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Speaker 1: Pushkin.

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Speaker 2: Hey, happiness Lave listeners, We're taking a break from our

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Speaker 2: Happiness Hot Take series to bring you a special treat.

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Speaker 2: If you listened to last week's episode, you know that

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Speaker 2: I recently got to interview happiness historian Darren McMahon, who

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Speaker 2: told me all about the history of the idea of

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Speaker 2: the pursuit of happiness. While in this episode, I'll be

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Speaker 2: continuing my conversation with Darren, but this time he'll be

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Speaker 2: interviewing me. You'll get to hear a live conversation that

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Speaker 2: we had at Darren's home institution of Dartmouth College, as

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Speaker 2: part of the Nelson A. Rockefellers Center at Dartmouth's Public

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Speaker 2: Conversations on the Pursuit of Happiness. We talked about all

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Speaker 2: things happiness science, like what practices we can do to

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Speaker 2: really feel better, and some thoughts I've had about new

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Speaker 2: technologies and AI. It was a wide ranging and super

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Speaker 2: fun conversation, so I couldn't wait to share it with

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Speaker 2: all my podcast bans. So enjoy the special episode of

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Speaker 2: my conversation with Darren McMahon at Dartmouth College. Our minds

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Speaker 2: are constantly telling us what to do to be happy,

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Speaker 2: but what if our minds are wrong. What if our

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Speaker 2: minds are lying to us, leading us away from what

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Speaker 2: will really make us happy. The good news is the

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Speaker 2: understanding the science of the mind can point us all

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Speaker 2: back in the right direction. You're listening to the Happiness

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Speaker 2: Lab with doctor Laurie Santos.

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Speaker 3: This is the second in our series on the willing

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Speaker 3: of the pursuit of happiness, both in the past and

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Speaker 3: the present and maybe the future. Today we have Glori Santos,

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Speaker 3: and I'm just delighted to have you here, Laurie. Last

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Speaker 3: week Laurie very kindly invited me to be on the

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Speaker 3: podcast and to talk about happiness in the eighteenth century. Today,

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Speaker 3: I think we're gonna talk about pursuit of happiness in

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Speaker 3: the twenty first but feel free to bring history into

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Speaker 3: it if you feel so moved.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, we're going four or fix. So.

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Speaker 3: Laurie is known as an authority on the science of

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Speaker 3: happiness and the pursuit of happiness, but you cut your

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Speaker 3: teeth as a psychologist and researcher of studying animal behavior,

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Speaker 3: I think particularly dogs, and I'd love to hear I mean,

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Speaker 3: I get as a dog lover, the link between dogs

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Speaker 3: and the pursuit of happiness. Would love to hear if

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Speaker 3: there's a link between the study of animals and the

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Speaker 3: pursuit of happiness or how you got from one to

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Speaker 3: the other.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think the biggest link between

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Speaker 1: animals and happiness is the animals. Definitely, dogs make us

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Speaker 1: really happy, They keep us moving, they make us mindful.

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Speaker 1: Lots of evidence showing that dog owners are happier. So

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Speaker 1: if you need one quick happiness tip, get a dog's

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Speaker 1: and make you happy, not a cat. Not a cat's

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Speaker 1: too less research on cats interestingly, but definitely cats make

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Speaker 1: you happier as well. But I think the psychological connection is.

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Speaker 1: One of the reasons I was studying animals is that

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Speaker 1: I've long been interested in the kinds of ways that

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Speaker 1: our minds lead us astray. Most people study animals to

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Speaker 1: try to figure out whether or not animals are as

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Speaker 1: smart as humans, but I spent a lot of my

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Speaker 1: time studying whether or not animals were as dumb as

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Speaker 1: people were in some of the ways that people are dumb.

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Speaker 1: I did this with monkeys, studying the economic errors that

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Speaker 1: we have and trying to see whether monkey show those two.

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Speaker 1: With dogs, we were really focused on social errors do

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Speaker 1: dogs imitate to the point that they're doing really irrational

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Speaker 1: things in some of the same ways as humans do.

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Speaker 1: And the connection between that and the happiness work is

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Speaker 1: that my take on happiness has always been that one

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Speaker 1: of the reasons we're not as happy as we can

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Speaker 1: be isn't that we're not working towards it. We're working

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Speaker 1: very hard towards becoming happier, but we're often doing it

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Speaker 1: in the wrong way because our minds are lying to

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Speaker 1: us about the kinds of things that we need to

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Speaker 1: do to be happier. And so in some ways, this

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Speaker 1: work on animals, which is really about what it is

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Speaker 1: that makes our minds go awry, it's very similar to

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Speaker 1: the way I think about happiness.

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Speaker 3: That's so interesting is there actually work on the well

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Speaker 3: being of animals When I always point out that Darwin

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Speaker 3: writes about some horses that are sort of ill tempered

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Speaker 3: and some that are cheery, and he begins to speculate

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Speaker 3: along those lines, and I don't know if there's actual

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Speaker 3: work in the lab.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, there's lots of we're trying to look at what

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Speaker 1: animals feel. Right. This is really important even for animal

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Speaker 1: researchers who are trying to make animals lives better and

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Speaker 1: think about animal welfare and so on. The problem with

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Speaker 1: animals and thinking about animal happiness is that the way

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Speaker 1: I know even if you, Darren, are happy, is that

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Speaker 1: I ask you often in some very formalized psychometric survey

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Speaker 1: where I ask you about your life experiences and your

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Speaker 1: life satisfaction and so on. But ultimately I don't really

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Speaker 1: have a way objectively to find out if you're happy.

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Speaker 1: You have to tell me. And the problem with animals

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Speaker 1: is as much as we ask them, they tend not

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Speaker 1: to tell us directly. Lacking verbal language, it's really hard

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Speaker 1: for us to find out whether or not animals are happy.

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Speaker 1: And so I think that's been the main limitation of

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Speaker 1: why there's not a whole field of animal well being

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Speaker 1: research that's as a robust as the research in humans.

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Speaker 1: Is very hard for them to tell us.

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Speaker 3: But if I know a psychologist, I won't stop them.

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Speaker 1: That's true. That's true.

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Speaker 3: So you begin with the animals, and then I think

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Speaker 3: it's in twenty eighteen you launched this great course, Psychology

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Speaker 3: and the Good Life. I'm sure you've answered this a

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Speaker 3: million times, but I'm curious how that came about. Had

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Speaker 3: you taught on well being prior to that point, what

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Speaker 3: was the impetus? And then be particularly interested to know

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Speaker 3: how the course has changed as you've taught it, because

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Speaker 3: I believe you still teaching it now.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. The pivot to thinking about well being

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Speaker 1: came with a pivot in my role at Yale. So

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Speaker 1: for most of my time at Yale, I was a

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Speaker 1: professor at the front of a classroom. Much like this.

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Speaker 1: I interacted a lot with students, but I was a

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Speaker 1: little bit distant from them. I was kind of, you know,

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Speaker 1: teaching them, but didn't really see closely what was happening

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Speaker 1: in student life. That all changed when I became what's

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Speaker 1: called the head of college on Yale's campus. These are

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Speaker 1: faculty members who live functioning in the dorm communities with students.

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Speaker 1: Yale is kind of like one of these weird colleges

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Speaker 1: like Hogwarts and Harry Potter, where there's like Gryffindor and Slytherin.

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Speaker 1: These like mini colleges within a college. I was head

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Speaker 1: of Sylhomon College, no relation to Slytherine, even though it

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Speaker 1: sounds very similar. But that meant that as a faculty member,

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Speaker 1: I for the first time was seeing student life really closely.

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Speaker 1: I was eating the students in the dining hall, I

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Speaker 1: was hanging out with them in the coffee shop, and

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Speaker 1: I just didn't like what I was seeing. Like I

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Speaker 1: was seeing this so called college student mental health crisis

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Speaker 1: up close in Personel where the stats when I first

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Speaker 1: started were that in twenty eighteen, more than forty percent

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Speaker 1: of college students reported to being too depressed to function

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Speaker 1: most days. Not just Yelle students, but nationally, more than

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Speaker 1: sixty percent said that they were overwhelmingly anxious. More than

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Speaker 1: one in ten had seriously considered suicide in the last

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Speaker 1: six months. This was a staggering amount of suffering that

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Speaker 1: was happening on canvas, and it was happening in my community. Right.

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Speaker 1: I'm this benevolent aunt who's hanging out with students trying

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Speaker 1: to make this community great, and I was just watching

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Speaker 1: my students suffer from panic attacks or worse. And that

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Speaker 1: made me really question what my institution was doing in

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Speaker 1: terms of mental health. I was kind of like, you know,

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Speaker 1: we as faculty members assume that you students are learning

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Speaker 1: you know, computer science or chaucer or whatever we're teaching you,

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Speaker 1: and how can that be true if more than two

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Speaker 1: thirds of you are too anxious to function most days,

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Speaker 1: or if you or your teammate or your roommate is

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Speaker 1: seriously considering suicide. It just seemed like there was this

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Speaker 1: disconnect between what we were expecting students to be learning

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Speaker 1: and the real level of suffering that I was seeing

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Speaker 1: in the community. And so I was just like, I

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Speaker 1: have to take action. Being a nerdy psychologist, there were

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Speaker 1: limited ways that I could take action. But I could

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Speaker 1: teach a new class. And I had already had a

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Speaker 1: little bit of experience in this field of happiness science

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Speaker 1: or what psychologists call positive psychology. I had done some

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Speaker 1: work with Marty Selligman, who's often thought of as like

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Speaker 1: the leader of the field. So I had a bit

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Speaker 1: of background in it, and so I thought, you know,

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Speaker 1: let me just teach a new intro class. I'll just

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Speaker 1: make a new class about this stuff. But the difference

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Speaker 1: with this class that I was teaching is that I

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Speaker 1: wanted it to be practical. I wanted it to be

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Speaker 1: a skills learning class where students were learning strategies they

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Speaker 1: could use if they were feeling burned out or stressed

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Speaker 1: and so on. It was a new class on campus though,

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Speaker 1: so I thought I'd show up in forty students would

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Speaker 1: be in a classroom, which is typical for a Yale

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Speaker 1: psych class. I did not expect the only place to

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Speaker 1: teach it on campus would be our concert hall. There

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Speaker 1: was also the football stadium, but to be fair, January

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Speaker 1: Football Stadium was not an awesome spot to teach a

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Speaker 1: toy somebody class. Yeah. Yeah, so that's the history. It

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Speaker 1: really came out of seeing this need on campus and

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Speaker 1: recognizing that we as I don't know the rescuer as,

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Speaker 1: it felt like we weren't doing our job. We were

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Speaker 1: just like pretending it was fine and kind of holding

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Speaker 1: it aside. And I really wanted to give student skills

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Speaker 1: they could.

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Speaker 3: Use so interesting. You know, it's funny. My late godfather

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Speaker 3: was close friends with Lorraine Siggins, who was director of

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Speaker 3: mental Health at Yale for years, and I remember Lorraine

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Speaker 3: saying at one point her office was seeing more than

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Speaker 3: half the undergraduates and that one had told her that

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Speaker 3: he had mortgaged his childhood in order to get into Yale.

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Speaker 3: And you know, that realization of the stress that we

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Speaker 3: put our young people through and the stress they take on,

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Speaker 3: it's just overwhelming. You know, you make a point that

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Speaker 3: I often try to highlight, and that is that all

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Speaker 3: this talk about happiness in the news and you know elsewhere,

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Speaker 3: it's not necessarily a good sign, right. It reflects a

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Speaker 3: kind of underlying anxiety and unhappiness, which is I think

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Speaker 3: says a lot about our time. Has that course changed?

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Speaker 3: I mean, so that's the initial impetus, but has it evolved?

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Speaker 3: Have things gotten better?

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Speaker 4: Yeah?

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Speaker 1: One of the things that changes the focus that I've had. Right.

