1 00:00:03,120 --> 00:00:05,920 Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff 2 00:00:05,920 --> 00:00:14,239 Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow 3 00:00:14,240 --> 00:00:16,960 Speaker 1: your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. 4 00:00:17,000 --> 00:00:19,439 Speaker 1: And Robert, you write a fiction. I do. I do 5 00:00:19,440 --> 00:00:22,520 Speaker 1: occasionally commit acts of fiction, right, and as a fiction writer, 6 00:00:22,640 --> 00:00:25,520 Speaker 1: I'm sure you have heard this saying, though I can't 7 00:00:25,520 --> 00:00:27,680 Speaker 1: remember where I heard it. If you want to make 8 00:00:27,720 --> 00:00:30,800 Speaker 1: a character interesting, what should you do? You give him 9 00:00:30,840 --> 00:00:35,479 Speaker 1: a secret some broad advice because not all secrets you 10 00:00:35,560 --> 00:00:38,839 Speaker 1: created equally. Uh, that you could give a character a 11 00:00:38,880 --> 00:00:42,680 Speaker 1: secret identity. You could give them a secret past, a 12 00:00:42,800 --> 00:00:48,600 Speaker 1: secret mission, um, a secret mark upon their body. Uh, 13 00:00:48,720 --> 00:00:52,519 Speaker 1: Like I always think back to um a secret pet. Yes, 14 00:00:52,840 --> 00:00:55,160 Speaker 1: well secret pet. I don't know as has been a 15 00:00:55,480 --> 00:00:57,840 Speaker 1: I guess you could have like an illegal pet. But 16 00:00:58,000 --> 00:01:01,920 Speaker 1: I always think back to raising Arizone in the The 17 00:01:01,960 --> 00:01:06,760 Speaker 1: Bounty Hunter character played by text Cob and uh, and 18 00:01:06,760 --> 00:01:11,080 Speaker 1: he has the secret what like woody woodpecker tattoo on 19 00:01:11,120 --> 00:01:13,360 Speaker 1: his body that's revealed in one of the scenes. And 20 00:01:13,400 --> 00:01:15,920 Speaker 1: there's this moment between which is the protagonist also has 21 00:01:16,040 --> 00:01:17,960 Speaker 1: the protagonist has it as well, and so it's the 22 00:01:18,120 --> 00:01:21,880 Speaker 1: protagonist Nicolas cave, which also has a woody woodpecker tattoo. Yeah, 23 00:01:21,959 --> 00:01:23,960 Speaker 1: and uh and it's a lovely moment in the film 24 00:01:23,959 --> 00:01:28,280 Speaker 1: because suddenly these two characters share a secret or a 25 00:01:28,319 --> 00:01:31,440 Speaker 1: secret has been exposed and uh and and there's not 26 00:01:31,560 --> 00:01:34,000 Speaker 1: much made of it in the film. There's just this this, 27 00:01:34,000 --> 00:01:38,280 Speaker 1: this one pregnant moment where where we just consider the 28 00:01:38,800 --> 00:01:43,160 Speaker 1: absurdity and strange depth of of what has happened. I 29 00:01:43,160 --> 00:01:45,160 Speaker 1: would say, in general, it's kind of hard to have 30 00:01:45,240 --> 00:01:48,400 Speaker 1: a good story without a secret. I mean, try try 31 00:01:48,440 --> 00:01:49,960 Speaker 1: to think. I'm sure you can come up with a few. 32 00:01:50,120 --> 00:01:54,680 Speaker 1: But secret secrets are always there in fiction because good 33 00:01:54,720 --> 00:01:57,840 Speaker 1: fiction is the act of discovery, and if you want 34 00:01:57,880 --> 00:02:00,320 Speaker 1: to make a discovery tantalizing, you should know that there 35 00:02:00,400 --> 00:02:03,800 Speaker 1: is something to be discovered, but not know what it is. Yeah, 36 00:02:03,840 --> 00:02:07,760 Speaker 1: I mean, it instantly creates, creates drama, tension, there's stuff 37 00:02:07,760 --> 00:02:10,200 Speaker 1: that the character has to hold back. The character may 38 00:02:10,280 --> 00:02:13,239 Speaker 1: end up then having to lie about things. Yeah. It 39 00:02:13,720 --> 00:02:17,800 Speaker 1: it opens up possibilities there and conflict and inner conflict, 40 00:02:17,800 --> 00:02:20,320 Speaker 1: I should add, because that's another huge aspect of secrets. 