[HN Gopher] Venting doesn't work
___________________________________________________________________
Venting doesn't work
Author : miobrien
Score : 163 points
Date : 2022-03-08 16:15 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (slate.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (slate.com)
| vernie wrote:
| Whoops accidentally submitted to HN instead of LinkedIn.
| swagasaurus-rex wrote:
| Stop using small sample sized studies done on college campuses (n
| = 600, 178, 60) to push clickbait headline articles.
|
| Sounds like saying, "Don't cry when you're sad it Doesn't Work"
|
| How about let people do what they want? People vent because they
| want to know they aren't crazy or at fault. Not because they're
| trying to be calm or forget grievances.
| snarkerson wrote:
| Bad science reporting and Slate go hand in hand.
|
| Clickbait is what they do.
| roywiggins wrote:
| On the other hand, if these sorts of cathartic expressions of
| anger _did_ reliably "work" at dissipating anger, I would
| expect it to show up in even small samples of college students?
| For it not to show up, either the effect only shows up in
| certain circumstances or it's actually not very strong.
| mettamage wrote:
| Quite frankly, almost all psychological experiments are
| nonsense. After the replication crisis and other things (e.g.
| p-hacking) I simply can't be bothered to take the field
| seriously. I am beyond mad at the intellectual dishonesty many
| sciences have committed, social psychology in particular. I
| couldn't care less if it's an emergent failing of science.
| First principles were not followed, too few people cared, I
| can't ever trust the fields again that took part in this.
|
| I'll stick to forms of science that actually know something
| worthwhile. And when I need to intuit anything about human
| behavior, then I know that I am on my own.
|
| With that said, here's my criteria for a study I'm willing to
| take seriously:
|
| * n = 10000
|
| * The effect size is big
|
| * It's measured in at least on western, one eastern and one
| other culture
|
| * It's independently reproduced by at least 2 other independent
| universities/research institutes
|
| There are probably another few things, but I think you get the
| spirit.
| chaostheory wrote:
| To piggyback, until psychology has a repeatable theoretical
| model; it's hard to take conclusions like this seriously. It
| needs to become married with neurology. ie We need to see this
| happening from a biological perspective. A small sample of
| surveys is not good enough to form strong conclusions.
| Otherwise, the results and conclusions feel arbitrary.
| kashyapc wrote:
| On studies with students:
|
| Our prefrontal cortex [which plays critical role in cognition,
| emotional regulation, and control of impulsive behavior]
| doesn't come fully online until you are about 24 (!). Given
| that, I take all studies done on university campuses with
| students younger than 24 with a good spoonful of salt.
| parksy wrote:
| "Researchers first criticized essays written by the study
| participants and then told some of them to hit a punching bag.
| Afterward, they gave them all an opportunity to blast loud
| noise at the person who had insulted their writing. People in
| the bag-hitting groups reported experiencing more anger and
| were more likely to blast noise than those who did nothing."
|
| This does sound like a selection bias and priming.
|
| You have a group of people who are criticised. Some of those
| people are told to do something physically violent. All were
| then told to push a button to blast a noise.
|
| Blasting a noise is a mild aggression. Hitting a punching bag
| is much more aggressive. It's no surprise that the group primed
| for violence reported more anger and was more primed to the
| milder form of aggression.
|
| Also how did the people hit the bag? Did any resist and needed
| encouragement. Did they punch it full force or just tap it so
| they could get their reward and leave?
|
| There is no way this study can draw conclusions on people who
| are victims of sustained physical and emotional trauma. It only
| proves that people who had college essays criticised are more
| likely to press the beep button and feel angry if they're
| forced to punch a punching bag.
|
| edit - I am biased. I endured a tough childhood with bipolar
| parents, physical and emotional abuse was involved. I know
| there is a venting trap where you can get comfortable and
| wallow, but that's like finding a local minima, without any
| form of catharsis you never heal, with undirected catharsis you
| get stuck, but catharsis coupled with guidance and
| reinforcement really does help.
| bduerst wrote:
| That's the point of the study though, right? That violent
| behavior begets more violence.
|
| It may seem like a "no duh" moment, but sometimes you need to
| observe it in a structured format to demonstrate it.
| roywiggins wrote:
| > selection bias and priming
|
| "priming" has had something of a fall from grace.
|
| > The studies of behavioral priming that I had cited in the
| chapter were largely discredited in the famous replication
| crisis of psychology... behavioral priming research is
| effectively dead.
|
| https://www.edge.org/adversarial-collaboration-daniel-
| kahnem...
| JAlexoid wrote:
| Like almost all analogies - it's a bad analogy.
|
| Catharsis has a long history of study and proponents of
| catharsis have yet to get a "win".
| SketchySeaBeast wrote:
| I think you missed an opportunity for a "find relief".
| peteradio wrote:
| When I bang my thumb with a hammer I yell FUUUUUCCCCKKKKKK as
| loud as I can, are you telling me that doesn't make the pain
| less? I'm almost 100% certain that form of catharsis works.
| It even works in reverse for me, if I'm having a moment of
| intense emotional strain, punching the wall (also yelling
| fuck as loud as possible) resets my brain. To say catharsis
| doesn't work seems to be a limitation of the definition of
| catharsis in these studies.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| That's mischaracterization of catharsis.
|
| As for releasing intense emotional strain - you're more
| likely to lash out.
|
| Have you tried not punching the wall and have a time out
| instead? Because people who "punch the wall" are, according
| to multiple studies, more likely to lash out and be
| abusive.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| > Because people who "punch the wall" are, according to
| multiple studies, more likely to lash out and be abusive.
|
| Presumably the wall-punching and tendency toward other
| physical/emotional abuses are tied to one or more
| underlying common causes.
|
| That is, people shouldn't be told to punch a wall (for
| cartharsis) or even necessarily _not_ to do so (because
| it 'll make you abusive), but those for whom that is a
| temptation or tendency should seek assistance to uncover
| and address the root causes.
| peteradio wrote:
| I guess that's my point, how do you disentangle the need
| for cathartic outburst from the negative connotations and
| actual perhaps small positive impact of the cathartic
| outburst? Is practicing karate and punching boards on a
| schedule ok?
| mikepurvis wrote:
| I feel like it's different when it's a scheduled, planned
| release, rather than losing control in the moment.
|
| Like, my overall emotional regulation is way better on
| the weeks when I've been more active, with cycling, lane
| swimming, taking walks, etc. And I'm certainly not doing
| those things "in anger", but it's still absolutely a kind
| of release.
|
| Of course, the article is mostly talking about _venting_
| as a scheduled, planned thing too, so I don 't know.
| peteradio wrote:
| Have you had what you would consider an extreme event
| which didn't ripple beyond a need to maintain regular
| exercise? One time I was upset because my now wife
| decided to spend time with friends instead of with me on
| the last day before I drove off to grad school across the
| country. I rode my bike around a large lake (not
| something I would normally do). Is that somehow doing it
| wrong? It seems like the whole issue is "don't rock the
| boat or people will look at you sideways and make you an
| outcast". Works fine to be and express yourself in a safe
| place (accepting people/sound-proof walls), even if its
| peakish at times, just my experience.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| I have been going through some significant personal
| issues over the past year, and finding productive outlets
| for processing those feelings/emotions/etc was indeed the
| genesis for getting more serious about a fitness routine.
|
| But now that I'm there, it's clear that this really is a
| helpful long-term pattern to follow for mental well-
| being, quite apart from being now in my mid-30s and
| needing to actually be intentional about staying in
| shape.
