Why We Brag | Hacker News Reader

Why We Brag

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Interestingly enough, there was an AskReddit thread yesterday that consisted of people bragging. Many people in the thread described it as extremely therapeutic.

The link is here : http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/taiqo/can_we_all_...

We're all here on this planet for a limited amount of time. One of the principles of life is to "leave a mark" on the planet.

We reproduce and feel awesome about our kids, because that is part of our "mark" on the planet. They'll carry on.

I believe the answer to the question "why do we brag"? Is because it's part of our instincts to let other human beings know of the "marks we've made" to the planet. What have we changed on this Earth? What did we accomplish?

If according to the article bragging is on the same brain energetic level as ingesting food, then obviously bragging is part of our survival instinct. To reach that level, then it's been there for millions of years.

Which can only mean one thing: it's also part of our most basic instincts which are to survive and to reproduce.

Maybe bragging has been a way of reproducing in the past?

Food and money(current day weapon) mean survival, why is bragging on par with those two? It's part of our DNA's assembly language instructions to reproduce and leave a dent on the planet and telling others about it seems to be a way to reinforce that instinct. My 2 cents.

Disclaimer: I have absolutely zero knowledge of whatever it is I'm talking about here.

This research doesn't answers why we brag. It just tells us what we already know.. that it feels good to talk about ourselves, but why?

I agree, this article is far too shallow given the headline. I'd love to see the actual results or at least a more in depth analysis of the research and the results. The obvious aside, it would be very interesting to know what type of evolutionary or social function "bragging" may serve... But alas, this article is clearly lacking...

Perhaps it's for the same reason as why we like to help others in an area we're knowledgeable about. We are experts of ourselves, we love to talk authoritatively on subjects we know lots about. It'd be interesting to see if we get the same "pleasure sensation" from teaching/helping.

That’s probably the case. Teachers certainly seem to find it pleasurable to teach, and I’ve found it immensely rewarding to tutor CS and SE students while in college. It’s useful practice as a writer to have someone constantly challenging you to explain yourself succinctly and clearly.

On the other hand, it’s also great to talk with someone who’s knowledgeable about your interests. That seems to have less to do with pleasing oneself by speaking as an authority, and more to do with sharing and collaboration. My major is not in computing, so it was a breath of fresh air to discover CS professors and graduate students with whom I could speak freely.

If I were to guess, it's just a consequence of arrogance. Which in itself is an evolutionary artifact that was necessary for our survival. Imagine if we were 100% humble about every subject. Then you'd be 100% agnostic about every problem, and then never make any decision.

"Should I hunt a deer? I don't know, I don't think I'll ever know." Then dies of starvation. At some point you need that little drop of arrogance to tell you. "That's it, I'm right, I need to do this." Even tho, technically, you can't be sure.

So a little bit of arrogance is necessary for animals to function. We evolved into beings with a drop of arrogance because the ones without this trait died off. Natural selection made sure both extremely humble and extremely arrogant personalities were evolved away from.

And bragging about is just one of the many consequences of arrogance. We're arrogant + we can communicate = we brag.

How did they not touch on a lack of confidence being a reason for bragging? I've noticed when people tend to brag, sometimes it's because they're compensating for other issues. I'm not a psychologist nor have I done any lab studies on this, but I'm sure many of you can agree.

Edit - Isn't bragging generally self-praise, not just talking about yourself? Saying "I'm the worlds greatest programmer and these are some programs I've written" and "I like pizza with pepperoni" are two entirely different things. None the less, both do trigger a rewarding response in your brain. Just questioning the semantics of the article.

I like to use this to my advantage... by making bloggers feel special and talk about themselves. Then asking them for an interview/link later on. Helps with the Google juice.

What a stupid study.

If asked whether I wanted to talk about someone else for 4 cents (the maximum they offered) or myself for free I would choose to talk about myself not because I enjoy talking about myself but because I don't want 4 pennies in my pocket.

Pennies are shitty and I would guess a lot of people would see pennies as a penalty.

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