41 00:02:20,360 --> 00:02:22,760 Speaker 1: So many of our our more weighty secrets in life, 42 00:02:22,760 --> 00:02:26,000 Speaker 1: and certainly in fiction, or secrets that are tied to identity, 43 00:02:26,040 --> 00:02:28,760 Speaker 1: So you end up with a with a protagonist or 44 00:02:28,800 --> 00:02:32,560 Speaker 1: an antagonist who is um who whose whole You know, 45 00:02:32,639 --> 00:02:36,040 Speaker 1: personality and identity is sort of a spun around of 46 00:02:36,080 --> 00:02:39,760 Speaker 1: this often dark secret about who they really are, right, 47 00:02:39,800 --> 00:02:42,400 Speaker 1: The tension in their character is trying to keep all 48 00:02:42,400 --> 00:02:46,000 Speaker 1: that bottled inside. Yeah, now, of course, Uh, you know, 49 00:02:46,040 --> 00:02:47,840 Speaker 1: secrets have been a part of our stories for a 50 00:02:47,960 --> 00:02:51,720 Speaker 1: very long time. Secrets factor into many myths and folk tales. 51 00:02:52,200 --> 00:02:54,400 Speaker 1: So you have like the secret names of demons, come 52 00:02:54,480 --> 00:02:57,600 Speaker 1: up right, Rumpel still skin, you have you know, if 53 00:02:57,639 --> 00:03:00,359 Speaker 1: you know an entity's name, then you have some power 54 00:03:00,480 --> 00:03:04,040 Speaker 1: over it. Uh. You have secret betrayals, secret histories. But 55 00:03:04,240 --> 00:03:07,040 Speaker 1: I've always found one particular tale of secret and secret 56 00:03:07,120 --> 00:03:11,040 Speaker 1: keeping particularly compelling, and that's the Japanese folk tale of 57 00:03:11,360 --> 00:03:14,520 Speaker 1: Yuki Onna the woman in the snow Hit me with 58 00:03:14,560 --> 00:03:17,000 Speaker 1: it all right, So this is the this is the 59 00:03:17,000 --> 00:03:20,360 Speaker 1: basic telling of the tale. So a young man ventures 60 00:03:20,400 --> 00:03:23,079 Speaker 1: out into the woods with other woodcutters and then they're 61 00:03:23,120 --> 00:03:26,520 Speaker 1: caught in a terrible snowstorm, and a terrifying figure finds 62 00:03:26,560 --> 00:03:28,840 Speaker 1: them in the cold, and then one by one she 63 00:03:29,000 --> 00:03:31,840 Speaker 1: drains the life from the woodcutters. But then when she 64 00:03:31,880 --> 00:03:34,440 Speaker 1: comes to the young man, she spares him, and she 65 00:03:34,520 --> 00:03:36,600 Speaker 1: tells him that she will let him live. But there's 66 00:03:36,640 --> 00:03:40,320 Speaker 1: one provision. He must never tell a single living soul 67 00:03:40,600 --> 00:03:43,200 Speaker 1: what has happened here. He has to keep this secret 68 00:03:43,560 --> 00:03:47,520 Speaker 1: his entire life. And if he tells anyone, she'll come 69 00:03:47,560 --> 00:03:50,360 Speaker 1: for him and take his life. So it's like the 70 00:03:50,440 --> 00:03:54,160 Speaker 1: opposite of natural born killers, or or tell them the 71 00:03:54,160 --> 00:03:58,120 Speaker 1: North Remembers, or something like that is saying like, no, 72 00:03:58,360 --> 00:04:01,160 Speaker 1: don't tell this story. I got to keep it inside, 73 00:04:01,200 --> 00:04:03,840 Speaker 1: even though it's I mean, it's it's the most interesting 74 00:04:03,880 --> 00:04:07,000 Speaker 1: thing that's ever happened to you, young woodcutter. But but 75 00:04:07,000 --> 00:04:09,760 Speaker 1: you must never tell anyone. It's gonna define who you are, 76 00:04:09,760 --> 00:04:11,560 Speaker 1: it's going to change the course of your life. But 77 00:04:11,640 --> 00:04:14,320 Speaker 1: you have to keep it inside. And so the young 78 00:04:14,320 --> 00:04:17,080 Speaker 1: man survives the storm, He ventures back to the village, 79 00:04:17,080 --> 00:04:19,479 Speaker 1: and life moves on. He keeps the secret. He meets 80 00:04:19,520 --> 00:04:21,800 Speaker 1: a beautiful woman and they marry. He and his wife 81 00:04:21,800 --> 00:04:24,800 Speaker 1: have children, and they settle into a happy and normal life. 82 00:04:24,800 --> 00:04:27,760 Speaker 1: But the whole time he has this secret tugging at him. 83 00:04:27,760 --> 00:04:30,680 Speaker 1: He feels it's weight, it's chill, and and then finally, 84 00:04:30,920 --> 00:04:34,919 Speaker 1: one night, after the children are asleep, he unburdens himself 85 00:04:34,920 --> 00:04:38,080 Speaker 1: to his wife. He tells her of this deadly encounter, 86 00:04:38,200 --> 00:04:41,560 Speaker 1: this deadly spirit in the woods, on that that day 87 00:04:41,640 --> 00:04:44,120 Speaker 1: so long ago. So he feels a lot better than right, 88 00:04:44,440 --> 00:04:47,000 Speaker 1: well maybe for yeah, I think he does for a 89 00:04:47,000 --> 00:04:51,560 Speaker 1: few seconds there. But after he unburdens himself, his wife 90 00:04:51,680 --> 00:04:54,200 Speaker 1: curses him for breaking his word and telling the secret. 