| peteradio wrote:
| > That's mischaracterization of catharsis.
|
| Please explain? Pain is both processed physically and
| psychologically in my experience. Is the suggestion that
| if I feel pain psychologically I'm abnormal? Catharsis is
| a name given to a human action as old as time.
|
| > Because people who "punch the wall" are, according to
| multiple studies, more likely to lash out and be abusive.
|
| I would be curious to see the studies, perhaps people who
| lash out are more likely to have issues worth punching a
| wall over? All sorts of biases could come into play.
|
| > Have you tried not punching the wall and have a time
| out instead?
|
| The times I've punched a wall are too few to derive
| meaningful statistics vs other methods of unwinding.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| Yelling at the time of physical pain is plain reaction,
| it's not catharsis... specially not in this context. It's
| not a violent release of pent up emotions.
| rectang wrote:
| The article reads as though its author has a vested interest in
| protecting some status quo that people complain about a lot.
| Like they just can't stand hearing people vent because they
| hate being reminded that people are unhappy.
| willhinsa wrote:
| "What do you call your act?"
|
| "YouTube!"
|
| * a reference to The Aristocrats joke, and how YouTube
| removed publicly facing downvotes on videos. Great for
| concealing negative sentiment!
| cannonpalms wrote:
| The conclusion here presupposes that other benefits such as
| increased clarity of the situation and one's own feelings are not
| present, but in that context vacuum? Sure, I agree.
| trynewideas wrote:
| There is likely no good medium- or long-term benefit to venting,
| especially when it's defined as physical violence directed at
| objects or verbal aggression directed at people. That's pretty
| clear.
|
| But one of the best pieces of advice my therapist gave me was
| that under extreme stress, sometimes the only path to making it
| to the next minute intact is to do something where the long-term
| benefit isn't clear, or even negative. In those moments, the best
| we can do is focus on preventing harm to others and minimizing
| harm to ourselves. (This isn't just about venting, but other
| stress and trauma reactions.)
|
| If a situation is so terrible that there's a chance of having a
| more brutal breakdown (or in my case, a suicide attempt) if we
| don't throw a plastic cup at a wall, or scream out the pain, or
| otherwise do something stupid for that short burst of peace with
| a relatively high cost, then we won't make it to a point where we
| can reflect on how we got there, and how to actually get to a
| better place in the medium- or long-term.
|
| Cycles of venting are bad, because constantly venting means
| constantly being under stress, which means it's harder and harder
| to step away from it to recognize the sources of the stress and
| break that cycle. But as a response to a peak in stress, or a
| sudden trauma, it's a tool - not the best tool, not even a good
| tool, but if it's the _only_ tool I can reach in time, the advice
| I got (for myself, which I am not a therapist, and which may not
| be relevant to you) was to not second-guess whether to use it.
| blamestross wrote:
| A more general version of this:
|
| You, being vaguely competent, are where you are because it is a
| local optima. Always, to progress to a better state, you are
| going to take at least some steps down a hill to get there.
| Sometimes a lot of them. We end up in situations bc the paths
| past/out of them are not obvious or easy.
|
| Don't let an obsession for every step being 'improvement'
| prevent you from taking the messy up and down path to get
| somewhere better.
| awb wrote:
| It sounds like the aggressive behavior was measured pretty soon
| after hitting the punching bag. It would be interesting to run
| the test again after the adrenaline has worn off.
|
| I don't think proponents of catharsis are claiming that screaming
| at a tree if going to instantly make you calmer, it's that later
| that day you might feel better.
|
| Also, participants were instructed to focus their anger on the
| perpetrator of the criticism, whereas it's probably healthier and
| more effective to simply focus on releasing your aggression.
|
| Or, a combo study would be interesting where participants are
| instructed to hit a punching bag and then try to empathize with
| themselves or others, vs. only trying to empathize.
|
| Anyway, it's an interesting study, but I'm not sure I'd rule out
| catharsis just yet.
| zasz wrote:
| There's also this implicit conclusion that venting must not
| work if the levels of aggression don't change, but the article
| did say that blood pressure dropped. I thought the paragraphs
| on venting to friends didn't make much sense to me either--
| honestly, if something terrible happened to a friend, and they
| didn't vent to me about it, at least a little, I'd be wondering
| if we were still friends.
| kodah wrote:
| As an aside, I'd be curious to see the effects of venting on
| the subject as well as people that surround them. I'd also be
| curious to see the effects during a one-time episode and
| through repeated exposure.
|
| I say that, because one of the worst things about social
| media is the venting. It's almost like folks are trying to
| suck you into a weird codependent relationship with them.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| Do you know of a single study that supports catharsis? Because
| all studies I know of disprove or end up inconclusive.
| Swizec wrote:
| Anecdata but a good boxing session after a stressful workday
| always makes me feel better. High intensity running also
| works. Great for relieving various undirected frustrations.
| Especially of the angry kind.
|
| Writing in a journal does wonders for the more subtle things.
| When your mind is running in circles trying to process
| something. The act of writing it out helps me avoid circles
| and get to a conclusion.
|
| The only thing that never does much is bottling it up inside.
| slfnflctd wrote:
| Almost 100 comments as of me adding mine, and you're the
| first to mention journaling so I have to chime in. It's
| better than some therapy I've had. Therapy can of course be
| hugely helpful if/when you find a decent therapist, but
| writing things down really is the next best thing.
|
| I haven't felt the need to do it in years, since I replaced
| it with a concise log which doesn't usually get bogged down
| in details. Mostly because I purged the majority of my
| worst freakouts into text files no one else is likely to
| read years ago. This wasn't the only thing that helped me,
| but it was at least half of it.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| Intense physical activity isn't necessarily violent
| catharsis.
|
| I almost never engage in catharsis now, but I do go on half
| marathon runs when I'm stressed. They're not the same
| thing... as like yelling at my husband over random
| annoyances.
| lkbm wrote:
| It definitely seems likely that physical activity is
| beneficial. I'd be curious to see studies comparing
| something like running vs. boxing. (Also weightlifting vs.
| cardio, or springs vs. long-distance.)
|
| Additionally, one thing that's often obscured in studies
| (or the reporting thereof) is that different people are
| different. Studies say that running doesn't help people
| lose weight, but that's looking for significant effects
| across a population. For some individuals, it does. The
| concept of "ymmv" is incredibly important when you care
| about individual impacts.
| rectang wrote:
| It seems plausible that catharsis makes some people more
| agitated and perhaps unhappy.
|
| It also seems likely that those agitated, unhappy people
| continue to struggle and don't give up as opposed to those
| who "stop venting".
|
| "Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against
| the dying of the light." -- Dylan Thomas
| mcguire wrote:
| Don't give up, or train themselves to be agitated and
| unhappy?
| rectang wrote:
| ?Por que no los dos?
|
| I'm not persuaded that those who "stop venting" end up
| happier in the long run. It seems like a road to letting
| yourself be mashed down and convincing yourself that you
| lack power to change your circumstances.
|
| I'm glad that Malcolm X didn't pay attention to all the
| people who wished he'd "stop venting".
| mcguire wrote:
| Did Malcolm X vent by yelling at trees, punching pillows
| or griping to his friends?
| antisthenes wrote:
| I know catharsis was extremely helpful in my grieving
| process.
|
| Realistically, I'm not sure how you would even design a study
| to accurately measure the effects. Any sort of cathartic
| experience would necessarily be self-reported and we all know
| the accuracy of self-report studies.
| lcuff wrote:
| I'm glad it helped your grieving process, and a big yes to
| the reality of "this is hard to study".
