Giving a douchebag the silent treatment can lead to better grades! | Source: ShutterStock

Dealing with douchebags isn’t easy, but one method works better than the rest: giving them the silent treatment. In fact, ignoring jerks can actually help you get better grades on assignments!

Have you ever been dealing with someone who is really lame, obnoxious or otherwise annoying and realized it literally feels exhausting? You’re onto something: A new study says that instead of actually trying to reason with a douchebag or hear them out, it’s actually better for your brain and your soul to just get the heck out of there and ignore them.

While it may seem like common sense, actual experiments were done just to be sure. Half of the volunteers in the research were given either the job of acting like a complete jackass–think bigoted, loud, irritating douchebag types–or normal, likable, charming person (like you!).

The other half of the participants were led to private rooms to do an assignment after dealing with either the douchebags or the nice folks. And guess what? The people who gave the douchebags the silent treatment did a lot better than those who ignored the awesome people.

Applying this to your own life: if there’s a jerk in study hall who just won’t shut up, don’t try to argue or get through to him or her. Just cover your ears and go about your business. And if there’s someone cute and fun? Chat him up–you may do better on your exam next period!

How do you deal with obnoxious douchebags? Have you ever given someone the silent treatment? How’d they react? Do you think not wasting your energy on douchebags can help you get better grades? Tell us in the comments!

You won’t believe how this teacher gives out grades!

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