91 00:04:54,360 --> 00:04:56,919 Speaker 1: And then she reveals her true form, for she is 92 00:04:56,960 --> 00:04:59,240 Speaker 1: the woman in the snow and has lived these many 93 00:04:59,320 --> 00:05:01,960 Speaker 1: years as his wife and mother to his children. So 94 00:05:02,040 --> 00:05:04,640 Speaker 1: she had a secret to Yeah, yeah, I mean their 95 00:05:04,680 --> 00:05:07,839 Speaker 1: whole They're both wrapped up, their fates are both wrapped 96 00:05:07,880 --> 00:05:11,599 Speaker 1: up in this this one potent secret. And you know, 97 00:05:11,680 --> 00:05:15,719 Speaker 1: and obviously there are you know, less defined magical qualities here, 98 00:05:15,760 --> 00:05:19,200 Speaker 1: the idea that this is a secret um actually has 99 00:05:19,320 --> 00:05:23,000 Speaker 1: magical power to it. Now what happens next varies with 100 00:05:23,040 --> 00:05:26,159 Speaker 1: the telling, uh, and the various versions make us ponder, 101 00:05:26,240 --> 00:05:28,000 Speaker 1: you know, what the weight of a secret is, what 102 00:05:28,080 --> 00:05:30,720 Speaker 1: the weight of a solemn vowel is, because that's the 103 00:05:30,760 --> 00:05:34,520 Speaker 1: other aspect here is the vow not to tell. And uh. 104 00:05:34,560 --> 00:05:36,960 Speaker 1: In some cases and some tellings of this she melts 105 00:05:36,960 --> 00:05:40,000 Speaker 1: away into ice, water and others. She spares him yet again, 106 00:05:40,600 --> 00:05:43,080 Speaker 1: but promises to come for him and show no mercy 107 00:05:43,160 --> 00:05:46,000 Speaker 1: if he's not a kind father to their children. And 108 00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:48,000 Speaker 1: then she you know, walks off into the snow. But 109 00:05:48,080 --> 00:05:51,200 Speaker 1: either way, the husband's heartbroken. The children are gonna wake 110 00:05:51,279 --> 00:05:54,720 Speaker 1: up the next morning and find their mother gone. It's uh, 111 00:05:54,800 --> 00:05:56,560 Speaker 1: you know, it's it's heavy stuff no matter how you 112 00:05:56,640 --> 00:05:58,880 Speaker 1: shake it. Well, this place on our deepest fears and 113 00:05:58,960 --> 00:06:01,479 Speaker 1: the thing that motivates it's most secret keeping. Now, there 114 00:06:01,520 --> 00:06:03,400 Speaker 1: are a lot of different kinds of secrets you could keep. 115 00:06:03,400 --> 00:06:05,520 Speaker 1: You could be a spy and keep secrets in your 116 00:06:05,560 --> 00:06:08,720 Speaker 1: line of work, or you could be keeping a very temporary, 117 00:06:08,800 --> 00:06:12,000 Speaker 1: benign secret, like planning a surprise party. But most of 118 00:06:12,040 --> 00:06:14,240 Speaker 1: the secrets that come to mind when you think about 119 00:06:14,279 --> 00:06:17,680 Speaker 1: secrecy are things you don't want other people to know 120 00:06:17,800 --> 00:06:21,240 Speaker 1: about you. And that's that's the kind of thing that 121 00:06:21,279 --> 00:06:24,240 Speaker 1: can be especially damaging in a relationship, right, Like, if 122 00:06:24,279 --> 00:06:27,880 Speaker 1: there's something that you don't want your life partner to 123 00:06:28,040 --> 00:06:31,360 Speaker 1: know about you, that's a fundamental flaw in the most 124 00:06:31,440 --> 00:06:34,520 Speaker 1: important relationship in your life, right, I mean, it's some 125 00:06:34,560 --> 00:06:37,320 Speaker 1: of the literature we're looking at for this episode, they 126 00:06:37,360 --> 00:06:40,000 Speaker 1: got into this little bit. They're like, I'm about their 127 00:06:40,120 --> 00:06:43,159 Speaker 1: being a balance to right, how because you end up 128 00:06:43,160 --> 00:06:45,080 Speaker 1: in a situation where you