Gossip, a social phenomenon ... why are we gossips?
Gossiping It is not a modern phenomenon, it is not something exclusive to the pink press or certain television programs. The interest and taste for gossip, to know details of the lives of others is as old as the ability to speak of the human species, but why are people we gossip? Why are we interested in knowing details of what happens to others? Is it something learned or is it something natural?
Gossip is a very common social phenomenon
Gossiping is a social phenomenon that floods interactions and social relationships. In all social groups, friends, work, family, neighbors, etc. gossip appears. Commenting on what happens to others becomes a fascinating and fascinating topic of conversation.
If we stop to think, we've all heard someone tell us or maybe we've said it: "Do not you know what I've heard?" before telling the latest news about someone's life. It is true that some people are more prone than others, but all at some time, we have fallen into gossip, it seems that it is something natural among people.
Why are we gossips?
Interest in the affairs of others' lives seems to be widespread and very common. The basis of gossip lies in the same human nature. The human being is a social being by nature and gossip is a basic mechanism of socialization that allows to strengthen ties and covers individual social needs, of the group and of the species.
But also, knowing other people's affairs is a need of the human brain, which is designed to learn, know and eliminate uncertainty.
The gossip as a mechanism of socialization
These are some of the social functions that gossip behavior accomplishes.
1. Gossip appears in primitive societies as a way to strengthen ties and bonds. The gossip is an exchange of information in a confidential context, when we tell a gossip to someone we are transmitting our trust to that person.
2. Gossip has a learning function and of transmitting information that may be important. Through gossip group members can learn the rules of the group, the unwritten rules, also know the roles played by different members and open opportunities. Thanks to gossip you can know if relating to a certain person is positive or if on the contrary it can bring problems, etc.
3. Gossip has been useful for the evolution of language and communication and therefore for the evolution of societies, as studies show.
The gossip sub personal needs
The gossip responds to the curious nature of the human being and his need to eliminate uncertainty.
- The human brain is ready to know, to learn. It is a brain that constantly tries to eliminate uncertainty. Knowing what happens to others, that interest in knowing, is just a way to eliminate the uncertainty that other people produce. Our mind needs to form mental schemes about what surrounds it, and also about other people and for that, gossip is a very useful resource.
- On the other hand knowing information about others gives us relief, it comforts us to know that the same things happen to others as to us.
- The gossip also helps us to define ourselves, we compare ourselves with others and compare our lives and in this comparison we support the reaffirmation of identity (what I am and what I am not).
- And what about the impulse to tell the details of the lives of others? When we tell the gossip beyond listening to it, we also feel good, because it allows us to get away from our problems and consoles us.
Being gossip is good or bad
Gossip is something, that despite being considered negative, we all do and have done more than once. But being a gossip is something negative or is it positive?
Gossip is a social behavior that sustains our relationships and serves to provide coverage to our needs, is something natural in the human species and does not have to be bad. However, there is a limit, a slight line that separates natural gossip from insane gossip. Gossip can become a destructive and insane behavior that stops fulfilling social and personal functions and can take us away from our acquaintances and friends and can lead us away from solving our problems.
When gossip is based on envy and becomes something malicious to create tares, it can be a very dangerous behavior. People who act like this can not accept their own problems, live an empty life and have the need to fill those gaps with gossip. This takes them away from their problems, they focus their attention on those of others, and therefore they move away from the solution.In the long run, their relationships also break down, as the congeners end up moving away.
Celia Rodríguez Ruiz. Clinical health psychologist. Specialist in pedagogy and child and youth psychology. Director of Educa and Learn. Author of the collection Stimulate Reading and Writing Processes.
