Feeling Lost? Neuroscience Explains Why! The Science Behind Happiness! - Dr Tali Sharot

Steven Bartlett 0:00 You say that children don't impact our happiness positively.

Dr. Tali Sharot 0:04 I mean, that's the data. What are you gonna do? And that kind of got me worried, I have to say.

Steven Bartlett 0:09 Dr. Tali Sharot- A leading expert on human decision-making, optimism, and emotion.

Dr. Tali Sharot 0:14 And her TED Talk has received over 14 million views. I'm gonna talk to you about optimism. Kids and children, they're happiest and the most optimistic. Then it goes down and reaches rock bottom in your midlife.

Steven Bartlett 0:27 (laughs) I'm 30 now, so I'm heading right down to rock bottom as we speak. Um, any advice?

Dr. Tali Sharot 0:33 Yes, absolutely. So-

Steven Bartlett 0:36 One of the startling things is you talk about how one tiny move up on the optimism scale is worth an extra $33,000 a year in salary.

Dr. Tali Sharot 0:44 It's quite something. So optimists, this is what they usually do. If something went well, they usually interpret that as something about them that caused this positive outcome. Pessimists do the exact opposite. "I got the job, but really because they didn't have any other candidates."

Steven Bartlett 1:00 Is that negative explanatory style the road to depression?

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:04 There's a really tight link between depression and pessimism. The question becomes, well, how do I enhance optimism? So there's a few ways to do it. I was thinking that everything you do is for happiness, that happiness is actually one of three factors that matter. So one is happiness, the second is meaning, and then there's a third factor that's also really interesting, which is-

Steven Bartlett 1:28 Before this episode starts, I have a small favor to ask from you. Two months ago, 74% of people that watched this channel didn't subscribe. We're now down to 69%. My goal is 50%. So if you've ever liked any of the videos we've posted, if you like this channel, can you do me a quick favor and hit the subscribe button? It helps this channel more than you know, and the bigger the channel gets, as you've seen, the bigger the guests get. Thank you and enjoy this episode. (upbeat music) Tali,

Steven Bartlett 2:04 on the back of your book here, The Optimism Bias, it says you're one of the most innovative neuroscientists at work today. How would you sort of define or categorize your own professional background?

Dr. Tali Sharot 2:17 Um, so I'm... I guess I call myself a cognitive neuroscientist, which is really a mix of psychology and neuroscience, and I mix in behavioral economics as well. Um, so it's, it's really a mix of, of all of that. So I'm interested in how, why human behave the way that they do. Um, and why do they have the thoughts that they have and the feelings that they have? And I think to understand that, you do wanna understand what's going on inside the brain. Um, but then there's other fields that give you a lot of really interesting insight, including psychology, um, and behavioral economics, even things like law as well, sociology, philosophy. So it's, it's really a kind of interdisciplinary adventure.

Steven Bartlett 3:00 And you, you studied both neuroscience and psychology-

Dr. Tali Sharot 3:03 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 3:03 ... at, at university and post-grad?

Dr. Tali Sharot 3:06 Yeah. So I did my undergrad in economics and psychology.

Steven Bartlett 3:08 Right.

Dr. Tali Sharot 3:09 And in fact, I did that because at the time, neuroscience was not available for an undergrad degree in Israel in the whole of the country. Uh, so that wasn't even an option. Yes. This was a kind of a long time ago. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 3:23 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 3:24 Um, and then for my PhD, I did cognitive neuroscience, which is neuroscience and psychology mixed together.

Steven Bartlett 3:29 What was compelling on a personal level to you about studying those topics? Why, why... of all the things you could have pursued, why those things?

Dr. Tali Sharot 3:36 Um, very early on, I was just really interested in human behavior, right? It's, it's about understanding yourself, but also understanding other people around you. Um, and, you know, I think it's one of the most intriguing topics, and, and the brain was kind of a mysterious kind of organ that is orchestrating all of that. Um, so I think it was just in- an interest in the world around you and people in it.

Steven Bartlett 4:00 Are there some, like... you know, when you started studying neuroscience and psychology, were there

Steven Bartlett 4:04 some, like, fundamentals about the nature of life and the nature of human beings that, um... I'm, I mean, sure, there's so many of them, but were there any, like, real fundamentals that were, um, debunked or reversed as it relates to your own personal perspective? Whether it's about personal responsibility or about, um, I don't know, agency or autonomy, about how much control we have, about how much influence we have over our happiness? Were there anything foundational that had a real impact on your personal life?

Dr. Tali Sharot 4:30 You know, uh, there's one thing that recently is just... it's just something that I recently changed my mind on, uh, and that was actually while writing the current book that I'm writing, which I'm writing together with Cass Sunstein, um, who is the co-author of Nudge, and it was actually, in fact, about happiness, 'cause... and I remember this clearly. Um, I was in a workshop at the LSC, um, and they did a survey. They asked, "Who thinks that happiness is the most important thing?" Right? That everything you do is for happiness. And, you know, everyone had to stand on a scale. "If you think, like, it's all about happiness, stand here, and if you think it's not at all, stand here." And I was standing here. I was thinking anything that we do, we do for happiness, and that all that, that matters. Um, and while writing this book, actually, we both came to the conclusion, and for me it was a change of mind, that happiness is actually one of three factors that matter. Um, so one is happiness. The second is meaning. A lot of things you do because it gives you meaning, and it doesn't necessarily give you happiness. Sometimes the two go hand in hand, right? But sometimes it doesn't. Um, so you could do work that's meaningful, and it doesn't necessarily give you happiness, and sometimes it does. And then there's a third factor that's also really interesting, which is called a psychological rich life, which is basically variety. A lot of people just do things for diversity, for variety, to try a lot of different things. And again, sometimes it goes hand in hand with meaning and happiness, but sometimes it doesn't. And that kind of explains why many times we make choices that we understand is not necessarily gonna gain us more happiness, but it will gain us some other thing, one of these two other things, that together I think is what brings, uh, a good life.... right? Um, and that- that w- that is something I think I changed my mind on, that it's- we're not actually motivated for happiness, um, probably defined as a good feeling, kind of joy.

Steven Bartlett 6:28 Why variety? Why do humans care about having variety in their life?

Dr. Tali Sharot 6:32 Um, (sighs) I mean, there's kind of the unconscious evolutionary reason.

Steven Bartlett 6:37 Give me that one.

Dr. Tali Sharot 6:38 Um, so I think it's exploration, right? To move forward, both as an individual and as a society, we have to explore a lot of different things. Um, some of these things are not necessarily gonna give you happiness immediately or for you at all, but a lot of times if you explore a lot of things, you will find something that are- is gonna be very important, maybe for yourself, maybe for our species. I always give kind of, you know, the really simple example of, um, our ancestors leaving Africa to explore the rest of the world, right? They had to- I mean, why would they do that? I mean, either they thought there was something better for them to find, right?

Steven Bartlett 7:17 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 7:18 And- and it was probably very hard to do, but that's just kind of an example of exploration, right? You're trying different things. Um, and I- I can see it in my own life, right? I often do something and then I kind of, "Okay, I had enough with this. Let's try something else," and so variety is kind of a factor that I'm trying to max- maximize. Um, it's kind of a balance, right? It's- it's exploration and exploitation, right?

Steven Bartlett 7:41 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 7:41 So, you need to do a little bit of exploitation 'cause if you found something that works and it's something that you're good at, you don't wanna just leave it be. But on the other hand, if you just stick with one thing, you may be missing a whole other- a lot of different things.

Steven Bartlett 7:53 It's like farming and hunting. It's like the- the analogy, I think-

Dr. Tali Sharot 7:55 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 7:55 ... from that book, Who- Who- Who Moved My Cheese? When I think about, um, variety, my brain was going, "Well, I know some people that get so caught up in their comfort zones that they never go exploring." And so the- the- the thought that we'd be motivated or fulfilled by variety, by new things, by adventure seems to sit in conflict with a lot of people that I know that are, like, stuck in a situation and, um, maybe not happy, but there's- they're more confident in the- the known than they are leaving that place and- and, uh, inven- venturing out.

Dr. Tali Sharot 8:26 Right, because exploration is risky 'cause there's uncertainty. You don't know what's gonna happen.

Steven Bartlett 8:32 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 8:32 Risk means that there's a high likelihood of both good and bad, and you just don't know where it's gonna go, um, and so that can cause fear. Um, uncertainty is a state that usually people don't like and don't enjoy, um, and that's definitely something that keeps you in place. And in fact, one of the kind of points that we make is that, um, it seems that people are not making enough change in their life, um, that a lot of times if- if people think about changing something in their life, maybe it's a relationship, maybe it's a profession, it could be something stupid like, you know, the color of your hair or something like that. Um, there's a great, um, fun little study that was, uh, conducted by the Freakonomic, uh-

Steven Bartlett 9:13 Oh, yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 9:13 ... Steven Levitt. What he did, he wanted to see if, on average, making a change, when you think you might wanna make a change, this is not just like, "Oh, I think you should get divorced," when you're not even thinking about it, but when you're thinking about a specific change, on average, are you more likely to be happy if you go ahead with a change or not, right? And this is a tricky thing to study because normally you could say, "Well, let's test people. Let's ask them how happy they are before and after they decide to make a change, after they made a change. And then also let's do the same for people who didn't make a change and- and see who's happier." Well, that's not gonna work 'cause people who dec- who- who go on and make a change, they probably had more reason to do it, right? So, it's not kind of a good experimental design. So, he wanted to randomize whether people are gonna make changes or not.

