Using 'you' helps cope with negative experiences: study

People use the word "you" more often than "I" to cope with negative experiences or while sharing an insight, a new study has found.
It may seem contradictory that a means of generalising to people at large is used when reflecting on one's most personal and idiosyncratic experiences, researchers said.
Researchers from University of Michigan in the US said it may seem contradictory that a means of generalising to people at large is used when reflecting on one's most personal and idiosyncratic experiences.
They conducted nine experiments with about 2,489 people to understand why people curiously use "you" not only to refer to specific others, but also to reflect on their own experiences.

In one experiment, researchers asked participants to write about a personal experience: 201 were asked to make meaning from a negative event, 198 were asked to relive a negative event, and 203 were simply asked to write about a neutral experience.
Those in the meaning-making group used generic-you more in their essays (46 per cent used the word at least once) than those in the relive group (10 per cent used the word at least once) and the neutral group (three per cent used the word at least once).

The researchers also found that using generic-you led people to view the event as more distant.

"It is something we all do as a way to explain how things work and to find meaning in our lives," said Ariana Orvell, a doctoral student in the University of Michigan.
"When people use "you" to make meaning from negative experiences, it allows them to 'normalise' the experience and reflect on it from a distance," said Orvell.
The study was published in the journal Science.