don't want to share all 129 00:06:45,080 --> 00:06:47,680 Speaker 1: your secrets and then your beloved turns into a snow 130 00:06:47,720 --> 00:06:50,840 Speaker 1: monster and kills you. Like, I mean, that's kind of 131 00:06:50,880 --> 00:06:55,360 Speaker 1: one reading on the Tale of Yukiola is that he 132 00:06:55,440 --> 00:06:57,400 Speaker 1: was a little too open with his secrets. He should 133 00:06:57,440 --> 00:06:59,840 Speaker 1: not have told that secret. That's one that should have kept. 134 00:07:00,040 --> 00:07:01,880 Speaker 1: The moral of the story is that he should not 135 00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:04,280 Speaker 1: have been honest. Yeah, But then there there are some 136 00:07:04,400 --> 00:07:08,159 Speaker 1: versions of that tale where where she's completely forgiving because 137 00:07:08,279 --> 00:07:10,840 Speaker 1: because it was not a breaking of the vowel to 138 00:07:11,000 --> 00:07:15,640 Speaker 1: share that with his wife. So yeah, and then's and 139 00:07:15,640 --> 00:07:17,640 Speaker 1: then of course there's there's one version where she right 140 00:07:17,680 --> 00:07:21,360 Speaker 1: out right kills him. Uh. And that's a nineteen nineties 141 00:07:21,920 --> 00:07:24,680 Speaker 1: retelling in Tales from the Dark Side in the movie. 142 00:07:24,840 --> 00:07:27,720 Speaker 1: I like that the chassis of this story can be 143 00:07:27,800 --> 00:07:30,840 Speaker 1: repurposed to suit almost any moral you want people to 144 00:07:30,880 --> 00:07:33,520 Speaker 1: take away. So like, this story could be about how 145 00:07:33,640 --> 00:07:36,240 Speaker 1: you should not keep secrets, or it could be about 146 00:07:36,240 --> 00:07:39,320 Speaker 1: how you should keep secrets. Yeah, and yeah, there's that's 147 00:07:39,320 --> 00:07:40,720 Speaker 1: one of the things that I think is so attractive 148 00:07:40,720 --> 00:07:43,360 Speaker 1: about it. There's there's an ambiguity a to the magic, 149 00:07:43,480 --> 00:07:45,480 Speaker 1: like what's the what are the what's the actual what 150 00:07:45,520 --> 00:07:48,000 Speaker 1: are the actual magical mechanics of what's going on here? 151 00:07:48,360 --> 00:07:51,520 Speaker 1: And then uh and then yeah, like was the guy 152 00:07:51,520 --> 00:07:53,680 Speaker 1: in the right because you have a you have a 153 00:07:53,680 --> 00:07:56,960 Speaker 1: guy who tells his secret for reveals the secret for 154 00:07:57,080 --> 00:08:00,200 Speaker 1: a seemingly very noble reason, like it's weighing him down own, 155 00:08:00,240 --> 00:08:03,679 Speaker 1: it's it's causing him pain, and it's something that's between 156 00:08:03,840 --> 00:08:06,119 Speaker 1: him and the most important person in his life. Also 157 00:08:06,160 --> 00:08:08,960 Speaker 1: though the fact of the secret is not an admission 158 00:08:09,000 --> 00:08:12,520 Speaker 1: of personal wrongdoing on his part or something that that 159 00:08:12,600 --> 00:08:15,040 Speaker 1: he should be ashamed of, it's just about a thing 160 00:08:15,080 --> 00:08:17,400 Speaker 1: that happened to him that he can't talk about, right 161 00:08:17,480 --> 00:08:19,280 Speaker 1: and and I can't. I have to assume it's the 162 00:08:19,360 --> 00:08:21,440 Speaker 1: kind of thing that like shapes you, that's a connects 163 00:08:21,440 --> 00:08:23,960 Speaker 1: the kind of thing that changes the person watching a 164 00:08:24,000 --> 00:08:28,360 Speaker 1: snow spirit murder people before you. Uh So, you know, 165 00:08:28,440 --> 00:08:32,640 Speaker 1: it's it's it's sad, it's it's it's it's depressing to 166 00:08:32,679 --> 00:08:34,360 Speaker 1: think that you would have a character that would be 167 00:08:34,400 --> 00:08:37,880 Speaker 1: that affected by something like it really it's a traumatic event, 168 00:08:38,440 --> 00:08:40,520 Speaker 1: and and he can never talk about it. And I 169 00:08:40,600 --> 00:08:42,000 Speaker 1: think that's something that a lot of and a lot 170 00:08:42,040 --> 00:08:43,600 Speaker 1: of people can relate to. That a lot of people 171 00:08:43,640 --> 00:08:47,200 