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Speaker 1: The nice thing about having a quarter of the entire

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Speaker 1: Yale student body in your classroom is that you can

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Speaker 1: see what works, what they resonate with, and what's working

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Speaker 1: less well. One of the things I consistently hear from

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Speaker 1: my students about the stuff that they take away with

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Speaker 1: them and the course, what I'm most interested in is like,

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Speaker 1: what are the strategies you're going to use. You've heard

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Speaker 1: about all these different strategies, kind of menu of different

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Speaker 1: tools you can use to feel better. Which are you

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Speaker 1: actually using, Which are you putting into effect in your

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Speaker 1: own life? And the ones I consistently heard that students

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Speaker 1: were using all the time were strategies that we had

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Speaker 1: to regulate and navigate self talk, right, the stuff in

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Speaker 1: your head, I'm not good enough, I'm screwing up, I

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Speaker 1: should be doing more that like hustle culture voice that's

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Speaker 1: out there in society, that gets embedded in your head.

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Speaker 1: That's the thing that I think my students needed some

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Speaker 1: help with. And so we talk a lot about strategies

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Speaker 1: you can use to gain more self compassion, strategies you

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Speaker 1: can use to get some psychological distance from the problems

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Speaker 1: that are coming up in your life. And those were

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Speaker 1: the tools that I think my students were using more

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Speaker 1: and more, and so the class has shifted to focus

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Speaker 1: more on some of the things. I think when people

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Speaker 1: classically hear about the work in positive psychology, they hear

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Speaker 1: things like meditate or right in your gratitude journal, and

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Speaker 1: those things are great. But I think what my students

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Speaker 1: really needed help with was like, when I'm beating myself up,

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Speaker 1: how can I talk to themselves in a healthier way?

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Speaker 1: And those really resonated.

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Speaker 3: So some basic cognitive behavioral therapy basically.

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Speaker 1: I mean what we do in the class really is

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Speaker 1: the kind of skills building that you learn with a

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Speaker 1: good therapist. Right, Cognitive behavior therapy is really changing your

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Speaker 1: thought patterns changing your relationship to your thought patterns, finding

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Speaker 1: ways to regulate your emotions better. That's functionally the tools

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Speaker 1: that we're teaching in the classroom, and I think that's important.

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Speaker 1: It is the case that sometimes for certain issues in life,

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Speaker 1: you need a one on one therapy session to gain

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Speaker 1: these skills. But these skills are also I don't want

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Speaker 1: to say they're not hard, because they're hard to put

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Speaker 1: into effect in the moment, but they're pretty straightforward. And

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Speaker 1: this is one of the insights that I've had teaching

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Speaker 1: this stuff, is like, we should be teaching this stuff

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Speaker 1: earlier and earlier. One of this stuff is rocket science. Like,

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Speaker 1: these basic emotion regulation strategies are ones that I think

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Speaker 1: we should be teaching definitely in middle school, but maybe

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Speaker 1: even earlier.

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Speaker 3: I mean, Yale's done wonderful work introducing these kind of

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Speaker 3: emotional skill building into elementary schools.

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Speaker 1: Right, and I think it can come earlier and earlier.

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Speaker 1: There's been so many cool opportunities that came from teaching

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Speaker 1: this course that I didn't expect. But one of the

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Speaker 1: most cool ones was that I get to work with

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Speaker 1: Sesame Workshop, which is the group that runs Sesame Street,

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Speaker 1: and think about how we can get these strategies out

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Speaker 1: to little little kids. And what I realized is like,

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Speaker 1: oh my gosh, what of the strategies I teach students

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Speaker 1: is this idea of affect labeling, which is like, just

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Speaker 1: give a label to what you're feeling. I'm feeling frustrated,

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Speaker 1: I'm feeling overwhelmed, I'm feeling sad, I'm feeling lonely, whatever

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Speaker 1: it is. A word can help you get some insight

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Speaker 1: into exactly what you're feeling, and it can also help

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Speaker 1: you get some insight into how to fix it. The

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Speaker 1: fix for when you're feeling lonely is totally different than

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Speaker 1: the fix for when you're feeling overwhelmed. Just like, I

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Speaker 1: don't feel good, then you don't know what to do.

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Speaker 1: But that's a strategy that you can teach a three

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Speaker 1: to five year old. Maybe not with big words like

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Speaker 1: overwhelmed and frustrated, but you can try. In fact, Elmo

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Speaker 1: was teaching kids about frustrated. That was one of the

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Speaker 1: words that Elmo was learning. So it's like, if we

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Speaker 1: could just have that stuff in earlier, we'd be giving

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Speaker 1: people tools they could use.

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Speaker 3: Well, you know, my five year old daughter then taught

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Speaker 3: me and I got that education a little late, perhaps,

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Speaker 3: but still got it nonetheless, So thank you. We human

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Speaker 3: beings are really bad at knowing what will make us happy,

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Speaker 3: and we make bad choices. According to me, and you, lawyer,

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Speaker 3: are not shy at all at pointing out what people

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Speaker 3: do wrong in terms of pursuing happiness. And you know,

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Speaker 3: while we have you can give us a few quick

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Speaker 3: tips on what not to do.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, because I'm staring out at a bunch of undergrads,

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Speaker 1: it looks like I'll give the one that my college

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Speaker 1: students get wrong the most, which is the connection between

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Speaker 1: money and happiness. Most of you are here at a

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Speaker 1: place like Dartmouth College because you want to like, earn

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Speaker 1: a lot of money later on. And turns out there

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Speaker 1: is a connection between money and happiness. But that connection

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Speaker 1: only exists if you really don't have any money. If

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Speaker 1: you're currently living below the poverty line, and I give

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Speaker 1: you more money, yes, that's going to make your life

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Speaker 1: a lot easier. You will be happier. But this connection

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Speaker 1: between money and happiness seems to level off. Researchers fight

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Speaker 1: about exactly where it levels off. Back in a very

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Speaker 1: famous paper in twenty ten, folks thought it leveled off

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Speaker 1: around seventy five thousand US dollars in modern day money,

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Speaker 1: that probably is an equivalent of like one hundred and

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Speaker 1: ten thousand dollars. People fight about whether the slope after

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Speaker 1: that point is totally flat or whether it goes up

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Speaker 1: a minuscule amount overtime, But the point is, like, it

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Speaker 1: just isn't helping your happiness that much to get more

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Speaker 1: money after a certain point. And that's one that I

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Speaker 1: just feel like is so hard to take into account.

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Speaker 1: I'm looking at a room of students that I imagine

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Speaker 1: some of your seniors, and thinking about different job offers.

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Speaker 1: Maybe you're lucky enough to have multiple ones, And my

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Speaker 1: guess is the first thing you look at is what's

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Speaker 1: the salary, and you're twiddling about, like, ooh, which one

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Speaker 1: should I pick? And maybe I'll get five thousand extra

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Speaker 1: dollars or whatever, And it's just not going to matter

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Speaker 1: at all. What will matter What is your social connection

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Speaker 1: going to look like? At work? One of the biggest

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Speaker 1: predictors of happiness overall and happiness at work is that

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Speaker 1: yes or no answer to the question do you have

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Speaker 1: a best friend at work? Another big predictor of your

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Speaker 1: happiness at work is whether or not you have a

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Speaker 1: lot of free time. This is some lovely work by

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Speaker 1: Ashley Willins at Harvard Business School on the power of

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Speaker 1: what's called time affluence, the sense that you feel wealthy

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Speaker 1: in time, So much more important to have time wealth

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Speaker 1: than monetary wealth, even interestingly at lower incomes. Actually, because

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Speaker 1: we're talking with so many folks at public policy here,

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Speaker 1: Ashley's pushed the policy that one way to solve the

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Speaker 1: kind of happiness crisis and so many other crises that

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Speaker 1: come up in low income populations is actually to give

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Speaker 1: low income individuals more time back right, because if you're

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Speaker 1: thinking about what happens if you're low income, you're driving

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Speaker 1: uber or maybe you don't even have a car, so

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Speaker 1: you're commuting two hours to work and so on, that

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Speaker 1: if we could solve the time crisis, we might actually

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Speaker 1: help them psychologically and maybe even monetarily down the line too.

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Speaker 1: But this isn't how we think. We're not like, if

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Speaker 1: I want to be happier, let me find a life

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Speaker 1: that gives me lots more time. We're just like money, money, money, achievement, achievement, achievement,

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Speaker 1: and it's not going to move the needle in the

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Speaker 1: way we think, so.

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Speaker 3: Money not unimportant, but not as important as people think.

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Speaker 1: It's so insidious for the way our mind works, right,

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Speaker 1: because it is important for a while, Like if you're

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Speaker 1: undergrad and you're not making any money, or like me,

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Speaker 1: when I was like a poor grad student, it was

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Speaker 1: the case that you know, in grad school, I was

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Speaker 1: earning enough that I was not below the poverty line,

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Speaker 1: but more money was definitely making me happier. I wasn't

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Speaker 1: at that threshold yet. So you learn that reward relationship.

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Speaker 1: You're like, oh my gosh, more money, more happy. But

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Speaker 1: then when it levels off, you stop realizing that that's

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Speaker 1: the case. And so what happens when you're getting more

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Speaker 1: money and it's not moving the needle? You don't think,

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Speaker 1: oh I must have been wrong about that relationship between

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Speaker 1: money and happiness. You just think, oh, I was wrong

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Speaker 1: about the amount of money I need. I need way

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Speaker 1: more money to be happy. In fact, one of my

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Speaker 1: favorite surveys this is Sony Lubermerski cites this in her

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Speaker 1: book is you ask people who are earning thirty thousand

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Speaker 1: dollars you know, is that enough to be happy? Those

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Speaker 1: folks say no, They say, okay, what amount of money

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Speaker 1: would you earn it? Like, if you were getting that,

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Speaker 1: I might just be happy. And this was years ago.

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Speaker 1: But folks that you're earning thirty thousand dollars say, well,

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Speaker 1: if I could just get fifty thousand dollars and I'd

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Speaker 1: just be happy. I would ever need another penny more.

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Speaker 1: But you do the same survey with people earning one

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Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars. You ask them is that enough? They

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Speaker 1: say no. You say how much do you need? Those

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Speaker 1: folks say I need two hundred and fifty thousand dollars

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Speaker 1: to be happy. Now I'm looking at smart Dartwin's students

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Speaker 1: who can do the math in their head, and you realize, wait,

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Speaker 1: it's not like you get there. It's like the ratio.

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Speaker 1: The difference between what you think you need and what

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Speaker 1: you have is going up as you get more money.

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Speaker 1: It's not going less, right, And so I think this

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Speaker 1: is the insidious thing about money is we don't realize like, oh,

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Speaker 1: I was wrong, it must be something else that I need.

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Speaker 1: We think like, it's still money, I just need way

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Speaker 1: more than I think.

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Speaker 2: It's time to take a quick break, but Darren and

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Speaker 2: I will be back with more conversation with the happiness

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Speaker 2: lab returns in a moment.

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Speaker 3: So pursuing happiness through money maybe doesn't quite work. That's

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Speaker 3: one of the wrong pursuits, right, What should we be doing?

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Speaker 1: How should we Yeah, well, here's one that I think

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Speaker 1: with your focus on the eighteenth century, you will love.

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Speaker 1: Which is another thing we get wrong about happiness is

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Speaker 1: we think happiness is about us. It's about me, me, me,

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Speaker 1: And I think this is especially true in the modern

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Speaker 1: individualist culture where we find ourselves and at a school

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Speaker 1: like this. To be honest, many of you students are

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Speaker 1: here because you focused on your studies and what you

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Speaker 1: needed and getting your stuff up. It wasn't what are

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Speaker 1: you doing to help the country, What are you doing

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Speaker 1: to help the world, What are you doing to help

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Speaker 1: your brothers and sisters? It was like you, you, you,

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Speaker 1: And the research just consistently shows us that this is

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Speaker 1: not the path to happiness. And I think this is

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Speaker 1: something that modern culture gets so wrong. If you go

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Speaker 1: on TikTok, you will see somewhere something about self care

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Speaker 1: or treat yourself or me, me, me, right, But if

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Speaker 1: you look at the happiness research, that's just not what

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Speaker 1: predicts people's happiness. Happiness is about being other oriented, so

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Speaker 1: control for income, people who donate more money to charity

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Speaker 1: are happier than those who self report not donating anything.

