6 ms·
Sad, lonely people more likely to be ‘natural’ social psychologists (2018)
- runawaybottle 5y agoThere’s a reason why they are sad. Humans in groups are particularly disappointing.
- devoutsalsa 5y agoNone of us is as dumb as all of us!
- pattusk 5y ago> a new study by Yale psychologists found a surprising group of people are particularly good at accurately assessing truths about humans’ “social nature” I am not a social psychologist (whatever authority that title may grant one), but I wonder about how one goes from a few conclusion that may hold true under certain conditions to "truth about human nature". For instance, "Do people work harder in groups or as individuals? " I could see peer pressure being a motivating factor to work harder as a group. Among highly accomplished and productive peers a new group member might strive to prove themselves by over contributing to the group. I would also expect cultural factors and (im)proper management to play a role.
- Arnt 5y ago"Do people work harder in groups or as individuals?" is not a yes/no question. It's a question they study, but they're not looking for a simple answer.
- Micoloth 5y agoWell yes, any sad, lonely 14 year old would have told you so… (not that they’d conduct a study, so it’s good to have scientific evidence)
- lovecg 5y agoSharing as a person who has on occasion been sad and lonely. Much like the difference between reading and writing, it’s very much possible to be skilled at understanding a social situation while at the same time having no clue how to respond appropriately. For me, “reading the room” is easy. “Writing the room,” so to speak, on the other hand will probably remain a lifelong awkward learning experience, and I don’t think I’ll ever be “fluent” in it. As is probably common, I did wonder if there’s something clinically wrong with me, but most screening tests I can find emphasize lack of understanding of social situations/facial expressions etc. which I’m just fine with.
- ultimoo 5y agoCould it be that you hesitate to "write" because you've accurately "read" the room? E.g. a toddler may find it easier to kick around a ball on a lawn vs. a kid kicking it around on a soccer field with boundaries, goal posts, and rules. To extend the analogy, everyone thinks the toddler is cute and doing a great job, but only the kid's parents think she's playing well.
- Cthulhu_ 5y agoThere's merit in that; being highly conscious of others' behaviour makes one think others are similarly highly conscious, making you self-conscious and awkward. I mean it's projection too; I'm very judgmental about people, thinking they look stupid, so I tend to avoid doing anything weird in case people think I look stupid.
- trangus_1985 5y agoi simply look stupid on purpose. i have a mohawk and now multiple tattoos. it kinda "breaks" that habit
- Aerroon 5y ago>Could it be that you hesitate to "write" because you've accurately "read" the room? And because you don't try (or try less often), you don't have as much experience with it.
- mouzogu 5y agoYou could say that an extrovert is someone who is more inclined or predisposed to seeing the good in others whereas someone who is "sad, lonely" is more predisposed to seeing the bad. Reminds me of the film There Will Be Blood, where Daniel Plainview says something like "I can only see the bad in others" (not exact quote). It makes it hard for him to form long lasting relations with anyone, or a successor he can trust. But as a somewhat neurotic introvert I can often understand that sentiment. It's like I'm preprogrammed to see the bad in people before the good.
- knaik94 5y agoThere is a link to "Yale survey: Are you a natural social psychologist?" at the end of the article. https://yalesurvey.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1XOUyQ4Ux6deFBH https://yalesurvey.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_1XOUyQ4Ux6deFBH I took it and got a 36/40. I have taken one intro to social psych course after taking gen psych. "Fantastic! Your score was better than approximately 99.5% of other people's scores. You have the ability to accurately infer how most people feel, think, and behave in social context without a background or little background in social psychology. In a way, you seem to be very good at capturing human's 'social nature'. This skill, which we call social psychological skill, has been linked to intelligence, a willingness to engage in complex thinking, melancholy, and introversion." I think some of the questions I remember learning about in psych 101, like the bystander effect, but the ones I was surprised that I had intuition for were the questions that asked about how other people deal with strong negative emotions and what works for coping. I think it's interesting that the article frame this skill as something that people in positions of power need but at the same time being introverted to begin with means people are less likely to try to attain those kinds of positions. I wonder if it'll continue to be a weakness of current governance long term because people prefer extroverts in those positions. I also think it's worth mentioning the book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie as a way to become better at some of the things people in the comment section are bringing up as an area that needs improvement for them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influence_People https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influen...
- gauravjain13 5y agoThis is somewhat paradoxical, but I think leadership requires some level of delusion. If one truly sees things as they are, it’s hard to create narratives and mythologies requires to motivate/lead people. Steve Jobs’ “reality distortion field” comes to mind.