Steven Bartlett 9:59 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 9:59 So, what he did is he had people go online and he asked them, "Are you thinking about a change?" And it could be small and it could be big, and they said what the change was, um, and then he had them flip a virtual coin, so heads, you go with the change, you know, you take the new job. Tails, you don't. Um, the likelihood that people would change if they got the heads, the change, was 25% more than the people who didn't. So basically, people were thinking about a change, they did it, they flipped the coin. If they got the change, they're more likely to have a change, and indeed people who went actually and- and- and committed and- and did the change were happier than people who didn't. So, that kind of suggests that we're probably not making enough changes than we should be, um, potentially because it's scary, right? Trying something new is scary and sometimes it's not gonna work.

Steven Bartlett 10:50 I think that so much in friends

Steven Bartlett 10:52 of mine and like lots of DMs from young people who are in a situation where they're- it's certain, but it's miserable, and they have a- they have a potential option to, like, go through that dark chasm to this potentially better place, but they're choosing to stay in that certain miserable situation, whether it's a relationship, a job, whatever it might be. And I've- I've always lo- I've always felt that our relationship with uncertainty has a huge, um, sway on our overall outcomes. And what I mean by that is people who are okay with j- jumping into that sort of dark hole where the- where there isn't certainty about their outcomes and just per- persisting because they'd rather not be in certain misery end up having better lives, but I don't know how to get people to have a better relationship with uncertainty. I mean, that's a compelling argument. I can say to them, "But you know, just stats and facts, 'cause I've read your books, aren't enough." There- there needs to be some kind of emotional pitch to them to get them to dive nose first into uncertainty. Um, any advice?

Dr. Tali Sharot 11:49 Yeah, that's a really good question. First of all, I mean, you're absolutely right. There's individual differences, um, on how comfortable we are with- with uncertainty and how comfortable we are with taking risks. Um, so I think probably it would be something like, to some extent, helping them through the change. So, it might be difficult to change people's relationship with uncertainty in a- in a global, general way, but perhaps every single time when there's a specific issue in front of them of what they want to change, um-... kind of like helping them along the way with that change, holding them- their hand and, you know, so to speak, um, is probably the only thing that you could do, right?

Steven Bartlett 12:34 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 12:34 To be like, "I'm here for you," whether it's a friend or a mentor, um...

Steven Bartlett 12:39 Well, in their mind in that moment, the thing that's causing the resistance, you, you describe it as fear, right?

Dr. Tali Sharot 12:44 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 12:44 So what's the opposite of fear? Is it hope?

Dr. Tali Sharot 12:47 You know, it's not an opposite.

Steven Bartlett 12:49 Okay.

Dr. Tali Sharot 12:49 But I think it is, um,

Dr. Tali Sharot 12:52 something that will be, um, likely to drive you to take that step. And it's not so much just hope, it's optimism, which kind of takes us to-

Steven Bartlett 13:02 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 13:03 ... uh, some of my research. So okay, what's the difference between hope and optimism? So hop- hope is you want something to happen in the future, right? "I want to get that job. I want to find that relationship." Optimism is believing that, "I'm likely to get that job. I'm likely to find that wonderful relationship." And it's absolutely true that if you're optimistic, you think, "This is gonna go somewhere good," then you're more likely to, to go ahead and try that, which makes sense, right?

Steven Bartlett 13:35 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 13:35 Because my expectation is gonna change my actions, and my actions is gonna change my outcomes, right? Because if I think, "Well, I am gonna, I'm gonna try for this competition because I think I'm, I'm likely to, to get something," then I go ahead and I try. If I think, "Well, there's no, no chance," I don't try and so of course I'm not gonna get it. So it be- it's a bit of a self- uh, fulfilling optimism. Um, and so then the question becomes, if I go back to your question, then the question becomes, well, how do I enhance optimism, right?

Steven Bartlett 14:05 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 14:05 So there's actually... And, and, and that's... It's a good idea because enhancing optimism will cause you to take more risk, and then-

Steven Bartlett 14:12 I want to learn how to enhance optimism in all of my team members-

Dr. Tali Sharot 14:15 Right. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 14:15 ... at all of my companies. (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 14:17 So there's a few ways to do it. Um, one way is a sense of control. We do have, we are more optimistic about things that we believe we have control over because we do think that when we have control, that means we can steer the wheel in the right direction, right? Um, and so, um, if we can, uh, cause people to get a sense that they have control, and if it's about your team... So for example, let's say they... There's a project that you want someone to work on. So you can just tell them to do that project or you can have them choose to do that project, right? Um, and you can guide them to the choice that you think is correct. But if they believe that they made the choice, that enhances a sense of agency, enhances a change of- the sense of control, and they become more committed to that option. Um, so you can give them, "Oh, well, there's two options, two projects you can work on. Which one do you prefer?" And again, you can frame it in a way that maybe perhaps will make them more likely to choose one over the other. But once they made the choice, it's amazing. We've done studies on this where we give people options. For example, um, going on holiday. "Do you wanna go to France or Rome, right? Thailand or Hawaii?" Um, if they make a choice, there are two things that are exactly... They, they want it the same. They really wanna go Hawaii, they really wanna go to Florida. But once they make a choice, seconds after making a choice, they now believe that Hawaii is much better than they did just a few seconds ago before making a choice, and that Florida is not that great, right? Because once you make a choice, immediately your preferences change. You rationalize why that choice was great, and now you're more committed to it. So that's true for holidays, but it can be true for work as well, right? "Should I, should I go work on, on project A or B?" If I make the choice, I become more committed, and it doesn't work if someone else makes a choice for you. If someone else makes a choice for you, don't get into this rationalization mode where you have to rationalize your choice because it wasn't your choice. And once I feel I have control, then kind of that also enhances my expectations of how good it's gonna be.

Steven Bartlett 16:21 But it also boosts your happiness, right? Because-

Dr. Tali Sharot 16:23 Oh, yes.

Steven Bartlett 16:24 ... I read about this study in care homes where they had an agency floor and the other floor where people didn't feel like they had a lot of agency and choice over their lives, and there was a pretty significant impact on levels of happiness, right?

Dr. Tali Sharot 16:35 Yes. So what they did is they gave them some plants. Is that, is that the study?

Steven Bartlett 16:38 Yeah, yeah, that one, yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 16:39 Yes, yes. Yes, absolutely. So, um, when we feel we have control, we have agency, that enhances well-being. When we feel our agency has been restricted, that causes anxiety, right? And this is one of the reasons that people are quite anxious on planes. It's not just because we fear the worst, but because we have no control at all, right? No control about when are we, "When are we gonna get there? What are we gonna eat," right? And that causes a lot of anxiety. Um, so by enhancing agency and control, you are lifting people's well-being, happiness, and reducing stress and anxiety. Yeah, and those, you know, that study with the plants, it works with kids as well, right? You can give kids some plants to take care of or have kids make their own salads. Um, they'll be more likely to eat it. Um, so that's just, you know, a few examples.

Steven Bartlett 17:25 What could, um... What do you... Uh, I mean, we're not part of the innovation team at any airline or anything, but I was just wondering, in the plane example-

Dr. Tali Sharot 17:33 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 17:33 ... what could we do then to reduce anxiety for passengers? I was thinking, you know, if we told them before takeoff, "Listen, if any of you need to land for any reason, we're, we'll land."

Dr. Tali Sharot 17:43 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 17:43 It's not that we necessarily will, but as you say in that study with the, the care homes, it's about giving them the perception that they have control versus actually giving them control.

Dr. Tali Sharot 17:50 Yeah. Okay, so there's- there's a couple of things that they do, and some of them work, um, for also some other reasons. But in a, in a funny way, it also enhances a sense of control. So one thing that the airlines do that I think is great is when you can see the, um, the-

Steven Bartlett 18:06 Oh.

Dr. Tali Sharot 18:06 ... the equipments, um, the pilot view, you know?

Steven Bartlett 18:09 Yeah, yeah, yeah. When you can see, yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 18:10 Um...... that for some, I mean, obviously you don't have control.

Steven Bartlett 18:14 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 18:14 But first of all, it reduces uncertainty. I mean, I really like to look at that, like, "What height am I in?" (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 18:19 Yeah. (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 18:19 "What speed am I going..." (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 18:21 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 18:21 So that's... And- and although you know you don't have control, that gives you a sense of reduced uncertainty and some weird way also enhances a sense of control.

