A recent study conducted by scientists at the University of Southern California have found that it takes longer for the average human brain to acknowledge stories relating to social or emotional issues than it does to register associations with stories of physical issues.
Test subjects were told stories concerning anonymous people overcoming various physical, emotional, and psychological stresses, and had their brains monitored for emotional reactions. Apparently the subjects were quicker to react to tales of physical hardship and pain than they were to stories about social or psychological woes. The study sponsors concluded that in our rapid-information society, where news flits in and out with rapidity, adherents to social networks like Twitter and Facebook might not allow users the necessary time to properly reflect on the import of some of the stories they read from friends and from news feeds.
Speaking for myself, however, I’ve found that there are other factors at play that mitigate against this facile judgment. For one thing, as a Twitter user myself, I’ve found that everyone I follow are immediately ready with sympathy when some news of tragedy — regardless of actual nature or cause — comes to the public. Some people are likely merely being polite in rendering words of support, but that’s probably a lifetime-learned response. For some people, the immediate reaction to hearing about personal trouble is sympathy, even without forethought. But there are also many instances of immediately-given help that would seem to prove the lie to the idea that users of social networks are slow to react to any kind of plea for assistance.
Another factor to consider is that news articles are sometimes subject to editorial slant, and article titles in particular can be written in such a way as to immediately generate some type of reaction, positive or negative. A reader’s mind, therefore, might already be set upon a particular reactive path before even getting into the details of the piece.
Finally, there are just some people who are more given to introspection than others. There are those who prefer to keep to themselves and not invest themselves with thoughts of the welfare of strangers. There are people who will have past experiences that will cause them to react with immediate negativity to certain elements of a story. So, as with all such studies like this, there are too many influencing factors to truly account for when trying to prove a hypothesis — but as a way of generating talk and controversy, nothing works better.
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