|
| I have an intuition that catharsis as part of a grief
| process might be quite different (more useful) than in
| situations where the anger arises out of other
| circumstances.
| Delk wrote:
| I've seen someone close to me have some kind of a cathartic
| process and get a lot better. It also required finally
| facing (at least some of) their emotional blocks or trauma,
| so it's not like venting alone did much of anything. But
| I'm pretty sure that if they hadn't got the opportunity to
| air a lot of their previously suppressed feelings in
| emotional safety, the rest of it also wouldn't have
| happened.
|
| I don't think aggressive venting alone is going to do much,
| but whenever I come across one of these studies that
| purport to show catharsis as not existing, I can't avoid
| feeling there must be more to the story.
|
| Some people are also going to interpret "catharsis does not
| work" as meaning it's perfectly wise to not listen with
| actual empathy and just slam solutions at people instead.
| But that also doesn't work.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| One of a few studies I've read followed people and found
| that people who engage in catharsis do it more often and
| have lower tolerances to irritants.
|
| One of the earlier studies just had people's anger
| tracked(anger has a very clear physiological response). So
| no need to have it self reported.
| klyrs wrote:
| For the value of an anecdote: in my grieving process, I
| tried several forms of catharsis: hitting a heavy bag,
| yelling, running and biking angry. In every case, it made
| me more angry. I got worse. The anger turned inward. It
| wasn't until I stopped that approach that I made any
| progress in my grief.
|
| > Any sort of cathartic experience would necessarily be
| self-reported and we all know the accuracy of self-report
| studies.
|
| That's not true. In the article, they mention observational
| studies wherein folks who vent are more likely to lash out.
| That isn't self-reporting.
| swagasaurus-rex wrote:
| > Since the students weren't randomly assigned to either
| vent or not, it's possible that the most anxious are the
| ones who chose to vent (so that venting was correlated
| with increased anxiety, not the cause of it)
| klyrs wrote:
| Yes, that particular study may have flaws in its
| execution. But that doesn't prove that studies on venting
| are necessarily self-reporting.
| darkerside wrote:
| I think this begs the question in assuming there is just one
| type of catharsis. In my experience, things like this can be
| done productively or unproductively, effectively or
| ineffectively. It's all about the execution, and different
| people use the same word for different things.
| awb wrote:
| No, just anecdotally I've seen it work for other people and
| it's worked for me at times as well. But that's not to say
| some other method wouldn't have worked just as well. And
| "worked" is a loose term, that just means "happier and less
| angry", rather than some form of perfection.
| keerthiko wrote:
| A proper venting process, like a heatsink or coolant, needs a
| mechanism to absorb the unwanted energy efficiently, and _then_
| disperse it. Asking folks to express anger or spend energy
| without it specifically drawing from the negative emotions within
| is like pouring coolant fluid from a bottle over your CPU box.
|
| I think carefully channelled energy, however, can really help
| calm. I don't necessarily think it's catharsis really, as it
| would tend closer to meditation. Practising a martial art, trying
| to focus on something creative, going on a long run, playing a
| mentally demanding game (chess, go, starcraft) -- with the right
| mindset, these allow you to harness your negative feelings into
| an activity that exists in its own sandbox, and then get
| processed in a way that only makes sense inside that sandbox.
| It's important that your activity is one where you have practised
| not getting further enraged (no 'tilting', as we say in video
| games) when you fail/perform badly inside your sandbox.
|
| When you leave the sandbox, you find a tiny bit more peace with
| whatever enraged you.
| saghm wrote:
| > The idea of venting can be traced as far back as Aristotle, but
| Freud is the one who really popularized the notion of catharsis.
| Most of what we assume about the need to "let it out" comes from
| his assertions about the danger of unexpressed feelings. In the
| "hydraulic model," frustration and anger build up inside you and,
| unless periodically released in small bursts, cause a massive
| explosion. Starting in the 1960s, this theory was debunked by so
| many lab experiments that researcher Carol Tavris concluded in
| 1988, "It is time to put a bullet, once and for all, through the
| heart of the catharsis hypothesis."
|
| I think there is some truth to the original theory, but not all
| "venting" is equal. I definitely have at times experienced
| growing resentment towards people in my life due to not fully
| confronting the feelings I had about my interactions with them,
| but in general I don't think that angry outbursts are a healthy
| way to deal with this. In an ideal relationship (general term,
| not necessarily "romantic relationship"), I think honest but
| empathetic and non-judgmental conversations between the parties
| is often going to be the only way to truly alleviate those
| feelings; being able to tell someone why you were hurt by their
| actions without judging them and then being able to hear the same
| without reacting defensively is much more effective than
| complaining to a third party, but it requires a level of trust
| and understanding that is usually not going to be present for
| anything but close family members or long time friends. Given
| that, I think there is value in talking through the issues with a
| neutral third party, but it can be hard to avoid falling into
| spiral of anger and resentment, which I think is why seeing a
| therapist or psychologist is such a common treatment. I don't
| think that being able to neutrally help someone deal with their
| feelings of anger or resentment is some kind of superpower or
| anything, but like any skill, there are some methods that are
| more effective and some that are less effective, so having some
| sort of training on the matter generally is helpful. Most
| importantly though, they still need to build that same level of
| trust and understanding with the patient, which I think is the
| most common reason that therapy isn't able to help some people;
| if you're not open to the idea of learning to trust and get
| helped in therapy, it's going to be hard to actually resolve
| anything.
| ascii_pasta wrote:
| There's a saying "the squeeky wheel get's the grease".
|
| People usually do what works for them. thats exactly why we still
| see fist fights, disinformation, yelling, racisim, war,
| complaining, etc. It does what it was intended to do. Otherwise,
| people would do something else.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| A leaky cauldron gets thrown out, is the counterargument here.
|
| If you want to be angrier or as angry - catharsis is great.
| ascii_pasta wrote:
| Thats why I love these types of sayings!
|
| It doesnt always get grease, does it!
|
| It depends on the usefulness of the source of the squeek! For
| me it translates as 'be worth helping'.
|
| This even works for your couldron, is it worth fixing?
| cosmiccatnap wrote:
| kazinator wrote:
| > _As one researcher put it, "Venting anger is like using
| gasoline to put out a fire."_
|
| The analogy holds only if the problem is one that is in some way
| exacerbated (i.e. fueled by) anger (even if only by growing worse
| due to appropriate action not being taken due to focus on anger).
|
| If anger is not relevant to the problem, then no. For instance,
| if you're angry that 2 + 2 isn't 5, venting will not make that
| issue escalate; 2 + 2 will not get farther away from 5 just to
| spite you for venting.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| From my purely anecdotal experience with mentoring younger
| people, I've seen two main categories of venting:
|
| 1) Venting about frustrations by talking them through with
| someone who will listen. This forces people to put their
| frustrations into words and elucidate the narrative as they put
| it into words. This can not only help people identify their
| feelings and work through them, but it also forces people to
| decide what a mature response would be. Once you start venting to
| someone you know, especially someone you respect, you have an
| incentive to present a mature interpretation and approach to the
| situation. This can help immensely.
|
| 2) The other group tends to want to avoid the mature response
| part, and instead wants to seek sympathy and confirmation for
| their frustrations. They deliberately avoid discussing these
| issues with respected peers or mentors because they know their
| response is unhealthy and not a good look. They embrace online
| forums like Reddit and Twitter where they're free to give one-
| sided stories without fear of their peers calling them out for
| exaggerating or stretching the details. This type of venting
| doesn't solve anything because they don't really want solutions
| in the first place. There's something rewarding or perhaps
| freeing about hunkering down in the victim role and being
| showered with sympathy from random internet strangers.
