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DENIAL EXAMPLES
Denial. This type of
passive-aggressive behavior occurs when the individual
appears to be distressed, frustrated, bored, confused,
or any number of emotions but when questioned refuses to
admit to the feeling. They may outright deny or they may
avoid by ignoring, working, or deflecting with humor.
However, the behavior has the outcome of frustrating the
recipient because they are unable to confront and
resolve the problem. Thus, this individual is able to
control the other by not engaging in conflict resolution
when an obvious problem has occurred.
The wife who expects her husband to read her
mind:
HUSBAND: Is everything okay?
WIFE: Of course everything is okay. Why wouldn't
it be? (with sarcastic tone)
HUSBAND (who doesn't know how to interpret sarcastic tone):
Okay, you just seemed quiet. Anyway like I said,
I'm going out with the guys tonight.
WIFE (walks away in a huff)
In this example the husband can only interpret the
wife's words. She's angry because he doesn't know
that she is upset because he is spending the evening
with friends. However, she said everything is
"okay" and he doesn't pursue it further. The
problem with the wife's behavior is that many men do not
easily understand emotional content of a message
especially when the verbal content is the opposite.
This creates a cognitive dissonance (an internal
emotional conflict) which is resolved by focusing on the
verbal content and ignoring the opposing emotional
content. This is not done deliberately but is the
way the man's brain reacts to such conflict.
Unfortunately, many women are the opposite and focus on
the emotional content and ignore the verbal content if
the two are in conflict. These women also expect
the men in their lives to do the same and often believe
that he is deliberately ignoring their "obvious"
emotional messages. This particular type of
unintentional passive-aggressive behavior creates many
problems in relationships.
Copyright © 2010 by Monica A. Frank, Ph.D. and
www.excelatlife.com. Permission to reprint this
article is granted if it includes this entire copyright
and link.
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