A Ghost(ing) Story
By far the most frightening, chilling and appalling horror stories I’ve heard this spooky season have been ghosting stories. Time and time again we are haunted by unanswered text messages, ignored DMs and opened snapchats. Long after excusing silence for a busy schedule, it’s time to face it: you’ve been ghosted.
Ghosting refers to cutting off all communication with someone without a warning or explanation. The word has recently entered the popular lexicon. It was roughly defined on Urban Dictionary as early as 2006 and was added to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary in 2017. Ghosting can happen with just about any kind of relationship: best friends since middle school, romantic relationships, hook-ups and tinder matches you thought you were hitting it off with, are no exception. If you’re reading this, you’ve most likely been the ghoster, ghostee or both. A study published in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships in 2018 found that in a sample of 1,300 people, 25 percent of participants had been ghosted and one-fifth reported that they had ghosted someone themselves. So why do we ghost? Why does it hurt so bad? And what do we do about it?
Ghosting is a recent emergence in the academic world, so as studies specifically on ghosting are scarce, psychologists can draw upon what we already know within the psychology of relationships. A 2018 study shows that the value we put on relationships and our motivations behind maintaining them vs. terminating them depicts our attitude and actions around ghosting. People with a growth mindset who think relationships take effort to grow, were 40 percent more likely to say that ghosting was unacceptable. Whereas people with a fixed mindset about the future, who believe in destiny and that a relationship is either meant to be or not, were 60 percent more likely to see ghosting as acceptable and were more likely to ghost themselves.
On the other hand, why we ghost has a lot to do with individual emotions and empathy. Tara Collins, an associate professor of psychology at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, South Carolina says that, “The people who do not like to have emotional closeness, are probably more likely to ghost.” A friend of mine who is a habitual ghoster explained it best: “It’s a protective response. I ghost because I want to do it before the other person takes their interest away. I’m protecting myself and my feelings. I don’t feel anything because there’s no consequence.” The simplest way to explain ghosting is that it’s easy. It’s hard for us to communicate what we want. We’re too scared of being hated after having a conversation about why we want to break ties with someone. Instead we say nothing.
Psychologists compare ostracism through silent treatment to the effects of being ghosted. When we are rejected, it triggers the same parts of the brain as physical pain. This explains why people have reported ghosting to be the most hurtful way to end a relationship and would rather have a face-to-face conversation. Ghosting leaves us with a lack of closure. We blame ourselves, wondering what we did wrong.
This ultimately messes with our brain. "Staying connected to others is so important to our survival that our brain has evolved to have a social monitoring system that monitors the environment for cues, so that we know how to respond in social situations," Jennice Vilhauer, psychologist at Emory University, wrote in Psychology Today. "Social cues allow us to regulate our own behavior accordingly, but ghosting deprives you of these usual cues and can create a sense of emotional dysregulation where you feel out of control."
Ghosting isn’t new, technology is. The more access we have to instant communication, the more we notice when someone is ignoring us. If you’ve been ghosted and are tempted to get in contact with that person, think first about what outcome you’re really looking for. The ghoster has already showed you that they lack emotional maturity and ability to handle conflict. Remember: ghosting reveals much more about the ghoster than the ghostee. To avoid becoming a ghost, practice direct communication and compassion. It’ll benefit you to develop the skills of sharing your intentions and feelings. It’s important to remember that open confrontation, no matter how painful, is ranked as the most preferred break up strategy. Who would’ve thought we’d be wishing someone would at least break up with us over text?
Contact our Sex & Love columnist at ariana.giordano1@marist.edu.