It is a cultural shift though that seems alien initially, but then you really get used to it, and it really does make people feel better when they encounter it literally at every store. Positivity also disarms people and makes them more likely to purchase goods.
It was from an episode of QI. Here's the clip if anyone is interested: https://youtu.be/E9PSg0sQyfs
My observation was that when you go into a shop in SF, you'll get greeted to a lesser degree, but more cheerfully.
In Berlin, you were greeted almost every single time, but more perfunctorily.
In that regard, I preferred the Berlin approach, even though it required me to respond more often. But I could simple acknowledge the greeting and keep going. It was more intrusive, but less demanding.
This (and the studies in the OP) should be taken with a grain of salt; there is a replication crisis in science, and psychology is one of the worst-affected fields.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replication_crisis#In_psycholo...
In some attempts at replication less than 50% of studies were reproducible, indicating that they were either p-hacked or simply badly designed. Priming results seem to be particularly flimsy.
I had culture shock going to stores in the rural areas, because the friendly customer service attitude appeared to be much less fake. People didn't feel as rushed. They took a little extra time to have genuine communication. It drove me crazy, because I was accustomed to the efficiency of city retail, but I've come to appreciate it.
One of my favourite anecdotes from living over there was from a friend who'd become a regular customer of a particular takeout place. On one occasion he phoned up to place an order only to be greeted with "Oh, it's you again. Why don't you learn to cook?"
To take a very simple example: you are trying to go to a new place in a city. Maybe you just moved in the city or maybe you've been living here a while but you just never been to that place. So you try to find out how to get there using public transit. Naturally you'd need to ask strangers or the lady selling tickets. You do that in Eastern Europe (at least in my experience growing up there) and people will be at best annoyed, at worst they make comments about why you even ask, you are expected to know everything and generally they just act to make themselves feel superior and make you feel dumb. And while all of this is happening they look upset and mad which is not helping at all in an already stressful situation. In the US I had the opposite experience, worst case they cannot answer but they are making an effort to be nice to me and not just make fun of me.
I'm also pretty confident this isn't just "one" example, I grew up in an Eastern European country so plenty of experiences there and I've been in the US for 10+ years and it's been consistently a better experience day to day with strangers.
Now it might seem like that is just one silly interaction, shouldn't affect one much. But multiply this by thousands as you spend years in such a place and the difference becomes huge, I would argue it even forms your psychology.
So yes, US-type niceness is freaky and weird for those of us not used to it and it's most definitely "fake" in most cases, if you define "fake" as anything that is just skin deep, but that "skin deep" fake smile/niceness is ALL you need in day to day interactions with strangers, I'm not trying to make friends with everyone I meet and develop deep meaningful relationships, I'm just trying to take the right bus to my destination and you'll never see me again. So yes, please be nice and kind and smile.
On the other hand, I have found it hard to develop meaningful relationships in the US. It could be because the superficial niceness means it's hard to find someone that you can genuinely click with and/or many other reasons (immigrant, different culture, older age, etc).
If someone invites you over for dinner in the US you’ll often hear “that meal was amazing!” even if it wasn’t. That’s just polite behavior.
My colleague was saying they don’t really do that in France. You’d never say “that meal was awful”, you’d just say nothing more than “thanks for the meal”.
I thought it was a great example.
You aren't saying it's impolite so say anything less, right? I've lived in the US all my life and that's not my expectation...it could be that cultural expectations are not uniform.
Obviously it’s a generalization, but an observation I found interesting.
So in a restaurant I wrote not say anything (and words not come back), if the meal was truly bad I woke say it was not good and probably leave some comments somewhere (I did it only once because it was really bad).
This kind of paying it forward never happens outside of the USA. That positive vibe is sincerely ment and it's sad to realize we Europeans take positive signals like a smile as cynical as we do. A smile lights up your brain with an injection of happiness.
Have you seen that sign on your Amazon package? It's not a mistake it looks like that.
It's particularly infuriating when the waiter comes up and does the "and how is everything today? Good? Steak nicely done?" routine while I'm trying to enjoy my meal or talk with someone.
ps. my kids think that i'm grumpy, bad tempered and pessimistic :) they're right about one of them.
As a surly grouch, I'd say that it's worth the annoyance for the cases when they get your order wrong. It's the compliments for finishing my food that I can't stand
A couple of summers in the early 1970s, I worked as a stockboy at Woolco stores that were opening. I didn't mind the customers once they did open, but I could have done without the jingle that went out over the loudspeakers: "There's bargains excitingly wonderful/All the things you've been looking for/???/At your Woolco department store!"
But at least we didn't have to sing along.
people were always polite, friendly and helpful.
and here I was thinking that the intro to "Sausage Party" (the movie) was just playing on disney clichés 0_o
Many of the things mentioned in the article I don't find at all surprising. When in challenging or sad situations it's only reasonable to be grumpy, or pessimistic or what have you. Negative emotions or feelings are part of our natural range and appropriate depending on the cirumstances. Forced positivy to me always has something ghoulish, Truman-show like.
One particular thing that I've noticed about very optimistic people is that they (not always) but sometimes tend to have an overly inflated sense of agency even in situations where they are objectively not in control. When something goes wrong in these cases people like that tend to blame themselves more than appropriate. I think this can be the source of a lot of frustration.