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Speaker 1: Same with volunteering for your time, controlling for that amount

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Speaker 1: of free time you have. It just seems like doing

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Speaker 1: stuff for others makes you happier. Those are correlations. So

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Speaker 1: you could be like, well, maybe it's that you're doing

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Speaker 1: nice stuff for other people makes you happy, But it

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Speaker 1: could also be that just if you're happy, you do

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Speaker 1: nice stuff for other people. And we know that's an effect.

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Speaker 1: It's what's called the feel good do good effect. If

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Speaker 1: you're like in a good mood, you want doing nicer

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Speaker 1: stuff for other people. But there are also studies that

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Speaker 1: they're very cute. They force people to do nice stuff

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Speaker 1: for others, and then they test what happens to your happiness,

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Speaker 1: and what you find is that even when you're forced

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Speaker 1: to do something nice for other people, you wind up

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Speaker 1: feeling better after doing that. And so I think this

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Speaker 1: is one that we consistently get wrong in the modern day.

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Speaker 1: And as I said, Darren, this is one that I

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Speaker 1: think you'll appreciate because the forefathers, you know, they were

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Speaker 1: good about individual pleasure, but they also got that even

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Speaker 1: just the whole concept of happiness was about everybody's happiness,

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Speaker 1: and this is something we really miss today.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, one thing that comes very close. When people in

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Speaker 3: the eighteenth century talk about the pursuit of happiness, they

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Speaker 3: don't mean the pursuit of quanta of pleasure. They mean

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Speaker 3: the pursuit of a life well lived. In order to

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Speaker 3: sort of access that, they draw really deeply on wisdom traditions,

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Speaker 3: so in their case Greek and Roman philosophy, as well

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Speaker 3: as religious traditions. Right, And I was while you were speaking,

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Speaker 3: I was thinking of that wonderful Chinese proverb and I

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Speaker 3: won't get it quite right, but it's something the fact

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Speaker 3: that if you want to be happy for an hour,

433
00:19:33,716 --> 00:19:35,796
Speaker 3: take a nap. If you want to be happy for

434
00:19:35,836 --> 00:19:37,636
Speaker 3: a day, go fishing, And if you want to be

435
00:19:37,676 --> 00:19:41,076
Speaker 3: happy for a lifetime, then help others. And that gets

436
00:19:41,076 --> 00:19:43,676
Speaker 3: at the way in which so many of the world's

437
00:19:43,676 --> 00:19:48,076
Speaker 3: wisdom and spiritual traditions have you know, deep lessons about

438
00:19:48,116 --> 00:19:50,636
Speaker 3: how to pursue happiness embedded in them. And I've heard

439
00:19:50,636 --> 00:19:52,916
Speaker 3: you say a little bit like John Height, who talks

440
00:19:52,916 --> 00:19:56,036
Speaker 3: about the modern truth and ancient wisdom, that you know

441
00:19:56,116 --> 00:20:00,196
Speaker 3: much of what positive psychologists do is to reaffirm or

442
00:20:00,316 --> 00:20:03,676
Speaker 3: validate insights that we've already known, but they've just put

443
00:20:03,716 --> 00:20:06,716
Speaker 3: a modern kind of scientific in premature on them, which

444
00:20:06,716 --> 00:20:09,516
Speaker 3: is important, but nonetheless the knowledge itself may not new.

445
00:20:09,956 --> 00:20:12,276
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think that that's a really important thing

446
00:20:12,396 --> 00:20:16,716
Speaker 1: to do, right. I think my scientist's hat sometimes is embarrassed, right,

447
00:20:16,756 --> 00:20:19,716
Speaker 1: because it's like, we positive psychologists and psychologists and behavioral

448
00:20:19,756 --> 00:20:22,196
Speaker 1: scientists in general have got out and tested all these

449
00:20:22,236 --> 00:20:24,836
Speaker 1: things that scholars have been talking about, you know, since

450
00:20:24,876 --> 00:20:26,756
Speaker 1: the time of Aristotle. Are like, oh my gosh, it

451
00:20:26,796 --> 00:20:29,236
Speaker 1: turns out that habits really good to form. We're doing

452
00:20:29,316 --> 00:20:31,996
Speaker 1: nice things for other people. It makes you happy, mindfulness

453
00:20:31,996 --> 00:20:34,396
Speaker 1: and being present, that's awesome. Folks have been saying that

454
00:20:34,436 --> 00:20:36,916
Speaker 1: for like thousands of years and so on the one hand,

455
00:20:36,956 --> 00:20:39,316
Speaker 1: it's like, really, this is the modern science. Is like,

456
00:20:39,356 --> 00:20:41,676
Speaker 1: you're just showing us what these folks were saying forever.

457
00:20:41,876 --> 00:20:44,676
Speaker 1: That's now true. But I think it's important to do

458
00:20:44,756 --> 00:20:47,676
Speaker 1: because it didn't necessarily have to be that way, and

459
00:20:47,756 --> 00:20:50,996
Speaker 1: sometimes the ancient traditions were just wrong. Think of your

460
00:20:50,996 --> 00:20:53,116
Speaker 1: favorite ancient tradition. You'll realize some of it. We just

461
00:20:53,156 --> 00:20:55,996
Speaker 1: don't really subscribe to in the same way today, and

462
00:20:56,036 --> 00:20:58,196
Speaker 1: so I think that that stuff is really important is

463
00:20:58,236 --> 00:21:01,716
Speaker 1: asking the question are we doing it right? And sometimes

464
00:21:01,756 --> 00:21:05,356
Speaker 1: when we look we realize we're doing it wrong. This

465
00:21:05,436 --> 00:21:08,116
Speaker 1: one isn't so much an ancient tradition, but it's another thing

466
00:21:08,156 --> 00:21:10,116
Speaker 1: that's really popular and the culture right now. And it

467
00:21:10,196 --> 00:21:13,996
Speaker 1: just drives me so crazy. Is the TikTok trend about manifesting?

468
00:21:14,556 --> 00:21:16,916
Speaker 1: You all the undergrads are nodding like, oh, I'm just

469
00:21:16,956 --> 00:21:18,676
Speaker 1: gonna like, I want to get good grades this semester,

470
00:21:18,756 --> 00:21:21,036
Speaker 1: so I'm just gonna manifest it. I'm just gonna envision

471
00:21:21,076 --> 00:21:24,436
Speaker 1: it right. Turns out it's not just that manifesting is

472
00:21:24,516 --> 00:21:28,116
Speaker 1: neutral or that it doesn't work. It actively causes the

473
00:21:28,196 --> 00:21:31,436
Speaker 1: thing that you want to get further away. How does

474
00:21:31,436 --> 00:21:33,836
Speaker 1: it do that? What does that? Through a funny trick

475
00:21:33,876 --> 00:21:35,876
Speaker 1: of the mind. It does that through the way your

476
00:21:35,916 --> 00:21:39,516
Speaker 1: mind images different rewards and the way your reward system works.

477
00:21:39,556 --> 00:21:41,516
Speaker 1: So let's say I want to get fit, right, this

478
00:21:41,556 --> 00:21:43,036
Speaker 1: is something I've been thinking About've been trying to go

479
00:21:43,116 --> 00:21:44,836
Speaker 1: with my trainer, go once a week. I want to

480
00:21:44,836 --> 00:21:47,076
Speaker 1: get a little bit fitter, right, So I manifest I

481
00:21:47,116 --> 00:21:48,756
Speaker 1: think like, oh, how awesome it would be if I

482
00:21:48,796 --> 00:21:51,196
Speaker 1: was fit. Oh my gosh, my clothes would fit better,

483
00:21:51,316 --> 00:21:54,476
Speaker 1: and like I have stronger muscles. What I'm doing there

484
00:21:54,556 --> 00:21:58,276
Speaker 1: is I'm vividly imagining that I've already gotten the reward

485
00:21:58,276 --> 00:21:59,756
Speaker 1: that I've already put in all the work I need

486
00:21:59,756 --> 00:22:03,196
Speaker 1: to put in, and I have that good thing already.

487
00:22:03,756 --> 00:22:05,796
Speaker 1: And the funny thing about our minds is like when

488
00:22:05,876 --> 00:22:08,636
Speaker 1: we image stuff really closely, there's part of our brain

489
00:22:08,636 --> 00:22:12,436
Speaker 1: that thinks we already got that. There's a wonderful study

490
00:22:12,476 --> 00:22:15,516
Speaker 1: by Carrie mor Wedge and colleagues that test this directly

491
00:22:15,556 --> 00:22:19,116
Speaker 1: with food. He either has you imagine carefully putting quarters

492
00:22:19,156 --> 00:22:21,396
Speaker 1: into a slot like you're going to do your laundry,

493
00:22:21,636 --> 00:22:25,116
Speaker 1: or imagine slowly eating one eminem at a time, and

494
00:22:25,156 --> 00:22:27,636
Speaker 1: you do this for a while, and then the experiment

495
00:22:27,676 --> 00:22:28,916
Speaker 1: is that you come out and there's a bowl of

496
00:22:28,916 --> 00:22:31,716
Speaker 1: eminems and the question is how many eminems do you eat?

497
00:22:31,996 --> 00:22:34,476
Speaker 1: And what you find is that when you've already imagined

498
00:22:34,516 --> 00:22:37,076
Speaker 1: really carefully eating all these eminems, the last thing you

499
00:22:37,076 --> 00:22:39,356
Speaker 1: want to do is eat more eminems. You kind of

500
00:22:39,436 --> 00:22:41,396
Speaker 1: have envisioned what that reward would feel like, so you

501
00:22:41,396 --> 00:22:43,276
Speaker 1: don't need it. Anymore, you don't need to take the

502
00:22:43,316 --> 00:22:46,196
Speaker 1: action to get it. And research by Gabrielle Oaching It

503
00:22:46,196 --> 00:22:49,156
Speaker 1: in Colleague finds that the same thing happens when manifesting.

504
00:22:49,556 --> 00:22:51,316
Speaker 1: If you manifest oh my gosh, I want to get

505
00:22:51,316 --> 00:22:53,756
Speaker 1: great grades, part of your brain thinks you got those

506
00:22:53,756 --> 00:22:56,236
Speaker 1: great grades, so you don't take as much time to study,

507
00:22:56,396 --> 00:22:58,876
Speaker 1: you don't work as hard. She finds that students who

508
00:22:58,916 --> 00:23:01,636
Speaker 1: manifest getting fitter actually go to the gym less often.

509
00:23:02,116 --> 00:23:04,756
Speaker 1: So it's not just that manifestings like oh it doesn't work.

510
00:23:04,796 --> 00:23:08,396
Speaker 1: It's like this wou thing. It's actively bad. But the

511
00:23:08,436 --> 00:23:09,836
Speaker 1: good thing is that there's a way you can do

512
00:23:09,836 --> 00:23:12,516
Speaker 1: it better. Gabrielle Otingham shows how this works, which is

513
00:23:12,556 --> 00:23:14,756
Speaker 1: just in addition to kind of thinking very vividly about

514
00:23:14,756 --> 00:23:18,436
Speaker 1: the reward, you also think, hmm, what are the obstacles

515
00:23:18,436 --> 00:23:20,676
Speaker 1: that are getting me to that reward? And you imagine

516
00:23:20,676 --> 00:23:23,196
Speaker 1: that and you're like, oh, I don't have Jim Shortz,

517
00:23:23,516 --> 00:23:25,996
Speaker 1: or I like don't have my books to study, or

518
00:23:26,036 --> 00:23:28,196
Speaker 1: like there's four parties this weekend and I'm going to

519
00:23:28,236 --> 00:23:29,796
Speaker 1: have time to read the book I need to read.

520
00:23:30,196 --> 00:23:32,476
Speaker 1: That causes you to think about how you can overcome

521
00:23:32,516 --> 00:23:35,756
Speaker 1: those obstacles you can use manifesting. Well, it's just that

522
00:23:35,836 --> 00:23:38,316
Speaker 1: like the TikTok version, drives us as straight. And so

523
00:23:38,476 --> 00:23:40,516
Speaker 1: the whole point of that is that it is the

524
00:23:40,556 --> 00:23:42,676
Speaker 1: case that sometimes science goes out and they study things

525
00:23:42,676 --> 00:23:44,676
Speaker 1: that are out there in the public ether the scholars

526
00:23:44,716 --> 00:23:46,516
Speaker 1: have been thinking about for a while and they're like, yep,

527
00:23:46,596 --> 00:23:50,076
Speaker 1: everybody was right. But sometimes we look and we realize

528
00:23:50,116 --> 00:23:53,716
Speaker 1: that the popular wisdom is just wrong. And that's where

529
00:23:53,716 --> 00:23:55,756
Speaker 1: I think science can help us get on a better path.