- knaik94 5y agoI don't think delusion is the best word for it. Delusion implies that the vision of people in leadership roles are unrealistic in some way. I think resiliently optimistic is probably a better term. I don't think most people are motivated by myth, they're motivated by good support.
- robarr 5y agoWhatever ‘human nature’ is, cultural and social layers make any answers rarely applicable to anything other than a relatively small universe of people, not universal truths. “Do people work harder in groups or as individuals?” For example can be answered in one way or the other depending on social values, cultural traditions, and those even change thru time. Ask your parents, ask younger generations, ask other ethnics groups or even ask yourself the same question in twenty years.
- autosharp 5y agoIs this article trolling? > He stressed that individuals who scored high on tests about human nature do not possess the same knowledge and skills as trained social psychologists. However, he also noted that while “natural” social psychologists will not replace actual psychologists, they could be important players in the real world. They have found a new class of humans?
- dmos62 5y agoWhat is a social psychologist? Or, what is an asocial psychologist? Is it someone who's interested in people's psychology, but not in the people? What a term.
- knaik94 5y agoA social psychologist examines an individual in group dynamics and interpersonal relationships. It is still focused on the individual. Thing like personal prejudice, the sense of belonging, implicit bias, and effects of bullying are what social psychologist study. On hacker news I expect the consequence of moving away from physical relationships to digital relationships, otaku, and parasocial relationships are pretty fascinating topics that fall under the research of social psychology. It's different from sociology because it's focused on the individual. Sociology would instead be focused on the development of groups as a whole. I am assuming by asocial you're referring to otaku as a concept and not someone's trauma response.
- guerrilla 5y ago> Social psychology is the scientific study of how the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, and implied presence of others, 'imagined' and 'implied presences' referring to the internalized social norms that humans are influenced by even when they are alone.[1] > Social psychologists typically explain human behavior as being a result of the relationship between mental state and social situation, studying the conditions under which thoughts, feelings, and behaviors occur and how these variables influence social interactions.
- npunt 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_psychology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_psychology
- Borrible 5y agoIt's sad that I have to ask, and I may become pretty lonely because of it, but has this study been replicated in the meantime? ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replication_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replication_crisis Just asking.
- Isinlor 5y agoThe questions are fairly complex, so I could easily see that people better at reading comprehension, and people who generally read more, will answer better. Additionally, the correct answers maybe compromised, since social psychology is one of the worst offenders in the replication crisis.
- Borrible 5y agoThrough self-replication stabilized replication crisis. Now that sounds fun. I smell infinite regress there. Somebody should feed it.
- knaik94 5y agoThis study isn't about the relationship in both directions. It's only really saying that lonely people might have a implicitly better understanding on the bigger trends that will face society. A total of six studies were examined. https://econtent.hogrefe.com/doi/full/10.1027/1864-9335/a000332 https://econtent.hogrefe.com/doi/full/10.1027/1864-9335/a000...
- Borrible 5y agoThanks for pointing out. And self-reported feelings of sadness and lonelyness could also be interpreted as symptoms of a more or less mild depression. Which makes this study prone to the same problems of the hypothesis of depressive realism. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depressive_realism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depressive_realism
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- ggm 5y agoFantastic! I am apparently a perceptive amateur sociologist despite disbelieving I had selected the 'appropriate' answers. I am now convinced everyone gets this score, and the actual experiment is to test something else like extrinsic motivation to conform to an ideal, or suggestibility or something..
- amelius 5y agoNow I wonder if Covid turned everybody into natural social psychologists.
- midjji 5y agoAstonishing this is considered news, its been a story trope for centuries.
- chadcmulligan 5y agoI thought the same, its a recurrent theme in Agatha Christies stories, amongst others.
- cesarvarela 5y ago34/40 here, I guess reading Dan Ariely stuff finally paid off. /s I'm curious if there exists people getting scores of 20 or less, most answers are pretty obvious.
- knaik94 5y agoThis same author published a more questionable conclusion based on the quiz linked at the bottom of this original article. "Those with autism make good social psychologists" https://news.yale.edu/2019/09/09/those-autism-make-good-social-psychologists https://news.yale.edu/2019/09/09/those-autism-make-good-soci... The original article is pretty interesting but I don't understand how the author was able to make the jump from a short 40 question survey to positing about ASD. The optional questions at the end of the survey were about how you feel about shapes. I am surprised that this passes as meaningful evidence of anything.
- frizdabble 5y agoExplains the arm-chair discussions on Clubhouse :-)