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It may be a good idea to keep on with your cursing if you can keep it controlled for certain situations.
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If cussing's a curse, not cussing's worse
By Ruth Wajnryb
November 29, 2003
First it was road rage. Then air rage, lift rage, phone rage and surf rage. Now, thanks to water restrictions, we have hose rage. At least there's some constancy in an age of flux.
Now violence is a no-no, lacking any remedial attributes, but I am loath to condemn verbal assault. Notwithstanding the possible offence caused by blasphemy or obscenities, swearing seems to have two advantages. It releases impotent rage, enabling it to spill over and not escalate into the physical kind. And it actually indicates that things aren't too bad, after all.
Let me explain by pointing you to a piece of research into stress and swearing, conducted about 40 years ago by Elizabeth Ross, who went with a team of university zoologists on an expedition to Arctic Norway. Eight people were involved, including three, non-swearing, women.
The research, reported by Ashley Montagu in The Anatomy of Swearing, uncovered two kinds of swearing: social and annoyance. Under conditions of low or no stress, the swearing was of a social nature. This swearing was solidarity-oriented and accounted for most of the swearing on the expedition. Another factor in social swearing is the audience. In the presence of other swearers, swearing is mutually reinforcing. But the absence of an appreciative audience inhibits social swearing.
In the week before the expedition, when the men had been together, swearing had been common and friendly. But they felt they had to watch their tongues when the women arrived, not only because of the gender factor but because they were new to a group that had already bonded.
At one point during the expedition, half the group left on a separate trip, including the three non-swearers. The swearing rate among those who remained behind doubled and remained high, which boosted solidarity.
Annoyance swearing was seen as different from social swearing. It occurred under conditions of low to medium stress and functioned irrespective of audience. In fact, as the stress increased, the social swearing went down and the annoyance swearing went up. As the stress continued to rise, social swearing ceased, while annoyance swearing continued to a point and then dropped. In high-stress situations, swearing stopped altogether. One inference to be drawn here is that annoyance swearing in moderately stressful circumstances is a sign that a situation is not unbearable.
It is not necessary, of course, to go all the way to Artic Norway to find out that swearing is socially acquired, not genetic, and that it is a stress-relieving strategy. Bottom line: if you're worried about which laid-off employee is going to show up with a semi-automatic and shoot up the office, be wary of the non-swearers.
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"That which is common to the greatest number has the least care bestowed upon it." -- Aristotle
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