Social Dynamics

[jbsegal]

A few days ago a friend posted the following thoughts on social dynamics. Thoughts?

# In social groups, people ‘talk behind your back’ because news needs to travel and people can’t be expected to wait until your front is present.

# In social groups, people ‘talk behind your back’ because the group needs to figure out what it thinks about people, events, and situations. Groups don’t have the luxury of doing their thinking internally, inside one mind. If you provide stimuli to the group, it needs to determine how to react to that stimuli.

I've been having a hard time putting my reactions in to words, other than that I'm attracted by these ideas, but that I know they're not the only reasons.

Comments

reasons, and not entirely positive ones, either.

[bethr.livejournal.com]

how about this?

# When people in a group talk about the member of another group behind his/her back, it's often because that person has trangressed, perhaps has transgressed, or is the possible victim of transgression. Talking amongst yourselves facilitates:

* A "reality check" about the situation---making sure everyone has all the correct or any information.
* A way of bonding with the group, in pity, anger, envy of the talked-about member
* Allows the individuals doing the talking to measure themselves against the subject both to themselves and to their peers, wrt how they would handle the situation.
* Allows the member of the group who breaks the news to have some temporary increase in social standing.
* Provides groupthink brainstorming about how to handle the person/s and the situation in a concrete way.

also, to avoid awkwardness

[cthulhia]

like last week, when I finally saw someone in person and could congratulate them on the pregnancy they announced online a month ago, only to find out they'd since had a miscarriage. I wish someone else had let me know before causing that moment of silence.

A lot of people don't think of it as talking behind one's back, but giving friends necessary updates.

Re: also, to avoid awkwardness

[blk]

I think the fine line depends partly on on "how private is the information, or would said friend be upset if s/he knew this information was being passed around behind his/her back?"

If my son had to go to the hospital, and that info got passed around without people checking in with me, I don't see any problem.
If I got in a fight with a friend, and the same thing happened, I'd probably be pretty peeved.

Re: also, to avoid awkwardness

[cthulhia]

Sure, to a point. But when you're too concerned with spin control, you do more harm than good.

Make a scene about your "privacy", and anyone who hasn't heard anything will start asking around, or merely listening more carefully, to find out what they missed, and make sure it wasn't something they need to know to avoid further awkwardness.

[marcusmarcusrc.livejournal.com]

I categorize "talking behind people's backs" in 4 ways:

Type 1: "nice" gossip (eg, so and so is so nice! Did you hear about how s/he drove X to the airport?)
Type 2: "public news" (eg, marriages, divorces, births, deaths, jobs, whatever)
Type 3: "negative" gossip (eg, can you believe that X cheated on Y? or Why does Z never wear deodorant?)
Type 4: "private" gossip (X confided in me that )

Type 1 or Type 2 stuff I think is great. Talking about common acquaintances is a common part of social interactions.

I normally try and avoid Type 3 conversations. They make me feel uncomfortable. I think in many cases, they aren't serving any good purpose, but rather just make everyone involved petty and mean and just generate bad blood. Having said that, I can see that sometimes Type 3 gossip would be useful. Eg, if X has cheated on Y, and Z, and Q, it would be good for the community to know that so that anyone else who thinks about getting into a relationship with X will have full information. Also, never passing on bad information can potentially lead to a distorted view of reality. However, I think that "negative" gossip often starts out rather distorted because there are usually strong emotions involved and people aren't good at being impartial.

Type 4 gossip is almost never justified. (a possible exception is where you need to act on confidential information and need advice on what the right thing to do is, but great care must be taken in this case)

[entrochan.livejournal.com]

I would be tempted to add a Type 5: "processing" gossip. I heard X cheated on Y. Do you know what's going on with this? Is it true? What were the factors involved? etc.

Which seems very similar to the second point in the main post.

[quietann.livejournal.com]

I think your Type 5 is really, really important. I've been know to gossip (heh), and on the inside, it feels like this. Thanks for adding it.

[water-childe.livejournal.com]

I agree about type 5.

[roadnotes.livejournal.com]

Yes! That's information gathering and processing, which I think is somewhat different, and more useful.

[dpolicar]

My $0.02 about type-3 gossip: spreading it responsibly includes making some effort to ensure that (a) it's true, and (b) the person (or people) it is about knows the gossip is spreading.

[roadnotes.livejournal.com]

I agree with you on all counts, and with the people who added the processing Type 5.

One thing I learned to do in one of the subcultures I grew up in was to be very wary of people who only ever relay Type 3 gossip. It says a lot about someone if the only community information they choose to relay is the negative stuff.

[babasyzygy.livejournal.com]

I think there's another factor, too - the one talking feels a need to talk about the situation before responding to and directly affecting the situation itself. It's often a more effective discussion if the listeners are familiar with the situation or the people involved.

Are of course, there's the problem with an interconnected social group: often the only people you can really talk to about something are themselves tangentially connected with it.

I avoid venting about some things with anybody who knows the individuals involved, just to avoid the "cascading psychodrama" effect - and damn but sometimes it sucks not be able to get all the basic mammalian soothing that comes with talking about things with an only partially involved person.

[randomenvy.livejournal.com]

:-P You could at least post a link next time =] The two points are from Traffic Jam (http://www.varacalli.com/random-traffic/2006-03-05-traffic-jam.htm).

I'll concede that "news needs to travel" needs refining. Some news needs to travel. Other news does not. I think MarcusMarcusRC did a good job in differentiating the different types of 'news'.

As noted, gossip isn't always negative. Even if it cast in a negative way, the group-discuss can help people see it in a more positive light. "Oh my god! I can't believe foo did bar! That's so bad of foo!"... "Foo did bar because of baz."... "Oh... now I understand, that's not bad at all."

I also like BethR's take on things, though I'd have chosen a broader word or concept than 'transgression'.

Have you figured out how to put your reactions in words?

[kimberlogic.livejournal.com]

I rarely find that folks acting along the lines of your second premise both to get all the facts or info. It's often one-side, highly judgmental and tends to morph quite a bit by the time it's been discussed or passed along a few times.

If folks could share info responsibly (i.e., be sure that it's ok to talk about what they know with a larger group, try to be balanced about it or say up front "this is my opinion" or "i only know this much ..." but that rarely happens.

[teddywolf.livejournal.com]

There is another form of talking behind someone's back that may not have been brought up: some people in some groups will 'talk behind your back' to spread deliberately skewed, slanted or outright false information. I know that two people will have two or more views on any given set of events; I am instead referring to deliberate shading of the truth.

I suppose we could call it 'swiftboating'...

[randomenvy.livejournal.com]

Wow. That's so... despicable... that I never even considered it originally.

[teddywolf.livejournal.com]

It is despicable, and it happened to me in the past in a different web of social groups. I don' play in dose groups no more, nosiree!

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

"type 6" ... either talking falsely or passing along false information (knowingly or without checking sources), often designed to cause disfavor of the subject, often to raise the importance of the speaker, and especially if it will result in some other tangible gain (forcing a break up, getting laid, getting a raise/promotion over someone else...)

despicable, common, and hard to fight, because a lot of people aren't willing to verify the truth and just assume the worst, and often the victim has no idea, which is often the point.

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