530
00:23:56,316 --> 00:23:58,356
Speaker 3: That's wonderful, and that's perfect segue to where we wanting

531
00:23:58,356 --> 00:24:02,476
Speaker 3: to go next. This last autumn in October, Professor Danny Blenchflower,

532
00:24:02,476 --> 00:24:04,916
Speaker 3: who is here in the audience, and colleagues put together

533
00:24:04,956 --> 00:24:07,916
Speaker 3: this wonderful conference with the United Nations around the crisis

534
00:24:07,916 --> 00:24:10,436
Speaker 3: and youth well being. And as Danny has shown and

535
00:24:10,476 --> 00:24:13,356
Speaker 3: others like Gene Twangy and John Hight who are also

536
00:24:13,356 --> 00:24:16,716
Speaker 3: at the conference, that crisis is real and moreover, it

537
00:24:16,756 --> 00:24:19,116
Speaker 3: shows up in the data right the same time that

538
00:24:19,156 --> 00:24:23,476
Speaker 3: the cell phone becomes broadly accessible. And so I'm wondering

539
00:24:23,516 --> 00:24:25,196
Speaker 3: if you might want to comment, and I'm hoping you're

540
00:24:25,236 --> 00:24:27,396
Speaker 3: not sponsored by Meta and hoping we're not.

541
00:24:27,276 --> 00:24:32,036
Speaker 1: Sponsored by metih one thing. We have meta sponsorship, but yes, so,

542
00:24:32,356 --> 00:24:35,996
Speaker 1: I think it's important when talking about technology and social

543
00:24:36,036 --> 00:24:38,356
Speaker 1: media and cell phones and how they're affecting our well being,

544
00:24:38,916 --> 00:24:41,236
Speaker 1: to remember that cell phones are just a tool. This

545
00:24:41,396 --> 00:24:43,516
Speaker 1: is a technology. We could use it in all kinds

546
00:24:43,556 --> 00:24:45,996
Speaker 1: of different ways. We could use our phones to call

547
00:24:46,036 --> 00:24:48,436
Speaker 1: a friend, to donate money to a good cause, to

548
00:24:48,556 --> 00:24:51,556
Speaker 1: do a meditation app. It could be used for good stuff.

549
00:24:51,796 --> 00:24:54,076
Speaker 1: It's just the problem is we don't tend to use

550
00:24:54,116 --> 00:24:57,196
Speaker 1: it for good stuff. Basically, all the different strategies I

551
00:24:57,236 --> 00:24:59,636
Speaker 1: talk about about how to feel happier, if you look

552
00:24:59,676 --> 00:25:02,796
Speaker 1: at how we tend to use technology, it leads us

553
00:25:02,836 --> 00:25:05,836
Speaker 1: to stray. Let's take the one that I find most ironic,

554
00:25:05,996 --> 00:25:08,716
Speaker 1: which is social connection. Every available study of happy people

555
00:25:08,716 --> 00:25:12,556
Speaker 1: suggest happy people are more social. Quickest intervention other than

556
00:25:12,596 --> 00:25:14,516
Speaker 1: getting a dog you could do to be happier is

557
00:25:14,556 --> 00:25:16,356
Speaker 1: to get a friend, or talk to a human, or

558
00:25:16,396 --> 00:25:19,596
Speaker 1: be socially connected in any way. Our phones were built

559
00:25:19,596 --> 00:25:21,676
Speaker 1: to literally do that. It's a phone. The whole purpose

560
00:25:21,676 --> 00:25:23,836
Speaker 1: of a phone is to call someone. How do we

561
00:25:23,916 --> 00:25:27,636
Speaker 1: normally spend it staring at it while ignoring the people

562
00:25:27,676 --> 00:25:30,596
Speaker 1: in real life around us, deep irony that these tools

563
00:25:30,596 --> 00:25:32,836
Speaker 1: that were meant to help us connect often help us

564
00:25:32,996 --> 00:25:35,596
Speaker 1: not connect. And there's some lovely work by folks like

565
00:25:35,676 --> 00:25:39,156
Speaker 1: Liz Dune and others showing just how much phones steal

566
00:25:39,196 --> 00:25:41,396
Speaker 1: our attention one way around other people. Liz does this

567
00:25:41,436 --> 00:25:43,916
Speaker 1: lovely study where she puts people in a waiting room.

568
00:25:44,436 --> 00:25:45,996
Speaker 1: You know, imagine Darren and I who are sitting up

569
00:25:45,996 --> 00:25:47,916
Speaker 1: on the stage. We're in a waiting room together. We

570
00:25:47,956 --> 00:25:50,596
Speaker 1: could just chat with each other, but if we have

571
00:25:50,636 --> 00:25:51,636
Speaker 1: our phones out, what are we.

572
00:25:51,596 --> 00:25:51,956
Speaker 5: Going to do.

573
00:25:51,996 --> 00:25:53,436
Speaker 1: We're not going to chat with one another. We're going

574
00:25:53,476 --> 00:25:55,116
Speaker 1: to look at our phones. And Liz just does this

575
00:25:55,196 --> 00:25:58,756
Speaker 1: clever study where she measures how much smiling happens between

576
00:25:58,796 --> 00:26:00,956
Speaker 1: people in a room together, you know, maybe the basic,

577
00:26:01,076 --> 00:26:03,716
Speaker 1: tiniest unit of social connection. And she finds like a

578
00:26:03,756 --> 00:26:07,156
Speaker 1: thirty percent reduction in smiling when people have their phones

579
00:26:07,196 --> 00:26:09,436
Speaker 1: available to them in this waiting room. Right, I adgine

580
00:26:09,476 --> 00:26:12,836
Speaker 1: that thirty percent multiplied by our whole society walking around

581
00:26:12,836 --> 00:26:15,116
Speaker 1: on campus and this kind of stuff. So we socially

582
00:26:15,156 --> 00:26:18,156
Speaker 1: connect less. Another big one, especially for young people, you

583
00:26:18,276 --> 00:26:21,156
Speaker 1: sleep less because you have your technology out. I think

584
00:26:21,196 --> 00:26:23,356
Speaker 1: the most evil thing cell phone companies ever did was

585
00:26:23,356 --> 00:26:25,156
Speaker 1: to put an alarm clock in cell phones because it

586
00:26:25,156 --> 00:26:26,956
Speaker 1: gives us an excuse to have it right near us

587
00:26:26,996 --> 00:26:29,156
Speaker 1: in bed, and then when we wake up in the

588
00:26:29,156 --> 00:26:30,396
Speaker 1: middle of the night, we look at it and we

589
00:26:30,396 --> 00:26:32,396
Speaker 1: are tempted by it, and so on. I think it

590
00:26:32,436 --> 00:26:35,276
Speaker 1: also makes us way less present over time. But the

591
00:26:35,316 --> 00:26:37,716
Speaker 1: mindfulness kind of noticing where you are, just being in

592
00:26:37,756 --> 00:26:40,316
Speaker 1: your space, so much evidence that this boosts our happiness.

593
00:26:40,956 --> 00:26:43,596
Speaker 1: We never have moments to be mindful, you know, probably

594
00:26:43,636 --> 00:26:45,436
Speaker 1: even some of you walking over here, Darren, you and

595
00:26:45,476 --> 00:26:48,196
Speaker 1: I are talking on this beautiful spring day where Dartmouth's

596
00:26:48,236 --> 00:26:50,876
Speaker 1: campus is just gorgeous right now, guessing some of you

597
00:26:50,916 --> 00:26:53,316
Speaker 1: didn't even notice that, why because you were staring at

598
00:26:53,316 --> 00:26:55,956
Speaker 1: whatever was going on in your phone right not to

599
00:26:55,996 --> 00:26:58,636
Speaker 1: mention all the anxiety provoking information about the news and

600
00:26:58,676 --> 00:27:02,396
Speaker 1: everything else. So it's just a technology. It's just one

601
00:27:02,396 --> 00:27:04,836
Speaker 1: that we tend to use in ways that make us miserable.

602
00:27:05,356 --> 00:27:08,356
Speaker 1: And the coolest finding that I've heard most recently this

603
00:27:08,436 --> 00:27:13,116
Speaker 1: actually on a podcash with Mamoosh Zamaruti, who's a journalist

604
00:27:13,196 --> 00:27:14,876
Speaker 1: who has been thinking a lot about the effects of

605
00:27:14,956 --> 00:27:17,996
Speaker 1: technology in the ways people typically thought about about attention

606
00:27:18,036 --> 00:27:21,116
Speaker 1: and all this stuff. But recently she's become interested in

607
00:27:21,156 --> 00:27:24,356
Speaker 1: the way technology shapes our physical body, not like what

608
00:27:24,396 --> 00:27:26,676
Speaker 1: we're thinking in our mental health, but our physical health.

609
00:27:27,236 --> 00:27:31,556
Speaker 1: And she talks about research showing this connection between our

610
00:27:31,596 --> 00:27:35,116
Speaker 1: core muscles and our adrenal glands, like our stress system.

611
00:27:35,556 --> 00:27:37,356
Speaker 1: And if you think of the way we often sit

612
00:27:37,476 --> 00:27:39,516
Speaker 1: when we are on our phone, I will demonstrate for

613
00:27:39,636 --> 00:27:41,356
Speaker 1: those of you who are not on your phone right now,

614
00:27:41,396 --> 00:27:43,276
Speaker 1: it is like this. It is in well, if I'm

615
00:27:43,356 --> 00:27:46,876
Speaker 1: hunching over and what's called the Cashew posture. It turns

616
00:27:46,876 --> 00:27:50,996
Speaker 1: out that this is a posture that is literally stimulating

617
00:27:51,036 --> 00:27:54,356
Speaker 1: our stress system, and the Zamarudi actually claims that, like,

618
00:27:54,796 --> 00:27:57,516
Speaker 1: maybe a lot of the mental health crisis that we

619
00:27:57,556 --> 00:28:00,036
Speaker 1: are getting with our phones is actually just the way

620
00:28:00,116 --> 00:28:03,036
Speaker 1: we're sitting in our physical bodies and our physical presence.

621
00:28:03,196 --> 00:28:05,716
Speaker 1: So everyone in the room right now is now straightening

622
00:28:05,796 --> 00:28:08,556
Speaker 1: up and like getting into the right position. But yeah,

623
00:28:08,596 --> 00:28:11,436
Speaker 1: she argues that we might be able to solve some

624
00:28:11,476 --> 00:28:14,516
Speaker 1: of this if we think about the way technologies changing, right,

625
00:28:14,796 --> 00:28:15,636
Speaker 1: are very posture.

626
00:28:16,196 --> 00:28:18,876
Speaker 3: Neither of us are policy people. I'm a historian, you're

627
00:28:18,876 --> 00:28:21,436
Speaker 3: a psychologist, and yet we're here under the auspices of

628
00:28:21,476 --> 00:28:24,836
Speaker 3: the Rockefeller Center of Public Policy. Our director is right here.

629
00:28:25,036 --> 00:28:27,476
Speaker 3: I feel obligated to ask a question about public policy.

630
00:28:27,516 --> 00:28:29,956
Speaker 3: If you were the advisor to a king for the day,

631
00:28:30,196 --> 00:28:32,476
Speaker 3: what would you tell them about things we could do

632
00:28:32,636 --> 00:28:35,596
Speaker 3: at the macro level to improve well being in the

633
00:28:35,676 --> 00:28:36,316
Speaker 3: United States.

634
00:28:36,556 --> 00:28:39,556
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you asked me that, because sometimes a

635
00:28:39,636 --> 00:28:42,636
Speaker 1: lot of this work comes off as saying the following thing.

