Saturday Audience Participation
Today's Question: When in a public space such as a mall, restaurant, or store, why is it more annoying to hear someone have a cellphone conversation than to hear two people speak to each other in person?
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Cellphone Convos
Today's Question: When in a public space such as a mall, restaurant, or store, why is it more annoying to hear someone have a cellphone conversation than to hear two people speak to each other in person?
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16 comments:
My guesses:
1. Hearing someone talk to himself in a one-sided conversation conjures up images of crazy streetpeople talking to imaginary friends/enemies.
2. We feel disgust for pompous, narcissistic dorks who can't be without their techno toys for even a couple of hours, even in public places. This is especially true when the convo consists of nothing but banal descriptions of whatever the cellphoner happens to be doing at that very moment (which is about 90% of the cellphone convos I overhear).
We have a natural suspicion when we can't follow a conversation, e.g. those talking in code or a foreign language. There is a breakdown of trust, and it alerts our wariness.
I'm thinking it would be colossally creepy to be near and aware of two people conversing by mental telepathy. A one sided cell phone convo is kind of like one person using telepathy.
i get annoyed when two people are talking loudly to each other. people are usually louder when talking on cell phones than when talking to each other.
also, the disjointedness of the cell phone conversation draws more attention to the fact that a conversation is occurring. face-to-face banter is mostly seamless and becomes background noise.
plus, the fact that public cell phone use is still considered rude makes us antagonistic to it - whether it is actually all that annoying. kind of like people who tailgate in traffic. sometimes i find myself inadvertently tailgaiting, but i get pissed when people tailgate me.
I like the previous replies. Good thoughts.
For my perspective, I'm not sure it really varies between celly and face-to-face talk. I think it varies mostly with volume and topic.
Scenario I: You're at a near-empty restaurant, and it so quiet that you can hear the lady at an adjacent table passing over pleasantries (how tasty the chicken is, nice to be getting some sunshine, her aged father has recovered thank you for asking) on a cell phone. There is no arguing or grandstanding.
To me: not annoying.
Scenario II: You're at a restaurant. Two folks are talking, and one of them has a quiet voice and is facing away from you so you can't hear a word he says. The person he's talking to (facing you) is very loud and repetitive, and keeps "assertively" point out her/his needs.
To me: very annoying, and it would be worse if you could hear both people.
Point is, people on cell phones are always being "assertive" (childish and demanding) because they can get away with more BS if they don't have to either look at the facial reactions of who they are talking to, or worry that they're going to get slugged. Face talk is not like that.
A conventional telephone is built to give the speaker feedback so that these speaker can hear themselves.
However, cell phones do not have any feedback mechanism. So many people talk louder so that it sounds the same as when they are on the phone.
superdestroyer, B Lode:
your comments made me realize something: I haven't talked on a conventional phone in years. Damn.
But the feedback thing is correct. IIRC, it seemed easier to communicate on telephones. There wasn't as much starting, stopping, and confusion in the conversation. It seems like most of my lengthy cell phone conversations are filled with "No, you go ahead" and "Oh, sorry, I'll wait." The conversants seem to talk over each other. I don't really know why that is, but I can only speculate that it has something to do with the feedback.
So as you said, its almost like a cell phone conversation turns into one person barking at another trying to get out as much as they can in one breath. Its really a very cumbersome form of communication now that I think about it. I've taken it for granted so much that I haven't thought about it in a while.
I recall reading that we are unused to the one-sided conversations posed by cell-phone use. Our brains start trying to fill-in the blanks, of what's being said on the other side.
And while with a landline, we assuredly know the person on our end, with cellphones, we're stuck trying to piece out the details on a complete stranger who has forced himself upon us.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=cell-phone-annoying
Shorter version (http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=120118):
Overhearing someone talk on a cell phone can be very annoying because it makes it hard, if not impossible, to concentrate on what you're doing, according to a new study.
Hearing just one side of the conversation is much more distracting than hearing both sides and erodes your attention to other tasks, explained Lauren Emberson, a psychology Ph.D. candidate at Cornell University.
