When there is more negativity in the relationship than just anger.
David Matsumoto, a professor of psychology at San Francisco State who studies negative emotions, states:
“The emotions of anger, contempt, disgust, fear and sadness may sometimes seem to overlap, however, each exhibits distinctive properties.
- Anger is elicited when one feels a goal is obstructed
- Contempt arises when one feels superiority
- Disgust is provoked when one perceives objects to be "contaminated”
- Fear is the emotion of threat
- Sadness is the emotion of loss.
“They all have different functions, and when you put anger, contempt and disgust together, that's when you get hostility."
How Contempt Destroys Relationships.
Psychologist, John Gottman, Has spent 20 years studying why marriages fail. In his book “Why marriages succeed or fail” describes contempt as being “directly corrosive of love in marriages” and “It is very difficult to live with someone who insults you: contempt is a form of psychological abuse.”
Wikipedia gives helpful basic information on the nature of contempt. It writes:
"Contempt is a ... mix of the primary emotions disgust and anger. The word originated in 1393, from the Latin word contemptus meaning "scorn."
Contempt presents a perfect storm of relationship spoilers.
Here's multiple ways that contempt insidiously or explicitly poisons relationships, and especially long-term relationships like marriage and parenting.
1) Insufficient loving.
The more expression of contempt, the less caring for and about each other.
Empathy has the opposite impacts. The more acts and attitudes of empathy, the more caring and love. The more empathy between spouses and toward children, the more that everyone in a household feels loving and loved.
2) Powering over.
Talking with a contemptuous tone of voice or dismissing information from the other of says "I matter. You don't." That's a power play. If I know better than you do about you, I’m setting myself above you.
3) Toxicity dumping.
Contempt dumps toxicity into a relationship.
As Eric Berne once wrote, relationships that convey “I’m OK, You’re OK” feel safe. “I’m OK, You’re Not OK” feels unsafe.
We all want to feel positive about ourselves. Negative messages of you’re-not-ok are in this sense toxic, poisoning our self-concept like mercury poisons a pool of water. "
Cognitive Principle Matrix
The combination of anger, contempt and disgust means that both parties in the relationship are stuck at the bottom of the cognitive principle matrix as shown below:
The combination of paranoid fear [I don't feel safe], the rage [with ongoing hostility driving it] the rejection [you are disgusting] and the hopelessness [there is no way out] has killed the spirit. If the spirit is dead then
- Forgiveness is not possible, because both parties don't trust the other and don't believe they can forgive.
- Peace is not possible because of the unrelenting hostility
- Suffering is about blaming, not growing, therefore it continues to be negative and personal.
- Unconditional giving is too risky, as there are no rules, boundaries or consequences in place.
- Both parties are fighting for control and neither party is prepared to humble them self and start the recovery process
- All hope is gone, and a hopeless feeling is present in the relationship.
Cognitive principle therapy uses the head brain-spirit brain to control the heart brain and gut brain as shown below:
Cognitive principle therapy will start with the head question;
Who am I? Answer-a partner in a relationship!
What do I want?- Am I "in" or "out" of the relationship
If either party is 100% out, then there is no hope, no support and no relationship. But both parties need to be fully aware what "out" means. Will it mean they have hit rock bottom and there is hope and the process can begin?
