Great fuckin’ news, bitches. Swearing a lot actually means you’re a smarter person. Fuck yeah!
Researchers over at Marist College and the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts wanted to test the common belief that people who swear often are less intelligent, and that they use swear words to compensate for their lack of knowledge of other, better words to use.
To test this theory, researchers asked participants to list as many swear words as they possibly could in sixty seconds. Immediately after, they were asked to name as many (non-swear) words beginning with a specific letter and animals within in minute.
The people who could come up with the most swear words surprisingly also came up with the most letter-specific and animal words. The “fluent swearers” had a greater grasp on language, which is not that surprising considering you would think people with greater vocabularies would also have a greater knowledge of swear words. It’s the same basic principle, after all. Competent speakers of any language will have a larger vocabulary, and that includes a larger knowledge of swear words.
Don’t start dropping F-bombs in everyday conversation just yet. The act of cursing won’t automatically increase your IQ, but the researchers have concluded that “the ability to generate taboo language is not an index of overall language poverty.”
So basically, you aren’t any more stupid if you use swear words a lot.
The next time your mom gets after for swearing out loud, just tell her about this study and how swearing actually means you probably know a lot of shit about a lot of shit. And if you’re really brave, you can tell her to GTFO..
[via Bustle]
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Cristina Montemayor
Cristina is a Grandex Writer and Content Manager. She was an intern for over two years before she graduated a semester early to write about college full time, which makes absolutely no sense. She regretfully considers herself a Carrie, but is first and foremost a Rory. She tends to draw strong reactions from people. They are occasionally positive. You can find her in a bar as you're bending down to tie your shoes, drinking Dos XX and drunk crying to Elton John. Email her: cristina@grandex.co (not .com).
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