This week I’ve been reading about ‘emotional contagion‘ and the ripple effects of emotions.
Essentially the idea is that when one person expresses an emotion it can be mirrored by other people.
So the emotion ‘spreads’ from one person to another.
American social psychologist Elaine Hatfield was one of the first to scientifically define emotional contagion and explore how people unconsciously ‘catch’ emotions.
Of course, you don’t actually catch or receive the emotion, but you find yourself mimicking or imitating it.
Think about it for moment.
A time when you’ve seen or heard someone laughing and it’s made you smile or want to laugh out loud too…
We used to hear a man living somewhere behind us in our last home, with a huge belly laugh.
We never got to meet him, but boy, when you heard him laugh it was impossible not to join in.
Perhaps you’ve noticed a child marvel at something so simple, it fills you with a sense of wonder.
Or have you ever noticed how small children observe each other, they study and copy facial expressions?
It’s all part of our social learning.
How about when someone is sobbing so hard, it pulls at your heart strings?
How many movies have you cried at?
You might feel emotionally drained afterwards.
I know I’ve cried watching news coverage, seeing hurt and anguish.
When we see pain in others, we can almost feel it oursleves.
That amazing capacity we have to feel empathy.
The impacts can be both positive and negative… depending on the emotion, the people involved, and the overall context.
There’s the ability to absorb people’s negativity, especially in a workplace.
Or even their stress, anxiety or anger.
According to the research one expressive group member can subtly shift the tone of an entire team, impacting measurable results such as performance and satisfaction.
Causing an emotional ‘ripple effect’, if you like.
When you bring in things such as social media, you can see how its impact can really spread.
Through influencers…
Misinformation…
Through crowd mentality…
But let’s stick to the positives here.
Just the simple act of smiling at a person can make a difference.
They might not smile back.
But they just might.
“A warm smile is the universal language of kindness.” – William Arthur Ward
Isn’t that beautiful?
The universal language of kindness…
Or how about…
“A smile is the shortest distance between two people.” – Unknown
This quote in particular struck me…
“Everyone smiles in the same language.” – George Carlin
Yes!
If we are automatically part of emotional contagion… let’s at least try to make the ripple effects positive ones.
“‘Cause when you’re smilin’… the whole world smiles with you…”
Now that’s a beautiful vision I would love to see…
Ann 🙏