Mark Leary, PhD, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University who specializes in social and personal psychology, explains it to Health this way: Gossiping is a fundamental human instinct because our lives are deeply rooted in groups. We not only live in groups, but we also depend on the people in our groups to survive. Think about your groups. You depend on your family for love and compassion, and in many cases food and housing. You depend on your friends for social interaction and companionship.
You depend on your employer for money and maybe health insurance. So if your mother tells you your father lost his job, you know you might need to find a different way to manage grocery bills and rent. If your coworker tells you that your boss is going to lay people off, you prepare to search for another source of income and insurance.
What gossip mostly is, though, is cultural learning, something that helps shape what behavior we find acceptable or unacceptable. Perhaps that's why one study found that our brains tend to focus on those who do troublesome things. For the experiment, participants looked at the face of someone they didn't know and then learned a piece of gossip about them. What researchers found is that participants focused longer on the faces of people who did bad things, but not those who simply had bad things happen to them.
In this sense, gossip turns into a tool that helps us filter whom to befriend and avoid—without doing any of that legwork to discover what you actually think. And, um, you should try and still do that legwork if possible. The implications here aren't necessarily bad—but they can be. This can help prevent problems. I figured they were gossip about me behind my back. So I used to wonder why I was always being labeled as black sheep of the family, and now I know how it all got started.
I once told my older son who is now 32, not to say rude things about his younger sister who But you know what else? Because you have a double PhD. Its very fortunate of finding this website on the Internet.
Now I know that people who do gossip- should be minding their own affairs, and should be keeping their personal opinions to themselves. Most people have personal issues, and they need to learn how to deal with. But only if they want to. So I prefer to be left alone whenever I can, these days. Thank you for posting this comment and your self-reflection. You certainly have been through a lot in your 50 years here.
And it appears that you have worked quite a bit on becoming a better person and becoming more understanding of the imperfections of human beings that cause so much pain. Good for you for avoiding gossip and focusing on becoming a writer, artist, and singer.
English is my 3language so please escuse my French lol. It went on for years. Never told my parents because I was going to be blamed. My younger sister was molested and my parents never stopped abusing her emotionally and reminding her what happened. Also calling her names:stupid, naive, retarded. My dad been struggling with undiagnosed depression. Unfortunately we are all around him.
We wants his approval and he never gives it. Was always the good one, the smart one and pretty too. Even though deep down I blamed myself for what happened. Got married when I was in university. Was 21years old. After my first child, my husband lost his job, from nowhere I lost it. Was worried about everything. Had affairs not because I wanted it but because I needed the attention. Went through so much.
My child hood abuses came back. Remembered all the abuses we went through both physical and emotional from our parents. Was a mess for 6years. Oh by the way I started drinking for the first time too. My husband did not know what to do with me.
He got disconnected. Our marriage became a hell. Throughout my life I found myself gossiping about other people. I hate pretty women coz I feel filthy and ugly now. So anytime I hang out with other people I start gossiping to get their attention and to be liked or show off. At the end I go home sad because I revealed my true colour.
I really wanna get self respect, I wanna forgive myself, I wanna deal with my guiltiness. My husband hates when I start gossiping and I noticed that he tend to give attention or respect those I trush. I guess he sees them as special women since they thretened me. I guess I make him pay attention to beatiful and strong woman. And I enjoy when others gossip about them. And I feed the gossip. I have excuses about everything. I feel like everybody gossip about me therefor I should gossip back.
My dad always said that everybody is gossiping about our bad behaviour. He always talked about others succes except his own family. I have lots of issues no wonder why I feel judged by everyone including my husband, my siblings and few friends I have.
Wow that first paragraph was loaded with painful experiences. I am so sorry. So all your excuses are real excuses. But nevertheless, you can improve your life.
Obviously the first thing is to be aware of that which you want to change in yourself and in your life. I wanna learn how to self control myself because anywhere I am I wanna win the conversation. You have it exactly right. You need to accept yourself to have self-respect. That means you need to forgive yourself. And you need to learn self-control.
You are still young and the brain can change through habit, which means it will become easier and easier for you to resist gossiping, and to change the negative dialogue in your mind. Let me focus on something more positive. Rehearse how you would like to respond in situations that may come up. Also, try to surround yourself with more positive people. Avoid people who gossip and who enjoy bringing others down. Now I try my best to use people situations in understanding them and even myself rather than just belittling or killing time.