636
00:28:42,956 --> 00:28:45,556
Speaker 1: Here are these strategies you can use as individuals to

637
00:28:45,596 --> 00:28:47,996
Speaker 1: feel happier. Right in your gratitude journal, you know, use

638
00:28:47,996 --> 00:28:51,356
Speaker 1: these self talk strategies, and that's it good. We can

639
00:28:51,436 --> 00:28:54,196
Speaker 1: ignore the fact that there's many structures around us, in

640
00:28:54,236 --> 00:28:58,236
Speaker 1: governments and companies and institutions that are actively making it

641
00:28:58,276 --> 00:29:00,996
Speaker 1: harder to be happier. And I think that that's just

642
00:29:01,076 --> 00:29:03,156
Speaker 1: a misnomer. It is the case that we can use

643
00:29:03,156 --> 00:29:05,876
Speaker 1: individual strategies to get happier, but it would be so

644
00:29:05,956 --> 00:29:08,476
Speaker 1: much easier to employ those individual strategies if we had

645
00:29:08,476 --> 00:29:11,636
Speaker 1: the institution and governments around us helping us. And we

646
00:29:11,676 --> 00:29:14,356
Speaker 1: as psychologists don't often get to pontificate about that, So

647
00:29:14,356 --> 00:29:16,796
Speaker 1: I'm excited to puntificate about that. What do we know

648
00:29:16,836 --> 00:29:19,676
Speaker 1: about the policy applications of what we've learned in happiness.

649
00:29:19,956 --> 00:29:23,036
Speaker 1: We talked about this connection between money and happiness, where

650
00:29:23,276 --> 00:29:25,676
Speaker 1: money after a certain level doesn't make you happy, but

651
00:29:25,836 --> 00:29:28,476
Speaker 1: money under a certain level really, really really doesn't make

652
00:29:28,476 --> 00:29:31,436
Speaker 1: you happy. I think the happiness science is super clear

653
00:29:31,516 --> 00:29:35,836
Speaker 1: about the powerful impact that a universal basic income could

654
00:29:35,876 --> 00:29:38,796
Speaker 1: have on both levels. If you give low income people

655
00:29:38,836 --> 00:29:41,836
Speaker 1: more money, it will necessarily make them happy. If you

656
00:29:41,956 --> 00:29:44,676
Speaker 1: have to tax higher income people to get that money,

657
00:29:44,836 --> 00:29:47,556
Speaker 1: it's going to have absolutely no effect on their happiness.

658
00:29:47,636 --> 00:29:51,596
Speaker 1: It's just super super clear. Another big policy implication is

659
00:29:51,596 --> 00:29:54,716
Speaker 1: that social connection really matters for happiness. I think there's

660
00:29:54,876 --> 00:29:58,436
Speaker 1: many ways that public policy can influence social connection. Here.

661
00:29:58,476 --> 00:30:01,716
Speaker 1: I'm channeling great folks like Robert Putnam and others who've

662
00:30:01,756 --> 00:30:04,436
Speaker 1: long talked about the power of things like third spaces,

663
00:30:04,556 --> 00:30:07,956
Speaker 1: literal spaces that aren't work or school or something, or

664
00:30:08,076 --> 00:30:10,836
Speaker 1: home places where you can get together with other people.

665
00:30:11,196 --> 00:30:13,356
Speaker 1: These are things that governments can do is just make

666
00:30:13,436 --> 00:30:15,676
Speaker 1: it easier for people to have these spaces, And in

667
00:30:15,676 --> 00:30:19,476
Speaker 1: empirical cases where people have done that, we've seen huge

668
00:30:19,476 --> 00:30:22,596
Speaker 1: impacts in terms of more connection, more happiness. But I

669
00:30:22,636 --> 00:30:26,156
Speaker 1: think even more conversations across the political line, which can

670
00:30:26,276 --> 00:30:28,876
Speaker 1: help a lot. Finally, we talked a lot about the

671
00:30:28,916 --> 00:30:32,356
Speaker 1: power of time and the importance of time affluence. I

672
00:30:32,356 --> 00:30:34,916
Speaker 1: think this is a lever that public policy can use

673
00:30:34,956 --> 00:30:36,996
Speaker 1: that it often doesn't think about because we forget the

674
00:30:37,036 --> 00:30:40,316
Speaker 1: importance of time. But even things like a four day

675
00:30:40,356 --> 00:30:43,396
Speaker 1: work week, which even economists are now telling us, wow,

676
00:30:43,476 --> 00:30:46,956
Speaker 1: four day work week makes workers more productive. They get

677
00:30:47,036 --> 00:30:50,316
Speaker 1: more of the bottom line stuff done, and they also

678
00:30:50,356 --> 00:30:52,756
Speaker 1: have time to rest and do other things can be

679
00:30:52,796 --> 00:30:56,076
Speaker 1: super powerful. Finally, I'll say that I think one of

680
00:30:56,156 --> 00:31:00,916
Speaker 1: the things we forget is that being happy leads to

681
00:31:01,236 --> 00:31:03,836
Speaker 1: doing nice things for others and kind of doing what

682
00:31:03,876 --> 00:31:06,556
Speaker 1: the forefathers wanted, which is like being good in terms

683
00:31:06,556 --> 00:31:08,476
Speaker 1: of your civic life, living a good life not for

684
00:31:08,516 --> 00:31:11,876
Speaker 1: yourself but for everyone else. There's lots of new work

685
00:31:11,996 --> 00:31:14,756
Speaker 1: just showing that a really great way to get people

686
00:31:14,796 --> 00:31:17,236
Speaker 1: to fight for what's good in the world, to fix

687
00:31:17,276 --> 00:31:20,076
Speaker 1: the structures around them, is just to make sure they're

688
00:31:20,196 --> 00:31:22,636
Speaker 1: in a positive mood and feeling happier. This is some

689
00:31:22,716 --> 00:31:25,076
Speaker 1: lovely work by kush Lef at Georgetown that asked the

690
00:31:25,156 --> 00:31:27,836
Speaker 1: question of well, who's going out and like doing the stuff?

691
00:31:27,876 --> 00:31:30,916
Speaker 1: Who's going to like climate protests, or he was doing

692
00:31:30,996 --> 00:31:32,596
Speaker 1: this work at around the time of the Black Lives

693
00:31:32,596 --> 00:31:34,476
Speaker 1: Matter it's like, who's going to those protests and like

694
00:31:34,516 --> 00:31:37,436
Speaker 1: fighting for social justice? And what he finds is it's

695
00:31:37,476 --> 00:31:39,156
Speaker 1: not what you think you might assume, like who's going

696
00:31:39,156 --> 00:31:40,836
Speaker 1: to a climate protest? It must be somebody who's really

697
00:31:40,836 --> 00:31:43,996
Speaker 1: anxious about climate. It turns out no, the people who

698
00:31:43,996 --> 00:31:47,276
Speaker 1: are least anxious, the people who have the most positive mood,

699
00:31:47,396 --> 00:31:49,516
Speaker 1: they're the ones getting out to do the stuff. And

700
00:31:49,556 --> 00:31:51,596
Speaker 1: in some ways, you didn't need to know that study

701
00:31:51,636 --> 00:31:53,196
Speaker 1: to know that fact. Like if you think of when

702
00:31:53,236 --> 00:31:55,596
Speaker 1: you're just feeling overwhelmed and in a really bad space,

703
00:31:55,636 --> 00:31:57,436
Speaker 1: you're not out there trying to fix the world. You're

704
00:31:57,476 --> 00:32:00,596
Speaker 1: just like trying to deal. But it does mean that

705
00:32:00,796 --> 00:32:05,036
Speaker 1: this connection between individual happiness and civic happiness is an

706
00:32:05,036 --> 00:32:07,636
Speaker 1: important one. But if we give people the tools and

707
00:32:07,676 --> 00:32:10,596
Speaker 1: the skills to promote their individual happiness, it's going to

708
00:32:10,676 --> 00:32:13,436
Speaker 1: give them the bandwidth to fix the bigger stuff. And

709
00:32:13,476 --> 00:32:16,596
Speaker 1: so I think policymakers need to realize that it's not

710
00:32:16,676 --> 00:32:20,356
Speaker 1: just that welfare at the individual level is a policy goal.

711
00:32:20,876 --> 00:32:23,836
Speaker 1: It might be a policy tool to help people to do.

712
00:32:23,796 --> 00:32:26,876
Speaker 2: Better more broadly, it's time for a break, but Darren

713
00:32:26,916 --> 00:32:29,116
Speaker 2: and I will be back with more conversation when the

714
00:32:29,116 --> 00:32:30,356
Speaker 2: Happiness Lab returns.

715
00:32:30,516 --> 00:32:40,396
Speaker 3: In a moment, Well, I have more questions, and I

716
00:32:40,436 --> 00:32:42,476
Speaker 3: have time, and I'm mindful. I want to open it

717
00:32:42,556 --> 00:32:45,676
Speaker 3: up to folks. The Dartmouth tradition is that a student

718
00:32:45,676 --> 00:32:47,956
Speaker 3: asks the first question, and so if there's a.

719
00:32:47,916 --> 00:32:52,476
Speaker 1: Bold student, Hi, thank you for being here. My name

720
00:32:52,516 --> 00:32:54,036
Speaker 1: is Mia. I'm a first year student.

721
00:32:54,516 --> 00:32:57,076
Speaker 6: I was wondering, what do you think the relationship is

722
00:32:57,116 --> 00:33:01,596
Speaker 6: between like comparison and happiness, and to what extent can

723
00:33:01,636 --> 00:33:06,156
Speaker 6: you really separate your happiness from evaluating it in comparison

724
00:33:06,196 --> 00:33:09,716
Speaker 6: to someone else's, Like how can a call college student

725
00:33:10,356 --> 00:33:14,396
Speaker 6: derive their own happiness without thinking, Oh, I'll be happier

726
00:33:14,436 --> 00:33:15,556
Speaker 6: if my life looked like so.

727
00:33:15,596 --> 00:33:19,276
Speaker 1: And sos totally. So, here's another dumb feature about how

728
00:33:19,276 --> 00:33:21,356
Speaker 1: the mind works when it comes to happiness and how

729
00:33:21,356 --> 00:33:23,316
Speaker 1: the mind works just in general. Is it not just

730
00:33:23,316 --> 00:33:25,796
Speaker 1: true of happiness, it's just like human mind writ large.

731
00:33:26,276 --> 00:33:30,396
Speaker 1: We don't think about anything in objective terms. We only

732
00:33:30,436 --> 00:33:33,036
Speaker 1: think about stuff relative. We're here in this room with

733
00:33:33,236 --> 00:33:36,676
Speaker 1: kind of brightish artificial lights. When you walk outside into

734
00:33:36,676 --> 00:33:39,676
Speaker 1: the slightly darker hallway, you'll feel like, oh my gosh,

735
00:33:39,676 --> 00:33:41,516
Speaker 1: it's so dark. It's not that the hallway's dark, it's

736
00:33:41,596 --> 00:33:43,796
Speaker 1: just it's brighter in here. You don't think of the

737
00:33:43,876 --> 00:33:46,116
Speaker 1: light in terms of its objective properties. You think of

738
00:33:46,116 --> 00:33:49,316
Speaker 1: it relative to another space. Right. This is just how

739
00:33:49,356 --> 00:33:53,556
Speaker 1: we think about everything, including our own level of whatever.

740
00:33:54,116 --> 00:33:57,596
Speaker 1: Our grades, our beauty are a salary. We can't even

741
00:33:57,716 --> 00:34:00,956
Speaker 1: understand them in objective terms. We only can think about

742
00:34:00,956 --> 00:34:03,876
Speaker 1: them in relative terms. And our brains have this other

743
00:34:03,956 --> 00:34:07,236
Speaker 1: insidious property, which is that we tend never to do

744
00:34:07,316 --> 00:34:11,476
Speaker 1: that relative comparison towards things that we're better at, So

745
00:34:11,516 --> 00:34:14,436
Speaker 1: we tend to look at the person that makes us

746
00:34:14,516 --> 00:34:17,756
Speaker 1: feel worse about ourselves. My favorite nerdy example of this

747
00:34:17,836 --> 00:34:22,156
Speaker 1: is a sports example. Researchers looked at Olympic medalists on

748
00:34:22,236 --> 00:34:26,036
Speaker 1: the stand and their emotional expressions. So the gold medalists

749
00:34:26,076 --> 00:34:30,116
Speaker 1: super happy, really excited. Right, what about the silver medalist?