|
| I haven't seen any reason to believe the first type of venting
| (discussing with respected peers, seeking feedback and solutions
| in the process) is anything but helpful. However, the latter type
| of venting (online venting to collect sympathy) does seem to be
| quite damaging from my limited experience. There's something
| dangerous about going online to bond with others and seek
| personal affirmation in a way that's fueled by venting
| frustrations and victimizations. Once inside of those circles,
| there's an incentive to continue bringing more frustrations and
| more victimizations to the table to keep the bonding and
| community contact flowing.
|
| The story in the article about going to a park to scream together
| raises my red flags as such a situation: It becomes an in-group
| thing where you need to adopt an outward appearance of being very
| frustrated to fit in with the other people in the group. Not a
| good incentive for improving the situation.
| Enginerrrd wrote:
| Yeah, I know it's anecdotal... but when I've had issues with
| people that "stuck", and didn't go away on their own, I've had
| a lot of success writing those people a letter. It forces me to
| present all the information factually, how I feel about it, why
| I feel that way, etc. which helps elucidate the charitable and
| less-charitable interpretations of what happened. In writing, I
| have to reread and edit what I wrote a dozen times at least to
| make it nice and coherent. I also have a rule, that I can't
| send out such letters until the next day after writing the
| letter. Every time I've done that, I didn't need to send the
| letter after I wrote it. The anger was gone. Sometimes it
| persisted for weeks leading up to me writing the letter.
|
| I would absolutely describe that as "venting". I just wouldn't
| describe it as super aggressive or hostile, even though
| sometimes I think the letters were pretty harsh.
| _rs wrote:
| Do the situations ever get resolved if you don't send the
| letters, or do you use the letters as a basis for having a
| more mature conversation after?
|
| I sometimes do the same thing, and after I get my ideas
| out/vented, I end up rewriting the letter with gained
| empathy/understanding, and then use that as an outline for a
| conversation (if not reading the letter verbatim for
| especially difficult subjects) with the person. Otherwise,
| even if I feel a little better, nothing actually was
| resolved.
| agumonkey wrote:
| I don't want to overstretch my already thin stance, but I think
| a lot of social groups are built on this. Finding peers that
| respond to your experience.
|
| I noticed something about web convos, they're often transient
| blips. You vent, get validated, come back a month later, vent
| again. It's very shallow.
|
| Lastly, I wonder how much of youth venting is due to having too
| much time on their hands. Imagining a society where people just
| have more things to do (but also integrated faster and smoother
| in the work force) ... I'd bet 10$ that people would vent less.
| It's not a cheap jab at young people, I had to learn that
| myself too.
| Llamamoe wrote:
| I can't speak for everyone, but as a person with unmedicated
| ADHD and chronic fatigue, I feel pretty hostile to sentiments
| like this.
|
| In my experience, people who engage in #2 aren't - as you seem
| to be implying - people who are immature and lazy.
|
| A lot of the time they're people who struggle with the
| executive function necessary to actually change their life, who
| feel helpless and just want validation after having been made
| to feel insane by the #1 crowd - crowd who gives them obvious
| (non)solutions like "eat healthier", and "just exercise more!",
| and shits on them if they claim it doesn't work for them or
| can't do it.
|
| People _love_ to rationalize why and how those people are
| motivated to not solve their issues instead of acknowledging
| that, just maybe, they really can 't do better, really need
| help, and just gravitate towards the only crowd that won't
| treat them like moral failures for it.
|
| I have been disabled by overwhelmingly debilitating fatigue for
| a third of my life, and human tendency to treat every attempt
| to describe my struggles as excuses to debunk so I finally
| "stop feeling sorry for myself" has been dehumanizing. The
| victimization isn't made up. People who REALLY struggle are
| systematically gaslit and abused by the overwhelming majority
| of people. The moment people catch wind of your inability to
| take care of yourself, they treat you as less than human and
| make up one reason after another to blame you for your struggle
| and exclude you from deserving empathy.
|
| Rant over.
| bittercynic wrote:
| I do not want to diminish the importance of your perspective
| in any way, only to add that some in the #1 camp are
| teetering on the brink of "able to take care of self" and not
| withholding help to be cruel, but because they think helping
| might pull them over the cliff, too.
|
| Wellness has big steps sometimes, and if you tumble down a
| step it may take a long time to get back up, and your ability
| to help yourself, and anyone else, will be diminished.
| GauntletWizard wrote:
| I do want to diminish the importance of GP's perspective.
| It's a lazy and tired answer to the problem, and quite
| frankly - Offers a direct confirmation of the top level
| post's point rather than a refutation. "unmedicated ADHD
| and chronic fatigue"? Really? They're a nutjob. How has
| discourse gotten to the point where we're all so afraid of
| hurting the feelings of the fringe that we can't point out
| the obvious? Being dismissive is precisely what we should
| be doing.
| Blackstone4 wrote:
| I can see where you are coming from. At my work for instance,
| we will take on those with good people skills and the
| intelligence to learn the technical skills they are missing.
| We are reluctant to do it the other way round. We avoid those
| who have the technical skills but not the people skills
| because common wisdom and experience indicates it is much
| harder to teach the people skills... I would add that we are
| not equipped to help them get up the curve. The thought
| process is that once you teach someone able a technical
| skill, it generally sticks. Soft skills tend to be harder to
| teach and problems recurring in nature...this results in time
| sinks. This might be perceived as unfair but it is a
| reflection of the world we live in...and generally they are
| practical observation. People and businesses need better
| tools/methods/education to help people but right now there is
| little incentive to do so...we, as a society, are more
| focused on gender and racial equality than mental health
| equality.
|
| On a personal level, if I have to invest too much of my time
| or energy managing someone else's emotional state on an
| ongoing basis...then I'm not interested in maintaining that
| relationship. Maybe because I was once in a toxic, draining
| relationship which almost destroyed me..I am maybe more alert
| or sensitive to these issues.
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| >It becomes an in-group thing where you need to adopt an
| outward appearance of being very frustrated to fit in with the
| other people in the group.
|
| Very important point. Similarly, many self-help groups trend
| towards a culture of "wound worship."
| allmodelsRwrong wrote:
| I may not have read your post correctly but why do you think
| "seeking sympathy and confirmation" is mutually exclusive to a
| "mature response"?
|
| There is a tendency I have seen in people in the tech industry
| to try to problem solve everything. Like debugging a bug. In my
| experience this creates unhealthy relationships. Sometimes all
| we can do is listen and say, "yeah that sucks, I'm sorry".
| krinchan wrote:
| So is 1 basically rubber ducky debugging but for social
| situations? Because I do this pretty often by myself. I feel it
| does require a certain level of self-honesty and I've often
| used good friends (the ones who I know will call me on my BS)
| as sounding boards to double check my conclusions.
| mike10921 wrote:
| Rubber ducking for non-technical issues. Love the concept
| XorNot wrote:
| (2) is rubber duck debugging (written in a condescending
| way).
|
| The point of rubber duck debugging is the duck isn't talking
| back, or questioning why the code exists, or why the project
| exists, or suggesting different programming approaches - it
| just sits there while you work through explaining it and
| listening to you.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| Is this
|
| http://www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement/why-estrange...
|
| and example of type (2)?
| dvtrn wrote:
| Sheesh I was _not_ ready to read that, nor get as hooked in
| as I did. Some of those bullet-points are things I 've
| witnessed first hand in an 'IRL' parenting group from some
| now ex-members.
| krinchan wrote:
| As an estranged child I was not ready to read that. Sent it
| to my other sibling (also recently estranged from the
| family) and we're both just...in shock.
| Shadonototra wrote:
| what a selfish mindset
|
| venting produce effects, it make the reader understand other
| people's feeling without knowing them
|
| if makes them learn about people and their frustrations
|
| ultimately, it gives them the opportunity to come up with a
| direct or indirect response to them
| randomsilence wrote:
| >The idea of venting can be traced as far back as Aristotle, but
| Freud is the one who really popularized the notion of catharsis.
| Most of what we assume about the need to "let it out" comes from
| his assertions about the danger of unexpressed feelings.
|
| When it comes to 'let it out', it should be traced back even
| further to the Iliad. At least according to this [1] video by
| Lindybeige, the Iliad is all about forgiving, after having
| exhausted every other option, aka after letting it all out.
|
| Having said that, the article seems to make a negation error. The
| opposite of not expressing feelings is not expressing all
| feelings but expressing some feelings.
