The Influence Of Gossip

Great Essays
According to Dunbar, gossip as a term, that examines social interactions and relationships to facilitate and create meaningful conversations between humans, inviting them to share their knowledge and ideas with one another. Gossip is the backbone of significant conversations for people in its provocative nature. People love to share ideas with one another, especially if it feeds them with new information on their outer relationships (Dunbar, 5). Dunbar describes gossip as a habit of one refraining themselves from isolation. His research indicates that 2/3 of conversations will include gossip in them, leading Dunbar to presume that gossip is a method of social inclusiveness that strives to create relationships consisting of comfortable and …show more content…
For about twenty years, the range of most people’s social circles were mainly embedded to real-life encounters exclusively. It seems that social networking sites have transcended the limitation of time-schedules and geographic locations that factor into the encounters between individuals. One of the unforeseen and intriguing by-products of this technological revolution has been the sporadic mentality of gaining the most number of friends on one’s personal site. Some of these claims have been exaggerated with the number of registered friends running into the tens of thousands in some cases. Although, this signifies that the distribution number of friends is largely misrepresented and distorts in actuality the truth of the average number of friends individuals have on their list, with just a handful having numbers above two hundred. The accountability of what constitutes who a legitimate friend is, is also an important subject. Some users have a large number for the amount of friends they have, yet know minimal details about them (Dunbar, …show more content…
Pinker 's writings in The Language Instinct also refers to the power that lingers in conversation and language between people. As stated, valuable communication provides certain individuals with more opportunities to re-modify and add to their social circles while interacting with others, thereby developing the ability to replicate and hand over their heightened language abilities to their kin. (Pinker, 379). It is evident that gossip is an essential factor to developing effective language and communication, and the evolution of knowledge through conversation and gossip has equipped humans to create a creative and colorful society that facilitates conversations on a daily basis, proving the importance of language Gossip is critical for the dependence of cooperative efforts of human survival by forming alliances created by exchanging information and commitments. This asserts complex grammar for efficient usage, because recursion creates alternative means for gossiping; an apparently universal human vice (Pinker, 380). Social media is likewise associated in the language evolution, by formulating new ways to create conversation and meaning through the use of words. Users are given opportunities to formulate discussion amongst their fellow users with topics of interest as well as gossip while using these

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Is Facebook Really Changing Our Society? In his essay “Faux Friendship”, William Deresiewicz discusses the impact of social-networking websites on how modern society perceives friendship. Deresiewicz argues that websites such as Facebook convey a false sense of connection and extinguish the intimacy that composes a true friendship. He also claims that the dynamics of Facebook leave no room for deep conversations, and concludes by claiming that the online social media imported the principles of professional networking to interpersonal human relations, damaging their personal nature.…

    • 836 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    (Brownlow, 2012, page 266), the geographical closeness is not anymore required for this connection, with the invention of the internet and mobile phones. Raacke and Bonds-Raacke’s study showed that social networking online is very much in use for keeping in touch with…

    • 1448 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In this society, not too many people realize that their social media friendships are not the same as a true friendship. According from Curtis Silver, the author of “The Quagmire of Social Media Friendships”, he argues that these social media relationships cause conflicts amongst people. His inner beliefs notice how people do not overlook their relationship with their friends. Silver points out to his readers that the Dunbar number theory illustrates the desire to prove that this is essential to figuring out the sufficient logic behind relationships. The greatest challenge is coming to a decision whether or not that the difference corresponds to one another.…

    • 860 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Facebook has been a medium to help people meet others that are far apart, but it has also turned out to be a way to lock people into solitude. According to Marche, “We meet fewer people. We gather less. And when we gather, our bonds are less meaningful and less easy”. In other words, we are loosing connection between those…

    • 1112 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    I hate it when I have prepared, a carefully crafted soliloquy, a sentiment of pure splendor, a plethora of plentiful thought, and my script is discard within seconds because the conversation takes a detour. Conversations are inimitable and completely wild. They roam from topic to topic without a glance at the well written thoughts I have so tedious prepare the night before. When I reach a place to interject a bit of my rehearsed dialogue, it comes unnatural and the conversation withers within seconds. This only contributes to the fascination and passion I have for writing.…

    • 626 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Columnist Gregory Rodriguez has written about things such as immigration, political issues, as well as rumors. In “Truth is in the Ear of the Beholder” he discusses why people believe rumors for many reasons from trying to make themselves feel better, wanting it to be true and making sense of the world around them. Rumors can happen to anyone, including the President of the United States, usually very controversial, but that doesn’t prevent rumors from being told or believed. While he brings legitimate points to his argument to persuade readers there are also some fault in them as well. Rumors are processed differently as people hear them because of their own desires.…