Speaker 1: have experienced traumas that they either do not feel they 172 00:08:47,240 --> 00:08:50,080 Speaker 1: can talk about, or they or they you know, they 173 00:08:50,080 --> 00:08:52,680 Speaker 1: can talk about it very rarely, or they spoke of 174 00:08:52,720 --> 00:08:56,280 Speaker 1: it once, you know, to you know, an appropriate authority, 175 00:08:56,320 --> 00:08:59,000 Speaker 1: and then they can't share it again. Right now. Tales 176 00:08:59,040 --> 00:09:00,560 Speaker 1: from the Dark Side of the movie V that's the 177 00:09:00,559 --> 00:09:03,360 Speaker 1: one where a cat jumps down a guy's throat. Yes, 178 00:09:03,480 --> 00:09:07,280 Speaker 1: that's the also a Japanese legend. No, that's a Stephen 179 00:09:07,360 --> 00:09:12,200 Speaker 1: King story. But let's see. I'm not gonna remember all 180 00:09:12,240 --> 00:09:15,080 Speaker 1: the tales that are retold in that one, but I 181 00:09:15,120 --> 00:09:18,160 Speaker 1: know one is a one is a retelling of the Mummy, 182 00:09:18,640 --> 00:09:20,760 Speaker 1: uh that I've I've referred to a few times because 183 00:09:20,760 --> 00:09:23,240 Speaker 1: that's one of the few terrifying Mummy tales in my opinion. 184 00:09:23,360 --> 00:09:25,280 Speaker 1: It's got Christians Slater in it, right right, and the 185 00:09:25,320 --> 00:09:28,439 Speaker 1: Mummy goes around pulling people's brains out with a coat hanger, 186 00:09:28,600 --> 00:09:32,360 Speaker 1: so it's it's actually terrifying for a little bit. But 187 00:09:32,480 --> 00:09:36,600 Speaker 1: this one, in particular, it's a retelling of of of 188 00:09:36,679 --> 00:09:39,400 Speaker 1: the Snow Woman The Woman in the Snow, except you 189 00:09:39,440 --> 00:09:42,360 Speaker 1: have it set in New York City with Gargoyles the 190 00:09:42,360 --> 00:09:45,120 Speaker 1: Monsters of Gargo instead of Snow Spirit, and then you 191 00:09:45,200 --> 00:09:49,040 Speaker 1: have James Ramar playing the husband and Raydon Chong playing 192 00:09:49,040 --> 00:09:51,120 Speaker 1: the wife. And it's it's actually really good. It's uh. 193 00:09:51,280 --> 00:09:54,720 Speaker 1: It was written by the late novels and screenwriter Michael McDowell. 194 00:09:55,600 --> 00:09:58,480 Speaker 1: Now another and far more literal telling of this uh 195 00:09:58,559 --> 00:10:04,320 Speaker 1: this tale is Masaki Kabayashi's five film Kaitan, which features 196 00:10:04,360 --> 00:10:08,080 Speaker 1: this tale among other Japanese traditional Japanese ghost stories. And 197 00:10:08,160 --> 00:10:11,559 Speaker 1: it's extremely beautiful. It's really like a really there's a 198 00:10:11,600 --> 00:10:15,840 Speaker 1: psychedelic vision to this film. It's It's available on Criterion Collection. 199 00:10:16,040 --> 00:10:17,680 Speaker 1: This is one of those I've been meaning to watch 200 00:10:17,720 --> 00:10:20,280 Speaker 1: for years and haven't gotten around too. I've got a 201 00:10:20,320 --> 00:10:22,960 Speaker 1: good friend of mine from Tennessee really loves this one. 202 00:10:23,080 --> 00:10:25,760 Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it's it's beautiful, it's hypnotic. Um this one. 203 00:10:25,800 --> 00:10:28,120 Speaker 1: I think I've actually referred to another story that's featured 204 00:10:28,120 --> 00:10:30,800 Speaker 1: in this where you have the the reflection of a 205 00:10:30,840 --> 00:10:34,120 Speaker 1: samurai's ghost and a cup of tea. Yeah, So in 206 00:10:34,160 --> 00:10:36,440 Speaker 1: this one, what happens when he reveals the secret. This 207 00:10:36,480 --> 00:10:39,880 Speaker 1: one has the more traditional version where she she spares 208 00:10:39,960 --> 00:10:42,320 Speaker 1: him but makes him promise to be a good father 209 00:10:42,360 --> 00:10:45,280 Speaker 1: to the children. Oh well that's sweet. Yeah, well, I 210 00:10:45,280 --> 00:10:47,959 Speaker 1: mean it's sweet, but again it's it's still heartbroken. So 211 00:10:48,080 --> 00:10:50,120 Speaker 1: if it's not obvious by now, we are going to 212 00:10:50,160 --> 00:10:52,240 Speaker 1: be talking about secrets today