The problem is not everyone is that way. So many years being a person who considered himself better than others I developed quite the friend list. One specific friend, I have done my best to show there are better things than gossip and that gossip really makes us weak. Good for you, and unfortunately not everyone is on the same path. Unfortunately you have deal with associates as best you can. I rarely gossips about other people but there have been venting going on. Which is usually always the case with work gossip.
I kinda do factual comments if I can. I find myself not liking a coworker so much. And she take joke soo seriously. She can joke with other but get annoyed and offended when you do…. One of the girls she complains about is now the girl she comains to about another co-worker. I feel these are result of miscommunication, misconstrued understanding and some were beyond the persons control.
This is getting me up. I ignore it and focus on my job. I was joking around and she got all mad and annoyed with me. I do my job and then some. Others people seen, recognized it and always compliment me on it. How do I best interact and deal with this type of person? For sure i need to stop joking around with her. She gets grrr…about it. I need to avoid and not join on the complaining about others. I feel she feels she always has to be involved. Any suggestions?
How annoying to have that negative energy in the workplace! You might still be respectful and polite to her. Could you go to your manager in private to let him or her know that the work place environment is being affected by the negative gossip? Make sure you tell your manager that you work hard and get along with everyone, but that you notice that the whole environment is negatively impacted by negative gossip that seems to be spurred on by one particular person. It is quite annoying to hear these things once you decide you no longer want to live that type of life.
Work will be hostile do to a loss of professionalism that probably only existed centuries ago. Interupt conversations with positive messages or ignore the negative. Be careful not to allow this to make you feel superior though. Hi i need some help. Theres this girl at school who is pretending to be my friend i think, i recently had a falling out with one of my best friends, so she keeps hanging out with her and gossiping about me.
One time i heard her say, so are you still best friends with her me? Then she said i dunno. Then the mean girl replied how do you not know, i already told you so much stuff about her. What should i do? I really just wanna be friends with my best friend again, how do i get rid of that mean girl…?
PS I also just noticed that you are in school together. So you might be more likely to have lunch together and hang out between classes than to call each other. The person you are gossiping to could spread it and get you in trouble. Hi, I would focus on doing things with your friend—one day at a time—in other words, call her and plan stuff that you typically have a good time doing together. In essence, nourish your relationship with your friend by doing some stuff that is fun together.
If she continues to be negative, act above it, and your friend will probably see that you have more self-respect and self-confidence than someone who likes gossip maliciously. Greetings Alison, I was so compelled by some of the messages posted and I must say indeed a lot of us has been through so much.
It is sad to see that our childhood was not as pure and innocent as it should have been. My heart breaks for many of us, though I am glad to see that there are a lot of hopefuls looking to make a change. I am usually a very straight forward person, however specifically twice I too have been trapped by the gossip vine. Lately I have been in a down mood due to a few life changes and disappointments, I feel I have been burnt a few times now and 2 or 3 times is way too many, I too was sexually abused as a child, at times the bad memories had come back, but I never let it hold me back instead I encouraged myself to never take the blame, forgive the abusers act and move forward by educating my son and especially my 5yr old Daughter about the signs to be aware.
So the first part of my being burnt started in high school, I had a best friend NEW GIRL whom at first I did not gravitate too when she started at my school, due to her being new and always wanting to be the forefront of everything, I guess me being more reserved and more cautious about trying new things keep me front liking her too soon…I take risk however I analyze it first then gravitate slowly if I see it fit.
Eventually NEW GIRL I became friends after something we connected on, then it lead to close friends to best friends, as a teen she lived with her moms friend as her mother lived in another country, after 2years our friendship started become a bit rocky due to her gossiping about other students which I opposed and eventually she retaliated with negative comments directed at me.
I finally met her mom after a year of friendship and immediately connected with her, she was an amazing lady, because New Girl lived away from her mom, I felt sorry for her so I tried to ignore her bad behaviors.
After 3 years of friendship it went down, due to romours of her being promiscuous, for a while I was admittedly defending Her that she was a virgin as that is what she told me, really why would my bestie lie about this, eventually I had confirmation it was mostly if not all true, the guy I was with told me his unfaithfulness and that he had done it with her, I felt betrayed, a bit stupid and naive, then more signs came, she would try to get with my older brother, keep in mind he did not go to my school or lived in the neighborhood so that was very convenient, we had stopped talking for a while until I confronted her, she denied it with the guy I was with, but after looking back on her always saying he is a dog and he is no good made me think.
