Skip to main content
Tweeted twitter.com/#!/StackCogSci/status/544452553606709248
Source Link

How does look, tone and voice manipulate behavior

I am socially anxious person with wooden behavior and emotions. Unlike others, I try to suspend emotions and stay stoic when I feel uncomfortable. That's my weakness because I don't let others see how I feel and that only let's them the freedom to behave as they want with me. I am not talking about cultural, polite and compassionate people, but less civilized ones who are opposite to description I just gave.

What I have noticed is that such people react differently to emotional people who do not hold anything in them and behave as they see fit. I have noticed that look, tone and voice can manipulate behavior and instill fear in non-emotional people. I have listed 3 examples below:

Look - when you are being talked to with angry look, if you don't show same angry look and react in a normal polite way, you just give person freedom to keep talking in such manner to you.

Voice - if you are being talked to with raised voice, you need to adjust to same voice of person talking to you, but stay calm and you give freedom to person talking to you to treat you that way.

Tone - we'll take customer service as an example when it comes to customers fighting for their rights and claiming what they deserve. Because in phone conversation there's only hearing involved, tone and voice play important roles that determine the outcome of conversation. Polite and cultural people are easy to deal with while it's hard to deal with opposite people who don't feel limits in how they react. Those impudent people usually get what they want by being emotionally manipulative compared to the opposite type of people.

I guess with this question I wanted to get more input from others here and to know how wooden people should deal in stressful situations being as they are, implying freedom to emotionally-unrestricted people to talk to them as they see fit. Should such susceptible people keep being socially avoidant type of people to avoid conflicts or become as their opposites through cognitive behavioral therapy or hypnosis?