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aofPdMbXzUQ The Iliad - what
| is it really about?
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| Venting totally CAN work in customer support situations. You let
| someone pour out confusing and undirected anger/fear/frustration
| and then you get to work solving the underlying problem or pain
| point.
| motohagiography wrote:
| Can't help but think the term "toxic," discredits the whole thing
| as a vehicle for something else. Aggression is natural and
| universal, but the tools for expressing and self-regulating it
| are not. One description of it that resonated personally for me
| was Robert Sapolsky's "depression is aggression turned inward,"
| and while the phrase doesn't do the whole idea justice, it's more
| useful than hollow and seductive cliches like toxicity.
|
| Arguably, aggression is necessarily an artifact of ideas of self
| and how we relate to others, and "venting" aggression safely lets
| you accept it (and yourself) in its totality and gives you a
| sense of how to manage it, instead of suppressing it and fearing
| that it will be exposed, only to have it come out in perverse
| other ways anyway. What bothers me about a lot of psychology is
| it seems mainly like a critical theory for deconstructing mental
| suffering as a means to relieve it theraputically - which is
| noble and useful, but it has been adopted as a scheme for
| moralizing coarse political interests.
|
| Some years ago I turned a lot of my aggression outward and into
| disagreeableness, replacing a few intense relationships that
| enabled turning it inward with many new ones that did not, and it
| has made me more likeable, honest, trustworthy, reliable, fairer,
| and more sincerely compassionate, and as a result I have never
| been more content. It sets a healthy boundary where your natural
| aggression doesn't get triggered nearly as often, and you can
| manage it in other ways. Yes, some people will think you are an
| asshole, but the little bit of friction and occasional loss of a
| connection does not compare to relief and peace of just not
| caring what they think, and being free to engage people for only
| the enjoyment of it instead of some absurd sense of obligation.
| Or not.
| bob1029 wrote:
| > Yes, some people will think you are an asshole, but the
| little bit of friction and occasional loss of a connection does
| not compare to relief and peace of just not caring what they
| think
|
| I have found deep joy in un-filtering myself. Not worrying
| about every syllable that comes out of my mouth for fear of
| retaliation, cancellation, et. al. My social circle had to
| shrink a bit, but the trade-off is that I am no longer
| suffering from a constant stream of cognitive dissonance. I
| stopped forcing myself to believe in ridiculous pop-
| culture/tech bullshit just to fit in with others. It was taking
| too much out of me to fake it for arbitrary social credits.
|
| The crazy thing is that I still have high quality social
| relationships despite my unfiltered expression. I'd rather have
| a few people I can actually trust with controversial ideas
| rather than an army of sycophants I have to pander to
| constantly.
| digisign wrote:
| > I stopped forcing myself to believe in ridiculous pop-
| culture/tech bullshit
|
| Curious what this means?
| cplusplusfellow wrote:
| OP probably doesn't want to answer this question for the
| exact reason he posted his comment. Your inquiry may be in
| good faith but it is 99% of how the cancel warfare begins:
| "Here let me ask a really introspective question to see
| exactly how badly I'm going to throw my code words at you
| in my response."
| digisign wrote:
| Perhaps, but unfortunately there is not enough
| information to get even a toehold on an idea. Do people
| really go online to present a fake persona? Most
| embellish, and I bet some do, but does anyone else care
| enough to pay attention? For most folks I'd say no.
|
| If GP said, "politics" then I'd get the drift.
| bob1029 wrote:
| > Perhaps, but unfortunately there is not enough
| information to get even a toehold on an idea.
|
| Imagine some position you personally find to be
| controversial/wrong/stupid but that everyone else around
| you agrees with (or vice versa).
|
| In my view, understanding what my position is on some
| arbitrary matter does not further this conversation in
| any meaningful way.
| abyssin wrote:
| Can you expand on how an intense relationship can enable
| turning aggression inward? I'm genuinely curious about this
| idea.
| hirako2000 wrote:
| I think by intense he implies with a lot of pressure from the
| other side. And like in most relationships we often try to
| internalise our stress in fear to make things worse and loose
| that relationship.If it's intense stress it's far more
| noticible.
| bduerst wrote:
| Maybe this is wrong, but it sounds like you were in toxic
| relationships, ones which you were able to escape by asserting
| your boundaries. Asserting yourself is a little different than
| being hostile and/or violent, which is what aggression is
| usually considered.
|
| In any case and semantics aside, congrats on removing
| relationships that were pushing you inwards and making you
| unhappy. Like the article mentions, brain pathways and behavior
| are like hiking paths, it's incredibly difficult to forge new
| ones and continually use them until it's normal.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| I have been reading a lot of books by this guy
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Stoller
|
| and up until his late book _Sexual Excitement: Dynamics of
| Erotic Life_ he uses the word Hostility to mean "desire to
| hurt others" whereas aggression is the desire to make your
| mark in the world (e.g. it is "aggressive" to try to put the
| soccer ball in the other team's goal.)
|
| By the time _Excitement_ was written people started splitting
| the meaning of aggression to frame it as a bad thing (as
| Stoller said hostility was) and used assertion to describe
| the positive side of what Stoller called "aggression" and
| there is a short passage where Stoller talks about this
| change in terminology.
|
| Stoller uses the terms "hostility" and "sadism" for phenomena
| that are more common than people might think. If you ever get
| some pleasure out of causing somebody to suffer, even in some
| small way (e.g. flag somebody's post and imagine them
| suffering from the feeling they are being persecuted) you are
| being "sadistic."
| mattgreenrocks wrote:
| Lots to think about here, thank you for sharing.
|
| I'm no stranger to depression, but thinking of it as aggression
| turned inward seems like a useful tool. Long term, I'd like to
| be able to befriend my aggression, or at least understand it,
| so it doesn't seem so inscrutable.
|
| First step is probably just to recognize and accept that part
| of me.
| Brian_K_White wrote:
| Crucially, it was probably better for everyone else too, not
| just yourself.
| henrydark wrote:
| +1 for mentioning the ever enlightening Robert Sapolsky
| eric-hu wrote:
| Did you apply this concept from a book or other set of
| writings? I'm just curious about this process and would like to
| learn more.
| [deleted]
| MrYellowP wrote:
| Venting _does_ work, but there 's differences in how you do it.
| Mindlessly ranting about bullshit doesn't help. Mindfulness is
| the key. Feelings want to get out. Keeping them inside doesn't do
| any good.