She played recordings of one side and both sides of a conversation to volunteers as they tried to complete computer tasks that required attention, such as using a mouse to track a moving dot. The participants did much worse on the task when they could hear only half of the conversation, she discovered.
Your brain tends to ignore predictable things, but pays more attention to unpredictable situations. When you hear both sides of a conversation, it flow predictably. But just one side of phone conversation is quite unpredictable, Emberson explained -- that's why it's so hard to shut out.
The study appears in the journal Psychological Science.
Talking on a cell phone in public "has a really profound effect on the cognition of people around you, and it's not because they're eavesdropping or they're bad people. Their cognitive mechanism basically means that they're forced to listen," Emberson said in an Association for Psychological Science news release.
Maybe our brains unconsciously try to fill in the gaps to compensate for the disoreder/unpredictability.
When in a public space such as a mall, restaurant, or store, why is it more annoying to hear someone have a cellphone conversation than to hear two people speak to each other in person?
Because the person on the cell phone is making an inherently anti-social statement.
If someone was reading a book, you'd know that if you had to say something to them you could gently draw their attention from the book.
But when someone's on a cell phone he's in his own little world, cut off from everyone around him and protected from outside stimuli by the self-fostered illusion that he’s interacting with an actual human being who can’t be troubled by an interruption in the so called “conversation”.
Thus cell phone use makes the people around the cell phone user feel, rightfully, socially snubbed in a way which they tend to find hurtful.
My gym has a no-cell-phone policy in workout areas and members rarely violate it. On two occasions I had to play "phone police."
One time in the cardio room, I started glaring at a woman who was talking softly on her cell. What annoyed me about her is that she clearly looked like an entitled yuppie bitch in her early 30s. No-cell signs are prominently posted all over the walls, so she was just brazenly acting as she's above the rules. She caught my glare and embarrasedly put the phone away.
Another time, a guy in his twenties was talking loudly on a hands-free set while using a machine. I approached him and firmly but politely told him that he needs to hang up or go out into the hallway. He got confrontational wiht me but complied. I picked up on grateful looks from other members in the room.
I simply woud be unable to work out with a cell phone talker nearby, even if he were talking inaudibly. It woudl fuck with my concentration and workout vibe.
In contrast, loud and boisterous conversarions of groups of guys working out at the next benchover are perfectly fine for me. In fact, if the guys are advanced lifter or high school athletes, those convos even enhance the workout for me by amping out the T factor.
amping UP the T factor.
"Convos"?
Modern liberalism a slippery slope, OneSTDV, and it grieves me to watch you slither down it.
I don't mind cell phone conversations conducted in public as much as many seem to do. Since the talkers are in public, I feel free to interrupt them ("Excuse me, please" if they are standing in my way--and they often are) or even to comment on their "convo".
To those who are really bothered by public cell phone "convos", just think how rapidly their frequency would decline if the offenders knew they would be subject to complete strangers chiming in.
The reason is that the talker, usually a young female, gets psychologically thrilled by being the recipient of a call, and thus speaks faster, louder and longer than she otherwise would. In face-to-face chats, people are either trying to save the other person's time, or there's non-verbal communication to fill in gaps.
@ Kylie:
I don't know if you're serious or not, but I do find your contention that I'm one step from liberalism quite amusing.
@ OneSTDV:
"@ Kylie:
I don't know if you're serious or not, but I do find your contention that I'm one step from liberalism quite amusing."
No, that's not what I contend.
But I am glad--and relieved--to learn that I amuse you. That's a point in your favor, if not in mine. I find most liberals have no sense of humor beyond enjoying pithy sayings like "Kill Bush!"
A point to consider is how people seem unable to resist the ring of a cell phone. They have to answer, no matter what they are doing, even if speeding along on the freeway or in the midst of a business meeting. It's as if people have become Pavlovian dogs, conditioned to act at the ringing of a bell. This makes it often impossible to get anything done because you know that there will be the interruption of a cell phone, followed by a usually pointless conversation.
Another point is that while all these conversations are being done in the name of being "connected," the reality is that people are more alienated than ever. Talking at a disembodied voice is not conversation.
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