The experiment, published in Frontiers In Communication, demonstrated that verbal insults might have an effect regardless of whom they were directed towards, demonstrating “enhanced brain sensitivity” to negative words.
According to new research, a verbal insult is like a “mini smack in the face” and will “get at you.”
As part of a study examining the relationship between emotion and language, scientists examined the short-term effects of repeated insults.
The experiment, published in Frontiers In Communication, demonstrated that verbal insults might have an effect regardless of whom they were directed towards, demonstrating “enhanced brain sensitivity” to negative words.
Dr. Marijn Struiksma, the corresponding author from Utrecht University, stated: “It is not yet well known how words might deliver their hostile, emotionally negative payload at the precise moment they are read or heard.
“Because insults pose a threat to our reputation and self,’ they offer a unique chance to study the interplay between words and emotion.
Understanding what an offensive expression does to people as it progresses and why is crucial not only for psycholinguists who are interested in how language affects people but also for those who desire to comprehend the finer points of social behavior.
A total of 79 female participants were monitored using electroencephalography and skin conductance electrodes as they repeated a series of utterances.
Dr. Struiksma added, “Our study demonstrates that in a psycholinguistic laboratory experiment without actual interaction between speakers, insults deliver lexical mini slaps in the face,’ such that the strongly negative evaluative words involved that a participant reads automatically attract attention during lexical retrieval, regardless of how frequently that retrieval occurs.”
