Anyway, I've been thinking about this lately. And, in my thinking, I've narrowed social skills down to 2 intersecting continuums?... continuui?... whateverthepluralofcontinuumis.
First, what brought this on: It's become quite apparent to me that most people are lacking social skills in one way or another. Some people may be plenty loud and outgoing, but lack what I'll now term social empathy. Or, others who have social empathy up the wazoo are too quiet. So, without further ado, my *ahem* Axes of Social Ability:
The Introvert/Extrovert Axis:
We're all familiar with this one. Extroverts talk to everyone and are at the very least "loud enough". They function well in large groups of people, speak with sufficient volume, and are so-called social butterflies. Introverts are less comfortable in large groups of people, and will favour the company of few over the company of many. They are more independent, and may talk quieter on average (I've made no effort to verify this).
The Social Empathy Axis:
Where the Introvert/Extrovert axis deals with general social comfort, this axis deals more with one's responsiveness to the social needs of others. This may take a bit more explaining. Individuals blessed with an ideal amount social empathy are very perceptive of others. They notice everyone around them, and make an active effort to include individuals into conversations. People lacking in social empathy tend to be more socially "greedy". That is, they socialize primarily to entertain themselves, and don't focus on people who aren't entertaining them at that moment. People with too much social empathy develop a bit of a paranoia of the motives or feelings of others, over-think most social interactions, and probably come off as way too "nice".
The ideal place to plot on these axes is right in the middle, I'd say. People who are too extroverted get annoying. People who are too introverted just come off as loners. People with too little social empathy are too socially greedy, while people with too much social empathy over-think every social interaction to the point where it becomes a hinderance, and they just seem awkward.
So, there you have it. I may expand on this later. Or I may end up dismissing it as total bullshit. Whatever.
Where do you think you plot on the.....
Axes of Social Ability
?
Edit: It's occurred to me that I should probably plot myself, so I don't come off as a self-absorbed twat who just judges others. I'm an introvert and I have too high social empathy, to the point where I just say "fuckit" and shut everyone out when I'm not in a conversational mood. Being an introvert makes that pretty easy to do.
See? I'm just as socially inept as you are! Yeah... you.
I think you're on to something here. It makes me wonder if there have been any papers published on the subject.
ReplyDeletei don't think i consider myself introverted or extroverted. I try to include people in conversations but I can get distracted. Its interesting that introverted-ness is seen as bad. no introverts like being introverted. nice people also don't want to be nice. I don't understand how anyone can be too "nice" if it's a legitimate niceness and they're not just doing it to manipulate people down the line.
ReplyDeleteAlso, there are lots of really nice people that are "loud", and lots of "quiet" people who are assholes.
There's a million ways to interpret what people do or say. Even the slightest change in how you say something effects the interpretation. People always think I'm sarcastic when I say something like "yeah that's pretty good" because I have no emphasis when I say it, even though I mean it. The same word can have different meanings to different people. So I think it's best to just never interpret anything.
I'm sure there are a million papers published on this kind of thing.