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Why is it hard for us not to shake hands? | Israel today

2020-05-10T16:36:16.752Z


Social remoteness causes us to minimize contact with fear of infection • New study reveals why we shake hands at all | Science today


Social remoteness around the world causes us all to reduce contact out of fear of infection • New research reveals why we shake hands at all? • And it turns out that in the past the purpose of the handshake was to see that we do not hide weapons

  • Photo by Getty Images

The Corona changes ancient habits: One of the greatest difficulties humanity faces around the Corona epidemic is the ban on shaking hands and social contact - such as hugs or kisses during social gatherings. The BBC looked at why handshaking, like other gestures, has become an important varnish and what the reasons are for this fact. 

The article explains that as early as the 1960s, renowned American psychologist Harry Harlow showed how important maternal and maternal warmth was not only to humans but to other mammals. Harlow performed a series of studies on rhesus monkeys using "artificial mother." The same studies illustrated the importance of tenderness and maternal love, and in particular the importance of human contact.

The researchers see similar realities in the chimpanzee monkeys, the closest cousins ​​of modern man. The monkeys touch each other, hugging and kissing. However, contact does not only exist in mammals, and giraffes also rub their long necks as affection or a test of strength. 

And what about shaking hands? Studies have shown that when pressed, brain reward areas are associated with good eating, drinking and sexual intercourse. That is, this simple human gesture, which has become a universal symbol in the last century, is a significant act in establishing our relationship with one another. 

However, there are cultures that have found a way to bypass the handshake - such as the Indian Namaste Blessing in which each person clutches their own palms and bow of affection, expressing contact by putting hands on the heart, raising eyebrows and enlightenment, and the native peace gesture in the Hawaiian Islands that fights the The middle three fingers with both sides touching each other only with the pinky and toe quickly.

Why a handshake?

Professor Christine Lagara, a psychology professor at the University of Texas at Austin, believes this is a kind of refinement of the deep need for contact between mammals. "Humans are very deep social animals and are tactile."

"To express this need, we ceremoniously made it a handshake. For example, instead of a handshake, we created elbow shakes to show how much of a basic need we have, "Professor Gara explains." In pain, crisis, loss and grief we embrace. So shaking hands is not an easy point to cancel, "she added.

Beyond this culturally, there are 3 sources of the handshake in the West. The first source goes back to ancient Greece, where it was a gesture of peace. If we shake hands a sign that we have no weapons in our hands and face a non-violent encounter. The second source is in the Middle Ages where the handshake made it possible to hear whether the other side was hiding a knife or weapon. Beyond that, religious organizations such as Quakers have also sanctified the handshake as a way to show that everyone in the community is equal and in the same class.

So what will replace our handshake?

"Cultural habits so deep are something that can be changed very slowly," says Alec Webber, a professor of psychology and public affairs at Princeton University. Meanwhile, Professor Arthur Markman, a professor in the psychology department at the University of Texas at Austin, explains that "the need to survive is so important in us that the understanding that shaking a hand to a stranger is jeopardizing us."

He also adds that "the main point here is to develop such a habit that will compensate for what we lost at the shake of the hand. That it did not create alienation but would actually replace the original. "

Source: israelhayom

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