Rejection is absolutely an art. Many people apologize and say "I'm sorry" before politely rejecting, but psychologists point out that this behavior will make the speaker feel better and the listener feels worse.
This study was published by American psychologist Gili Freedman and others and was published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology. Researchers asked thousands of participants to refuse social invitations from others in different situations. Participants need to propose methods of rejection on their own, including appointments, continuing to rent a house with roommates, and going out to eat with colleagues.
Then the researchers wanted to browse various rejection methods and evaluate the "injury index" of each method. The results showed that 39% of people apologized while refusing, but made people feel even more hurtful.
Researchers pointed out that apology is useful in unintentional offense, but it is counterproductive for intentional offense. The rejected person believes that he should not have been rejected, but the other party wants to cover up the rejection through an apology, so a saying "sorry" may be more harmful than a direct rejection. "It can lead to worse results than rejections without apology, including sorry rejections," Freedman said, "Although the apology is good, this may be a selfish behavior."
Next：None