Steven Bartlett 18:30 I have to-

Dr. Tali Sharot 18:30 Um-

Steven Bartlett 18:30 I have to say, I was on a plane one day, flying, I don't wanna say the airline, but I was flying, and I woke up in the middle of the night on the plane, and I was, it- it was turbulent, and I was convinced that we were going down. I was convinced. I looked out the window, and we were getting closer and closer to the clouds. And I- I did my quick math, we're flying from New York to London. We're three hours, roughly three hours into the flight, we're going down, that means we're going down in the sea. And I have about 10 minutes on that plane where I have complete cert- and I'm like, "We're getting closer to the clouds. Why would we be getting closer to the clouds?" And I click on the little thing that you've described, the little flight map thing, and it says we're at 33,000 feet and we're not moving.

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:04 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 19:04 And I go, "Okay, fine."

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:05 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 19:06 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:06 I go back to sleep. Very relaxing.

Steven Bartlett 19:07 Because the clouds are getting closer to us or something. (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:09 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 19:09 Yeah. (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:09 I mean, whoever thought that was a good idea-

Steven Bartlett 19:11 (clears throat)

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:11 ... obviously understands psychology.

Steven Bartlett 19:13 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:14 Um, the other thing that- that I d- that I like that they do, um, is, actually they did, and I mention that in- in- in one of the books, and it's not really related to control, but it relates to another really important part of- of psychology, which is, so normally at the beginning, you know, you're about to go, um, to get on the flight, um, and they have to go over all the safety instructions. And normally no one would listen, right? Because it was all about, "In the state of emergency, then you have to do this and that," and no one wants to think about the state of emergency, right?

Steven Bartlett 19:46 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:46 So you kind of, like, shut down.

Steven Bartlett 19:47 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:48 You're like, "Okay (laughs) ," Twitter, Facebook.

Steven Bartlett 19:51 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 19:51 Um, and so what they did is, they, um, and especially Virgin did this, um, they switched it so it was very entertaining, very light, and it was all about the destination. It was all about, it wasn't about being in the sky and having an emergency state, which is negative, and I don't want my attention to go there, I don't want to think about it. It was about, "Let's think about when you land, and it's gonna be the islands-"

Steven Bartlett 20:17 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 20:17 "... and, you know, the beach and so on." And they kind of, like, put the information that you need to know within this very light, entertaining, positive, humorous video. Um, and the number of people that- that watched that, that attended, has gone- gone up really, uh, tremendously. And in fact, people started watching it at home before they even got on the plane-

Steven Bartlett 20:37 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 20:37 ... right? (laughs) On YouTube. So that's- that's another really, um, interesting thing. And that goes to another principle that we find a lot in our work, which is that people, um, take in positive information about their own future much more than negative information about their own future.

Steven Bartlett 20:55 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 20:56 So if I'm starting, if I will tell you, "You know, I think your podcast's listening numbers is gonna go down," you'll be like, "Well, she doesn't know what she's talking about," right? But if I say, "Oh, I think this is great and it's only gonna go up more and more with time," you'd be like, "Yeah, she's probably right," and become more confident. So that's on average, people tend to take positive information to update their beliefs more than negative. It doesn't mean that we don't listen to negative information about the f- our own future, um, but on average, we see that you learn more from unexpected positive information about the future.

Steven Bartlett 21:28 That somewhat

Steven Bartlett 21:30 confirms some of the things that I read in your second book, The Influential Mind-

Dr. Tali Sharot 21:34 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 21:34 ... where I remember, I was watching a YouTube video where you were in it, and they were X-raying, is that what they call it when they look at someone's brain?

Dr. Tali Sharot 21:43 Uh-

Steven Bartlett 21:43 Scanning someone's brain.

Dr. Tali Sharot 21:44 Scanning, yeah, like in an MRI or something.

Steven Bartlett 21:46 Yeah, like an MRI scan. And they were scanning someone's brain, um, as you told them that you agreed with their beliefs-

Dr. Tali Sharot 21:52 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 21:52 ... versus when you told them that you kind of disagreed with their beliefs. And when you agreed with their beliefs, their brain lit up and seemed to be really receptive, and then when you told them you disagreed with their beliefs, their brain seemed to kind of just be frozen. And this is really useful for when you're thinking about having a conversation, trying to influence or have a conversation with your partner or get through to someone, that starting with agreeability or something where you- you make them feel heard and seen and understood is a good way to open them up to information.

Dr. Tali Sharot 22:18 Yeah. So this relates to something that's known as a confirmation bias. So the confirmation bias is our tendency to look for information that confirms what we believe and to, um, use information that confirms what, uh, what we believe to become even more confident and even more kind of in our belief. And yeah, so we- we did a study where we had people come into our lab in- in pairs, and they had to make, uh, a financial decision together. In this case, they had to assess the, uh, value of a real estate. Um, so they made their decisions, and we did scan their brains at the same time, and they were just in two separate scanners, but they could interact over the wifi. Um, and they had to, they saw like a real estate and they had to say how much it's worth, and they could see what the other person said and if they agreed with them or not. And it's exactly what you said. I'm agreeing with you. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 23:07 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 23:07 When they agreed, your brain is like, "Whoo."

Steven Bartlett 23:09 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 23:09 When they agreed, um, and they gave them more information about how confident I am and so on, so when someone agreed, the other person's, uh, brain showed activity that suggested they were encoding the information coming from the agreeing partner. They were using it to- to update their beliefs, and they were becoming more confident. But when someone disagreed, they kind of, as exactly like you said, they shut down, they weren't listening, they weren't using this information, you know, they were like, "Well, they don't know what they talk about," and they were, "That's it." Um, and as you said, we- we feel that like in- in real life all the time, you know? And- and it's- it's a problem because really, our, um, kind of instinct when someone disagrees with us is usually to say, "Well, listen, you're wrong. Let- let me explain. I'll explain why- why you were wro- why you're wrong. Here, look at the data, look at the figures," and so on. And what happens? The person in front of us is shutting down. A lot of times what they're doing is that- that the other person is starting to think about other reasons why actually they're right-

Steven Bartlett 24:03 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 24:04 ... and the other person's wrong. So while I'm talking, you're trying to think about what are you gonna say to, you know... But if I start with something where we have common ground...... then you're more likely to listen to me. You're more likely to see me as an agreeing partner and be more open to what I'm gonna say next. Um, and there's one example that I really like is actually, um, about vaccines. And this was before COVID, so it was about childhood vaccines.

Steven Bartlett 24:29 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 24:29 So, a lot of parents, uh, don't want to vaccinate their kids because of the alleged link to autism. Um, and so usually, they would go to the doctor's office, uh, and the doctor said, "Well, look, there's no link between the two. And here, I'll show you the figures, the data, the science." And it didn't really work. The parents usually didn't change their mind. So instead, there's a group of scientists that said, "Let's see if we can go a different route. We won't actually mention anything about what we disagree, which is the relationship to autism. Instead, we will simply highlight what we already agree on, which is that these vaccines protect kids from potentially deadly disease," which is not something that the parents disagreed on, but the whole- that seemed to have been forgotten in the debate, right, while they were focusing on what they disagreed on. So, by focusing on that, on what they agreed on, which is the vaccines will- will, um, protect kids from deadly diseases, they were, um, three times more likely to change the parents' intention of vaccinating the kids.

Steven Bartlett 25:25 Wow.

Dr. Tali Sharot 25:26 So, I think this means, you know, if we're kind of in a conversation about should we invest in this company or that company and we're kind of disagreeing about something, is there a different route to get to, you know, the decision that we want without focusing there? Are there other things that we agree on that- that would take us to the same point? And then there's another method, which is just to highlight the commonalities between us. That's also helpful. You know, perhaps there's something, I mean, we- we have a goal in common, we have a motivation in common. Maybe there's something in our background which is similar. Um, and that also always makes people more likely to listen to you and to use what you're saying.

Steven Bartlett 26:07 It's so true. I was actually, as you were saying that, I was thinking about a tweet I saw the other day where Mark Cuban was having an argument with someone else on Twitter. And Mark Cuban was going back and forth with this person, and he started his response to them with, "Wrong," full stop-

Dr. Tali Sharot 26:22 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 26:22 ... and then made his point.

Dr. Tali Sharot 26:23 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 26:23 And you see that a lot, where- where someone will start a sentence with, "I disagree," full stop, and then make their point. When that hap- And I'm just gonna be completely honest because who ca- I'm- I'm a f- com- somebody that is imperfect and full of fault. When someone does that with me, when they literally start a sentence with, "Wrong," or, "I disagree," it's instant combat.

Dr. Tali Sharot 26:43 Right.

Steven Bartlett 26:43 And like, I'm well aware of it, so maybe it doesn't come up as much in me. But I remember, I can go b- I can remember three years ago where I was when someone said to me, when we were having a conversation and they went, "Wrong," full stop, and then they made their point. Regardless of what comes next, it's combat the minute you do that. The minute you kind of close the door and, like, pull up the drawbridge, which is exactly what that sentiment does, it's combat from then on. It's like, it's this war of proving that you're right. And that's not helpful for either party, right? It takes someone with a certain self- self-security, I guess, and, um, a not- not fragile ego to be able to- to be able to be greeted with that, um, sort of conflict and turn to what we have in common and what we agree on first. But it's a real- it's a real powerful skill for someone to master. So, if you're disagreeing with me, for me to... And you know where I learned this as well is in my relationship because me and my partner, we might not agree on something. We might- we might- we have, like, very fundamentally different beliefs about the world. She's very spiritual, I'm very sort of scientific in how I think. But I know that I get through to her when I first u- understand how she's feeling. I don't have to agree with it. But even if I understand how she's feeling and kind of like validate it, anything that I say next seems to get in behind (laughs) , if that makes sense.

