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Previously awkward teens, how did you eventually figure it out? (lemmy.world)
submitted 4 months ago by to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
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Trying to get some input for someone else. Was thinking of upskilling, finding a group, developing a hobby, guided activities. Any ideas?

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[–] 4 points 4 months ago* (13 children)

That's not quite true. It is also built into us to not care about certain people. While what you say is true about our in-group, it's not true about the out-group. So what you can actually do is mentally identify certain people as not belonging to your group, and then you can actually not care about what they think.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (12 children)

    Throughout most of human history, the only people you even knew about were those in your tribe and your neighboring tribe. Whether they were friends or enemies, you still very much cared what they thought about you.

    The fact that we now have people in our lives we don't need to care about is a modern luxury that our evolution hasn't caught up with.

    I stand behind everything I said: we care, and when we think we don't care is when we especially care.

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    Research disagrees with you, humans are very much capable of not caring about certain people. Also, I'm glad you never had to experience what people truly not caring is like.

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  • [–] 3 points 4 months ago (2 children)

    I'd like to see that research if you wouldn't mind linking it.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (1 child)

    https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317615470_Empathy_Group_Identity_and_the_Mechanisms_of_Exclusion_An_Investigation_into_the_Limits_of_Empathy

    There are a lot of these kind of studies about empathy. I didn't find any particularly about "what this other person thinks of me" (I don't know if there is a specific name for this that would be easier to search), but I think the logical leap from "being able to disable empathy for other people" to "not care what those people think about you" is not really disputable. Though of course it might not be quite the same thing, I think when you can disable empathy for someone, you can also pretty easily disable to care about what they think of you.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    Well, I think those are two different things. Empathy is about feeling or understanding someone else's emotions. Being able to dial that down (like a surgeon or soldier does) doesn't mean you stop caring what people think of you. Psychopaths are a good example - very low empathy, but often highly attuned to social perception because it helps them manipulate others.

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  • [–] 3 points 4 months ago (7 children)

    Throughout most of human history, the only people you even knew about were those in your tribe and your neighboring tribe. Whether they were friends or enemies, you still very much cared what they thought about you.

    This sounds like some anthropology shower thought I'm not sure I'd hang a theory on.

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  • [–] 0 points 4 months ago (6 children)

    That's a very easy way to dismiss an idea without actually engaging with it. Could you explain what specifically you think is wrong with it, or offer a better alternative explanation? Otherwise it just comes across as 'I don't like the sound of this.'

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (5 children)

    It's really overly simple and makes a lot of assumptions. We only knew people in our immediate area ergo empathy is part of our hardcoded biology. Is there any research backing it up?

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (4 children)
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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (3 children)

    And where does any of that link it to your theory of only knowing a few people around us made us biologically empathetic?

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (2 children)

    I haven't made such a claim. If you think I'm wrong, then let's see the studies backing that up. I've already spent 10x the effort and good faith in my responses compared to what I've gotten back from you, so now's the time to return the favour.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (1 child)

    Throughout most of human history, the only people you even knew about were those in your tribe and your neighboring tribe. Whether they were friends or enemies, you still very much cared what they thought about you.

    This is why I said it sounded like bs in the first place. You said now there are other people but we still care in a "hardcoded" sense. How does knowing only a few people connect to our empathy?

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    I haven't said a word about empathy. The discussion is about reputation management and social status.

    My claim is that caring what other people think about you is in our biology and can't be turned off.

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