Hurt feelings and four letter words: Swearing alleviates the pain of social distress

Methods for alleviating physical pain are increasingly found to attenuate social pain. Recent evidence suggests that swearing may attenuate sensitivity to physical pain. This study examined whether swearing similarly attenuates two consequences of social distress: social pain and exclusion‐induced hyperalgesia. Sixty‐two people wrote about an autobiographical experience of exclusion or inclusion. Then they repeated a swear or neutral word for 2 minutes followed by measures of social and physical pain. Excluded non‐swearers reported feeling more social pain and greater sensitivity to physical pain compared with included non‐swearers. Excluded swearers reported less social pain than excluded non‐swearers and no heightened sensitivity to physical pain. The findings suggest that social and physical pain are functionally similar and that swearing attenuates social pain.     

感同身受的社会痛苦：来自神经影像学的证据

社会痛苦是指个体感觉到被渴望的社会关系排斥或者被重要他人和群体贬损时表现出的一种特定的负性情绪反应。对于社会痛苦的神经生理机制的探讨已成为当前研究的重点, 研究者主要从个体经历社会排斥、目睹他人被社会排斥(共情)时的神经活动来解释社会痛苦的神经生理机制。社会痛苦受到依恋、自尊等因素的影响。未来可从探讨社会痛苦在不同年龄阶段的神经机制和探索社会痛苦与人格障碍之间的关系两个方面展开进一步的探究。     

Being excluded by one means being excluded by all: Perceiving exclusion from inclusive others during one-person social exclusion

Although research has shown that social exclusion undermines well-being, past work has focused primarily on complete and unambiguous social exclusion in which all people in a situation exclude one individual. Might the presence of an inclusive other buffer individuals against the deleterious consequences of social exclusion? The present research investigates a novel situation, one-person exclusion, in which one person includes while another excludes. Participants played a virtual ball-tossing game in which they experienced two-person exclusion, one-person exclusion, or inclusion. Inclusive others did not buffer against the consequences of exclusion; experiencing one-person exclusion (vs. inclusion) led to perceived exclusion and lessened belongingness, similar to two-person exclusion. Moreover, instead of perceiving includers as a form of support, paradoxically, participants inaccurately believed that inclusive others had engaged in exclusion. These findings suggest that one-person exclusion is sufficient to elicit negative outcomes and that inclusive bystanders may be perceived as part of the exclusion.     

Happiness: unlocking the mysteries of psychological wealth,by Ed Diener and Robert Biswas-Diener

No research to date has supported the ‘social contagion’ effect of laughter and smiles in a non-Western context, nor among children. Expressions of positive affect were here compared according to social and non-social conditions among 163 children between the ages of 5–12 while playing in a park in Afghanistan. Independent observers coded laugh and smile responses using published criteria and identified 147 laugh responses and 697 smile responses. Children in the social play condition demonstrated significantly more laughs than children in the non-social play condition, and the number of peer observers present in the social play condition significantly increased the number of participant smile responses, but not laugh responses. Findings supported the idea in Western research that laughter and smiles may function in moderating social relationships and communicating affect. The authors recommend future research to investigate the relationship between positive affect and well-being across cultures, with consideration for practical interventions.