Dr. Tali Sharot 28:03 Yeah. So, what, I mean, the difference is that what you're doing in the last kind of example is you're using what we call theory of mind, right? Theory of mind is our ability to kind of think about what other people are thinking or feeling. So, basically, take the point of view of the other person, right?

Steven Bartlett 28:20 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 28:21 If... And- and- and there's a huge variability in the ability of people to do that. There's, like, tests, relatively simple tests actually, that can measure your ability to do that. Um, and so if you do that, the likelihood that- that you will answer by wrong is very, very low, right?

Steven Bartlett 28:37 Hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 28:37 The reason we- we start by "wrong, y- you're mistaken," is because we do the opposite. We come from our point of view, which makes sense because our brain is here and our eyes are here, right? So, it makes sense that we come from our point of view. But from our point of view, it's like, "This is wrong. This is not right." Right? But, of course, the best way to get your message across is to try to see things from the other person's point of view and then-

Steven Bartlett 28:59 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 28:59 ... think like, "Okay, what can I say from that point of view? Not from my point of view. From that point of view." Um-

Steven Bartlett 29:05 Super difficult to do. I- I can give an example. So, my, um, my partner was, um, upset about something and feeling stressed about something, which is just to do with her environment. And my first response was very, like, logical and scientific, like, and als- also psychological. Like, kind of like, "It's just in your head," which I know is kind of gaslighting (laughs) . That's not exactly what I said, before I get canceled, but it was r- referring to the fact that I- I think you can- you can kind of think your way through this. Like, as if I was trying to help her feel h- feel empowered and not letting her environment get the best of her. Now, that didn't work (laughs) .

Dr. Tali Sharot 29:39 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 29:39 The response there was, like, not good. My next approach was to completely understand how she's feeling and kind of go around her side and say to her, "Do you know what? You're only going to be here for five minutes anyway, and then it'll be fine." And that completely worked. It was like she was glued on me as I said that, and she l- looked at me and nodded and went, "Yeah, you're right." The first approach of trying to apply, like, logic and like-

Dr. Tali Sharot 30:00 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 30:00 ... "No, no, no," y- you know, didn't work. But then when I said t- um, "I understood," but then offered a solution from that place of understanding, she was really open to it.

Dr. Tali Sharot 30:07 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 30:08 And that was, like, an hour ago, so (laughs) -

Dr. Tali Sharot 30:09 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 30:09 ... it's very front of mind for me (laughs) .

Dr. Tali Sharot 30:11 (laughs) Um, yeah, so- so I think this is a problem a lot of times with like campaigns, like political, but also different campaigns where people try to, um...... get a message across using data, figures, logic, which are important. I mean, we need all the science and we need all the data to know what's true. But once you know what's true, the data is not enough to convince people of what is true. And in fact, the things that work are things that you were talking about, which is emotion works really well, stories, anecdote example, right? For in science, the worst thing we can do is use one anecdote, right?

Steven Bartlett 30:47 Oh, yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 30:47 So, we don't wanna get a conclusion based on one anecdote. But in order to get our message across, in fact, a single anecdote is really helpful, right? Um, and to my mind, we actually have to embrace that. That's the way the human brain works, right? So, I mean, I think in, uh, if we just go ahead and say, "Well, I don't like that. I don't like how the human brain works, so I'm gonna give them data and figures anyway," um, well, the message won't get across, right? So, we really need to embrace, if we understand how the mind work and then we embrace it to get the, the important information across. And again, another example that I kind of write about is, this was, um, years ago with, uh, the 2016 campaign where, um, Trump was one of the candidates for the Republican Party, um, and Dr. Carson was another, and they were debating, and the debate turned again to the vaccines and autism question. And so they were asked about, you know, Trump says that there's a relationship between, uh, childhood vaccines and autism. Dr. Carson, um, is a pediatrician and, and he was asked, "Well, you know, what do you think about this?" And Dr. Carson said, "Look, this is not true. We have a lot of data. We have a lot of science. And, and, you know, I'm sure that if Trump reads the science and data, he will be convinced otherwise." Um, so then they turned to Trump to see if he was convinced, and of course he wasn't convinced. But then what he did, he used the absolutely opposite approach, which is he told a story, a story of someone who worked for him who had a little baby, and he said the baby got the vaccine. And he used, like to, to induce emotion, he used, like he said it was, um, a horse-sized syringe, right? Um, and after a few weeks, the baby got autism. And now, I'm not saying (laughs) that we should do, we should, um, communicate false information using anecdotes and emotion. But me, I remember I was actually watching that, and my son was a few weeks old and he was next to me on the sofa. And I'm a scientist and I know all the data and I, you know, but still my... and I know that he was wrong, but my reaction was like, "Ooh, maybe I should think about this twice before I decide whether to vaccinate my little son here." Um, and I felt like that for at least I would say like a few minutes, a little bit more. And kind of that feeling made me think, "Look, if I'm thinking that because all, because Dr. Carson just said there's data and figures and science, and Trump just told a story that got me feeling quite anxious and he was much more influential, um, what about everyone else that's watching? You know, people who are not neuroscientists, who don't have training in science?" Um, and it really kind of hit home how powerful it is. Now, you could use these techniques, obviously, to spread misinformation and to do harm, of course. But if Dr. Carson had used some of these techniques as well, he could say there's a science, but together with that, you know, uh, maybe using some kind of anecdote, maybe use some, um, hope, hope and optimism emotion, right? Some- something like that. He would maybe have caused m- many, many people who are watching it to vaccinate their kids and therefore to save lives. Um, so I think there's like, you know, if you don't understand human behavior and you don't use it because maybe you don't like it, you know, you're like, you don't like that that's how the brain works, you'll be missing on something, right?

Steven Bartlett 34:11 This is why conspiracy theories flourish on social media, right? Because all they need to do is get one anecdote, one low-context video, one picture, one screenshot of something and post it on Facebook. And regardless of the science, whether it's climate change or vaccines, whatever, that one little screenshot from a Telegram group that says something happened to one person somewhere out of eight billion becomes way more sort of, um, believable and plausible and, um, powerful than all of the science. I'm, I've seen that over the last couple of years. That's why like the misinfamy, it feels like a bit of a losing war, really, because s- we're, we're bringing like facts and figures to a, to an emotional fight. And the facts and figures just will never win. Like, even below the, you know, social media channels now are putting the little tag on posts to say, "Well, actually, Politico says this isn't true." It's like, who gives a crap? It hits somebody in, in the feelings. Um, but it also speaks to the, you know, you talk a lot about this in your book, The Influential Mind. It speaks to how as s- as business people or in sales or whenever we're trying to be heard and understood or influence others, coming with facts, figures, graphs and charts is not gonna be as compelling as coming with, um, a really great emotional story. I, I've always impressed upon people as much as I can that like, your facts and figures and charts and graphs really don't really matter when you're trying to convince people. Um, and that's what your book really speaks to.

Dr. Tali Sharot 35:30 Right. And it's terrible for a scientist, of course. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 35:33 Yeah, yeah, it's really... (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 35:33 'Cause all I do all day is, you know, gather s- gather data and do analysis. But, um, yeah. So, so it's an interesting question. So, why do these stories? Why are they so effective? And so I think there's two major region- reasons. One is they of- well, three actually. One is mostly they induce emotion. And what emotion does, it gets you to focus. Because emotion tells your brain, "This is important," right? And it gets the whole brain noticing. It's like a little red kind of light in your brain going, "Emotion, pay attention," right? So, if you say something that's emotional, people are gonna pay attention and they're gonna remember better. So, emotion enhances the likelihood that you will remember things.

Steven Bartlett 36:14 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 36:15 Um, then the second reason is, if you think about it, how humans, how did we learn, right? If before we had science, before we had all these ways to get so much data, we would, we would live in like relatively small groups and we would learn from observing others, right? Observing like a friend or someone who lives nearby. It was learning from stories. That's how we evolved, to learn from a-... a, a small N, right? Um, only now do we have, you know, these, these techniques and big data that we could really figure things out. But our brain is still a brain of these humans that didn't have the internet, that didn't have all the math that we have now, and so we're still learning from stories. That's kind of our, our, um, instinct. Now, we are sophisticated creatures. We can overcome this. We can look at the data and we can learn, but really our instinct is to learn from a single story. The third reason, I think, is that stories are often novel. Like, you've never heard the exact same-

Steven Bartlett 37:16 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 37:16 ... story in that kind of way. Again, novelty causes you to pay attention and causes you to remember. It's, it's another sig- signal if something is important, right?

Steven Bartlett 37:24 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 37:25 Um, while data and figures, you kind of heard it before if someone says, "Well, there's no relationship between autism and vaccine," or whatever, I mean, you've already had the science. It's usually doesn't, it doesn't sound so novel. And really, our brain cares about the headlines, right? What's new? It's like a newspaper. We don't care about what's been the same.

