It’s official. Swearing helps you cope with pain. Today Slashdot highlights this article from Scientific American that explains how certain words are better at coming from/getting to the deeper and more evolutionary parts of the brain like the amygdale.
A study had college students see how long they could keep their hands in cold water and either repeat a swear word or a neutral phrase. The 67 students who swore in the experiment experienced less pain and lasted an average of 40 seconds longer than those who did not.
Is the same to be said online? If someone is able to mouth off about poor customer service or a malfunctioning website are they likely to put up with the problem for longer? This author’s gut feeling is that the answer is: no. Someone having problems on line and being vocal about it may be given helpful suggestions and some of those may be of alternative solutions.
What do you think?
July 13, 2009
Connections