and we're gonna try to 213 00:10:52,240 --> 00:10:54,920 Speaker 1: get into some of the science of secrets, talk about 214 00:10:54,960 --> 00:10:59,160 Speaker 1: the psychological research that exists on secrecy, the practice of 215 00:10:59,240 --> 00:11:03,600 Speaker 1: keeping secret it's and the effects of secrecy. But I 216 00:11:03,679 --> 00:11:06,280 Speaker 1: was trying to think about the concept of secrecy because 217 00:11:06,280 --> 00:11:10,760 Speaker 1: it first it seemed like a very straightforward idea. Right, 218 00:11:10,800 --> 00:11:14,520 Speaker 1: A secret is just what standard definition is something kept 219 00:11:14,559 --> 00:11:18,679 Speaker 1: from knowledge or view? Right, Yeah, Like I keep thinking 220 00:11:18,679 --> 00:11:21,080 Speaker 1: of it in terms of my my son, Like how 221 00:11:21,080 --> 00:11:23,440 Speaker 1: did we introduce the concept of a secret to him? 222 00:11:23,480 --> 00:11:27,760 Speaker 1: And it's in the form of giving gifts Christmas or birthdays? Right, 223 00:11:28,120 --> 00:11:30,320 Speaker 1: Because it comes down to what's in this box? For 224 00:11:30,440 --> 00:11:33,200 Speaker 1: your mother? You can't tell her it's a secret. Like 225 00:11:33,240 --> 00:11:36,560 Speaker 1: it's a very literal scenario. There is an unseen quantity 226 00:11:36,600 --> 00:11:38,720 Speaker 1: in this box. You know what it is, and you 227 00:11:38,800 --> 00:11:41,680 Speaker 1: can't say what it is. You know, for the sake 228 00:11:41,720 --> 00:11:46,600 Speaker 1: of fun, and that that's the nice version, right, But so, yeah, 229 00:11:46,640 --> 00:11:50,400 Speaker 1: something kept from knowledge or view. Okay, that seems fairly straightforward. 230 00:11:50,400 --> 00:11:52,240 Speaker 1: But the more I thought about it, the more I thought, 231 00:11:52,280 --> 00:11:57,120 Speaker 1: that's not really a very accurate version of how we 232 00:11:57,280 --> 00:12:01,000 Speaker 1: use the word secret. It doesn't match the usage. Because 233 00:12:01,080 --> 00:12:04,240 Speaker 1: here's an example. If I live alone and I haven't 234 00:12:04,280 --> 00:12:06,560 Speaker 1: had anybody over to my apartment yet, and I have 235 00:12:06,600 --> 00:12:09,640 Speaker 1: a green chair that I've never told anybody about. Is 236 00:12:09,679 --> 00:12:13,280 Speaker 1: that green chair a secret? Not really, right, you, You 237 00:12:13,280 --> 00:12:15,880 Speaker 1: wouldn't use the word that way. So nobody but me 238 00:12:15,960 --> 00:12:19,000 Speaker 1: knows about it, but it's not a secret. But say, 239 00:12:19,080 --> 00:12:21,880 Speaker 1: imagine I'm living alone, I haven't had anybody over to 240 00:12:21,920 --> 00:12:24,559 Speaker 1: my apartment yet, and I also have a vintage dock 241 00:12:24,640 --> 00:12:27,640 Speaker 1: in poster hanging up on the wall, and that poster 242 00:12:27,840 --> 00:12:30,840 Speaker 1: is the reason I haven't had anybody over to my apartment. 243 00:12:31,760 --> 00:12:35,280 Speaker 1: Is that poster a secret? In that case? I think 244 00:12:35,360 --> 00:12:38,200 Speaker 1: maybe it is. Yeah, I've been picturing in the scenario 245 00:12:38,200 --> 00:12:40,960 Speaker 1: that you have an entire room set aside for this 246 00:12:41,040 --> 00:12:43,120 Speaker 1: dock and poster and the green chair that you sit 247 00:12:43,160 --> 00:12:45,800 Speaker 1: in while you stare at it, right, And I also 248 00:12:45,840 --> 00:12:48,040 Speaker 1: sleep in the green Chair, so I have immediate conscious 249 00:12:48,080 --> 00:12:53,040 Speaker 1: access to the dream Warriors. Wait, the Dream Warriors. That's stocking, right, 250 00:12:53,160 --> 00:12:56,120 Speaker 1: I'm not wrong about that, am I? Oh? I'm not sure. 251 00:12:56,160 --> 00:12:58,160 Speaker 1: I'm not a I'm not a huge dock and expert, 252 00:12:58,200 --> 00:13:01,240 Speaker 1: but this would be the theme song for um, the 253 00:13:01,240 --> 00:13:03,680 Speaker 1: The The, the Freddy Krueger movie. Yeah. I don't want 254 00:13:03,679 --> 00:13:08,360 Speaker 1: to dream no more anyway. This makes me think that 255 00:13:08,400 --> 00:13:12,520 Speaker 1: the idea of secrecy it's something that we deploy as 256 00:13:12,559 --> 00:13:15,960 Speaker 1: a read on intent, right, it's the intent to conceal. 