Steven Bartlett 37:42 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 37:42 We care about this is new, means that we should pay attention, and then maybe it's important or maybe not. But, um...

Steven Bartlett 37:49 Mm-hmm. That last point really resonated about the, the, the sheer nature that stories are in essence novel. You've never heard about Debbie in New Castle-

Dr. Tali Sharot 37:56 Exactly.

Steven Bartlett 37:57 ... before. Um, but also, uh, what, you know, uh, now it makes perfect sense as to why politicians in the House of Parliament every week say, "I spoke to my constituent, Dorothy, in Burnley." And then they'll tell the story about Dorothy struggling to, to heat her home versus just coming with facts.

Dr. Tali Sharot 38:10 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 38:11 And when you hear about Dorothy who can't heat her home, you feel way more, "Oh, my God," versus hearing 24% of elderly people can't heat their home, for example.

Steven Bartlett 38:20 When I think about motivation though, does the... do the same rules apply? So if I wanna motivate my team, should I be telling them The Diary of a CEO has done 20 million downloads this month, or should I be telling them a story of Dorothy who listened to the podcast and it changed her life?

Dr. Tali Sharot 38:38 I think in this case, both things will, will work. I mean, um, seeing progress is something that really motivates us, and seeing progress with numbers is an easy way for us to see progress, right? This is why, um, all these kind of, like, track your steps work, right? Um, so i think to motivate... I mean, it, it's al- it's always lovely also to hear a story. I mean, even for yourself, if, you know... It doesn't matter how many people watched your-

Steven Bartlett 39:07 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 39:07 ... podcast. It's that when you get, like, you meet someone, they tell you about, like, how much you touched them and really changed their life, and they decide to make a decision because of you-

Steven Bartlett 39:14 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 39:14 ... they heard you do something-

Steven Bartlett 39:15 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 39:16 ... you really remember that, right? That, like, causes so much joy and motivation.

Steven Bartlett 39:19 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 39:20 Numbers are great too, right? When you look and you're like, "Oh, I have one million people listening to b- my podcast."

Steven Bartlett 39:24 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 39:24 That's great too. So I think both things work, and when... if you do use numbers, it's really great to kind of show the progress, right? A really great way to change behavior is to show people progress, and numbers is just one way to show it, right? If they can kind of see it going up, up, up, up, um, that's, that's really helpful. And I mean, we know it in sports, but it can, it can be true for anything, right? If it's like, you can do it with money, investments, right? Um, seeing that go up.

Steven Bartlett 39:53 Relationships as well?

Narrator 39:54 To be part of-

Dr. Tali Sharot 39:54 I wonder how you can do it for relationships? It's a good question. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 39:56 Well, I, I, I actually, I say that 'cause I feel like I do that sometimes with my partner, where, um, we might be facing some kind of issue, and one of the most compelling things we've ever done when we're facing an issue, is we look at all the issues we've overcame together-

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:09 Mmm.

Steven Bartlett 40:09 ... and, like, how we're here.

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:10 Right.

Steven Bartlett 40:11 So there were so many other times where we thought this, you know, we couldn't solve it. She lived on the other side of the planet. I lived here. We both didn't wanna move. (laughs) And then-

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:19 I've had exactly the same... (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 40:21 Exactly. Exactly.

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:22 ... situation. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 40:22 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:23 That was a problem-

Steven Bartlett 40:24 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:24 ... for years and years. Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 40:24 Oh, really?

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:25 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 40:25 Yeah, I remember just being sat in a, a bar and m- my partner was ta- talking about an issue or something w- that we were struggling with or whatever, and I remember her saying to her, like, "Look, look how far we've come-"

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:35 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 40:35 ... from where we were here to where we are now." It's like, "Well, there's nothing that's gonna get in the way of us," you know? And that seemed to be compelling because it... I guess it was an, an emotional story of all the is- the

Steven Bartlett 40:44 previous issues we've o- we've overcame. Getting back to the optimism bias, the optimism bias from what I understood is that, is that bias to believing that, um, the future will be good? Is that, is that accurate or is that inaccurate?

Dr. Tali Sharot 40:58 Yeah, kind of. So, um, optimism on its own, um, means-

Steven Bartlett 41:02 You're agreeing with me even though I'm wrong. (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 41:03 No, no, no. You're not wrong.

Steven Bartlett 41:04 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 41:04 I think what you mean is right. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 41:05 (laughs) Thank you.

Dr. Tali Sharot 41:06 I'll just give you the scientific definition.

Steven Bartlett 41:08 Yeah. (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 41:08 So, um, yeah. So optimism is, is believing that, that some, you know, that positive things will happen. The optimism bias means that, um, you're either like... that w- you believe these optimistic things wi- the, these good things will happen, but y- the evidence suggests otherwise. So it's, it's actually a mistake, right? The optimism bias. So usually, we define it as overestimating the likelihood of positive events happening.

Steven Bartlett 41:32 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 41:33 So you're overestimating, um, how much money am I gonna get with my first job when I leave, uh, graduate school, right? Or overestimating, like, how long my marriage will last, um, and so on. So overestimating the positive in light of the evidence that is in front of us, um, and underestimating the likelihood of negative events happening. So I'm underestimating my likelihood of getting COVID, of getting cancer, of being in a car accident, going bankrupt, whatever it is, based on whatever evidence is, is there. Um, so optimism bias does mean mistakes. So the word bias means a systematic mistake. So obviously, when we think about the future, we can't be right most of the time 'cause the future is uncertain and we don't know what's gonna happen, so we're gonna be wrong a lot of the times when we predict the future. But the optimism bias means that the mistakes that we make tend to systematically be that we expect it to be better than it ends up being. So that's basically the optimism bias, right? I expect it to be better than it ends up being. Um, which sounds like a bad thing, but it's not necessarily so. I mean, the word bias, people usually... because it, it is a mistake, uh, people usually think that that means it's not a good thing, but it's not necessarily so. It can actually have both positive and negative, um-... outcomes to it. So, if you think about the positive, um, if I expect good things in my future, specifically good things, even though I'm overestimating the likelihood of these things happening, even if I think, "Oh, I'm, you know, I'm going to make one million in the next year," and of course that's way more than I'm going to, um, but that then motivates you, right? So, having these positive expectations motivates you to try harder. It's a bit like, "I think I'm going to get the gold. I'm more likely to get the silver." So, that's kind of the idea. And it also enhances your happiness and wellbeing, right? 'Cause how you're feeling now is a lot to do not necessarily with what you're doing at the moment, but what you think you'll be doing later, right? How you're feeling now is like, okay, am I maybe feeling nice talking here?

Steven Bartlett 43:35 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 43:35 But, um, a lot of it is, what do I think I'm going to do later on this evening? Next week? Next month? In a year? Our expectations of where we will be in the future affects our happiness today, right? And so, if I have these positive effe- posit- positive expectations of the future, even if they're not gonna happen, they make me happier today. This is why there's a really cool study that was done at Harvard where they were asking people who were about to go on vacation how happy they were every day before vacation, and hav- every day during vacation, and every day after vacation, for a week. Uh, so a week before vacation every day, a week during vacation every day, a week after vacation every day. So, what was the happiest day, do you think?

Steven Bartlett 44:14 The day before they went on-

Dr. Tali Sharot 44:14 Right, exactly right. The day before vacation, they were still in the office, like working on the computers, but on their mind, they were already on vacation. On, on the, in their mind, it was wonderful. And when they went on vacation, it was good, but it wasn't as good as it was in their minds the day before. So, it's the anticipation of these goods. So, it's an optimism bias, 'cause they thought the vacation was gonna be better than what it ended up being, but that brought them the happiness beforehand, right? And also, probably enhanced the likelihood that they will go on vacation, which is a good thing, um, as well.

Steven Bartlett 44:44 So, does that mean that we should, uh, in our relationships, in our, in our teams, et cetera, we should try and give people things to look forward to?

Dr. Tali Sharot 44:50 Absolutely. Absolutely. And- and I think that there's two things. You kind of want things in the diary, right? So, having a vacation in the diary that's gonna happen i- in a month makes you happy today. So, whatever it is, whatever you're doing for that matters to your team, have what I call anticipatory events, right? Things that they could look forward to that will make them happy today. Um, but also, I think, you know, a lot of times I do motivate my, uh, team by telling them that I think this project is gonna work really well. I mean, even, I think it's going to work pretty well, but I might like exaggerate a little bit. (laughs) 'Cause you know, that enhances motivation. And who knows, you know, maybe it will work even better than I expected. So, it's good to kind of enhance kind of the- the expectations, and also to have these things that people can look forward to. And of course, it works the other way. So also, if you're dreading something that's gonna happen tomorrow, next week, right? You have to go to the dentist, or whatever bad thing is happening is gonna get there in the- it's gonna affect your mood today. Um, so dread of things in the future and anticipation of the good stuff is all affecting how we feel at the moment.

