Humiliation

This article is about a learning emotion or class of learning emotions.
View list of learning emotions / classes of learning emotions

Definition

Humiliation is a social learning emotion experienced by a learner, usually as a result of either failing a learning goal in a way that is visible to the explainer or other learners, or in anticipation of such failure.

Generally speaking, humiliation is a negative for learners and hinders the learning process; however, it could indirectly spur learners to put more effort into learning.

Relation with learning contexts and feedback formats

Asynchronous, single-learner feedback formats reduce the risk of humiliation

Learning from a text or video reduces the risk of humiliation, because the explainer and other learners are not watching. While epistemic emotions and achievement emotions are still common in these situations, the lack of a social component to the learning helps.

Feedback formats such as cold calling increase the risk of humiliation

Cold calling -- where individual learners are called at random to ask questions -- runs the risk of a learner experiencing humiliation in front of the explainer and other learners. With one-on-one tutoring, the "other learners" part of the risk is mitigated, but the increased frequency of calling can increase the experience of humiliation with the explainer.

For this reason, explainers should not use cold calling as a gotcha and should be accepting of non-answers or wrong answers, using the feedback.

Relation with learner and explainer attitudes

Various attitudes among learners and explainers can reduce the learner's experience of humiliation:

• Presumption of learning failure: If the learners and explainer both start with the assumption that learning has failed, this shapes their expectations. Failure to achieve learning goals is therefore viewed as the baseline rather than an unexpected negative.
• Less active thinking about achievement during the process of learning: While achievement goals (such as acquiring mastery of a subject or doing well on a test) may be the underlying motivation for learners, learners may be more successful if they are not thinking about the achievement goals while actually learning, but are focused on the learning process itself (including epistemic and physical aspects).
• Reduced importance of performance in learning context to social status among learners: If learners believe that their social status among their peers will be influenced heavily by their performance in the learning context, this can lead to more humiliation when they fail. Both explainers and fellow learners can try to reduce the social stakes involved in performing well in the learning context.