Picture this: It’s been a week of messaging with a match and you finally set up a date. You settle on an outfit, do your hair, slick on a subtle lip tint. At the bar, you spot them right away: leather jacket, stirring a negroni. You approach, engage in the awkward to-hug-or-not-to-hug dance, take a seat. Smile. Adjust your top. They look you up and down, give the negroni another stir, and say, “Wow, nice shirt. Did your mom pick that out for you?”
Ha ha. Very funny. You’re laughing, and then you’re not. Suddenly you’re self-conscious. You specifically chose this polka dot mock-neck tee because you thought it was cute but sexy, without going overboard! How are you supposed to focus on the rest of this date while you’re replaying every fashion choice you’ve made since middle school on a loop in your head, critiquing each one with the white hot cruelty of Tyra Banks on “America’s Next Top Model”?
Take a breath, my friend. You have just been negged.
Yes, repartee is important — and the desire for banter among people who go on dates is only growing. Just ask US Tinder users, who, according to the Los Angeles Times, have listed “banter” on their profiles 7 percent more frequently since 2022. (Or ask any contestant on “Love Island.”) But in a situation like this, what might have been meant as a flirty observation instead came across as disparaging — a form of derogatory communication known as negging.
Sometimes it’s hard to tell what’s negging and what’s just good old fashioned flirting, but experts say the difference lies in the speaker’s intent. Negging crosses a line into emotional manipulation because it’s intended to take another person down a peg. It uses humor and back-handed compliments to trigger someone’s insecurities, giving the speaker the upper hand.
“In a clinical sense, [negging] is a microaggression,” psychotherapist Elisabeth Crain, PsyD, tells PS. “It sounds nice initially but there’s a zinger attached to it. It’s a tiny, subtle hint of something that is intended to make somebody feel bad, but it’s not overt. And it can be packaged quite nicely, which can be confusing for people.”
In romantic settings, negging is a device used to make another person feel bad about themselves so that they’ll be more likely to work for your approval. But not all sarcastic, quippy humor qualifies as negging (thank god). We asked two experts to break down the meaning of negging, its potential to do harm, and the differences between emotional manipulation and good-hearted banter.
Experts Featured in This Article
Elisabeth Crain, PsyD, is a psychotherapist.
Claudia Johnson, LMFT, is a certified sex therapist and sexologist.