Eventually we were friends again but not as close, she tried leapfrogging a few of my friends and cousin in which she met them through me, she would make plans with them without me because she thought they were pretty she was a very superficial girl At one point she introduced me to a guy she said was her friend and she wanted us to go on a double date, I will admit the guy was attractive not that smart but attractive, his friend not so much…after meeting up it turned out the guy was her boyfriend, I was to date his friend and you know the friend was a great guy, I felt horrible that I was trying with her and she did such a thing.
Forward 10 years later… I became acquaintances with my cousins girlfriend 8 years younger than I after doing him a favor, then we became friends. After moving into the apt, she was not happy with her unit as she felt it was too small, one day her, her mom, sister and cousin visited me unexpectedly, she started crying that her apt is small and that it is not the same size as mine and that she thought it was the same as mine, her family had seemed embarrassed of her behavior and apologized because it might have been her hormones after all she just had a baby.
Over time the young lady tried talking to me about my 2 lady friends but my loyalty was nope I will condone this and if you have an issue then you need to speak to the lady the issue is with on your own, if it is not important I would leave it alone.
I know there were many signs to end the friendship, but like my friend from high school my self pity jumped in. A lot more things started happening in a short the time my friendship with her, young mom would always be at my house, always talking to me about my husband how cute he is, why his brothers does not look like him eventually my husband started feeling uncomfortable as he felt she was always at my house when he comes home from work, so he would go in our bedroom until she leaves.
It turned from fascination with my husband to gossiping, any chance she got to talk about her friends, sister or family she would. One major issue was with her sister, her sister was always upset when she is out with her friends as her sister had issues with keeping friends of her own. The sister felt left out and she did not hide it, because she displayed it in front of me, at one point I told young mom listen, I see exactly what you are talking about and because she is your family spend time with her, I know I am your friend but I believe family comes first and I do not want to be apart of that problem.
For a while I pulled away and eventually we gravitated back, the issues with the sister continued, her sister would take any opportunity to upset young mom if her day was not going well. I told young mom you should never let anyone take your sunshine when they have a dark cloud, what your sister is dealing with she is going to have to figure it out on her own.
Also she had just moved in 2 months prior. So the sister got in, which turned out to be hell she had similar issues as young mom.
I kept my self out of it. Over time again young mom wanted myself, my friends and her sister to hang but that did not happened, we just did not mesh well. I had a talk with young mom and she said at one point She felt I was not around and I reminded her about the family comes first discussion, she then started gossiping about her sister the sister is always copying what she does and that the sister is envious of her I should have then but I did not tell her she did the same towards her sister and other folks.
I started having a lot of issues with her behavior and did not tell her, so I admit I started talking to Apple about my concerns until it turned into gossiping. I had issues with her cleanliness, she had kept the dirty pillows I thought she tossed, while bad mouthing others about their homes being dirty in which her home was no better, I just think if your place is dirty you should not judge someone else for the same thing, she constantly called other women ugly and always sticking her nose where it did not belong and realized I was now gossiping about these things to Apple buy keeping up a fake friendship with the young mom.
It made me feel awful, so instead of confronting young mom I blamed myself for being too harsh, I tried to convince myself to ignore it, but the issues still grew.
The next day Apple told she was disgusted by her behavior and now she does not feel so bad for not bringing her a gift. A month later this lead into a further conflict with her and Apple, in which Apple said she was done with the friendship. During the summer the young mom and I hung out a few times, eventually I noticed her and Apple started being friends again, then Apple began to become a bit cold towards me, I ignored it.
The young mom hand some skin issues and was not taking care of it properly, one day on a road trip she took a business card and started scratching the dead skin off her hands in my car, I look at her in disgust and that was it for me, all the nasty traits and behavior came back immediately… So I decided nope this is not good for me and removed my self.
I really felt this young lady was zealous of anyone she thought might be a threat and mostly with me, starting with the day she cried for my apartment, I started feeling the single-white-female effect, she changed her to look like mine, changed her husbands look to resemble my husband, she had an accident and bought the same car as my husband, copied the same party themes as my self, friends and my cousin and it goes on.
