Almost everyone has indulged in gossiping about other people at some time.David recalls, "When I first graduated from college, I was hired along with a few other graduates to be an assistant at a news station. It was a really competitive job, and at first, it was difficult to make friends. We worked long hours and weren't paid very much. We were all really struggling. Or at least that's what I thought. But one day I overheard one of the other assistants, Rick, on the phone with his father. He asked his father if he could send more money to cover his rent. He also asked him whether he could increase the limit on the credit card he had given him. I got the feeling from the conversation that his parents were basically supporting him. I ended up gossiping about it to the other assistants. I knew I was wrong to do it, but at the time, I couldn't resist. We all had a good laugh about it, and it helped us bond as a group. But there was a price to be paid for that, and Rick paid it. We used to tease him quite a bit. For example, if we were ordering a pizza, we would say, "Oh Rick, wouldn't you prefer to have a nice meal at a restaurant and charge it to your daddy?""When I had been at my first job for about a year, I was hoping for a promotion. Instead, they hired a new guy for the job that I had wanted. About six months later, a friend who worked in human resources told me that the new guy had been given a really bad performance review. My friend said that if his performance didn't improve, he would be in danger of being fired. I knew that this was confidential information, but each time I was having a conversation with someone in the office, I somehow found myself gossiping about it" Gossiping also made Jim feel powerful, important, and like the center of attention --at least for the few minutes it took to divulge the gossip.