From the song of words you can not erase: unexpected advantages of abusive words

If you grew up with a sister or brother who is 10 years older than you, most likely you have started using profanity ever since you remember. As practice shows, children with ecstasy begin to use abusive words at the age of six. But in adult abuse takes from 0.5 to 0.7% of the time allotted for speech. And this means that those who speak more speak foul language.

This can be a problem of education

Since childhood we have often heard that it's not good to swear. Speech, stuffed with strong words, is the prerogative of uncultured, poorly educated and not trustworthy people. True, my mother sometimes used these words for the sake of education. Do you know that warfare can have some advantages? The researchers found that profanity can ease the pain, and also make a person more convincing in their statements. Let's talk about this in another publication.

For abusive words, another part of the brain is responsible

Richard Stevens is sure that abuse is treated by the brain in a completely different way from the ordinary language. While most conversational skills come from the cerebral cortex, as well as some areas of the left hemisphere, abusive words can be associated with quite another area. According to the scientist, the old cortex of the brain can be "guilty" in their production. For example, in people with pronounced speech disorders, the left hemisphere is damaged. This phenomenon scientists call aphasia. At the same time, in the process of monitoring patients, an interesting detail emerged: these people use brusque words, idiomatic utterances and sing well in speech. And this means that these skills are not related to the left hemisphere of the brain.

Where are these words formed?

In order to discover the source of abuse, researchers had to observe people exposed to Tourette's syndrome. This phenomenon implies the uncontrolled use of non-normative vocabulary in the case when the nervous system fails. In other words, on a nervous basis, people start a lot and swear persistently. It turned out that the battle is born in the basal ganglia, and this is the deepest structure of the human brain.

Advantages of "strong words"

Probably, you noticed that sometimes tens and even hundreds of words can be powerless when you persistently explain to a person. However, one strong word immediately immediately hits the target. Of course, the effect of use can only be if it happens unexpectedly. Nobody will take seriously statements, entirely covered with profanity. A single use of the abusive word helps to strengthen and supplement the semantic load of the utterance.

In addition to the interlocutor who heard the forbidden word, the corresponding emotional background is created by the narrator himself. Well, where did you see a man who used curses, shading it in a gentle and affectionate tone? Most often we reproduce such words, being in anger, rage or pain. Any trouble that can happen to us in a day is usually supplemented with obscene language.

Warnings words

If, when you get into an unpleasant situation, you are not alone with yourself, then swearing can be regarded by the interlocutor as a kind of warning. Thus, you give the person to understand that they do not intend to stand on ceremony with him, and if necessary, they are ready to move to more radical measures for the settlement of the conflict. As we see, such a measure can become effective when we want to be too convincing. The main thing is to follow the golden rule: excessive zeal is fraught.

Depending on the culture

Of course, in each culture taboo words were formed in different ways. So, for example, in those historical communities where people saw one as naked, human genitalia or actions associated with them were rarely used as the basis for swear words. These words are in all cultures, but somewhere there are more, and somewhere less. But in English, the origin of taboo words is associated with religious origins. So, in the Middle Ages the strongest word was "devil". Modern man is always covered with clothes, so he takes with pleasure the taboo words describing body parts as a basis for battle. It is curious that a few centuries ago the famous English word, consisting of four letters, could easily be someone's name.

Everything changed already in the Renaissance, when sexual terms got more power. But in those parts of Europe where the Protestant revolution did not take place (Spain or Italy), insults of religious figures are still considered particularly strong swear words. But in the East, the most powerful swear words are related to social status, the mention of ancestors or depersonalization.

Social Experiment

In 2014, a group of researchers conducted an analysis of the influence of abusive words and curses on people using fake accounts of well-known politicians in social networks. It turned out that the "strong word" in general acts on people positively, but does not have any influence on the electorate during the elections. However, a positive impression of the read swear words can be explained by the phenomenon of modern virtual communication. It's no secret that on the Internet the language is too warped and filled with special terms adopted among young people. In ordinary life, so few people talk. That's the brutal words the average user uses on the network more often than in real life.

How does cursing help relieve pain?

In conclusion, let's talk about another experiment of Richard Stevens and his colleagues. It turns out that non-normative vocabulary to some extent facilitates physical pain. During the experiment, volunteers had to hold their hand in a bucket of ice water. All this time the participants of the experiment loudly pronounced the given words. Those people who used the swearing could keep their hand in the water tanks for much longer than those who pronounced the words with neutral meaning.

Experts believe that, in addition to reducing the pain threshold, people using profanity increase the heart rate. This means that our body surprisingly reacts to the abuse. The body is preparing to fight back the stress, and this is already covered by natural anesthesia. And the most powerful influence on physical pain can be how much this word is forbidden for a person. As you understand, more taboo words have the greatest "anesthetic effect".