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Steven Bartlett 47:40 How contagious is optimism, and conversely pessimism, in like in life generally? If I'm around a group of pessimists or I'm around a group of optimists, what kind of contagious impact is there on- on me?

Dr. Tali Sharot 47:53 Yeah. Any emotion is contagious. Um, anything. Sadness, anxiety, joy. Um, everything is contagious. Fear. And it happens really, really fast and in an unconscious way, right? It could be even like you're sitting in, um, in the Tube and someone in front of you is looking fearful. You straightaway will s- will feel fearful yourself. First of all, you will mimic the expression of the person that's in front of you without noticing it. So, if you look fearful, I'm gonna start mimicking the same facial expressions.

Steven Bartlett 48:26 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 48:26 Yeah. And that facial expression will make me feel fearful, right? 'Cause our brain is learning from how our face, right? There's- it's a signal, and it goes both ways, like a feedback loop. Um, and there's a good reason for it, because if someone is afraid, there might be something dangerous around us.

Steven Bartlett 48:41 There might be some monkeys.

Dr. Tali Sharot 48:42 So, I should-

Steven Bartlett 48:43 Have you seen the monkeys-

Dr. Tali Sharot 48:44 Okay.

Steven Bartlett 48:44 ... in the David Attenborough documentary? That star, they l- they know that, they know that the other monkeys are taking a cue from them.

Dr. Tali Sharot 48:49 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 48:50 So, they fake s- fear.

Dr. Tali Sharot 48:51 Oh.

Steven Bartlett 48:52 So, they go, "Aah! Aah!" And then when all the monkeys run off, they go and get the food.

Dr. Tali Sharot 48:55 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 48:56 'Cause they- they're- they've like, they've like got to level two where they realize-

Dr. Tali Sharot 48:59 Right.

Steven Bartlett 48:59 ... that they're all taking cues from each other. And I remember that documentary thinking, "Wow, like," you know, 'cause all the monkeys would run the minute one monkey made a reaction.And that's pretty much what you're describing there, right?

Dr. Tali Sharot 49:08 Yeah. Exactly. And it works for good things as well. If, if someone looks excited, you're like, you will feel excited as well. You don't know why, but if they're excited, there might be something good around, right?

Steven Bartlett 49:17 Is this-

Dr. Tali Sharot 49:17 For them to get-

Steven Bartlett 49:18 ... why people yawn together? (laughs) I was thinking about yawns are contagious.

Dr. Tali Sharot 49:19 Oh, we always... It's just mimicking. We do f- facial expressions. We, we mimic any kind of facial expression and, and bodily expressions as well.

Steven Bartlett 49:26 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 49:26 Yeah, I'm trying not to now.

Steven Bartlett 49:28 Yeah. (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 49:29 Um, but, um, but okay. So, why this, this is really important to think about? Because let's say you want to... You're managing your team. If you're stressful and you're gonna start, like, I don't know, even, like, shouting or raising your voice, or... They're gonna get more stressed as well, right? So, it's, it's, it's true. It's a bit like the monkeys. You can actually change at least exp- how you look in terms of the emotions. You need to think about, "What is my... What emotion am I conveying?" Because the emotion that you are conveying is going to then affect how people around you feel. Um, so there's a little bit of kind of emotional control, um, that is helpful too.

Steven Bartlett 50:09 You-

Dr. Tali Sharot 50:09 To do.

Steven Bartlett 50:09 You mentioned there that you kind of exa- you might exaggerate a little bit the belief in a positive outcome to your team members, and I think that's-

Dr. Tali Sharot 50:16 And I hope they're not listening. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 50:17 Yeah. (laughs) Well, I think we all do sometimes. I mean, I usually believe it because I think I have a bit of a, a bias, uh, optimism bias myself, but, um, th- that's in part because of, I guess, chapter three in The Optimism Bias, where you talk about how self-fulfilling, um-

Dr. Tali Sharot 50:31 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 50:31 ... optimism is. And there was some really, really staggering s- statistical sort of studies and s-, um, experiments that have been done to prove that optimism really is a self-fulfilling thing, and it kinda, kind of, um, makes me think about this concept of manifestation. People always talk about manifestation, and it seems that, see, it's, in my mind, always been this kind of pseudo-sciencey, you just think about something and then it happens. What's your view on manifestation? Is it true?

Dr. Tali Sharot 50:56 Yeah. So, it's not magic. It's not that I'm thinking something in my mind and the waves are gonna change what happens in the world. The reason, if you believe something, the likelihood it will happen is higher is because you then change your actions, right? You think, "I think, you know, my startup is gonna really succeed," and that then changes your actions. You're more likely to go out there and tell other people, right? So, if you think it's gonna succeed, you're more likely to convey that information to investors and so on. They can see your, your kind of confidence. They'll be more likely to invest in you, right? You put more time in. You put more effort in. Um, and that's why it can have an effect on the, the outcomes. So, it's not kind of a magic kind of thing. It's just that what we believe in our mind changes the way we behave, and the way we behave in the world changes the world. Um, so that's, that's why that is-

Steven Bartlett 51:51 And then-

Dr. Tali Sharot 51:52 ... the way that it is.

Steven Bartlett 51:52 ... that's kinda like... This idea of s- self-fulfilling prophecies is linked to this concept of stereotyping, where-

Dr. Tali Sharot 51:58 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 51:58 ... one of the real startling things I read in your, um, in your work was that if a woman is reminded of, of her gender before a math exam, then her performance on that math exam will drop.

Dr. Tali Sharot 52:12 Right. So, our expectations, where do they come from, right? To some extent, I mean, they're coming from around us as well. Not only. We, we can have, like, confidence even if the people around us do not. But other people's expectations, whether it is your friends, your family, society, will impact your own. Um, and so, and again, that's becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, right? If, if you're told, "Females are not good in math, they're not good in science, they can't be CEOs," and so on, that will change the way that you think. Even if it's momentarily. Even if you're trying to fight it, it will change the way that you think and what you believe, and that will then change, um, your outcomes. And I think maybe in that, I mean, we don't know exactly why, um, reminding females about the stereotype that the females don't do well with math changes the exam results, but it could be things like maybe it enhances anxiety. You start self-doubt, right? I mean, if you go to an exam and there's self-doubt, well, that's not helpful. Um, and there's, you know, there's all these classic studies where, um, there was... In, in a class, they would tell the teachers at the beginning of the semester, um, who the talented kids were, but it was random. They randomly selected kids, and they said, "These are the talented ones." By the end of the year, they did better, these kids, right?

Steven Bartlett 53:30 Mm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 53:30 Because the teachers believed that they were talented. They would treat them in that kind of way. They would maybe put more time. They convey the expectations to the kid. The kids then started believing that they're talented, and that gave them confidence, and they, um, performed better. And of course, it works the other way, right?

Steven Bartlett 53:46 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 53:47 If a teacher belie- or is told, "This is, you know, the naughty one. This is, you know, the not intelligent one," that will then change, um, how the kids behave, what they believe, and this is where stereotypes are, you know, come into play as well, because sometimes it's about not specific individuals. It's about a whole group, um-

Steven Bartlett 54:05 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 54:05 ... of individuals.

Steven Bartlett 54:06 And one such example as well is the, the study where African Americans were found to do significantly worse on IQ tests compared to Caucasians, people that are white, when race was emphasized before the IQ test, um-

Dr. Tali Sharot 54:20 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 54:20 ... but did as well as white people when no stereotype was mentioned before.

Dr. Tali Sharot 54:24 Right.

Steven Bartlett 54:24 So, just, just by mentioning that I'm Black before I do a IQ test will lower my performance on the test versus if you hadn't mentioned it.

Dr. Tali Sharot 54:33 Because the association. You're, you're-

Steven Bartlett 54:36 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 54:36 ... reminded of your ethnicity, and you're doing this exam, and then you know that maybe in your-

Steven Bartlett 54:41 A stereotype.

Dr. Tali Sharot 54:41 ... society there's a stereotype, and again, that can cause self-doubt and anxiety and so on. And what I, I think I like is that I think after I, I, I talk about that study, I also talk about another study that after Obama was elected, grades went up for-

Steven Bartlett 54:55 Interesting.

Dr. Tali Sharot 54:55 ... African Americans, um, 'cause it's, again, it's a self-confident thing. It's, it's amazing how these, you know, little things... I mean, it's not little. The fact that Obama got, got, uh, elected is not little, but then the fact that that then impacts your self-confidence, you know, the little impact on self-confidence then changes, um, your grades, um, it's, it's quite something.

Steven Bartlett 55:17 But it also changes your, um... One of the other things I read that was really startling, it also changes your salary.You talk about how one tiny move up on the optimism scale is worth an extra $33,000 a year in salary over the long term?

Dr. Tali Sharot 55:32 (smacks lips) Right.

Steven Bartlett 55:32 Is that-

Dr. Tali Sharot 55:32 And I, I, okay, so that, um, that, that shows there's a correlation.

Steven Bartlett 55:37 Anyway.

Dr. Tali Sharot 55:37 I think, I think that's, um... So we still don't know for sure if it, is it that because I have specific traits, I'm more likely to be optimistic, and therefore more likely, because of those traits, also more likely to gain higher salary, right?

