Are you afraid of social death and should you take the initiative to socialize? Study: "Striking up" conversations with strangers can increase self-confidence and reduce embarrassment
Although humans are “social animals”, there are also many groups that are relatively introverted and highly sensitive. They are afraid of socializing with strangers and are afraid that their emotions and emotions will not be responded to. A recent study published in the “Journal of Experimental Social Psychology” pointed out that talking to strangers is not always scary, and can even enhance self-confidence and a sense of belonging, helping to improve one’s mental health.
Should social anxiety be solved through social interaction? Study: Talking to strangers increases happiness
The University of Sussex in the United Kingdom and the University of Pennsylvania in the United States conducted a joint research and recruited college students from the two universities to participate in the experimental project. The researchers created a “treasure hunt”-like game and randomly divided 286 subjects into groups. They had to solve 29 tasks to obtain the final reward. The game process requires subjects to find players that match the task description, such as those who are drinking coffee, those who wear bright shoes, etc.
The group that actively performed the task required subjects to talk to strangers a lot, while the control group was only told to observe strangers. After the 5-day experiment, the two groups completed questionnaires and scored based on “embarrassment”, “enjoyment” and “positive impression”, with a total score of 5 points. The result is as follows:
Feelings of embarrassment: 3.7 points at the beginning of the study, 3.4 points at the end of the study, and 3.5 points 1 week after the end of the study.
Level of enjoyment: 4.3 points at the beginning of the study, 4.6 points at the end of the study, and 4.5 points 1 week after the end of the study.
Positive impression: 4.2 points at the beginning of the study, 4.4 points at the end of the study, and 4.5 points 1 week after the end of the study.
The results showed that the group performing the task was less awkward than expected when talking to strangers, and the subjects even gained self-confidence as a result. Study author Gillian M. Sandstrom said that two major indicators exceeded the subjects’ expectations. One was the probability of rejection, and the other was their expected conversational ability. The expected value of the former is about 65%, but the actual probability of rejection is less than 10%; the expected value of the latter is only 4 points (out of 7 points), but the actual conversational ability can reach about 5 points. The frequency of task failure due to rejection was also much lower than the subjects imagined.
Are you afraid of being embarrassed when chatting with strangers? Experts reveal “3 things” that can help promote social interaction
Sandstrom noted that people’s predictions about talking to strangers are “extraordinarily pessimistic.” The actual results show that the intervention through interaction with strangers improves people’s fun and positive emotions. In the future, it may also have the potential to be used as a psychotherapy to help patients with depression, anxiety, or social difficulties. She says subjects may derive mental health benefits from even just observing strangers.
Sandstrom emphasized that analysis of the subjects showed that people may have too many negative imaginations and judgments about fear of rejection, poor conversation skills, or embarrassment when socializing. The analysis showed that subjects went from having overly pessimistic expectations until their personality became more positive day by day, showing the importance of repeated experiences in improving people’s attitudes towards talking to strangers. Sandstrom also said that if you want to break through the bottleneck of talking to strangers, the following three situations are actually measures that can alleviate embarrassment:
Repeat the conversation. The intervention in the study, which prompted people to talk to strangers repeatedly over a week, proved highly effective in reducing people’s fear of talking to strangers.
Gamify interaction. Given people’s aversion to talking to strangers, the validity of this study may be attributed to the success of the game design. This may have helped subjects view talking to strangers as a challenge rather than a threat.
Practice talking while you work. The fact that certain subjects held jobs that required them to interact with people may have been a factor in the study, as they had better social skills and coping skills. Therefore, if you are not a related worker, you can actively interact with your supervisor and colleagues during office hours, which can also promote group harmony.
Finally, Sandstrom also reminded that even though conversations may bring people positive feelings, it does not mean that they can rationalize behaviors such as harassment, stalking, or malicious chatting. “Conversing with strangers is not always nice, and this is also the source of people’s fear of social interaction. Therefore, when chatting with strangers, there should not be too much purpose and commercial considerations, so as to promote a good cycle. "
Source:
Talking to strangers: A week-long intervention reduces psychological barriers to social connection
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