257 00:13:16,520 --> 00:13:20,079 Speaker 1: But there are also things that you don't want other 258 00:13:20,120 --> 00:13:24,760 Speaker 1: people to know about that aren't really secrets, right, like uh, 259 00:13:24,880 --> 00:13:27,960 Speaker 1: not to get too gross, but descriptive details of your 260 00:13:28,080 --> 00:13:32,160 Speaker 1: excretory function. These are things you'd really prefer your friends 261 00:13:32,160 --> 00:13:36,120 Speaker 1: and colleagues not know. But would you call them secrets? 262 00:13:36,720 --> 00:13:39,400 Speaker 1: Not really, right? No, I mean it's unless you're doing 263 00:13:39,440 --> 00:13:42,600 Speaker 1: it and you know aut in a really novel fashion. 264 00:13:42,640 --> 00:13:45,720 Speaker 1: You're probably doing it like everybody else anyway, So exactly so, 265 00:13:45,760 --> 00:13:47,679 Speaker 1: you wouldn't want other people to know about this stuff, 266 00:13:47,679 --> 00:13:49,400 Speaker 1: but you wouldn't call it a secret. And I think 267 00:13:49,440 --> 00:13:52,400 Speaker 1: the reason is that you there's no reason to presume 268 00:13:52,480 --> 00:13:55,240 Speaker 1: that your friends and colleagues would have any interest in 269 00:13:55,400 --> 00:13:59,480 Speaker 1: knowing that information, right, they don't know, You don't want 270 00:13:59,520 --> 00:14:02,120 Speaker 1: them to know, and they wouldn't want to know. So 271 00:14:02,160 --> 00:14:03,880 Speaker 1: there are a lot of things about you that other 272 00:14:03,880 --> 00:14:06,880 Speaker 1: people don't know, but they're not secrets. I think secrets 273 00:14:06,920 --> 00:14:10,480 Speaker 1: are the intersection of things that people don't know, that 274 00:14:10,559 --> 00:14:14,199 Speaker 1: you suspect they might want to know, and that you 275 00:14:14,400 --> 00:14:16,760 Speaker 1: don't want them to know. What do you think about that, 276 00:14:16,880 --> 00:14:22,120 Speaker 1: Robert m M. Yeah, I would say, but that's I 277 00:14:22,120 --> 00:14:25,440 Speaker 1: think that's a good way of initially defining it. But 278 00:14:25,480 --> 00:14:27,840 Speaker 1: then you get into like what does someone want to know? 279 00:14:27,960 --> 00:14:31,760 Speaker 1: And there's like there their things they consciously and openly 280 00:14:31,800 --> 00:14:34,240 Speaker 1: want to know, and there are things that they they 281 00:14:34,240 --> 00:14:36,000 Speaker 1: tell themselves they wouldn't want to know, but if they 282 00:14:36,000 --> 00:14:39,200 Speaker 1: were presented with an envelope or you know, or a 283 00:14:39,280 --> 00:14:43,800 Speaker 1: file or something, then they might be tempted to look 284 00:14:43,840 --> 00:14:46,560 Speaker 1: inside that sort of thing. And then uh, and then 285 00:14:46,600 --> 00:14:50,680 Speaker 1: there's just varying levels of like realistic concern over the 286 00:14:50,720 --> 00:14:54,320 Speaker 1: secret being found out and just sort of anxiety, you know, 287 00:14:55,440 --> 00:14:57,960 Speaker 1: like building up in your mind that something is some 288 00:14:58,240 --> 00:15:00,920 Speaker 1: dreadful secret or you know it would be terrible of 289 00:15:01,000 --> 00:15:03,400 Speaker 1: other people found out about it. Yeah. So a lot 290 00:15:03,440 --> 00:15:07,800 Speaker 1: of the experience of secrecy, I think, necessarily hinges on 291 00:15:08,320 --> 00:15:11,640 Speaker 1: imagining what would be going on in other people's minds. 