to simply forget such memories and thoughts, just leave. What do they think of me, the other person?

I felt so strange. Are they disclosing this to others? We substitute social interactions in over and over in our minds.

There is no doubt that the person we were awkward with remembers us the same way we remember ourselves and is similarly fixated on the awkward thing we did.

they are?

An excellent wet blanket for dousing the flame of insecurity fears viewpoint is. Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "You wouldn't worry so much about what others think of you if you realized how rarely they do."

Despite how much you may think about yourself, nobody else is thinking about you.They are concerned with what you will think of them and about themselves. And perhaps more crucially, how they view themselves.They don't see the world through your eyes.

Another well-known adage claims that in your 20s and 30s, you care about what other people think of you. When you are in your 40s and 50s, you stop caring what other people think of you.

Finally, in your sixties and seventies, you come to the realization that they had never given you any thought in the first place.

the propensity to conduct oneself as though they are the universe's actual protagonist has been referred to as protagonist illness.

It constantly creeps into how we act. For instance, the basic attribution mistake. When considering your own actions, you frequently see yourself as a complex character who is affected by a variety of obstacles and an antagonist, while other people are only seen as one-dimensional background figures who play straightforward, unchanging roles. The person who placed his order in front of you this morning and took far too long,

Well, he's obviously just a grouchy person by nature.That is his sole aim. However, if you take too long ordering, it's usually because the staff wasn't friendly or you were agitated and preoccupied with a previous conversation.

After all, you are the primary character. You are far more aware of the events taking on in your life. It's simple to live that way.There isn't enough time or brain room to contemplate every other individual in their entirety. Yet they exist.

This understanding has a name. a name The Dictionary gave it one of my favorite sources, of Obscure Sorrows, and now, YouTube channels. They condense complex ideas into tiny, insignificant words.packagesSure, giving something a name doesn't mean you understand it or how to feel about it, but words still give things handles so we can control them, hold them down, offer them to others, and feel more powerful than the concepts they describe.

Now, they use the word "sonder" to acknowledge that you are only an extra in other people's stories and not even cast in the majority of them. This is how they define it.Sonder is the awareness that every person you pass by is leading a life that is as rich and complicated as your own, one that is filled with their own goals, friends, habits, concerns, and inherited madness. This epic story is one that goes on invisibly all around you like an anthill that is spreading out.

You might only ever appear once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, deep below, with intricate pathways leading to thousands of other lives that you'll never know existed.

as a window that is lit at dusk, or as a blur of moving traffic on a highway.

Recognizing this makes your awkwardness appear less severe. But it also makes you all appear little.

Tiny. Despite being a needle in a huge haystack, you have a big concept. Your flaws are hidden from a distance, as is your individuality, yet the vista from this high up... It is, in fact, invincible.