750
00:34:30,236 --> 00:34:32,796
Speaker 1: They're not just like ever so slightly less happy than

751
00:34:32,836 --> 00:34:35,716
Speaker 1: the gold medalists. If you do analyzes of their facial muscles,

752
00:34:35,756 --> 00:34:38,676
Speaker 1: what you find is that silver medallists are showing emotions

753
00:34:38,716 --> 00:34:42,756
Speaker 1: like contempt, deep sadness, they're not like little less happy,

754
00:34:42,796 --> 00:34:46,436
Speaker 1: they're miserable. Why they just feel like a total loser.

755
00:34:46,596 --> 00:34:50,076
Speaker 1: They're just looking to the gold medalist and feeling awful. Right,

756
00:34:50,636 --> 00:34:54,236
Speaker 1: you can be an objectively the best circumstances in life,

757
00:34:54,756 --> 00:34:57,116
Speaker 1: and if your mind finds the one person that's better

758
00:34:57,156 --> 00:34:59,556
Speaker 1: than you, it's going to look to that person and

759
00:34:59,596 --> 00:35:03,676
Speaker 1: do it. I consulted very briefly for an NBA team

760
00:35:03,916 --> 00:35:05,876
Speaker 1: with basketball players, which is funny because like, I don't

761
00:35:05,876 --> 00:35:07,876
Speaker 1: know anything about basketball or anything about sports in general,

762
00:35:07,916 --> 00:35:08,956
Speaker 1: and so I have to figure out ways to talk

763
00:35:08,956 --> 00:35:11,756
Speaker 1: to basketball players. But we were talking about the insidiousness

764
00:35:11,756 --> 00:35:14,556
Speaker 1: of social comparison, even at the highest level in the NBA,

765
00:35:15,036 --> 00:35:17,236
Speaker 1: and I was asking them who their comparison points where

766
00:35:17,276 --> 00:35:19,636
Speaker 1: I was like, who's your comparison point for like salary

767
00:35:19,716 --> 00:35:20,796
Speaker 1: right now? And at the time, they were like, oh,

768
00:35:20,836 --> 00:35:22,396
Speaker 1: it's Steph Curry. And I was like, who's your comparison

769
00:35:22,436 --> 00:35:24,436
Speaker 1: point for like three point shots? And they're like Steph Curry.

770
00:35:24,636 --> 00:35:27,876
Speaker 1: And I was like, who's your comparison for height? And

771
00:35:27,916 --> 00:35:29,996
Speaker 1: they're like, oh, it's like Taco fail or something. I

772
00:35:29,996 --> 00:35:31,516
Speaker 1: was like, why is it not Steph Curry for height?

773
00:35:31,556 --> 00:35:33,396
Speaker 1: Because if you know basketball, Steph Curry is pretty sure

774
00:35:33,396 --> 00:35:35,196
Speaker 1: and they're like, well, I didn't think about him for that,

775
00:35:35,276 --> 00:35:37,316
Speaker 1: but like you thought about him for every other comparison.

776
00:35:37,316 --> 00:35:39,916
Speaker 1: Why is that not so? Like even at the highest level,

777
00:35:39,916 --> 00:35:42,876
Speaker 1: we picked the awful stuff, right. So I think one

778
00:35:42,916 --> 00:35:45,436
Speaker 1: way to deal with comparison is just to have some

779
00:35:45,556 --> 00:35:48,236
Speaker 1: grace about it. It's just the way your mind works

780
00:35:48,276 --> 00:35:51,316
Speaker 1: for everything. Of course you're going to compare, but you

781
00:35:51,396 --> 00:35:54,676
Speaker 1: need to realize that you can shift that process a little.

782
00:35:55,036 --> 00:35:56,556
Speaker 1: And this is why I love to nerd out and

783
00:35:56,596 --> 00:35:59,156
Speaker 1: tell this Olympian story, because there's a third data point

784
00:35:59,156 --> 00:36:00,956
Speaker 1: that I haven't mentioned. I talked about the gold medalists

785
00:36:00,996 --> 00:36:03,556
Speaker 1: and the silver medalist. I didn't mention the bronze medallist.

786
00:36:03,996 --> 00:36:08,436
Speaker 1: Researchers analyze their facial expressions, and it turns out they're ecstatic.

787
00:36:08,596 --> 00:36:10,676
Speaker 1: They often and then some of the analyzes are showing

788
00:36:10,956 --> 00:36:15,276
Speaker 1: more positive expressions than the gold medalist. Why their comparison

789
00:36:15,316 --> 00:36:17,876
Speaker 1: point isn't gold? They were like multiple seconds or multiple

790
00:36:17,876 --> 00:36:20,636
Speaker 1: points away. Their comparison is like, oh my gosh, if

791
00:36:20,676 --> 00:36:22,596
Speaker 1: I just messed up a little bit more, I would

792
00:36:22,636 --> 00:36:25,796
Speaker 1: be going home empty. And then aha, And so the

793
00:36:25,916 --> 00:36:28,156
Speaker 1: joke is you have to find not the silver lining,

794
00:36:28,196 --> 00:36:32,076
Speaker 1: but the bronze lining. You literally have to look at

795
00:36:32,276 --> 00:36:34,876
Speaker 1: Could it be worse? Is there another comparison I could find?

796
00:36:35,196 --> 00:36:38,436
Speaker 1: And that intentional energy takes work, but it's possible, so

797
00:36:38,836 --> 00:36:41,716
Speaker 1: little grace. Everybody does it just the way your mind works.

798
00:36:41,756 --> 00:36:45,916
Speaker 1: But if you look carefully you can detect the objectively

799
00:36:45,996 --> 00:36:47,076
Speaker 1: you're not doing so bad.

800
00:36:47,956 --> 00:36:51,956
Speaker 3: Strive in life for third place. Yeah, exactly, Professor Blanchflower,

801
00:36:53,876 --> 00:36:54,196
Speaker 3: thank you.

802
00:36:54,436 --> 00:36:57,076
Speaker 5: I'm Danni Blansflaw. That's exactly the theme I was going

803
00:36:57,156 --> 00:36:59,436
Speaker 5: to try and think about. Darren and I were in

804
00:36:59,476 --> 00:37:03,356
Speaker 5: Scotland for the three hundredth anniversary of Adam Smith's birth,

805
00:37:04,076 --> 00:37:06,436
Speaker 5: and if you read the first page of Ethery of

806
00:37:06,436 --> 00:37:10,716
Speaker 5: Moral Sentiments, he says what you just said. He actually says,

807
00:37:11,236 --> 00:37:13,836
Speaker 5: actually we compare ourselves to others, and we care about

808
00:37:13,836 --> 00:37:15,796
Speaker 5: the well being of others. For the guy who wrote

809
00:37:15,836 --> 00:37:20,316
Speaker 5: about markets, so the relative thing is really important, even

810
00:37:20,396 --> 00:37:22,716
Speaker 5: I think in macro sense it's really important. I just

811
00:37:22,756 --> 00:37:25,876
Speaker 5: tell you a Nobel Prize winner who remain nameless, call

812
00:37:25,956 --> 00:37:27,916
Speaker 5: me one day and I've written about relative things, and

813
00:37:27,956 --> 00:37:30,756
Speaker 5: he said, I can buy anything that I like, but

814
00:37:30,796 --> 00:37:34,036
Speaker 5: I still care about the salaries of my colleagues. But

815
00:37:34,156 --> 00:37:35,996
Speaker 5: this is a big deal, right, So if you think

816
00:37:36,036 --> 00:37:39,476
Speaker 5: in macro terms, we've seen GDP rising, income of the

817
00:37:39,636 --> 00:37:42,276
Speaker 5: nation rises, and if you look at happiness is flat

818
00:37:42,276 --> 00:37:45,476
Speaker 5: as a pancake. Well, what happens is people compare themselves

819
00:37:45,556 --> 00:37:48,676
Speaker 5: to others. If I get a BMW, this is work

820
00:37:48,716 --> 00:37:51,076
Speaker 5: of colleagues of ours. If I get a BMW, it

821
00:37:51,076 --> 00:37:53,236
Speaker 5: makes me happy. But if you get one, I'm not

822
00:37:53,276 --> 00:37:57,396
Speaker 5: happy anymore. So, I mean, this is literally true, and

823
00:37:57,396 --> 00:38:01,316
Speaker 5: there's evidence. Lotmu's famous paper finds that if I get

824
00:38:01,396 --> 00:38:04,436
Speaker 5: about ten percent rise in income, that's fine. But if

825
00:38:04,476 --> 00:38:06,196
Speaker 5: I get no rise in income and everybody in the

826
00:38:06,236 --> 00:38:08,956
Speaker 5: neighborhood gets a ten percent rise, I'm worse off. So

827
00:38:09,236 --> 00:38:12,916
Speaker 5: these comparators are really important. And I know you've talked

828
00:38:12,916 --> 00:38:16,276
Speaker 5: about it on an individual level, but obviously I think

829
00:38:16,276 --> 00:38:18,276
Speaker 5: it's really important for us to think, perhaps to your

830
00:38:18,276 --> 00:38:21,516
Speaker 5: connection on smartphones. When I was a kid and I

831
00:38:21,556 --> 00:38:23,756
Speaker 5: was twelve, I'm old now I was twelve, I compared

832
00:38:23,796 --> 00:38:28,236
Speaker 5: myself to my sister and my school colleagues. Maybe what

833
00:38:28,316 --> 00:38:32,036
Speaker 5: we've got here is the smartphone has changed the comparator group.

834
00:38:32,676 --> 00:38:37,476
Speaker 5: The comparator groups are not real, right, If I'm comparing

835
00:38:37,516 --> 00:38:40,996
Speaker 5: myself to my sister or to Darren or something. That's fine.

836
00:38:41,156 --> 00:38:43,436
Speaker 5: But in a sense, the connection of the real things

837
00:38:43,476 --> 00:38:46,916
Speaker 5: and the smartphones is the smartphones change the comparator group.

838
00:38:47,036 --> 00:38:49,556
Speaker 5: And until we can do that, the individual things you've

839
00:38:49,556 --> 00:38:52,236
Speaker 5: talked about full flat. So I'm just trying to think

840
00:38:52,276 --> 00:38:55,556
Speaker 5: about how do we actually get people to compare themselves

841
00:38:55,596 --> 00:38:58,356
Speaker 5: to real things. Because if I've learned anything about the

842
00:38:58,356 --> 00:39:01,476
Speaker 5: happiness work I've done, it's what you said, relative things matter.

843
00:39:01,956 --> 00:39:04,476
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, I think this is such an important point, right.

844
00:39:04,556 --> 00:39:06,516
Speaker 1: It's comparing yourself. You know, if you're a student, you're

845
00:39:06,556 --> 00:39:08,956
Speaker 1: to everyone at Dartmouth. But it's also comparing yourself to

846
00:39:09,276 --> 00:39:12,516
Speaker 1: literally everyone on the internet. And of course what's happening

847
00:39:12,556 --> 00:39:15,516
Speaker 1: on the internet is completely curated, especially when it comes

848
00:39:15,556 --> 00:39:18,156
Speaker 1: to beauty, your your physical looks and so on. It's

849
00:39:18,196 --> 00:39:20,116
Speaker 1: like all made up. And I think in the age

850
00:39:20,116 --> 00:39:22,556
Speaker 1: of Aislop, which we're moving towards, we're going to have

851
00:39:22,636 --> 00:39:25,716
Speaker 1: even more comparisons that don't even exist, right, And so

852
00:39:26,196 --> 00:39:28,956
Speaker 1: it raises this interesting question of what we can do again.