I thought so I guess myself and all your friends hang…. Which we never did and that while chatting about me to your sister her friends came up as well, nope not so. Alison maybe you can make some sense out of this please? I also kept in my mind that I wanted to confirm Apple set her up to have this meeting, so I planted the Easter egg about Apple begging for the order.
While Apple was telling me all the things the young mom said, I kept my mouth shut not letting her about know about the times the young mom would discuss her to me, because I wanted the gossiping to stop.
During all this I only had my closest friend to talk to and she was aware of everything, she always told me to end it with the young mom in the beginning but I did not, after telling her what Apple did she said I understand your disgusted with the young mom, but Apple was always the problem, from the beginning as your friend she should have not allow the young mom to talk about you, but she did and there must be something your not aware of why she allowed this.
A guy friend of mine knew we were all friends and knew I introduced young mom to the ladies, we saw each one day and he asked about the girls, that is when the flood gates opened I knew it was wrong to gossip that way, but I think because this happened before and my friends basically cut me off and to find out the truth later I felt enough is enough your not going to get away with this, I allowed it before but no way not this time.
After my guy friend I spoke he said that there are two thing I did not like about this and that young mom was wrong, she met your friend through you she had not right and your friend Apple should have not condoned the gossip. I also told her many times young mom brought her name up to me and I shut it down, I choose not to say what it was because it time for a new chapter.
Apple had a party coming up and something happened between her and the young mom she was done with 3x before, but she said that is not the reason she wanted myself and hubby to come, rather she missed us and she was wrong in how she spoke to me, ok then she went on about young mom lying about something after she confronted her why they may not be friends again, I said well you confronted her 3x before about lying and you still choose to be friends with her.
Sorry for the long novel, I tried to summorize it but, I thought a lot of point would be missed. Thank you again Alison, I will try to follow up soon. I will respond briefly to a couple of points. If you can synthesize your question into a brief set of facts and a question, then I can respond more easily. Just politely maintain your boundaries.
Asking gossips to stop talking about you is usually not effective. You need to cool down your friendship and have better boundaries. Next time you tell someone that you will come to a party, do the courteous thing if you decide not to go, and give them a quick call. As to your last question, if you move on with your life and do more life-enhancing activities and eventually meet more positive people who read, work, volunteer and learn things, rather than gossi maliciously, you will no longer feel upset about young mom.
But you must move on in your life. Reading about this and having self-reflection is a good start. I have three cousins, 1 one of them tells me that two other are talking about me behind my back.
Who is worse the two talking behind my back, or the one that is telling them what they are saying. Who is worse? I think the ones talking behind your back are worse.
Of course, everything depends a bit on how mean-spirited each is being. I imagine your one cousin is trying to protect you from trusting the others too much. Ideally, that cousin who told you about the others would have also told the others to please stop gossiping. Try not to let it bother you, but remember that these cousins are capable of gossip.
I feel disappointed that I found out my husband is gossiping about me all the time with his two best friend female and male. I accidentally read their messages from Whatsapp and after my husband complaining about me with his friends, they commented about me as immature and they started to dislike me.
This is really killing me and I felt scary the person sleeping beside me every night tells my matters to his best friends. This is an unhealthy relationship I can say, the reason he sharing out his thoughts to his friends might trying to release his stress but I feel a bit too much sharing single matters of mine everyday. It will be extremely difficult for a marriage to work if one partner is negatively gossiping about the other with his friends.
You both need to love and protect one another, not to undermine each other. He needs to learn to talk to you directly when he has problems, not to others, unless it is with a counselor or perhaps a best friend, but his conversation even then needs to be focused on promoting the marriage, not undermining it and criticizing you.
Everytime when problems arise, I talk properly to him and he listened and trying to solve the problem but he will complain to his friends too. This make me and my family sick of it. The only thing just end this marriage to solve everything. My mom said husband that gossiping to friends about me have to leave. Shall I move on? Just pity my newborn baby. This is a big decision for me to weigh in on without really knowing both of you and the circumstances—how he treats you, etc.
If you do move on, for the sake of the baby and yourself, do so in the most respectful, dignified way. He simply may not be cut out or ready for a serious long-term relationship, which requires supporting your partner and cherishing the relationship. If you decide to do so, find a way to talk to him about moving on without belittling him. It is wonderful for a child to have a father or grandfather in his or her life.