    • 1311 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    Can the average social media user live without exploring social media every hour? Social media is extremely popular among the teenagers, and it affects not only teenagers but other ages as well. The effects of social platforms have on teenagers are not sleeping, females are concerned about their image, and social skills. In today’s world, social media became a platform not only to interact, but to be a part of an online community. There are many reasons people use social media today, such to create developing friendships, start online relationships, or to discover what new things are happening worldwide.…

    • 1397 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Communication is the basic step for people to live in the society. Gilbert thinks that people need communication because “ One of the benefits of being a social and linguistic animal is that we can capitalize on the experiences of others rather than trying to figure everything out for ourselves”(211). Individuals all need socialize and communicate with others to get themselves developed. They can learn lots of knowledge and experiences to be succeed and to be happy. Communication is the chance for people to get promotion.…

    • 1214 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the article “ Is Facebook making us lonely?” Stephen Marche provides an eye-opening piece stating the long term effects that the internet and social media portrays on the human mind and body. He provides statistics and examples of how the internet can affect our health, however these health concerns may only be affecting you because you have let them. The author demonstrates that social media is giving users a scapegoat to avoid physical contact, which in the long run is creating further problems in loneliness and anxiety which already existed. Stephen Marche conveys the idea that the internet has provoked feelings of loneliness through aiding in creating digital connections without providing the physical aspect as well yet, the internet…

    • 706 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    False Light Claims

    • 923 Words
    • 4 Pages

    When personal gossip attains the dignity of print, and crowds the space available for matters of real interest to the community, what wonder that the ignorant and thoughtless mistake its relative importance. Easy of comprehension, appealing to that weak side of human nature which is never wholly cast down by the misfortunes and frailties of our neighbors, no one can be surprised that it usurps the place of interest in brains capable of other things. Triviality destroys at once robustness of thought and delicacy of feeling. No enthusiasm can flourish, no generous impulse can survive under its blighting…

    • 923 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Comparably the development of internet technologies means that individuals can communicate online in various ways such as email, forums and webcam video, this means that it has become easier to maintain and even develop relationships online over long distances. The emergence of social networking websites has created new ways of developing and maintaining friendships online, this use of technologies may lead to the questioning of our understanding of friendship and the potentially damaging effects of excessive use of social networking sites (Brownlow, 2012, p. 266). Something else to consider is the cultural differences in understanding, friendship and how online friendships show this as most of the communication online is still conducted in English, as is the research in this area, if such research was limited to online methods, these populations would be excluded (Brownlow, 2012, p. 267). However, Bigelow and La Gaipa (1975) could not have known that sometime in the future children would be as likely to interact with online friends as friends in the playground, this is an example of the way new technologies and the changing way of how people interact, brings about new challenges for psychologists to address. We will now look at research on the structure and…

    • 1579 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Rumors are unverified accounts of the truth, yet people often hear rumors and believe them to be fact. Psychologist Daniel Goleman’s article “Anatomy of a Rumor: It Flies on Fear” sets out to explain why rumors spread and provide a solution on how to fight them. He divides his article into six different sections to help the reader better understand. Goleman’s article is an interesting look at the world of rumors and explains to the reader in a logical manner why they spread. Goleman begins his article by introducing the reader to three different examples of a rumor.…

    • 1048 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Deresiewicz notes “With the social-networking sites of the new century- Friendster and Myspace were launched in 2003, Facebook in 2004-the friendship circle has expanded to engulf the whole of social world…” (440). People are becoming friends through social media in nowadays. Facebook and Myspace are widely used to make friends and to reconnect with old friends, along with several other social media sites. This proves that, since social media like Facebook and Myspace are invented in this world, friendship has changed. People are no longer seeing each other face to face.…

    • 814 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Do you lack effective conversation skills? Do you feel like people ignore what you have to say? Do you quake with fear when talking to a group of people? Steve Brown address these questions in his book How To Talk So People Will Listen. His book teaches people how to convey their message effectively.…

    • 963 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Deborah Tannen in her Essay, the “the Power of Talk” dissects how communication tells not only ideas, but the power structure of a conversation. Tannen looks at the fundamental differences within people to show how power can change in a conversation. Looking specifically at gender, culture, and job standings - Tannen can understand how those anthropological aspects affect conversation. Within individual speech patterns, communication can be used to pinpoint the imbalance of power in a group setting.…

    • 701 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays