Words such as racist slurs can literally hurt – here’s the science

By Glenn Hadikin, University of Portsmouth

Rishi Sunak, the British prime minister, recently spoke of feeling hurt and angry at racist comments made about him during the UK election campaign. Anyone who’s experienced racist or other discriminatory language is likely to know what this is like.

But is it more than just an emotional feeling? Research suggests that although words are abstract they really can cause a reaction similar to physical hurt. In fact, pain is intimately linked to language.

A 2022 study from the Netherlands described short verbal insults as lexical “mini-slaps in the face”. The team measured physical reactions to short insults such as “Paula is a liar” using two techniques. One was electroencephalography, which records electrical signals from the brain through sensors on the scalp, and the other was skin conductance, which is a measure of changes in sweat production.

The team found clear, measured reactions to the insults across different parts of the brain. It is difficult to compare results directly with neural responses to physical pain, but the authors suggest the result could be seen as comparable to a slap in the face.

That’s because the response occurred rapidly and then faded. In fact, the longevity of the reaction was no longer than the measured response to compliments. The researchers were cautious to point out that their results were based on insults in a lab setting, without much context, so they could be very different from the experience of being insulted in everyday life.

It may be tempting to think the idea of a slap is just a metaphor. But metaphors shape how we think. They have real power which affects us every day. Put simply, a metaphor is where the language of a simpler real-world experience is used to describe something more abstract.

A very clear example of the real-world effect is when Donald Trump compared COVID to influenza. A survey of US citizens then showed that people who associated it more strongly with the flu were less likely to take precautions such as social distancing.

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