853
00:39:29,036 --> 00:39:32,196
Speaker 1: Being a psychologist, I think of the individual strategies that

854
00:39:32,236 --> 00:39:34,676
Speaker 1: we can use, and the idea is like you have

855
00:39:34,756 --> 00:39:36,916
Speaker 1: some agency over whether you pick up that phone and

856
00:39:36,956 --> 00:39:40,236
Speaker 1: look at TikTok. You can mindfully notice how is it

857
00:39:40,276 --> 00:39:42,516
Speaker 1: making me feel when I do that? If I leave

858
00:39:42,596 --> 00:39:44,676
Speaker 1: TikTok hating my body and demanding I go to the

859
00:39:44,716 --> 00:39:47,196
Speaker 1: gym and feeling bad about my grades, like try to

860
00:39:47,396 --> 00:39:50,756
Speaker 1: notice when are these comparisons coming up? And are they

861
00:39:50,796 --> 00:39:54,436
Speaker 1: really real? This is a strategy to journalists like Catherine Price.

862
00:39:54,516 --> 00:39:56,316
Speaker 1: It's this really lovely book How to Break Up with

863
00:39:56,356 --> 00:39:58,236
Speaker 1: Your Phone, where she argues you don't necessarily have to

864
00:39:58,276 --> 00:39:59,556
Speaker 1: break up with your phone, but you need to take

865
00:39:59,556 --> 00:40:01,676
Speaker 1: it to like couples counseling to figure out like how

866
00:40:01,756 --> 00:40:04,396
Speaker 1: fe a relationship? Wut it? You know? And she has

867
00:40:04,436 --> 00:40:08,196
Speaker 1: a strategy that she uses. It's an acronym WWW, which

868
00:40:08,196 --> 00:40:10,556
Speaker 1: stands for what for, why now? And what else? Right?

869
00:40:10,796 --> 00:40:12,876
Speaker 1: Why did I pick up my phone? What am I

870
00:40:12,956 --> 00:40:15,036
Speaker 1: using it for? What else could I be doing? But

871
00:40:15,076 --> 00:40:18,276
Speaker 1: the reason I like this WWW strategy is it's a

872
00:40:18,316 --> 00:40:21,036
Speaker 1: moment to be mindful. Why did I pick up the phone?

873
00:40:21,156 --> 00:40:23,436
Speaker 1: How am I feeling when I'm using it? If it's

874
00:40:23,476 --> 00:40:25,996
Speaker 1: making you feel totally crappy if you have all these

875
00:40:25,996 --> 00:40:29,196
Speaker 1: social comparisons, it's a hint to like maybe pop off

876
00:40:29,236 --> 00:40:31,756
Speaker 1: that stuff or take a moment to read and realize,

877
00:40:31,796 --> 00:40:34,116
Speaker 1: Like a crappy thing about our mind is that we

878
00:40:34,516 --> 00:40:37,596
Speaker 1: don't have a lot of control over what other reference points,

879
00:40:37,636 --> 00:40:40,476
Speaker 1: these social comparison points we use. We just soak up

880
00:40:40,596 --> 00:40:42,916
Speaker 1: any that we get, and especially ones that make us

881
00:40:42,956 --> 00:40:46,556
Speaker 1: look bad. And that means that we're constantly affected by

882
00:40:46,756 --> 00:40:50,476
Speaker 1: other folks. And when those other folks are real and

883
00:40:50,556 --> 00:40:53,076
Speaker 1: around us and our peer group, that's one thing. When

884
00:40:53,076 --> 00:40:55,556
Speaker 1: those other folks are fake people on the internet with

885
00:40:55,756 --> 00:40:58,756
Speaker 1: photo filters and whatever, it's just so much worse.

886
00:41:00,516 --> 00:41:01,276
Speaker 3: Question right here.

887
00:41:02,756 --> 00:41:07,916
Speaker 4: I was wondering because I'm a cognitive science major, given that,

888
00:41:08,076 --> 00:41:12,036
Speaker 4: like people started using AI sometimes as a substitute for

889
00:41:12,196 --> 00:41:16,876
Speaker 4: mental health, like counselors, like AI can late as long

890
00:41:16,916 --> 00:41:19,516
Speaker 4: as you prompt in the way it can lead to

891
00:41:19,516 --> 00:41:22,556
Speaker 4: you to do self harm. Do you have like any

892
00:41:22,556 --> 00:41:26,916
Speaker 4: suggestions because even when you like google something, it's usually

893
00:41:27,036 --> 00:41:30,996
Speaker 4: AI based answers too, Like I don't know, you're yeah, perspective.

894
00:41:31,036 --> 00:41:33,236
Speaker 1: I love this question because I think more and more

895
00:41:33,356 --> 00:41:35,756
Speaker 1: we're going to be needing to think about how these

896
00:41:35,756 --> 00:41:39,396
Speaker 1: emerging technologies like AI and LMS are affecting our happiness

897
00:41:39,876 --> 00:41:44,876
Speaker 1: on the chat bots and advice, or chat bots in therapy,

898
00:41:44,996 --> 00:41:48,876
Speaker 1: or even chatbots and friendship, chatbots and relationships. I just

899
00:41:48,876 --> 00:41:51,396
Speaker 1: did an episode with Gene Twangie and she was talking

900
00:41:51,436 --> 00:41:55,436
Speaker 1: about how it's likely that most like middle schoolers will

901
00:41:55,476 --> 00:41:59,316
Speaker 1: have their first romantic relationship with a chatbot because it's

902
00:41:59,356 --> 00:42:02,316
Speaker 1: just easy. It's frictionless. You can talk to them about

903
00:42:02,316 --> 00:42:04,956
Speaker 1: sexy stuff without having to talk to a real person.

904
00:42:05,516 --> 00:42:08,636
Speaker 1: And we just haven't thought carefully about this stuff at all.

905
00:42:08,876 --> 00:42:12,796
Speaker 1: But on chatbots and therapy and chatbots and friendship, I

906
00:42:12,796 --> 00:42:15,436
Speaker 1: think you've identified a lot of the problems, which is

907
00:42:15,476 --> 00:42:20,636
Speaker 1: that these tools aren't necessarily so hot at distinguishing between

908
00:42:20,676 --> 00:42:24,356
Speaker 1: good advice and bad advice. And sometimes especially since a

909
00:42:24,356 --> 00:42:26,236
Speaker 1: lot of the tools are built to kind of agree

910
00:42:26,276 --> 00:42:28,236
Speaker 1: with you a little bit, you know, if you say, oh,

911
00:42:28,276 --> 00:42:30,876
Speaker 1: I want to do this terrible self harmy thing, sometimes

912
00:42:30,876 --> 00:42:33,916
Speaker 1: they're prone to kind of oh, that sounds great. I

913
00:42:33,916 --> 00:42:36,876
Speaker 1: think these tools are getting better, especially as awful as

914
00:42:36,916 --> 00:42:40,636
Speaker 1: these incidents are coming out, But yeah, it's dangerous. I

915
00:42:40,836 --> 00:42:44,716
Speaker 1: worry too about the idea that social connection can seem

916
00:42:44,716 --> 00:42:46,756
Speaker 1: a little frictiony. It can be hard. Many of us

917
00:42:46,756 --> 00:42:49,596
Speaker 1: are feeling lonely, and that people are really turning to

918
00:42:49,676 --> 00:42:53,956
Speaker 1: these tools just for friendship, advice, companionship. And there's some

919
00:42:54,236 --> 00:42:57,036
Speaker 1: new work coming out of Liz Dunn's group that finds

920
00:42:57,076 --> 00:43:00,076
Speaker 1: that at first that's helpful, like in the moment, it

921
00:43:00,116 --> 00:43:03,036
Speaker 1: makes you feel less lonely, but long term it makes

922
00:43:03,076 --> 00:43:05,276
Speaker 1: it harder, it makes you more lonely. So I think

923
00:43:05,276 --> 00:43:07,636
Speaker 1: it's a kind of like a Nutris suite of connection

924
00:43:07,676 --> 00:43:09,636
Speaker 1: where it feels good, it feels sweet in the moment,

925
00:43:09,716 --> 00:43:13,156
Speaker 1: but it's not giving you the nutrition you need. Another

926
00:43:13,156 --> 00:43:14,716
Speaker 1: thing I'll say, just because I'm in a room of

927
00:43:14,756 --> 00:43:16,916
Speaker 1: lots of students, that I worry about a lot with

928
00:43:17,036 --> 00:43:20,476
Speaker 1: AI that I think we're not thinking about is the

929
00:43:20,596 --> 00:43:25,276
Speaker 1: impact that cognitive offloading is happening. That you let your

930
00:43:25,356 --> 00:43:27,716
Speaker 1: chatbot just do your response paper because it's a little faster,

931
00:43:27,956 --> 00:43:29,836
Speaker 1: or you let your chatbot like kind of write your

932
00:43:29,956 --> 00:43:31,876
Speaker 1: essay or do that hard thing because you kind of

933
00:43:31,876 --> 00:43:33,756
Speaker 1: feel the friction of doing the hard thing, you're having

934
00:43:33,756 --> 00:43:36,756
Speaker 1: some resistance, and you just offload it to that. There's

935
00:43:36,996 --> 00:43:39,476
Speaker 1: lots of work by folks like Mickey Inselect and others

936
00:43:39,516 --> 00:43:42,996
Speaker 1: showing the power of effort the effort feels good. We

937
00:43:43,036 --> 00:43:45,036
Speaker 1: don't like to do it, but once we get through it,

938
00:43:45,036 --> 00:43:47,516
Speaker 1: it feels nice. We like to have our own ideas.

939
00:43:47,516 --> 00:43:49,876
Speaker 1: We like to push through things. That's why for those

940
00:43:49,916 --> 00:43:51,916
Speaker 1: of you who do the New York Times wordle in

941
00:43:51,916 --> 00:43:53,836
Speaker 1: the morning, you don't just like look on one of

942
00:43:53,956 --> 00:43:55,996
Speaker 1: the many sites that just has the world answer and

943
00:43:56,036 --> 00:43:59,196
Speaker 1: type the word answer in. You try to push through it.

944
00:43:59,316 --> 00:44:03,116
Speaker 1: That feels good, right, But we are not thinking of

945
00:44:03,156 --> 00:44:06,276
Speaker 1: the consequences of this kind of offloading for an entire

946
00:44:06,356 --> 00:44:10,556
Speaker 1: generation's academic work for an entire generation, stuff where there

947
00:44:10,556 --> 00:44:14,316
Speaker 1: are cognitive benefits of pushing through something on your own,

948
00:44:14,436 --> 00:44:17,476
Speaker 1: and I think we're not tracking the happiness cost of that.

949
00:44:17,876 --> 00:44:20,476
Speaker 1: I see it a little bit in my students. Professors

950
00:44:20,476 --> 00:44:22,636
Speaker 1: can tell when you use the alum and they're like, Okay,

951
00:44:22,676 --> 00:44:24,876
Speaker 1: this was LLM written. And I'll be like, oh, what

952
00:44:24,876 --> 00:44:26,516
Speaker 1: did you think of paper? How is that idea? And

953
00:44:26,556 --> 00:44:28,316
Speaker 1: they like, they're just not as into it. They just

954
00:44:28,316 --> 00:44:30,916
Speaker 1: don't engage with it right in the same way, there's

955
00:44:31,116 --> 00:44:34,636
Speaker 1: something interesting being lost about that connection. There's obviously a

956
00:44:34,756 --> 00:44:37,476
Speaker 1: learning cost and other kinds of costs. I'm really interested

957
00:44:37,476 --> 00:44:40,356
Speaker 1: in the like that little happiness boost, the little flow

958
00:44:40,396 --> 00:44:42,756
Speaker 1: boost that you get from working hard on something. I

959
00:44:42,796 --> 00:44:44,156
Speaker 1: think more and more of a time, we're going to

960
00:44:44,196 --> 00:44:46,556
Speaker 1: lose that, and I worry that that's dangerous.

961
00:44:47,236 --> 00:44:49,316
Speaker 3: What's true of worl by the way, is also true

962
00:44:49,356 --> 00:44:53,276
Speaker 3: of learning the conjugations of irregular Latin verbs. Just so, folks.

963
00:44:53,676 --> 00:44:56,996
Speaker 3: So let's see, we are almost out of time, but

964
00:44:57,036 --> 00:44:59,156
Speaker 3: I think we could probably take one more question if

965
00:44:59,196 --> 00:45:00,516
Speaker 3: somebody wants to fight it out.

