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- A self help and improvement book
- A self help and improvement book
- What is subtle about social
Shyness
Shyness occurs when social anxiety is paired with reticent, cautions, and guarded social behavior. Shy behavior may range from mild inhibition, involving bashful timidity or wary watchfulness, to stronger distancing behavior that can include total withdrawal form social settings. That is a broad range, and no one pattern of behavior reliably distinguishes shyness form cooler, calmer states (such as those associated with introversion) that lead one to be quiet and reserved in the absence of any anxiety. Shy behavior may thus seem ambiguous to observers; it is obviously not gregarious and convivial, but whether it derives from shy trepidation, a mild manner, dullness, or unfriendly lack of interest may be hard to judge.
Proneness to shame and proneness to guilt
How do people react to their own failures and transgressions? People vary considerably in how they feel when they recognize that they have failed or behaved badly. For example, given the same event--say, hurting a friend's feelings--an individual prone to guilt would be likely to respond by ruminating about the offensive remark, feeling bad about hurting a friend, and being compelled to apologize and make up for it. A shame-prone individual, instead, is likely to see the event as proof that he or she is a bad friend--indeed, a bad person. Feeling small and worthless, the shame-prone person may be inclined to slink away and avoid the friend for fear of further shame. When people feel shame they feel bad about themselves- "small", however when people feel guilt they feel their conscience and feel morally bad that they did something wrong or are "guilty". The two are so different there can be "shame-free" guilt and "guilt-free" shame.
People can also blame other people instead of feeling shame for themselves, or maybe people that suffer from the pain and self-diminishment of shame may become defensive and angry and attempt to deflect blame outward. Because shame and guilt are painful emotions providing negative feedback for wrong-doing, it is often assumed that both motivate individuals to do the right thing. That isn't necessarily the case, however, someone could experience a lot of shame and still do lots of bad things (or do lots of bad things and not experience any shame).
Goals, motivation and perception
Social interaction can be motivated by a number of different drives. Motivation will affect the perceptual activity that takes place. The social situation in which A sees B at a party, or in some other open setting, and is deciding whether or not to interact with B. The problem here is one of predicting B's behavior - will B be a sufficiently entertaining and agreeable person to talk to? Is he likely to be able to tell A the way? etc. The prediction here is about behavior which is relevant to A's goals in this particular situation, and whether B is likely to be able to help him to realize these goals.
If A decides to initiate an encounter with B, A's initial problem is to select an appropriate interaction style from his repertoire that is suitable for B. If A behaves differently to others of different sex, age and social class (as everyone in fact does), he needs to be able to categorize B in terms of these variables, and whatever others are salient for him. At this stage then A is concerned with certain demographic and personality variables in B; once this is done that particular perceptual task is over, though some revision be made in the light of further experience of B.
Source:
OpenStax, A self help and improvement book: useful psychology information (an integration of personality, social, interaction, communication and well-being psychology). OpenStax CNX. Jul 11, 2016 Download for free at http://legacy.cnx.org/content/col11139/1.47
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