It usually happens in the shower or while waiting for the bus. The situation has not been considered for years. But out of nowhere the Memory pops up: of the dinner where you accidentally spit a portion of spaghetti in the boss’s face, laughing and spluttering. Or when you farted loudly during an exam at school. How embarrassing! Even years later, some people’s cheeks turn red again.

The British blogger and Youtuber Daniel Howell dubbed this phenomenon “Cringe Attack”. Literally translated from English, “cringe” means something like “shudder”. In this country, the Germanized Youth word of the year 2021 mainly used to express that one finds the behavior of a person or a situation embarrassing.

“You don’t just remember, you have a physical reaction,” explains blogger Howell in one of his videoswhat he imagines as a “cringe attack”. In the next scene he is seen shaking himself and making a face. 6.5 million people have seen the video so far, and more than 23,500 have written a comment. Many seem to know “cringe attacks” from their lives.

long-term memory and shame

The fact that unpleasant memories keep popping up in our minds – apparently by accident – ​​is due to the way human memory works. The more a person deals with information and the more meaning he assigns to it, the more likely it is to be stored in long-term memory. An experience that is perceived as embarrassing is accompanied by strong emotions such as Shame or anger. You live through the situation attentively and often think about it afterwards. These are all factors that cause the memory of the situation to enter long-term memory.

But she is not isolated there. “A basic function of memory is to summarize similar experiences in order to uncover patterns in the interaction with the environment,” writes Richard Gerrig in his standard work “Psychologie”. The brain continuously links the knowledge and experiences that a person accumulates over the course of life.

The purpose of embarrassing memories

The memory can regain consciousness if one experiences a very similar situation or performs almost the same task as at the moment when the embarrassing event happened. If you eat in the same restaurant – or if you have spaghetti on your plate in another – you probably remember spitting on the boss. If you write a university exam, the day you farted on the exam at school may appear in your mind’s eye. Such so-called cues do not have to be so clear. Sometimes a barely perceptible smell, a melody or a chain of thoughts is enough to mentally review long-forgotten thoughts.

People not only remember facts, but also the emotions felt in the situation. It can be nice if you mentally sunbathe on the beach as if you were on summer vacation, even though the slush is thawing outside the window. But if an embarrassing memory suddenly pops up, most people find it uncomfortable. Such memories, perceived as involuntary, tended to be more negative than memories that people voluntarily recalled, writes psychologist David John Hallford for The Conversation. In addition, negative memories usually triggered stronger emotions than positive memories. That explains why reminiscing about vacations doesn’t make you feel as relaxed as you did on the beach – but make you shake or even blush when you think about long-gone embarrassments.

But why does the memory store the embarrassing moments at all? It would be far nicer to forget them straight away. “A memory that makes us feel ashamed may be an indication that we’ve done something that others might find distasteful or negative, or that went against a social norm,” says psychologist Hallford. It is important that we feel shame and similar emotions (again and again) so that we behave differently in similar situations in the future – and continue to get along well with other people.

shame, vulnerability and fear

Closely related to shame is the feeling of vulnerability. “Shame is simply the fear of separation,” says social scientist Brené Brown in her famous TED Talk on Vulnerability. The researcher describes a kind of vicious circle of vulnerability, shame and fear. People were ashamed of their apparent shortcomings. One feels too fat; the other thinks she is not smart enough. Those who are ashamed feel small, worthless and vulnerable. Revealing that side of yourself in front of others creates fear.

Many people tended to numb the sense of vulnerability. You drink alcohol or eat unhealthy food. “You can’t selectively numb emotions,” Brown explains. Those who suppress difficult feelings such as sadness, shame or disappointment are also less able to perceive joy, gratitude and happiness.

Vulnerability is good

A way out of this misery is to believe that you are enough yourself – and to work on your own self-esteem. “Then we are more loving and kind to the people around us and also to ourselves,” says Brown. In addition: Those who show their supposed weaknesses, i.e. make themselves vulnerable, live more authentically. This makes it easier to build and maintain deep connections and relationships with other people.

Research has repeatedly shown that dealing openly with vulnerability is well received. Scientists at the University of Mannheim have discovered that other people rate a person who is vulnerable more positively than they rate themselves. They call this phenomenon “Beautiful mess effect”. It’s the same with blushing. Someone whose face turns red after an embarrassment is judged more favorably by other people result of an experiment by researchers from the University of Amsterdam.

Why shame can make you lonely

So shame and remembering embarrassing moments are very useful. “Without shame, we are missing a fundamentally important regulation for interpersonal relationships,” says social scientist Stephan Marks, who has been dealing with this topic for decades. However, it is an “extremely painful feeling”. As a result, people tend to repress shame or want to cede it to others. For example, they show themselves to be unapproachable, commit violence or shame others by laughing at them or insulting them. “Behaving like that is a relationship killer. You maneuver yourself into loneliness,” says the expert.

Shame can be understood as an alarm signal. “Like a seismograph that warns of earthquakes, shame shows that indispensable basic needs or limits have been violated – your own or those of others,” explains the expert, “It’s a feeling with great potential for development.” Because shame helps, mistakes to recognize and change their own behavior in the future. Then you have more positive experiences. In order to allow and feel shame, however, it is important that the feeling has its space. Only then can you learn from it.

Dealing with shame constructively

Marks gives an example of how to deal with shame constructively: A young man fails his high school exams. He’s ashamed of that. He takes this feeling as an impetus to learn a lot, to use holiday courses and private tuition. The following year he gets a very good Abitur. However, this only works because the man did not immediately repress his feelings of shame, but keeps thinking about the botched high school exams.

Those who are ashamed feel pretty alone in the world in these moments. But two things should not be forgotten. “Shame is universal. We all feel them. Nobody wants to talk about it, and the less you talk about it, the more ashamed you become,” says researcher Brené Brown. And: Our memory is subject to many distortions. With each new memory, the brain changes the stored information a little. Maybe it will help one or the other to think during the next “Cringe Attack”: The actual situation was definitely not quite as bad as the film that is currently playing in your head.