Is it an American thing? A European thing that came to America? I’m referring to when, for example, a boxer wins a match, he throws his arms up in triumph. Or when a hockey player scores a goal.
Why do people do that?
Like this:
It’s a lizard-brain thing. You are making yourself physically bigger, which is correlated with success across the animal kingdom.
It is also part of the whole squirmy dancy thing people do when they are very happy =)
Also, it’s often a display; “I did this!” When you succeed, you want other people to know that you have and that it was you who did it.
Only the squirm dancy thing is cultural: the throwing the arms up in the air thing is universal; as J Cubed said, it’s a lizard brain thing.
This has my, admittedly worthless, vote. It’s a really simple way of drawing attention to yourself.
I can accept without further proof that the act itself is “lizard brain encoded”, but not that the relation to success is.
Can anyone show an example of a lizard making itself bigger to celebrate an accomplishment? Oh, okay, I’ll accept closer relatives like primates.
You haven’t seen many nature documentaries, have you naita? It’s called a “victory display”. Lizards do it (mind you, it’s easier to see on crested ones), fish do it, gnus do it…
It’s purely cultural - in the United Kingdom by far the most common celebration is the “robot dance”, viz. It goes back hundreds, nay thousands of years, even before robots existed. Presumably the intention is to show off the triumphant individual’s incredible mechanical precision and poise.
I mean, sticking your hands up in the air is easy. Anyone can do that. It takes skill to move your arms in a robotic manner. Especially if - like Peter Crouch - you have gangly arms. There’s a potential whiplash effect, see. It can be quite dangerous.
Ah, condescension. That’s not so much a lizard brain thing is it?
I’ll readily admit that my education in animal communication through watching nature documents had failed to teach me the term “victory display” or instilled in me reflexive knowledge of the ubiquity of the phenomenon. I’m still not convinced that this proves the specific act of throwing your arms in the air has no cultural component, though. It wouldn’t take much to convince me, even if “I just told you” didn’t cut it.
I don’t expect a survey has been done on human victory displays, but do any of our primate cousins show this particular behaviour? My impression is that they’re more into hitting their chests and strutting.
Interestingly enough, animatedly gesticulating in the space above you can also be a sign of extreme apathy.
most of these cases are athletic victories involving exertion and sweating. the victor is just airing their pits out.
Even if its origin is in the species leading to homo sapiens, I suggest that it’s learned behavior as opposed to instinctual.
Until I saw somebody else do such a thing, I doubt I would have thought it meant a great deal to me personally to proclaim my victory at Old maid or the like by raising my arms over my head and pounding my chest.
Of those gestures, perhaps my favorite is in a video/commercial where the father of a toddler has just managed to trick the kid into giving up some of his cereal. The dad does that fist pump thing and exclaims, “Yes!” as if he had just won the Kentucky Derby on foot.
Hey dude, haven’t you ever seen the movie 2001 ? 
You start with flailing your arms,tossing a bone, and pretty soon, before you know it, there’s a satellite in orbit.
Oh, and some dramatic music helps, too.
It’s primal. I feel sorry for anyone who never had the opportunity to do it after some physical contest. It can’t be compared to an end zone dance or anything else so calculated. It’s a pure expression of ego.
I see it as making oneself bigger, but also leaving oneself unguarded – saying essentially my victory is so complete that you cannot possibly harm me. Picture King Kong or the Incredible Hulk and you’re on the right track.
It might also be a reference to some of the things those guys dressed in striped shirts do when somebody scores a goal…
It’s an old art custom, too. Victorious Roman gladiators were often depicted with their weapon arm raised, like this: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/16228
It seems to me that the simplest explanation is, besides a call to attention from others of what took place, it is a demonstration by the victor that their opponent is so vanquished that the action of raising hands shows to all that the defeated is out of action and there are no other threats around, there is no longer a need for the arms of the victor to be in a defensive or an aggressive stance.