Steven Bartlett 55:52 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 55:52 So, you know, you can imagine, I'm optimistic because I had a very privileged life, um, and I did well in school, so I'm more optimistic, and, and for the same reasons, I'm then more likely to get a higher grade. Um, but, um, in, in some cases, so we don't know if it's going one way or the other way, right?

Steven Bartlett 56:11 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 56:11 If it's a causation or correlation. One interesting thing that, that has been found is that optimists are more likely to be entrepreneurs.

Steven Bartlett 56:19 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 56:19 There's... I mean, that is quite clear, you know. Um, and again, we don't know, is it because I'm optimistic that I'm more likely to be an entrepreneur, or is it something about being an entre- entrepreneur that makes me more optimistic? But what they found is, after you become an entrepreneur, you become even more optimistic. (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 56:37 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 56:37 So that suggests that, that there is something, it is true, that optimistic people are more likely to take a chance, more likely to take a risk, and therefore are more likely to be entrepreneurs. And that experience of doing that enhances your optimism further-

Steven Bartlett 56:50 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 56:50 ... uh, which is really interesting.

Steven Bartlett 56:51 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 56:51 It kind of goes both ways.

Steven Bartlett 56:52 Does that then explain how we can teach someone to become more optimistic? Because if the pursuit of entrepreneurship may, is kind of self-reinforcing your optimism, it's making you more and more optimistic, one would assume that that's because you're, you're gaining evidence about yourself and the world and what you're capable of as you're going, which is further sort of fueling you. And conversely, someone who, I don't know, maybe lingers too long in their comfort zone and is, um, like, leaning out of opportunities, constantly being negatively reinforced in terms of their self-belief in their skills, et cetera, so they're becoming more and more pessimistic, is that, like, broadly true?

Dr. Tali Sharot 57:25 I think it might be, yes. I think you are gaining evidence that you can do things. And I think even if you fail, um, you still gained evidence that you were able to try something new, right?

Steven Bartlett 57:37 And not die.

Dr. Tali Sharot 57:37 What?

Steven Bartlett 57:38 And not die.

Dr. Tali Sharot 57:38 And not die, right?

Steven Bartlett 57:39 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 57:39 And you learned something, right?

Steven Bartlett 57:41 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 57:41 Um, yes, I think you're absolutely right. Um, so if you are able to get people to have these kind of, um, experiences that then causes them to become more confident, that will then enhance their optimism.

Steven Bartlett 57:57 So how do... You know, we talk- talked about

Steven Bartlett 57:59 the, all the positive upsides there of being an optimist.

Dr. Tali Sharot 58:01 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 58:01 How does... If I've got a friend that's a pessimist, or a partner, or a husband, or whatever it might be, how do I get them... We talked a little bit about it there, but how do I get them to become more of a optimist? 'Cause I wanna be surrounded by optimists. I want my company to be full of them, like, prag- pragmatic optimists, but still people that believe that, you know, the future's gonna be good, um, and we're gonna do great things, for all the self-fulfilling reasons you've described.

Dr. Tali Sharot 58:23 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 58:23 What do I do?

Dr. Tali Sharot 58:24 Okay, so first of all, I just wanna mention that about 30% of how optimistic we are is genetically determined. This has been shown from, uh, twin studies. But that still leaves two-thirds, right?

Steven Bartlett 58:36 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 58:36 Um, the, um... (sighs) I think the best studies on this comes probably from Martin Seligman, where he actually did experiments where he got people who were somewhat pessimistic, even slightly depressed, and the approach that he took is to change the inter- what he calls interpretation style. So optimists, this is what they usually do. If something happened and it, it, it went well, right? You sold your startup for a lot of money, you had a project and it was successful, they usually interpret that as meaning that they... It's, it's personally, it's something about them that caused this positive outcome, right? And it is something in them that's quite permanent. Let's say my project went well because I'm a hard worker, right? And, you know, maybe I'm intelligent or whatever. And then they say, "Well, if I have those skills, that means that a lot of other things are gonna work well in life," right? "If I'm a hard worker, or if I'm a good with, good with people, that also means that I'll be a good dad," for example, right? When something negative happens, they tend to do the opposite. They tend to see it as circumstantial, right? "This negative thing happened. Okay, so I didn't put a lot of effort in this, but not because I'm not a hard worker. I just didn't put in e- effort 'cause I was distracted by something else, or, you know, this other person just happened to have a better, uh, a better proposal." So it's circumstantial. That means that they don't take that as evidence of, "How am I gonna, uh, perform in the future?" Right?

Steven Bartlett 1:00:05 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:00:06 So it's really different interpretation of negative outcomes and positive outcomes. So what... And then pessimists do the exact opposite. When something bad happens, they say, "This bad thing happened because of me, because of a trait that I have, and because I have this trait," let's say, "I'm bad with people, that's gonna affect all the rest of my life and all these future projects." When something good happen, it's circumstantial. "Good thing happened, I got the job, but really because they didn't have any other people, candidates." So what Martin Seligman did is he, uh, taught people this interpretation style, that he taught them, to, whenever something good happens, this is how you have to think about it. You have to think about, what is it about you that caused this positive thing to happen, right? And how is that positive trait, or whatever, skill, or whatever thing you did, how can it affect other parts of your life and other future, um, outcomes? And the opposite for negative. If something negative happened, I don't mean it don't take responsibility, but are there circumstantial, right? It could be something that you did, but it doesn't have to be permanent, right? You happen to have, be in a really bad state because, I don't know, something else, your parent was, was sick or something. Um, so he teaches them, h- the, the people to kind of interpret this, to find these reasons for the positive and negative, and it seemed to work, um, to some extent. Now, it's difficult. I'm, I mean, (laughs) you know? It's not easy to turn a pessimist into an optimist, um, but it had some effect on their well-being and even on their physical health as a result.

Steven Bartlett 1:01:33 Is that negative explanatory style of saying, "Okay, this bad thing happened, it's 'cause of me, it's 'cause I'm not good enough," whatever-

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:01:38 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 1:01:38 ... is that the road to depression?

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:01:40 ... yeah, so there's a really tight link between depression and pessimism. So, pessimism is a symptom of depression. It's an actual symptom. Um, and so what we see is people with severe depression have a pessimistic bias. They expect the future to be worse than it ends up being, and worse than the evidence in front of them is. Um, people with mild depression have no bias at all. This doesn't mean they're accurate. They can make mistakes, but on both sides. So, sometimes they expect things to be better, sometimes they expect things to be worse. But overall-

Steven Bartlett 1:02:12 Realistic.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:02:13 ... um, they, they don't have a, a bias.

Steven Bartlett 1:02:16 Happiness. You know, one of the things we talked about before we started recording was, um, Scott Galloway said on this podcast that happiness looks like a U-shape throughout our lives. As in, when we're young, we're at a high level of happiness, and then we kind of dip into our 40s, I think he- I think from what I read, when we hit our 40s, that's kind of the lowest (laughs) . It sounds kind of morbid. It sounds kind of grim, but we- that's our lowest point of happiness. And then it kind of curves back up again as we go into the last sort of chapters of our life. Is that accurate? 'Cause Scott didn't provide any research, and I've mulled it over, and I, you know...

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:02:49 Yeah. No, so this, this is true. It's based on many studies and, and studies involving thousands and thousands of individuals, you know, up to, like, 70,000 or more in a country, and it's been shown in many, many countries. Um, so not just in, in the Western world. In many, many countries, almost all countries around the world. Um, so exactly what you said, kids and children, they're happiest and the most optimistic.

Steven Bartlett 1:03:15 Oh.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:03:16 Then it goes down and reaches rock bottom in your midlife, as well as optimism does. So actually, in middle age, you stop having an optimism bias. So, your optimism bias is greater, greatest in childrens and kids because it goes down, down, down. And then really, there's no optimism bias in midlife on average, of course. Um, and then it starts going up. You become happier and more optimistic until the last few years of life, which is counterintuitive to our image of the grumpy old man, right? And it actually stays there until the couple- last couple years of life. Um, the difference between countries is that the dip, the, you know, the point where it's lowest actually is a little bit different between country and country. I think in the US it's about 40. It's, uh, relatively early. I think in the UK as well. But then some countries as much, uh, I think, like, Italy might be 50. Greece as well, like, 50 to 60. And then there's a few countries where you don't see that. Russia is one of them. Um, Romania, and I forget, there's another one where you actually don't see. They, they actually just become, you know, less and less and less happy, um, in those countries. We don't know why that is, that specific, uh, case.

Steven Bartlett 1:04:24 So, I'm, I'm 30 now, so I'm heading right down to rock bottom as we speak (laughs) .

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:04:27 Well, you've got time. You've got time (laughs) . I'm about to turn, so I'm wait- I'm looking forward (laughs) .

Steven Bartlett 1:04:33 Oh, so you're on your way up, and I'm on my way down to...

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:04:34 I'm on the way... Well, not quite yet, but I'm about on my way up (laughs) .

