Why do people behave differently in different situations?

Sathish M (Management Accountant) (40581 Points)

18 April 2013  

 

We take care of those persons on whom our career and earnings depend. We salute them with the entire available obeisance that exists under this blue sky. When that person retires or loses power all our genuflecting mode escapes into the golden dawn of eternal bliss. This is where the problem lies. It is not our habit to show respect. We act according to situations.

Behavior of a person in society will depend on his upbringing, status, hereditary traits, etc. Hereditary impulses activate different persons differently.

Say, a splenetic/moody person reacts furiously to a situation and he finds himself land into an awkward position. This sort of feature is not easy to remove from a person’s behavior, because this is already integrated in the genes from conception.

Research shows that 50% of the population changes their behavioral pattern under stressful situations. People may also use different approaches or styles at home or at work. It is therefore inaccurate to predict how most people will actually behave in the real world.

Let us see how it works in our daily life:-

Motorist

 

When one is behind wheels one feels great especially when the wheel rolls. The moving vehicle thrills him and enlivens his sinking spirit. He is wildly excited and looks at everyone with threatening eyes because the motorist feels he can escape because of his speed. He is now in a ‘touch and go’ situation. If the motorist comes across any known person he is not at all embarrassed because he is not immediately answerable to that known person who cannot stop him.

He mildly abuses all traffic rules because he is in a hurry and wants to get rid of infelicity as early as possible. He wildly supports laissez-faire and creates shemozzle if anyone comes on his way.

Pedestrian

When we walk on a street we observe the same phenomenon. Both the persons think that the person coming from the front will move a bit aside making way for him. Both the persons think in the following fashion:–

Why should I move aside? Let the other person do it first.

Why should I belittle myself? I am not a penurious person.

To both the persons moving aside first, means—

Why should I show respect to the other person for nothing?

Why should I lose?

This is how we move.

Motorist/Pedestrian in a Shopping Mall:

In a Mall though, the same person behaves graciously because he is now surrounded by his family members/friends. He cools down as if he is cooling himself in a zephyr.

He knows that he is watched and if anything goes wrong he cannot escape the situation hurriedly (he is not behind wheels). Suddenly he changes from precocious to magnanimous, philharmonic and credulous.

The person doesn’t even allow his consort to spend her pin-money. Whatever he does is epideictic in nature & for this he has to adopt euphemism. His action continues and he advises others to be savoir faire, spic and span.

Youth on a bike

A Human being is a social animal. Social is a word which keeps on encompassing the word animal. Love, affection, theism, restriction, compassion, learning, shyness, concrescence, consciousness, etc. are the sensitive forces of attraction, which help to keep ‘social’ to move in the orbit of ‘animal’.

These forces are as delicate as gossamer. As he drives, a pleasant sensation occupies his whole heart. He is enraptured as a soft breeze blows across him. He is now in a happy-go-lucky mode. He feels terrific and the bond link like restriction, shyness, etc.(as mentioned above) slowly starts to reduce, which in turn affects the sensitive forces of attraction.

Animal behavior surfaces up & with ex cathedra he starts to tease and remark on girls or passersby and violates all traffic rules. He doesn’t want to stop.

Because stopping means getting heated up (because cross flow of the soft breeze will cease). Most of the youth have enough capacity to ingest anything that comes their way and is an egghead to evanesce from any situation and if he gets snared in the process; can extricate himself by comminuting others or by using weasel words whenever he makes any factum.

He doesn’t bother to expiate and argues that he has been wrongly exegesis.

This means that a person behaves temporarily based on his present environment, condition and situation but the inner instincts are still there and removing these instincts is next to impossible. Most of the public actions are the reflections of the social environment which is murky at present.

 

Source: WEB