| artursapek wrote:
| To stop venting would mean to stop going to therapy, lol
| tgv wrote:
| > Neuroscience--specifically, neural plasticity--explains why
| venting reinforces negative emotions. You can think of our brain
| circuitry like hiking trails. The ones that get a lot of traffic
| get smoother and wider, with brush stomped down and pushed back.
|
| That is so bad. It assumes that the brain uses one pathway for
| (different forms of) aggression and one neural mechanism for
| adapting behavior. It also assumes that the effect is cumulative.
| None of these are true.
| samatman wrote:
| Unpopular opinion, I expect, but until, and unless, there is a
| reckoning with the replication crisis in psychology, Hacker News
| should treat this kind of article the same way they would treat
| one which takes homeopathy seriously.
|
| I've flagged it as irrelevant and suggest you do so also.
| amelius wrote:
| > Venting anger is like using gasoline to put out a fire.
|
| There could be some truth to it. Since I started venting on HN
| about how bad ads, drm, social media, and patents are, their
| prevalence has increased!
| slowhadoken wrote:
| serenity now!
| kashyapc wrote:
| From Robert Sapolsky's _Behave_ , I learnt about the notion of
| "displacement aggression". We know what it is intuitively, but in
| short: depressingly enough, the reason stress encourages
| aggression is that it _reduces_ stress. And we don 't yet know
| the underlying biology of it. - - -
|
| Excuse the wall of text, but it's entirely worth reading
| Sapolsky's description of this:
|
| [quote]
|
| _Shock a rat and its glucocorticoid levels [a key stress-
| signaller] and blood pressure rise; with enough shocks, it's at
| risk for a "stress" ulcer. Various things can buffer the rat
| during shocks--running on a running wheel, eating, gnawing on
| wood in frustration. But a particularly effective buffer is for
| the rat to bite another rat. Stress-induced (aka frustration-
| induced) displacement aggression is ubiquitous in various
| species._
|
| _Among baboons, for example, nearly half of aggression is this
| type--a high-ranking male loses a fight and chases a subadult
| male, who promptly bites a female, who then lunges at an infant.
| My research shows that within the same dominance rank, the more a
| baboon tends to displace aggression after losing a fight, the
| lower his glucocorticoid levels._
|
| _Humans excel at stress-induced displacement aggression--
| consider how economic downturns increase rates of spousal and
| child abuse. Or consider a study of family violence and pro
| football. If the local team unexpectedly loses, spousal /partner
| violence by men increases 10 percent soon afterward (with no
| increase when the team won or was expected to lose). [...]_
|
| _Little is known concerning the neurobiology of displacement
| aggression blunting the stress response. I'd guess that lashing
| out activates dopaminergic reward pathways, a surefire way to
| inhibit CRH release [a hormone involved in the stress response].
| Far too often, giving an ulcer helps avoid getting one._
|
| [/quote]
| mcguire wrote:
| You, in combination with the article, are describing an
| is/ought situation here.
|
| Displacing aggression---biting another rat---reduces your
| stress. (This is an _is_ statement.)
|
| Therefore, to reduce your stress, you should bite one of the
| other rats. (This is an _ought_ statement.)
|
| But biting another rat leads to a stack of bad downstream
| consequences, which may include things that raise your stress.
| Therefore, _not_ displacing aggression is the better option;
| certainly, _telling_ other people to do so is probably not a
| good idea. Even if you are displacing aggression in a safe
| manner, by chewing on a piece of wood or yelling at a tree, you
| train yourself to respond that way to stress and will
| eventually end up biting an innocent rat.
| kashyapc wrote:
| Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to imply any "ought" here at all. I
| should've been more explicit. I thought my opening remark of
| "depressingly enough" was sufficient to note that I was
| lamenting the "is"ness of the situation, and don't
| "recommend" it (yikes!).
| klenwell wrote:
| A couple people have mentioned Sapolsky and he came to my mind
| also. Here's a comment I made a while back along the same lines
| on an article about why swearing (as a form of venting) _does_
| work (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12229422). Sapolsky
| again on rats and baboons (from Why Zebra's Don't Get Ulcers):
|
| _A variant of Weiss 's experiment uncovers a special feature
| of the outlet-for-frustration reaction. This time, when the rat
| gets the identical series of electric shocks and is upset, it
| can run across the cage, sit next to another rat and... bite
| the hell out of it. Stress-induced displacement of aggression:
| the practice works wonders at minimizing the stressfulness of a
| stressor. It's a real primate specialty as well. A male baboon
| loses a fight. Frustrated, he spins around and attacks a
| subordinate male who was minding his own business. An extremely
| high percentage of primate aggression represent frustration
| displaced onto innocent bystanders._
|
| I recently left a job and boss where this dynamic was very much
| in play (more blaming than biting but obvious displacement
| aggression all the same).
|
| My conclusion: swearing (venting) might be seen as a more
| civilized form of displacing stress-induced aggression.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| Catharsis(aka venting) has had a multiple studies saying that it
| doesn't work. Stop venting.
|
| https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1967-02716-001 - it's even in the
| abstract.
| antisthenes wrote:
| This is your 3rd post in the thread, alleging that catharsis
| doesn't work.
|
| Now, personally, I don't have skin in the game, so I can't tell
| you whether it works or not.
|
| But the fact that you're citing a 1967 psych study done on 9
| year old kids tells me you have some kind of agenda for
| whatever reason. Not only are most psych studies flat out junk,
| but the 50s and 60s was the time of particularly egregious junk
| science. Remember, that's the time they still did lobotomies.
|
| Besides, the study you cited only limits itself to cathartic
| aggression, which is clearly not the only case for the
| experience.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| I can link you to another bunch. Because I took interest on
| the subject. I've been told to "vent" almost all of my life
| and only a few years ago I got exposed to this research.
|
| I'm citing one of the earlier ones and there's plenty of
| newer studies.
|
| My "allegations" are based in research and not empty
| words(unlike the accusations in your comment)
| antisthenes wrote:
| Please do.
|
| There's a possibility that I'm using the term catharsis
| completely wrong, so I'm not taking the study at face
| value.
|
| I've never heard of people equating venting with catharsis
| or linking them logically.
|
| To me, catharsis is something that occurs rarely, to some
| people, after a tragedy. It's sort of an emotional closure
| that lets you move on in peace.
| JAlexoid wrote:
| In psychology venting is called catharsis.
|
| As for articles: Let's start with the one in the article.
|
| https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2002-13494-002
|
| https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1966-04874-001
|
| https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2002-00162-010
|
| https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10463283.2012
| .69...
|
| https://study.com/academy/lesson/catharsis-in-psychology-
| the...
| julianeon wrote:
| It's pretty incredible how few comments in this thread are
| saying "huh, this is interesting, I should try this,
| research backs it up." That's the engineer or HN way, isn't
| it? (Not being sarcastic, I include myself in this). When
| data comes along which disproves or at least weakens a
| previously held position, adjust your priors and try it
| out.
|
| Note: you can say "not until it's proven" but I can cite
| plenty of less weakly supported positions than "catharsis
| doesn't work" that have been enthusiastically taken up
| here. Consider trusting the data, at least a little bit,
| _especially_ if you have a strongly emotional, but not well
| supported, response. This is the way (of the engineer).
| JAlexoid wrote:
| Exactly.
|
| Right now all data that I can find tells me to not vent,
| but take a time out. You know.... how we have "count to
| 10 before saying anything nasty".
| WaitWaitWha wrote:
| People do not vent anger. People vent frustration. Anger is
| usually a follow-up because the person does not have a motion
| forward or solution to the frustrating element.
