Having a shy bladder can make you more inclined to avoid social situations altogether, but such isolation can actually make your body temperature dip. Rejection, or feeling rejected even when you’re not, can make you colder than you would be enjoying a feeling of acceptance.
In other words, there is a literal truth behind the figurative terms like “cold shoulder.”
An experiment published in the journal Acta Psychologica measured the skin temperature of participants who engaged in a computerized ball toss with computer avatars. The subjects that did not receive a return throw from the avatars showed a decrease in temperature. Those who received ball tosses from the avatars showed no such dip.
“How might this work?” a New York Times article asked, offering a theory. “One likely mechanism is through the autonomic nervous system. Research has shown that things like heart rate, levels of respiration and other involuntary physiological responses are affected by social connectedness. Thus, when people feel excluded, blood vessels at the periphery of the body (in the fingertips, for example) may narrow, preserving core body heat. This classic protective mechanism is known as vasoconstriction.”
Even if you do get a chill from your self-imposed shy bladder isolation, you can warm back up with a hot cup of coffee, soup or other liquid which mimics a “warm welcome,” the article noted.
Read the full piece at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/09/opinion/sunday/the-chill-of-loneliness.html?_r=2&