966
00:45:00,636 --> 00:45:06,556
Speaker 7: Yes, it seems like comparison is this thief of joy.

967
00:45:07,116 --> 00:45:12,356
Speaker 7: But we're taught that ambition is really important, and economically,

968
00:45:12,476 --> 00:45:15,556
Speaker 7: ambition and productivity are kind of these things that our

969
00:45:15,956 --> 00:45:21,076
Speaker 7: society prioritizes. So how do you reconcile that mindset of

970
00:45:21,276 --> 00:45:25,076
Speaker 7: it's okay to be a bronze medalist with the idea

971
00:45:25,156 --> 00:45:29,396
Speaker 7: that we want people striving towards being gold medalists.

972
00:45:30,836 --> 00:45:33,076
Speaker 1: One way to reframe your question is to ask, well,

973
00:45:33,116 --> 00:45:34,636
Speaker 1: what are the things that get us to be gold

974
00:45:34,676 --> 00:45:37,076
Speaker 1: medalists and whatever field? What are the things that cause

975
00:45:37,156 --> 00:45:40,356
Speaker 1: us to be a plus students, the best worker, like

976
00:45:40,596 --> 00:45:43,716
Speaker 1: whatever achievement you want to pick, how do I get there?

977
00:45:44,076 --> 00:45:46,436
Speaker 1: And I think our minds have this assumption, which is

978
00:45:46,516 --> 00:45:49,396
Speaker 1: like you just work to the point of absolute burnout

979
00:45:49,396 --> 00:45:51,836
Speaker 1: and kill yourself and push yourself in hussles a hustle,

980
00:45:51,876 --> 00:45:54,156
Speaker 1: and you'll get there. And I think that what we're

981
00:45:54,236 --> 00:45:57,476
Speaker 1: learning is, like's just not how it works. Even if

982
00:45:57,476 --> 00:45:59,836
Speaker 1: your goal is just achievement at all costs and you

983
00:45:59,836 --> 00:46:02,236
Speaker 1: don't care about your mental health, it might be that

984
00:46:02,276 --> 00:46:05,636
Speaker 1: by prioritizing your mental health, you get to that achievement more.

985
00:46:06,316 --> 00:46:09,436
Speaker 1: And we see this in the context of our physical health,

986
00:46:09,476 --> 00:46:11,516
Speaker 1: I think a little bit better. Right. You am here

987
00:46:11,516 --> 00:46:13,516
Speaker 1: at Dartmouth, so I know a lot of you are athletes,

988
00:46:13,556 --> 00:46:15,756
Speaker 1: and you probably if you're on a team or you

989
00:46:15,876 --> 00:46:19,396
Speaker 1: work out, have heard about concepts like active rest, where

990
00:46:19,436 --> 00:46:21,796
Speaker 1: like if you just kill yourself and keep practicing and

991
00:46:21,876 --> 00:46:24,396
Speaker 1: push yourself one hundred and ten percent for working out

992
00:46:24,556 --> 00:46:27,156
Speaker 1: all the time, you're going to get an injury, like

993
00:46:27,276 --> 00:46:29,116
Speaker 1: your body's not going to be able to handle it.

994
00:46:29,156 --> 00:46:31,476
Speaker 1: If you want to be optimal, you have to have

995
00:46:31,556 --> 00:46:33,916
Speaker 1: moments of rest and scale back in this kind of thing.

996
00:46:34,916 --> 00:46:37,916
Speaker 1: My read of what's happening in the performance literature is

997
00:46:37,916 --> 00:46:40,596
Speaker 1: that we're learning the same thing about mental health and

998
00:46:40,596 --> 00:46:43,036
Speaker 1: burnout and so on, that if we just push, push,

999
00:46:43,036 --> 00:46:45,516
Speaker 1: push all the time. Even if your goal is just

1000
00:46:45,596 --> 00:46:48,756
Speaker 1: the full performance goal, you're not going to get there

1001
00:46:48,836 --> 00:46:52,276
Speaker 1: as effectively by doing that four day work weeks people

1002
00:46:52,316 --> 00:46:54,996
Speaker 1: perform better than a five day work week. Like taking

1003
00:46:55,036 --> 00:46:57,756
Speaker 1: time off, sleeping and resting makes you perform better. There's

1004
00:46:57,836 --> 00:47:00,076
Speaker 1: lots of evidence for the power of sleep and grades

1005
00:47:00,316 --> 00:47:03,076
Speaker 1: that if you take an hour off of studying to sleep,

1006
00:47:03,476 --> 00:47:06,676
Speaker 1: you'll probably do better and perform better over time. There's

1007
00:47:06,716 --> 00:47:09,356
Speaker 1: also evidence to like a different achievement bottom line, which

1008
00:47:09,396 --> 00:47:11,876
Speaker 1: is just a capitalism achievement bottom line of like make

1009
00:47:11,916 --> 00:47:15,156
Speaker 1: as much money as possible, where researchers are learning that

1010
00:47:15,276 --> 00:47:20,196
Speaker 1: in fact, the act of taking rest, focusing on happiness

1011
00:47:20,276 --> 00:47:22,836
Speaker 1: doing the stuff that I'm talking about seems to matter.

1012
00:47:23,196 --> 00:47:25,876
Speaker 1: My favorite study of twenty twenty five People have like

1013
00:47:25,876 --> 00:47:27,916
Speaker 1: the Spotify raps from twenty twenty five, and I would

1014
00:47:27,916 --> 00:47:29,876
Speaker 1: say nerdy researchers want their favorite like. It would be

1015
00:47:29,876 --> 00:47:31,836
Speaker 1: great if app gave us our list of our favorite studies.

1016
00:47:31,876 --> 00:47:33,756
Speaker 1: But my favorite tety of twenty twenty five was by

1017
00:47:33,756 --> 00:47:36,956
Speaker 1: the Oxford researcher yan Emmanuel de Nev and he partnered

1018
00:47:36,996 --> 00:47:39,636
Speaker 1: with the job website Indeed, which I'm sure some of

1019
00:47:39,676 --> 00:47:42,156
Speaker 1: you know, to ask the following question. He's like, you know,

1020
00:47:42,236 --> 00:47:46,396
Speaker 1: on indeed, they have fifteen million rankings of all this

1021
00:47:46,436 --> 00:47:49,276
Speaker 1: stuff about people's workplaces, like their salary and all this stuff.

1022
00:47:49,356 --> 00:47:51,316
Speaker 1: But one of the rankings they have is people's happiness

1023
00:47:51,316 --> 00:47:54,036
Speaker 1: at work. And he's like, oh, these are rankings across

1024
00:47:54,196 --> 00:47:58,836
Speaker 1: five thousand different publicly traded companies, right, And so we

1025
00:47:58,836 --> 00:48:00,996
Speaker 1: could do is the following. We could take per company

1026
00:48:01,036 --> 00:48:04,196
Speaker 1: the average happiness at work and look at whether or

1027
00:48:04,276 --> 00:48:07,796
Speaker 1: not that predicts the stock performance of a company, and

1028
00:48:07,916 --> 00:48:09,916
Speaker 1: we could imagine this goes to diferent ways. We could

1029
00:48:09,916 --> 00:48:11,516
Speaker 1: have the theory that like, well, the way you get

1030
00:48:11,516 --> 00:48:13,836
Speaker 1: good stock performance is like you exploit the heck out

1031
00:48:13,836 --> 00:48:15,916
Speaker 1: of your workers, You make them really miserable, you push

1032
00:48:15,956 --> 00:48:17,916
Speaker 1: a push, But that's how you get to good performance.

1033
00:48:18,556 --> 00:48:21,836
Speaker 1: What jim Manuel Denv finds is just the opposite, super

1034
00:48:21,876 --> 00:48:26,956
Speaker 1: strong correlation between the happiest companies and the best stock performance,

1035
00:48:27,076 --> 00:48:30,036
Speaker 1: just a perfect, beautiful correlation. In fact, the correlation was

1036
00:48:30,076 --> 00:48:33,556
Speaker 1: so high that Denv has now made a stock index

1037
00:48:33,596 --> 00:48:35,716
Speaker 1: of the happiest companies, you know, like the SMP five hundred,

1038
00:48:35,716 --> 00:48:37,036
Speaker 1: where it's like you can invest in this and I'll

1039
00:48:37,036 --> 00:48:39,116
Speaker 1: get you money. You can invest in. You can look

1040
00:48:39,156 --> 00:48:41,356
Speaker 1: on his website and see this the top one hundred

1041
00:48:41,436 --> 00:48:44,196
Speaker 1: indeed companies and invest in that. And he's found that

1042
00:48:44,436 --> 00:48:46,836
Speaker 1: every time in the market from twenty twenty one till

1043
00:48:46,876 --> 00:48:48,436
Speaker 1: I think the last data set was like in twenty

1044
00:48:48,436 --> 00:48:52,636
Speaker 1: twenty five, this will being one hundred out for forms

1045
00:48:52,636 --> 00:48:54,916
Speaker 1: like the Dow Jones and the SMP five hundred. It's

1046
00:48:54,956 --> 00:48:57,756
Speaker 1: a little investment tidbit from that. There you get that

1047
00:48:57,996 --> 00:49:00,156
Speaker 1: little tidbit to take with you, which is why you

1048
00:49:00,196 --> 00:49:04,676
Speaker 1: came tonight. But my point is we have an incorrect

1049
00:49:04,716 --> 00:49:07,156
Speaker 1: theory about performance. Whether it's for companies as individuals. We

1050
00:49:07,196 --> 00:49:09,116
Speaker 1: think push push, push, that's the way to achieve more.

1051
00:49:09,676 --> 00:49:11,116
Speaker 1: But it might be the way to achieve more is

1052
00:49:11,156 --> 00:49:14,196
Speaker 1: to rest, but focus on your positive mood, to take

1053
00:49:14,236 --> 00:49:17,396
Speaker 1: some time off. I think even if all you care

1054
00:49:17,476 --> 00:49:20,276
Speaker 1: is you're about is your output, you need a different

1055
00:49:20,316 --> 00:49:22,436
Speaker 1: theory about how to do that well. And so that

1056
00:49:22,476 --> 00:49:24,676
Speaker 1: would be the idea is like ask the question what

1057
00:49:24,796 --> 00:49:27,316
Speaker 1: gets the gold medalist to be the gold medalist? Right,

1058
00:49:27,636 --> 00:49:29,596
Speaker 1: it might be rest, it might be time off. Look

1059
00:49:29,596 --> 00:49:32,596
Speaker 1: at Alyssa lu you know, we've just had this wonderful Olympics.

1060
00:49:32,596 --> 00:49:36,436
Speaker 1: Everybody watched her video. I think that's beautiful. But if

1061
00:49:36,436 --> 00:49:38,636
Speaker 1: you know her story, you know what happened was she

1062
00:49:38,676 --> 00:49:40,956
Speaker 1: was feeling burned out, so she took time off. She

1063
00:49:41,036 --> 00:49:43,396
Speaker 1: had people tell her that's stupid. You're you're never going

1064
00:49:43,476 --> 00:49:45,276
Speaker 1: to be a good skater, like you're never gonna be

1065
00:49:45,316 --> 00:49:48,196
Speaker 1: a good athlete. Right, what happened she took the time off.

1066
00:49:48,396 --> 00:49:50,156
Speaker 1: I mean, her own kind of account of it is

1067
00:49:50,196 --> 00:49:52,796
Speaker 1: that's why she was able to win. Right, So, I

1068
00:49:52,796 --> 00:49:55,036
Speaker 1: think that's the message. Even if what you want is

1069
00:49:55,036 --> 00:49:57,196
Speaker 1: to hustle, hustle, hustle and achieve as much and be

1070
00:49:57,236 --> 00:49:59,956
Speaker 1: the gold medalist and the perfect Dartmouth college student, you

1071
00:50:00,036 --> 00:50:02,116
Speaker 1: might do that by focusing on your well being more

1072
00:50:02,156 --> 00:50:03,276
Speaker 1: than you expect.

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Speaker 3: Wow, that was wonderful, Lloyd, please join me in thanking

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Speaker 3: her for with it him. Oh,