The Impacts of the Psychology of Rumor in South Sudan
7 min readBy Kot Achol Thuc, Yirol, Eastern Lakes State
June 13, 2016 (SSB) — Rumor, according to social psychology is described as information statements which are meant to be informative, and which are in circulation, for example if one has a conspiracy theory that the moon isn’t real and one keeps quiet with it, it’s not a rumor. A rumor should be unverified and instrumentally relevant. The psychology of rumor is the social science which aids at spreading messages which are either truthful or loathful. When the rumor is a lie, its spreads bombastically like a time bomb because there are few individuals who want to be the beneficiaries of the situation! Rumor has been common ill-practice amongst South Sudanese communities today; this is due to redundancy, dependency, joblessness, upsurge of corruption, nepotism, and trend of tribalism or any other related vices.
Rumor-mongering has been trending vastly too in our communities because of merits associated with it, most youth practice rumor-mongering because of gains of fame and fiscal funds associated with it earned from politicians possessed by the devil of myopathy who value rumors as source of rising to the echelons of leadership. Rumor-mongering should be harshly discouraged due to lack of beauty and brains in spade in it. Shannon L. Alder once said ‘’reputation is what others think of us, character is what God knows of us. When you have spent what feels like eternity trying to repair a few moments of time that destroyed the view others once had of you then you must ask yourself if you have the problem or is it really them? God doesn’t make us try so hard, only enemies do’’. It’s important that we all have the duty of protecting our reputations other than destroying them with an act of being a talebearer.
The primary function of rumor should have been to make sense of something which is already unclear, rumors help at explaining a confusing element of the world which I believe is not the case amongst societal set-up of South Sudan, It’s a measure at which power wrangling is strengthened! A rumor is different from gossip and therefore it’s a group sense-making activity which helps at impacting the community positively and not negatively.
The psychological reasons why people may spread rumors could be that, people spread when rumors there is uncertainty that is when we don’t already have a firm grasp on how or why things are happening in the world. For example, if you can imagine being in intermediate school again, imagine what would happen if one day out of blue, one of your classmates stopped coming to school. There’s a ton of uncertainty there, so people would probably develop and spread rumors as a way to get handle on what happened.
People spread rumors when they feel anxiety, oftentimes uncertainty breeds anxiety, we like to have a clear sense of the world and we get anxious when we feel uncertainty and anxiety on its own has been linked to rumor spreading. Some research has shown that more anxious people tend to be the ones who are more likely to spread rumors. Rumors that something bad is going to happen spread more than ‘a wish’ rumors. This is called ‘’dread rumors’’
People spread rumors when the information is important; as much as you might be dying to talk about the rumor you heard about company you work for, I probably don’t care a ton. The reason is that it’s just not relevant to me. I, on the other hand would be itching to talk about some other rumor that’s more important to me. Many people dwell on ambiguity of the rumor than its importance. People are more likely to spread rumors when the information is more important to them.
People spread rumors when they believe the information; if you hear a rumor that you think is completely ridiculous, you probably won’t find yourself on a mission to spread that information far and wide. For example, one study looked at the spread of rumors during a university strike. It was the rumors that were more believable that ended up spreading the most.
People spread rumors when it helps their self-image; plenty of research has shown that people often want to feel good about themselves, but one way people can do that is through rumor spreading. There are couple reasons this can happen. One is that spreading rumors positions you as someone who is clued into what’s going on this world. People might then come to you as the one who’s especially informed. Another way rumor spreading can boost self-esteem is when the rumor is about another group. Other research has shown that putting down other groups can boost people’s self-esteem. Lots of rumors, it turns out, are about group’s ‘’opposing’’ group. These has been called ‘’wedge rumors’’ and serve to reinforce intergroup differences. Clearly, these can boost self-regard by elevating one’s own group about a rival other group.
People spread rumors when it helps their social status; people cause rumors to strengthen their social ties. The evidence for this can be seen in studies where people tell different rumors depending on the person they’re telling them to. Specifically, the question was whether people would pass along a rumor that one school group’s ranking had decreased or whether they’d pass along a rumor that the group’s ranking increased. The results showed that it depended on who would be receiving the rumor. If it was someone who was part of that group, people were more likely to spread a positive rumor about them. If it was someone who was part of rival group, then people were more likely to spread the negative rumor. The point is that people spread rumors strategically, to gain respect of others.
There was some ambiguous rumor that had been in circulation like wild fire in a wild bush for the last three weeks when the governor of Eastern Lakes State, His Honor Maj.Gen. Rin Tueny Mabor went for an official visit in Juba purposely for the welfare of his state. It spread so fast because it was a lie like Terry Pratchett in one of his books truth once said ‘’a lie can run round the world before the truth has got its boots on’’. This is the reason why this rumor spread.
Because, he delayed in Juba, it was so rumored that he is detained to retain certain position in the national government. This became a very big, fat, beautiful, white lie especially when the governor proved them wrong when he returned to his workstation in Yirol town. Such rumor went viral because, there were individuals who were interested in taking over the position. This made the entire populace of Eastern Lakes State by the time to be in mayhem why he was to be detain and remain in Juba when the state expect much from and out him.
I, for one was so delighted that it became a lie because I was made worried where the new person that would begin afresh incepts from? This, in my own view would cause a lot of havoc and confusion especially when one is restructuring the government.
Albeit! This is a lie, let’s praise the almighty that made a rumor which is not substantial and doesn’t whole any water a lie. It was primarily aim at creating havoc in the state hence would lag us behind in the journey to restructuring the state structures as the case has been.
Mayhap, it was true that he wasn’t coming; this would cause a lot of instability for the state. This was good it became just a rumor which doesn’t hold any water. We were worried of the rumor that spread like a time bomb because of repercussions like costing us of would be (expectant) stability if it was true. We expect a lot from our governor, and therefore, we urged the people with witchful wishes and hunt to end from there.
Why should we dwell on rumors that are less significance to us? This should be high time we carry out ‘harambe’ in terms of finances, labor on how best the state will be develop in terms of schools, hospitals and other infrastructural development. Harambe is a Kiswahili word meant as amassing resources or monies from goodwill individuals.
As a state (E.L.S), we are so endowed with numerous resources that can make our infrastructural development so quick than the rest of the states hence the utilization of those resources to be of help to us should be prioritized other than dwelling on rumors that are less substantial and dangerous to us.
The writer is a South Sudanese, residing in Yirol, E.L.S, and can be reach at; kotacol66@gmail.com.
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