|
| In my experience people vent their frustration because they are
| stuck in their thinking and instinctively want to share it with
| others in hope the trusted person can give a way out, or comfort
| them.
| kstenerud wrote:
| I think they've missed the point.
|
| Venting isn't for catharsis; It's for seeking validation. When
| you vent TO someone and they lend a sympathetic ear, it's a huge
| help.
|
| Venting is a social bonding ritual.
|
| You generally don't get this online because most of the audience
| is NOT sympathetic, so you'll get criticism after criticism,
| making things even worse.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| There are lots of sympathetic audiences online too-- see
| relationship or parenting vents on tiktok, where the comments
| are often just wall-to-wall supportive, with crown emojis,
| slogans like "SLAYYYY!" etc. Twitch "just chatting" streams can
| be like this sometimes too.
|
| But I do wonder how much of it actually lands for the
| recipient. As an influencer putting out a carefully curated
| image of yourself, how meaningful is it to be boosted by a
| bunch of mostly-anonymous strangers? Wouldn't it just feed into
| a kind of dissociative thing where you recognize that they're
| praising and lifting up a mask and have no idea about the
| particulars of the real person's struggles? I don't know.
| slumpa wrote:
| Exactly, thank you! This article just read so bizarre to me -
| who thinks that venting is supposed to change your opinion
| about the matter? It felt like reading a headline like,
| "Researchers find that cardio vascular exercise doesn't help
| increase shoe size"
|
| That's not what it's for. It's for getting thoughts out of your
| head, having the opportunity to articulate strong feelings that
| might otherwise be fuzzy, and for feeling heard and supported.
|
| If changing your opinions is the goal, venting is pretty
| clearly not the way to get there.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Yes it's a communicative act. Communication can be bounced off
| others for social validation as you say, but can also be to
| oneself.
|
| You'd still vent, if alone on a desert island, maybe to The
| Gods.
|
| Ever hear yourself saying out loud, usually with expletives,
| something that you would "never say"? Listen to that voice!
|
| That's communication of unconscious but frustrated thoughts.
| Sometimes it has to come out verbally because ones inner
| dialogue isn't strong enough due to social or superego
| suppression.
|
| After you said it to yourself you feel better.
|
| We are not the singular identities simpler minds suppose us.
| munificent wrote:
| 100% agree.
|
| Anger usually stems from a boundary being violated. It's our
| instinctive evolved response for pushing back against someone
| who has encroached on us.
|
| When we "vent" to a peer, it is relieving because it transfers
| that personal boundary to a group boundary. We feel "OK, my
| peer will now back me up the next time this happens."
|
| Venting is like yelling for reinforcements when you see someone
| storming your corner of the castle wall.
| [deleted]
| blhack wrote:
| One of the most stressful projects I ever worked on had a really
| great way of dealing with the stress (a policy that I created).
|
| Every meeting, at the beginning of the meeting, everybody was
| required to complain for 5 minutes. Just talk about all the
| stupid decisions that got us to this point, how unreasonable the
| timeline was, any staffing issues you were having, any parts you
| needed, etc. 5 minutes. You are required to complain.
|
| It helped a LOT, and almost a decade later when I interact with
| that team, we still all look back glowingly on that practice as
| something good.
|
| It was a tense project, and that "you have to complain for 5
| minutes" completely broke all of the tension, and let us all work
| together effectively. If we hadn't implemented that policy, we
| might not have finished the project on time.
| julianeon wrote:
| There's a subtle distinction that I don't think the article
| addressed very well.
|
| One thing is doing something like: I know I am angry at you, my
| reasons are very clear to me, and now, without adding to my
| understanding of them, I am going to yell at you for 15
| minutes, loudly.
|
| Another is doing this: not really being sure what you're
| anxious or angry about, so talking about it to explore your
| muddled thoughts and figure it out, in a regular to soft voice.
|
| I can see how they flow into each other and too much of the
| second inevitably becomes the first. But when capped (like at 5
| minutes) - appropriately modulated (not yelling anger) - in a
| group context (further modulating the emotions) - you could
| arguably get the benefits of the 2nd without the downsides of
| the 1st.
| caddemon wrote:
| It also depends on what kind of challenges the team faces in
| the first place. If there are a lot of issues stemming from
| faceless corporate policies or bugs in external tools or
| something then venting about these things for a few minutes
| every meeting could be good team building. If the challenges
| involve each other or an adjacent manager or something though
| even 5 minutes could get mean spirited quickly.
| dudul wrote:
| How did you make sure that no one would complain that "Bob was
| an idiot who kept breaking the build", or "Alice never does her
| code reviews and blocks everyone"?
| J5892 wrote:
| Best approach: Don't hire people like that.
|
| Good approach: Specify that complaints be non-specific to a
| person on the team.
| yunohn wrote:
| > Specify that complaints be non-specific to a person on
| the team.
|
| Very often, it is the case that a specific person /is/ the
| problem.
| ar_lan wrote:
| > Recent headlines have shared tales of venting by everyone from
| Olympians to Russell Westbrook to moms meeting in a park to
| scream.
|
| Russell Westbrook is an Olympian...
| biesnecker wrote:
| The hell it doesn't! Let me tell you ... ;-)
| rectang wrote:
| Thought experiment: two groups of people, a control group and one
| told "stop venting".
|
| 1. Which group achieves more success in solving their underlying
| problem?
|
| 2. Which group exhibits higher levels of psychological
| satisfaction?
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| This article talks about "catharsis"
|
| catharsis and processing are key to getting past something, but
| it also depends on if sufficient (time|mental processing) have
| past to allow one to not become distraught over the situation.
|
| see: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/798927.Writing_to_Heal
| snarkerson wrote:
| Tamping down emotions and keeping them wrapped up has always
| worked well.
| Metacelsus wrote:
| From the title I thought this would be about ventilation and
| COVID.
| oversocialized wrote:
| lanstin wrote:
| Work for what? People vent for pleasure, not as part of a plan.
| Clearly a more rational response to anger is to let it dissipate
| without losing your cool, then let your best self decide what to
| do.
|
| But sometimes sharing a beer with a friend and going over the
| sins of those rat bastards that are fucking everything up is by
| God really fun. Like many pleasures, it is best in moderation.
| And should probably be done once you aren't so mad that you
| disturb your equanimity.
| sudden_dystopia wrote:
| If true, wouldn't this undermine the entire psychiatric approach
| of behavioral cognitive therapy and ideas such as confronting
| one's fears and talking through problems?
| k__ wrote:
| In my experience, therapy wasn't venting, it structured
| approaches to deal with the reasons that led to the need for
| venting.
| mikkergp wrote:
| I think there's a difference between mindlessly venting and
| mindfully stepping through thought processes.
| jsnodlin wrote:
| joshuacc wrote:
| I'm not sure why. "Venting" doesn't seem to have much overlap
| with CBT other than words being involved.
| user-the-name wrote:
| [deleted]
| jboynyc wrote:
| From TFA: "chatting with friends can bring closure when they
| help you reconstrue an event, rather than just recount it. What
| does that look like? Asking why you think the other person
| acted that way, prodding to see whether there's anything to be
| learned from it all, and just generally broadening your
| perspective to 'the grand scheme of things.' Unfortunately,
| this type of meaning-making is far from common outside of
| therapy"
| floatrock wrote:
| Article also mentioned the "The thoughts you water are the
| ones that grow" idiom.
|
| CBT is often about reframing or "reconstrueing" a negative or
| damaging viewpoint into something less emotionally charged.
