Revenge is not sweet

Revenge is one of our deep-seated instincts we have.  Throughout history blood has been spilled and lives ruined for revenge, even though no good could come from it. 

If revenge feels like too strong a word, you can replace it with ‘fairness’. 

Imagine you have a horse I desire. If I thought nothing would happen to me if I just took it, I probably would.  If, however, I knew you were a dark-souled, vengeful type who would chase me to the ends of the earth and not only take back the horse but leave me a bloody mess, I might think twice about my act. It appears the threat of retaliation can serve as a mechanism to support social order and stability. The response to being treated unfairly includes a range of emotions like anger and rage. Revenge is driven by emotion. 

Revenge is defined as harm done to someone as a punishment for the harm they have done to you.  It may help to add here; actual harm or perceived harm. Memories help us make sense of the current input; it may explain how one event could cause a feeling of harm in one person and not in another.  For example, some people take offense at not being greeted while for others it is the norm and so they don’t even notice it. 
 
It seems obvious that thoughts of revenge should be part of a normal reaction when huge harm is inflicted on us or our loved ones. Taking action based on thoughts is a factor of social norms and individual personality.  But what about the little social injustices? Do we feel the need for revenge here as well? 

Dan Ariely (an Israeli American professor of psychology and behavioural economics) set up an experiment where they found respondents in a coffee shop. They asked them to fill in a questionnaire and paid them when done.  The money was handed over in single notes, giving more notes than promised. The respondents were asked to sign a receipt.  The objective was to see if people would give back the over payment and if they were less inclined to if they had been annoyed by the researcher. In the control group the researcher just explained and left. In the annoyed group the researcher answered a 12-second personal call on a cellphone while giving directions, didn’t apologize, continued explaining and left. Forty-five percent of the people in the not-annoyed group returned the money (this may be saying something else about human nature but that is for another day!). Only 12% of the people in the annoyed group gave back the money. 

Professors Naomi Eisenberger and Matthew Lieberman have done studies of shared sensitivity to physical pain and social rejection. The most famous of these experiments include the cyber ball game. While participants were lying in a fMRI scanner they played a computer game where participants were led to believe they were playing a ball passing game with two other people. The ball throwers throw less to the participant, eventually excluding them totally. Afterwards the participants report feeling rejected, worthless and that meaning has been sucked out of life. The response to social exclusion is a highly negative emotion.  This qualified it as social pain.  The interesting thing was that the brain uses similar circuits to handle social and physical pain. 

Another finding was although participants could recall past physical pain, they found it difficult to re-experience the physical pain. Evidence suggests social pain can not only be recalled, but can be experienced at the same intensity as first felt, even many years after the event.        

In the workplace those with power very often inflict social pain on employees in the normal course of a day.  It could be public criticism including shouting, name calling and other abuse.  It could be as subtle as simply working with the exception rule. “I will pay attention to anything that deviates from the norm” and “if it isn’t broken don’t fix it”.  The impact of this approach is that people who work well are not noticed and no attention is paid to them. This is a form of isolation and exclusion and could cause social pain in the minds of some workers. In the minds of the powerful (position of power) they are only doing their jobs, driving an unwilling workforce to perform so targets can be met by whatever means at their disposal.  

Organisations may complain of disengaged employees who do little more than meet the requirements of their job and little else in a world that needs highly engaged, switched on members of teams.  Could it be they are disengaged to limit the impact of social pain?  

From a distance, it would appear all is well and the production is as efficient as possible. What if those on whom social pain is inflicted need retribution?  Experience has shown physical violence has a steep price, often the loss of income.  Verbal objections often lead to further abuse. The term silent sabotage has been used to label retribution where the offended person wishes to exact retribution, but does not want to make themselves vulnerable in the process. This sabotage can take multiple forms including simply working slowly, making mistakes, accidentally breaking equipment, misfiling and many more that may never be known simply because of the need for subterfuge.

Simply because there are no signs of blood, it does not mean real pain is being experienced and that the pain will be experienced again and again at the original intensity until it is soothed in some way.  Soothing the pain could include a variety of interventions like:

-    Working with people on their perceptions. Sometimes it is the interpretation of the event that causes the pain and not the event itself. 
-    Changing management styles to include awareness of the impact of internal harm. 
-    Including recognition in the workplace that humans are emotional creatures and creating opportunities to use that to elevate performance rather than shut people down. 

Be careful when you think you can get away with being mean.

Revenge may be sweet and you may not be able to prove it, but some of the bad things that happen to you may be linked to your own behaviour.  

*Mariane Vorster is a life and business coach. Her passion and focus is on providing strategic leadership development, concentrating on the transfer of skills and knowledge.Click here to get in touch with Mariane. ​