However, it is also important that if there are two parents that they treat each other well and with respect. The most important thing for a baby is that there is one parent or caretaker who is loving, has self-respect, and is well-grounded.
The worst thing is for a baby to be in a household where there is misery and unhappiness. Its normal to share thoughts to friends when stress? This is a big decision.
If so, then your answer is pretty clear. If he is kind and willing to change, and you are looking at yourself objectively too, then you might want to give it some time. But the most pity is baby will pass to him.. I want to suggest that you make a life-changing decision and have a discussion when you are not angry.
It will go better if you cool off first. All the best to you. Good day I struggle with the same problem. My friends are all from one friendship group and i find that they talk about eachother, e.
Jane will gossip and complain about Peter to me and then the next day Jane acts all best buddies with Peter… i dont understand why? And i try to keep myself out of all of this negative chats by not saying anything or to avoid the chat but now im being left out of all friendship activities and they make me feel like im nothing i do also know that they gossip about me; this one friend will be on her selphone while im talking, she will ignore me or starts talking about something els or with someone else i also notice she like attention and always have to talk about herself if you have an opinion about something she makes you feel stupid.
Please help me what should i do just ignore the fact that they are like that because im sharing a room with them or should i get out of this friendship? Kind regards Elze. Take this as a way to build your self up for the better no great goes on this energy pattern without set back or little things like these -as an overview -you can see that you evolutionary pattern is different and your friends are jealous be your best SELF good luck!!!
Good day. I would look for more interesting friends who gossip a lot less, but who are more considerate. But start focusing on other activities and people that will be more rewarding in the long-term, even if you have to spend more time alone for now. There are plenty of people out there who focus on more interesting subjects and are more positive or interesting to spend time with.
I mean educated as far as have nothing to generate about conversation. My mom told that my uncle feel so mad to my dad because my uncle hears that my dad won the lotto so my uncle have a talked to my dad. My mom told me that someone is talking to my uncle about the wrong news my mom has suspicious to my family members also who have business of gossips,lying in there outdoor home.
What should I do to help my family? This is a weird situation. I would stay out of it. If anyone tries to drag you in, just state what you see as the truth in a calm way, and say that you prefer to spend your time focusing on something more positive. If you feel that you must step in to help, talk to each person without saying ANYTHING negative about the others, and say what you think is true, and that you hope everyone can focus on enhancing their own lives and stop negative gossip, and that that is what you are going to do.
Then lead by being a good example. I am the victim of those people who gosipp about me even people I dont know Sometimes, I want to kill them, but I cant. I hate them. I cry because of them. I dont have many friends bcos I hate them. Oh I am so sorry. What can you do to prevent this from hurting you so much? You have to find a way to focus on improving your life and focusing your thoughts on other things.
You are giving them too much power to hurt you. An employer, a counselor, a church, an organization, or a nurse or doctor. Find someone you trust to talk to to help you build your self-confidence and change your focus onto more self-empowering endeavors, people and thoughts. I wish you the best, and feel free to email back. Also, this may sound silly, but make sure you are getting enough sleep, exercise, eating healthy foods, and getting out in nature.
Of course, this may not be enough, but it can help you from falling into a deeper depression. Please get some help. I actually think you made her feel worse, my advice gossip about them to someone else, it will make you feel better. My ex who was so secretive I could not even talk about what we had for dinner. He was like do not tell our business.
Needless to say I am divorced, and the more paranoid people are about being gossiped about the more people will ultimately talk about them. I always like the saying if you have an issue be sure to go to the source and not make it an issue of gossip. Great advice. Yes some people can be nasty like this try to avoid such people and do what is right sadly they do exist.
Thank you for the valuable information. Envy and gossip has just cost me every thing I worked my entire life to achieve.
The same for me. The same thing just happened to me. Our society looks down on those considered less than and more than others. Individuals who had given less than half their points initially increased their contributions by the end of the latter rounds, while those who had been excluded gave significantly more after they were allowed back into the game, conforming to the less selfish behavior.
Gossiping also says something about the relationships people have with each other. So, keep on talking. And when your conversation turns to gossip, as it inevitably will, remember that some good can come of it — with the right intentions, of course. The original version of this story misstated the methodology of research published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science in It is a meta-analysis of gossip as a behavior, not a study.
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