The word ASS has a different meaning..

Attention Seeking Syndrome (ASS)

I remember one instance from my school days where one of my friends asked a question related to the subject being taught in the class. Teacher first tried to convince him that this will confuse the other students as it is to be dealt in the subsequent sessions. But, then he answered that question and my friend went on to argue. Finally our instructor sarcastically commented that “it seems, you have read something” and a frenzied laughter broke out in the class. Now, that was just one random case and I am glad that CBSE do not follow CGPA system otherwise there could have been many more cases like that.

More than five years have past since then, and now sitting in an Organizational Behavior lecture, I am trying to attribute reasons to similar kind of behavior. Even in our undergraduate days students just loved to ask questions, not for satiating their intellectual hunger but only for the sake of asking questions. Asking stupid questions is not at all bad because that is a manifestation of your confusion but asking questions and making all others look like stupid is a real problem. Anyways this whole ASS syndrome is all about insecurity. People wants to look more confident than they actually are, they need attention because they treat this “gathered attention” as a measure of their accomplishment.

Well, this syndrome needs much more detailed analysis as many factors can be attributed to a particular attention seeking behavior. However, according to me the two major factors could be environmental or psychological. When everyone around you is suffering from the same syndrome then it’s not ASS it is GASS (General attention seeking syndrome) and the factors are largely external. It could be strict dead lines; stringent benchmarking for performance appraisals or it could be a strong competitive environment which drives the people to call for attention every time. But, when one or two individuals tries to capture the attention it’s because of psychological factors. People like these have their own agendas and they are always in a hurry. The underlying factor is that they need attention and they get a feeling of satiation when they get it.

Their ASS makes them vulnerable too. They expose themselves to others for exploitation. Now, next time you see someone trying to over impress you, you know what they are suffering from, ASS.

Honest advice***. Before asking something stupid or making some stupid remarks in public ask yourself this one question, is this ASS? And yeah, if someone else does exactly that, have some pity on poor guy. They do not know what they are suffering from.