Comments on: NCBI ROFL: Why overheard cell phone conversations are extra annoying.

By: neilbeairng

neilbeairng — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 06:56:00 +0000

this is a funny cat.

By: Alice Pacino

Alice Pacino — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 22:14:00 +0000

While this study might have some merit I think they made a significant mistake in overlooking something far more obvious and intuitive to explain the irritability of passive listeners to a cell phone conversation – it is the “volume” of the speaker that angers others. Plenty of people use cell phones in public places every day without aggravating others or “disrupting cognitive processes”. Most people, certainly in public transit and at coffee shops, use
headphones for personal music listening so its not like they are going
to be over-hearing many conversations anyway. As long as conversations are conducted with a moderate level of volume no one seems to care or feel invaded. The sound of cell phone conversations has long been part of the ambient noise scape common to urban settings.

But consider rather that its those speakers who, for whatever reason, like to raise their voices that cause unrest. It used to be the primary offenders were guys who were trying to sound like heavy duty deal makers to attract attention “let’s shift the 2 mil over to Merck and hedge it with a quick dump of those mutuals”. And they look around to see if anyone was checking them out. Put another way – its only when I detect that someone really wants me and others to hear their conversation that I get irritated. The clue is their volume. For whatever reason (general insecurity I suspect), there are those people who DESPERATELY WANT others to hear their conversation and the easiest way to do it is by getting loud. People pick up on this and the eyes start rolling.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 17:59:00 +0000

Oh look, it’s this article again.

By: Casey

Casey — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:08:00 +0000

There was an article about this in Science News from October 9th, 2010. Unfortunately it’s paywalled, but they essentially made the same claim.

By: Georg

Georg — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 14:47:00 +0000

Half of a Dialogue is a Monologue!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 06:24:00 +0000

Maybe it has more to do with the annoyance that someone is turning his/her back on the here and now, and even though occupying the physical space is not really present. No excuse me, but the call is more important than everything and everybody here. And then! then, though the conversation is staggeringly trivial, it’s the act of a techno-showoff, a little consumerist ostentation. Dopes.

By: Snoopydoc

Snoopydoc — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 00:46:00 +0000

Surely that has to get an IgNobel at some point?