하품으로 사이코패스 여부 알 수 있어 Is that person a psychopath? A yawn might help you tell
하품은 전염되는 성질있어
다른 사람과의 공감대 형성 의미
상대방 하품에 무반응 사이코패스 가능성
Shutterstock
edited by kcontents
케이콘텐츠 편집
하품을 하는 동영상을 보고도 사이코패스 가능성 여부를 판단할 수 있다는 연구결과가 나왔다. 하품 동영상을 본다고 가정해 보자. 자신도 모르는 사이 쫓아서 하품하게 되는가, 아니면 아무 생각 없이 하품하는 장면을 쳐다볼 수 있는가. 이 동영상을 보고도 입가 한 번 씰룩거리지 않는다면 사이코패스일 가능성이 높다는 주장인 것이다. 학술지 '성격과 개인차(Personality and Individual Differences)저널’에 실린 최신 논문에 따르면 하품은 전염되는 성질이 있으며 이는 다른 사람과의 공감대 형성을 의미한다. 즉 하품에 대한 민감도는 공감도 수치를 측정하는 기준이 된다는 것이다. 자신과 마주앉은 사람이 계속 하품을 하고 있는데도 불구하고 무관심으로 일관할 수 있다면 다른 사람과 공감대를 잘 형성하지 못하는 사이코패스 기질을 갖고 있을 수 있다는 것이 연구팀의 주장이다. 그렇다면 사이코패스는 어떤 성향을 가지고 있을까. 정신의학자 데이비드 M. 레이스 박사에 따르면 가학적인 쾌감을 즐기고, 삶의 주요 목적은 다른 사람을 조정하고 그로부터 만족감을 얻는데 있다. 사이코패스하면 아무런 죄책감 없이 다른 사람을 살해하는 범죄자를 떠올리기 쉽다. 하지만 이처럼 강력범죄를 저지르는 사람뿐 아니라 평범한 생활을 하는 사람들 중에도 사이코패스 기질을 가진 사람들은 얼마든지 있다. 심지어 사회적으로 성공한 사람들 중 일부도 이러한 기질을 갖고 있는 것으로 보고되고 있다. 사악하고 심술궂으며 자기애가 강한 속성은 사업적 성공을 거둘 수 있는 자질의 일부가 된다는 것이다. ‘행동과학과 법률(Behavioral Sciences and the Law)저널’에 실린 한 연구가 이를 뒷받침한다. 이 연구논문에 따르면 한 조직의 대표로 있는 사람들로 구성된 집단은 평범한 근로자들로 이뤄진 집단보다 사이코패스 비율이 4배가량 높다. 그렇다고 해서 사이코패스 기질을 가져야 사회적 성공을 이룰 수 있다는 의미는 아니다. 사이코패스 비율은 전 세계 인구의 1%에 해당하기 때문에 기업대표들의 대다수는 사이코패스가 아닐 확률이 더 높다. 즉 냉정하고 무자비한 사람이 인정 많고 공감대를 잘 형성하는 사람보다 성공할 확률이 높다고 보기는 어렵다. 이번 '하품 연구'를 주도한 브라이언 런들 박사는 "하품 동영상을 보고도 하품하고 싶은 생각이 전혀 들지 않는다면 사이코패스 성향을 가졌다고 볼 수도 있겠지만, 정신이 다른 곳에 팔려있거나 무기력하거나 스트레스가 심한 상태일 수도 있다는 점을 간과해서는 안 된다"고 했다. 코메디닷컴 문세영 기자 (pomy80@kormedi.com) |
Is that person a psychopath? A yawn might help you tell
Linda Carroll
If you've been wondering if that nasty, aggressive coworker is actually a psychopath in disguise, there might be a little clue: Try yawning and see if he or she yawns back.
People high in psychopathic personality traits often don't "catch" the contagious yawn, according to a report published in Personality and Individual Differences. The reason is they aren't particularly empathetic, says the study's lead author, Brian Rundle, a behavioral scientist at Baylor University.
Studies show empathy plays a role in whether or not you’ll be prompted to yawn when you see someone else doing so.Contagious yawning — or yawning when you see someone else do it — is a very primitive form of communication and bonding, Rundle says. It's been noted in non-human primates and as well as in other mammals.
Rundle is quick to point out that diagnosing psychopaths is more complicated than just watching to see if they yawn after you do. That's because the likelihood that someone will catch a contagious yawn is dependent on a number of factors, including age — you're less likely to yawn after someone else if you're older — and familiarity — you're more likely to yawn after someone else if you know the person.
Still, he says, whether it's in the boardroom or the bedroom, the study shows that you are more likely follow up on someone else's yawn if you score low in psychopathic traits.
For the new study, Rundle and his colleagues rounded up 135 college students and had them fill out a standard assessment of psychopathic traits, called the Psychopathic Personality Inventory. Questions were designed to ferret out traits such as cruelty, selfishness, impulsivity, aggression and empathy.
Normal folks fall in the 50 percent range, Rundle says, adding that there were some students who scored very low and some who scored up in the 90th percentile.
You might immediately think of serial killers burying bodies in the basement when you think of psychopathy, but Rundle says, "people high in psychopathic traits may just be hard to connect with, it doesn't mean they are malicious individuals."
The study volunteers were next asked to sit in front of a computer screen in a dark room wearing noise-canceling headphones as they watched 10 second videos of three different facial expressions: yawning, laughing or neutral. The volunteers also wore electrodes below their eyelids, next to the outer corners of their eyes, on their foreheads and on their index and middle fingers so that the researchers could monitor responses to the videos.
The volunteers who were lower in psychopathic traits were nearly twice as likely to yawn as those who were high in those traits. Still, there were individuals who were low in psychopathic traits who didn't yawn at all. That indicates more research is needed with a larger number of volunteers, Rundle says.
While scientists don't know exactly why we yawn, they do know what parts of the brain are involved in the process, says Steven Platek, an associate professor of psychology at Georgia Gwinnett College, who has spent some time studying yawning, but is unaffiliated with the new research.
"What's interesting is the parts of the brain that are involved — the posterior cingulate and the precuneus— in yawning are also involved in instinctual kinds of empathetic processes," Platek says.
"Scientists used to think that yawning was a way of dealing with oxygen deficiencies in our blood. That's been disproven. The current thinking is that it's a mechanism to help cool the brain. And the yawn is like a kick into action for the brain, as opposed to a sign of boredom."
Platek isn't surprised to see a link between psychopathy and immunity from the contagion of yawning, since there have been studies showing that empathy plays a role in whether or not you'll be prompted to yawn when you see someone else doing so.
"I tell my friends jokingly, if you're looking for a romantic partner, one of the things you can do is test them for contagious yawning," Platek says. "It's associated with empathy and the one thing you want is someone empathetic and caring, i.e., not someone who is sociopathic."
Liz Cirulli, an assistant professor of medicine at Duke University, says the new findings are interesting, but agrees more research needs to be done. Her own research on contagious yawning has shown we're less susceptible the older we get. But that's just part of the answer to why some people are more impervious to contagious yawning, she says.
Cirulli says she's been studying both yawning and psychopathy.
"I never thought of linking them up before," she says. "But it makes sense."
edited by kcontents
"from past to future"
데일리건설뉴스 construction news
콘페이퍼 conpaper
.
