So, since I obviously was confused about this in class today, I decided to try and find an example of it in my life so that I would not forget.... again…
So, as most people who know me are aware, I have nine piercings (all of which you can see so get your mind out of the gutter!). What most people don’t know is how I got my first piercing, which is what started me in my slight addition to metallic adornments.
When I was seventeen I wanted my cartilage pierced so bad. I already had my ears doubles pierced and I just knew that getting my upper ear pierced would add to the ambiance of my right ear. Well, my mom was not having any of that. –A slight note here. My mom is absolutely NOT the kind of mother okay with her daughter getting pierced and tatted, let me just tell you. My mom was 45 before she got her own ears pierced and it took her four months, okay lets be honest maybe it was more like six, to make the decision and get up the courage to walk into Claire’s and have them pierce her ears.—So, holy moly was she not having any of my crap when I told her I wanted my cartilage pierced. However, I being the conniving child that I am, know my mother’s personality like the back of my hand and knew that if I continually told my mom that there was never any way she would ever let me do it—knowing full well this would make her take me sooner than trying to reach her through rational arguments.
I used the theory of psychological reactance, or what lay people call “reverse psychology,” to inadvertently push my mom to take me to get my ear pierced (Brehm & Brehm, 1981). To make myself feel better and so everyone doesn’t think I’m a total Antichrist, the only reason I did this was because I couldn’t go by myself yet (you have to be 18 to get a piercing on your own). Psychological reactance is the idea that we all treasure our freedom to think and act the way that we each want, not other people; when we feel as if our freedom to make our own choices is being threatened we become motivated to maintain the status of our freedom and when we feel like our freedom is falling away we will do most anything to restore it.
For two, solid months I kept telling my mom things like “it’s okay, I know you’re not the type of person who’s okay with stuff like this,” or most frequently I would say something along the lines of “I just know you absolutely won’t take me.” Saying these things continually to my mom I induced the my mom to react to my continual comments with a negative attitude change (Hellar et al., 1973). In other words, because I repeatedly told my mom that she absolutely was not going to let me pierce my ear she reacted with a direction shift opposite what I was advocating (even though I knew she agreed with it) and took me to a tattoo parlor for my first legitimate piercing, which was my plan all along. It totally worked!
The moral of the story here is kids, use reverse psychology on your parents to gain revenge for all the time they tricked you into eating nasty vegetables! Just kidding… or am i?
Brehm, S. S., & Brehm J. W. (1981). Psychological reactance: A theory of freedom and control. New York: Academic Press.
Heller, J. F., Pallak, M. S., & Picek, J. M. (1973). The interactive effects of intent and threat on boomerang attitude change. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 5, 74-95.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
My last post was actually about body piercings and attitudes, but after reading your blog, I see how psychological reactance totally applies to my body piercing too!
It seems that you really played on your mom's emotions, without even realizing the psychological theories you were using in your manipulation. My parents are unfortunately not gullible enough to fall prey to negative attitude change, and always just give up and let me badger them with bogus claims about what they are and are not going to do.
I think it's a sign that your mom supports your wishes within reason, and finally viewed the piercing as pretty harmless. I still haven't told my mom I had my lip pierced for a day, and I sort of plan on keeping that a secret! Hopefully I can use the "well, at least I didn't go through with the body piercing" to get her to view me more favorably in the future! :)
That is so funny because almost the same thing happened to me! In seventh grade I really wanted to get my ears double pierced and my mom did not really see any problem in that, but my dad was a little more hesitant. We were at the mall one day and when we walked past the sign at Claire's for ear piercing I made the comment that he would never let me go in and finally get my ears double pierced, especially without my mom. Next thing I know, we are walking into the store and filling out the paperwork! I never thought about it until you wrote your blog, but psychological reactance really helped me out!
Post a Comment