Steven Bartlett 1:04:38 Okay (laughs) . And th- this, you know, this links to, I think, chapter five in your book, where we say, where you talk about h- the chapter's called Humans Are Bad At Predicting What Makes Them Happy. And one of the startling things is that you say that children don't impact our happiness positively. Now, I- I'm under the impression that children make us ecstatically happy. Well, it's difficult, but from what I've, from what I've heard from people, I thought children are something to really be looking forward to, but you seem to assert otherwise in your book.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:03 Um, so this, first of all, I wanna say, this is just the research and the numbers. And, um, my... I'm not just saying this-

Steven Bartlett 1:05:10 (laughs) .

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:10 ... but my own experience is the absolute opposite. Um-

Steven Bartlett 1:05:13 Bear in mind, her child is upstairs.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:15 (laughs) Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 1:05:15 (laughs) And he's watching this.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:16 Leo. No, but, but it, it's absolutely true 'cause it's, it's funny 'cause because of that research, and I wrote the first... This is in my first book, The Optimism Bias, which I wrote before my kids, and I, I actually... I mean, I believed in it. I mean, I mean, that's the data. What are you gonna do? And, and that kind of got me worried, I have to say, about having kids. I was a little bit worried about the fact that childr- it says, "Children's..." You know, children don't make you happy. You become less happy.

Steven Bartlett 1:05:42 You become less happy?

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:43 W- when you have children. That's what the, the research-

Steven Bartlett 1:05:45 Oh, really? I didn't, I didn't see that.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:46 Oh, sorry. That's what you said, right? 'Cause your-

Steven Bartlett 1:05:48 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:48 ... children don't make you happy.

Steven Bartlett 1:05:49 Yeah.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:49 Right?

Steven Bartlett 1:05:50 But I didn't know there was... I, I thought they didn't make you more happy. I didn't know they make you less happy.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:05:53 Oh, no. It's, uh, apparently, like, um, uh, I mean, the data shows... I mean, there's a little different points of data. Some... So, for example, there's one piece of data that shows that... This was done by actually Daniel Kahneman, who's a Nobel Prize winner, um, where they asked, um, a large group of French women to say how happy they were throughout the day. So, I don't know, every few hours, or, oh, oh, maybe at the end of the day. They said what they were doing and how happy they were, and they found that the least happy people are is commuting.

Steven Bartlett 1:06:24 Mm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:06:25 But then I think the number two least happy was being with their children (laughs) . Um, so I have to tell you, from my own ex- this is an anecdote, an N-of-1, my children really make me extremely happy. I love being with them. I'm, uh, really, it's contrary to all the research. So, I, I, I-

Steven Bartlett 1:06:41 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:06:42 ... truly, I mean, I'm surprised, you know (laughs) .

Steven Bartlett 1:06:45 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:06:45 Before they were born, I was thinking, "Look, if I, if, you know, if I don't like them, we'll put them in, uh, boarding school." (laughs) And my mom was like, "I don't think you wanna put them in boarding school. You'll probably..." And I was like, "Well, we'll see." And then-

Steven Bartlett 1:06:56 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:06:56 ... and then, no. Absolutely love, um, having them around. So, but that's just an N-of-1. So, I don't know. And of course, your own experience sh- unfortunately, even as a scientist, shapes the way that you interpret (laughs) the data.

Steven Bartlett 1:07:11 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:07:12 But, um, I mean, look, having... I mean, I'm sure having children can be difficult, and, and, uh, uh, you know, it depends on your life circumstances and, and all of that, and temperament of the child, and so on. And so I'm sure it could be, it could be difficult.

Steven Bartlett 1:07:26 But is that, is that because there's a distinction, as you said at the start of this conversation, between, like, happiness and meaning? Um, it might be difficult, but it's meaningful. I mean, like, work is difficult. There's, like, varieties of work. If I'm working in a job with low autonomy where I, um, the outcomes, I'm, like, subjectively not interested in, then it's just difficult work. But if I'm, like, raising a child, it's difficult, but it's tremendously meaningful. So, although I might say to this, the investigator that I'm unhappy when my s- kid is crying and running around and smashing everything and playing with the Rubik's Cube and p- won't put it down-... I reflect on that in hindsight and go, "Oh, amazing." You know what it-

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:03 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 1:08:04 ... you know what I'm trying to say?

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:04 Absolutely. I mean, meaning is important, and you should do things, you should make choices, um, according to meaning as well. Um, and, and obviously, there's individual differences.

Steven Bartlett 1:08:15 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:15 In my case, it, they just actually make me happy. I can, like, dance with them in my, you know, at home and (laughs) like-

Steven Bartlett 1:08:21 (laughs)

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:21 ... actual happiness. Um, but, but, you know, it can obviously ... It's different and it's not, like, all the time, of course.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:29 Um ...

Steven Bartlett 1:08:29 What about marriage? That was the other one that was quite surprising.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:32 That it didn't ...

Steven Bartlett 1:08:33 Didn't make us-

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:34 But I think, okay, so that was a little bit, it's been a while since I looked at this, but I think it was nuanced, which is what does make you happy is being in a relationship. I believe that did make, whether you were married or not married-

Steven Bartlett 1:08:47 Didn't matter.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:47 ... didn't really matter.

Steven Bartlett 1:08:48 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:08:48 But I think being in a relationship was, was, um, in- inducing happiness. The other kind of interesting finding about that is that, um, how fast people get over divorce, right? That it takes, I mean, I don't know if it's fast or not, but within, like, so just before, um, a few years before you get divorced, happiness starts going down because of course there's problems, I guess, and so on, and it actually hits rock bottom just about the time that you get divorced, and then it starts going up. You start adapting, right? Um, and in fact, goes back to baseline levels of happiness within about two years. I don't know, maybe, maybe two years is a lot, but then p- people, uh, bounce back. Um, so when you kind of think about these, um, changes, which could be negative, right? Divorce. I think people don't consider as much our ability to adapt so fast, right? To change so fast. I think COVID was a really good example, the pandemic. I mean, before the pandemic, if I was to tell you, "You're gonna have to stay at home and not see anyone else," and you, you'd be like, "This is disaster. How's it gonna happen?" Um, people adapted quite fast. Yes, stress, we did studies, we actually started doing studies a few weeks after the pandemic started. We did see, of course, stress and anxiety was enhanced, but A, not as much as we thought. And number two, the, um, bouncing back was extremely surprising. Within just a couple of months, a lot of people were back to their baseline happiness. So adaptation is really fast. You kind of find ways to overcome these things. That being said, that was like a bird's eye view-

Steven Bartlett 1:10:21 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:10:21 ... because there were parts of the population that were not doing well, right? So if you kind of take a worm's eye view-

Steven Bartlett 1:10:27 Sure.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:10:28 ... um, you see that, for example, people with, uh, mental health problems, I mean, preexisting ones, they had tr- trouble adapting to this new situation. Um, some, like women actually did a little bit worse because they were probably, had more of the, the childcare. Um, younger individuals did worse than older individuals, maybe because of that U-shaped-

Steven Bartlett 1:10:50 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:10:51 ... uh, curve. Um, but in general, people adapt faster than they believe they will, and I think that goes back to our question of why don't people take risks and why don't, right, why don't they make changes? I think because one of the reasons is they're afraid that, that ch- they won't adapt to the change, right? And they underestimate how fast and how well humans adapt to changes in their environment, in their situation. I mean, this is basically why our species did so well and why we're all here today, I think, because we can just adapt to, to these different environment changes, and ...

Steven Bartlett 1:11:25 When we're trying to get people to take action in their lives or just take action in teams and such, one of the things in inf- The Influential Mind book that you wrote talks about how, um, fear and trying to scare people, and I was thinking about it then when you were talking about the pandemic and much of what the governments were saying and how, trying to get us to conform to the pandemics through, um, fear, I guess. Um, should we try and scare people into action as leaders?

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:11:48 Yeah. So, so I really like this because it's kind of a fundamental neuroscientific, uh, finding that it's a little bit of a leap, but tells you something really interesting in how to get people to do something or not to do something. So basically, what we find is that if you want to induce action, it's more, um, helpful to highlight the rewards, you know. If you do this, you know, if you put the time in, you know, you're gonna get a promotion. Um, and less so about the fear, that if you don't do this, you won't get a promotion. So, if you want people to act, highlighting rewards, highlighting the good ti- the good outcomes is better. If you want people not to act, let's say you want them not to reveal some secret, actually highlighting the punishment is better. And why is that? So this is where I find it really interesting, which is we kind of evolved in a world that to get something good, whether it is a promotion or love, or we have to do something, so I'm thirsty, I need to move my hand and have a little sip of this tea, right? So, and imagine, it doesn't necessarily, this is the world we live in, but it, it, it's not necessarily the way it could have been. It could have been that to get the tea, I'd had to kind of, like, go like this and not do anything.

Steven Bartlett 1:13:06 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:13:06 I imagine, like, different physics or something, right?

Steven Bartlett 1:13:08 Mm-hmm.

Dr. Tali Sharot 1:13:08 But the world that we live in is to get the good stuff, you have to do things. And so our brain has evolved in this kind of world where any time something good, we anticipate something good, a go reaction is activated