| Venting is just watering and reinforcing the emotionally
| charged pathways -- the "gasoline on a fire" analogy.
| bena wrote:
| CBT is nearly the opposite of venting. Venting is just pouring
| out raw emotion, no confrontation.
|
| Venting is "John is an asshole who couldn't find his way out of
| a wet paper bag. I hope that fucker's entire dick just falls
| off. He doesn't deserve jack shit."
|
| CBT is more measured. You acknowledge the feeling, but you
| separate yourself from it. "Yes, I'm mad. I'm mad because of
| THING. THING upsets me because I believe it should be like
| THIS. My options are THESE."
|
| Venting is letting your emotions drive your actions. CBT is
| letting your reason temper your emotion. You control your
| actions in spite of your emotions.
| 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote:
| If the headline is true, yes. If the article is true, the
| opposite.
| Sohcahtoa82 wrote:
| Those are entirely different concepts.
|
| "Confronting one's fears" is usually about forcing yourself to
| accept and internalize that your fears are unfounded. Good
| examples are a fear of roller coasters, fear of flying, or
| basically anything else that is 99.999% harmless.
|
| Talking through problems is way to guide you (and potentially
| another person) into understanding, acceptance, and compromise.
| mwattsun wrote:
| I went through a Veterans Administration course of CBT and In
| Vivo Exposure Therapy and it was nothing like the "primal
| scream" therapies I did in the 90's that you may be thinking
| of. I thought "venting" was disproven to work in the late last
| century. That said, anything that interrupts a looping thought
| process is good. I've gone to the beach and rolled around in
| the cold pounding surf just to reset my head.
|
| https://centerforanxietydisorders.com/treatment-programs/in-...
| meowzero wrote:
| Not sure of the validity of the article. But in my experience, my
| friends and colleagues who vent a lot seem to vent all the time.
| It seem like their venting is fueling whatever their annoyances
| is at that moment.
|
| I think it's more about regulating your emotions in a calm,
| rational way. Venting can get emotional and could add fuel to the
| fire. But if you can achieve talking about the problem in a more
| calm, empathetic, rational way, it might work better. Of course,
| easier said than done.
| byoffor88 wrote:
| lcuff wrote:
| Doing good science around this kind of stuff is extremely
| difficult ...
|
| My personal experience with Psychodrama and Gestalt in the late
| '70s and early '80s was that for someone like myself who was very
| much 'in my head', it was an opportunity to acknowledge my own
| repressed anger. But in retrospect, it was/is also behavior
| rehearsal for bad behavior in the rest of my life. More effective
| was modern Somatic Experience techniques where the impulse to
| respond in anger is explored with a lot of inner attention and
| slow-motion movements of pushing away and/or striking back. I
| would call it more grounded and more present. There is
| dissociation that occurred for me with so-called cathartic anger.
|
| The variation in 'venting' adds to the complexity of the
| conversation. Physical venting vs naming sources of
| anger/frustration. Based on my personal experience, physical
| venting is far less effective than verbal venting, and of course
| verbal venting is massively variable. Naming the exact source of
| frustration strikes me as more likely to be usefully defusing
| than just shouting that someone is an f-ing a*hole. I can imagine
| the inclusion of humor, for example, would have a huge impact.
| notfbi wrote:
| I've noticed situations on the job where I've had little issues
| with management on my own, but experienced going out with
| drinks/coffees with gossipy venting colleagues and me
| internalizing their anger. This prima-facie seemed like the
| primary reason they did it.
|
| If venting is instead a coalitions/tribal consensus building
| exercise, the psychologists might need to wait until after the
| revolution to retest the subject's well-being.
| aseerdbnarng wrote:
| This naturally human response thats existed for longer than
| commerce needs to be suppressed because it doesn't further your
| career. Yup. Makes sense to me.
| birdmanjeremy wrote:
| "Stop Venting" doesn't just "work" either. Processing your
| emotions and letting go of them does. David Hawkins' book, aptly
| named 'Letting Go,' covers this in detail.
| [deleted]
| unfocussed_mike wrote:
| This is true, I suspect.
|
| Except if you make it funny.
|
| Funny venting -- exasperated joking -- is an enormously effective
| stress reduction tactic.
|
| The key point really I guess is that you have to have gone
| looking for the laugh before you let it out; that is likely the
| therapeutic value.
|
| "HELLO POLLLLLLYYYYY!"
| 6gvONxR4sf7o wrote:
| This seems like a great case of a bad headline derailing
| discussion. The first study quoted uses hitting a punching bag as
| an example of venting. I'd contrast that against what I think of
| as venting: talking about what's bothering you without looking
| for the discussion to solve anything other than providing space
| to say what you're feeling. When they say venting doesn't work,
| they're referring to a specific kind of venting.
|
| > In more general terms, embracing our feelings isn't the same as
| expressing them, and not all forms of expression are created
| equal. Realizing "I'm angry" (always OK) is a different beast
| from telling someone "I'm angry" (sometimes OK), and it's even
| further from berating a loved one for causing your anger (not
| OK).
|
| It's a good article with a nuanced point, and all the discussion
| reacting to the shitty headline is a shame.
| nineplay wrote:
| I've found the problem with venting can be that it cements an
| idea in your head.
|
| This is particularly true with people. If I find myself venting
| that <X> doesn't know what the heck they're doing, I've
| internally solidified that belief. If <X> improves, if I'm on
| another project with <X> where they clearly have a lot of
| knowledge, then it can still be too late. I've verbalized to
| myself ( and worse, my partner ) that X is incompetent and I'm
| not going to easily let that go.
|
| I think it's true with other things. <Y> is a terrible idea,
| <Z>'s code base is a mess. If I let it role over me, notice
| things without forcing an opinion, I'm more likely to realize
| I've judged to soon.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| This is an interesting one particularly when it comes to
| listening well in intimate relationships-- the wisdom is that
| men are generally worse listeners and have a tendency to want
| fix things rather than just being present with their partner to
| understand how they are feeling and where they are at. And that
| learning to do this and learning to _ask for it_ , are
| important pieces of long term relationship success.
|
| All of which makes sense, but I do think some of the times when
| I've struggled with this was maybe tied into what your
| describing: a concern that while my partner's _feelings_ of
| hurt or whatever were total valid, I found it hard to separate
| validating just the feelings while not also validating what I
| felt were unfair judgments /characterizations about the people
| or situations involved, and was nervous that letting those
| judgments go by unaddressed was indeed going to cement them as
| a future factual reference point.
| caddemon wrote:
| I agree with this to some extent, but I think when I get to the
| point of externally venting I've already pretty strongly
| internalized the thought. My larger concern with venting is
| that it seems to encourage bad next step coping strategies for
| me. I vent that "X is terrible so it's hard for me to get
| anything done" and oftentimes this gets validated in a way that
| encourages the "not getting anything done" part, which isn't
| helpful even when X actually is terrible. There's a fine line
| between recognizing that you're in a difficult situation and
| giving yourself an excuse to fail, at least for me.
|
| Like a lot of things, venting is probably good in moderation,
| as long as you are able to keep it in moderation. The most
| recent situation I was in I had trouble telling how much of the
| problem was on me, and then by venting to some coworkers I
| pretty quickly discovered that nearly everyone felt the same
| way about X. This was comforting at first, but the more we
| vented the more I felt justified in blowing off work. I didn't
| even replace that time with anything personally productive
| unfortunately. I've regrouped now and am working on getting out
| of the project the right way, but I wish I handled it better in
| the first place.
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