292 00:15:11,760 --> 00:15:15,320 Speaker 1: It doesn't even necessarily depend on what other people actually 293 00:15:15,360 --> 00:15:18,280 Speaker 1: would care about or how they would react. It's all 294 00:15:18,320 --> 00:15:23,360 Speaker 1: about how you imagine other people would think about these details, right. Yeah. 295 00:15:23,360 --> 00:15:25,920 Speaker 1: And in many of these cases too, you're imagining, like 296 00:15:26,160 --> 00:15:29,640 Speaker 1: yourself being the one who leaks the secret by accidentally 297 00:15:29,720 --> 00:15:33,120 Speaker 1: letting it leak. Now here's an interesting take on this. 298 00:15:33,160 --> 00:15:36,960 Speaker 1: I was reading about Jacques dar Da who is twenty 299 00:15:37,040 --> 00:15:41,480 Speaker 1: century French philosopher and the father of deconstructions, the high 300 00:15:41,560 --> 00:15:45,600 Speaker 1: priest of postmodernism. Yeah. Yeah, and a lot of this 301 00:15:45,800 --> 00:15:48,760 Speaker 1: boils under the critique of the relationship between text and meaning. 302 00:15:49,520 --> 00:15:51,480 Speaker 1: But he had the following insight to share on the 303 00:15:51,560 --> 00:15:54,800 Speaker 1: nature of secrets and this these basics come from his 304 00:15:54,880 --> 00:15:58,240 Speaker 1: work How to Avoid Speaking. So breaks it down like this, 305 00:15:58,440 --> 00:16:02,240 Speaker 1: A secret is something that must not be spoken, Okay, 306 00:16:02,240 --> 00:16:05,200 Speaker 1: but I must possess it and not give it away 307 00:16:05,200 --> 00:16:07,680 Speaker 1: for it to be a secret. So I must understand 308 00:16:07,720 --> 00:16:10,400 Speaker 1: the secret, or at least grasp the importance of it. 309 00:16:11,320 --> 00:16:13,920 Speaker 1: But to possess that that secret I do have to 310 00:16:13,960 --> 00:16:16,680 Speaker 1: tell one person, I have to tell it to myself, 311 00:16:17,240 --> 00:16:20,120 Speaker 1: like in in containing the secret in my mind, I 312 00:16:20,200 --> 00:16:23,080 Speaker 1: have to tell myself that secret. If I don't, I 313 00:16:23,160 --> 00:16:24,920 Speaker 1: have forgotten it. And how can I keep a secret 314 00:16:24,920 --> 00:16:28,800 Speaker 1: that I've forgotten? Uho? And also to keep that secret, 315 00:16:29,040 --> 00:16:33,320 Speaker 1: I must not keep the secret. Mm hmm. So yeah, 316 00:16:33,480 --> 00:16:36,280 Speaker 1: if you could have a secret exercised from your memory, 317 00:16:36,320 --> 00:16:40,240 Speaker 1: it wouldn't be a secret anymore. So my my advice 318 00:16:40,320 --> 00:16:43,920 Speaker 1: is that have this answer ready the next time someone 319 00:16:44,000 --> 00:16:47,640 Speaker 1: asks you if you can keep a secret for them. Um, 320 00:16:47,720 --> 00:16:50,000 Speaker 1: you know, and I realized some of that probably sounds 321 00:16:50,000 --> 00:16:53,240 Speaker 1: a bit like some you know, academic nonsense, but but 322 00:16:53,320 --> 00:16:55,040 Speaker 1: think of it this way. Secrets have weight, and if 323 00:16:55,040 --> 00:16:57,640 Speaker 1: I ask you to keep a secret, you must carry 324 00:16:57,680 --> 00:17:00,640 Speaker 1: the weight of that secret, even if it's slight, right, 325 00:17:01,080 --> 00:17:04,359 Speaker 1: And if the information is disturbing, frightening or sad or 326 00:17:04,359 --> 00:17:07,000 Speaker 1: what have you, you still have to roll it around 327 00:17:07,000 --> 00:17:10,239 Speaker 1: in your mind from time to time in order to 328 00:17:10,280 --> 00:17:14,280 Speaker 1: not share it with someone else. Now, George or would 329 00:17:14,280 --> 00:17:16,919 Speaker 1: probably disagreed with some of that. He said, if you 330 00:17:16,920 --> 00:17:19,359 Speaker 1: want to keep a secret, you must also hide it 331 00:17:19,400 --> 00:17:23,800 Speaker 1: from yourself. But again, part of keeping the secret is 332 00:17:23,800 --> 00:17:26,760 Speaker 1: knowing not to let it out. And if you I mean, 333 00:17:26,800 --> 00:17:28,240 Speaker 1: if you, I guess if you can forget it, but 334 00:17:28,280 --> 00:17:31,359 Speaker 1: then it's then you're not keeping a secret then right right? Well, 335 00:17:31,400 --> 00:17:33,040 Speaker 1: I mean that's part of the fear. Like, if you 336 00:17:33,080 --> 00:17:36,800 Speaker 1: were to actually forget about a secret, you would not 337 00:17:36,920 --> 00:17:40,560 Speaker 1: be in the prime position to defend against people finding 338 00:17:40,600 --> 00:17:43,320 Speaker 1: out about it, right, Like, if there's a secret that 339 00:17:43,359 --> 00:17:47,320 Speaker 1: people could discover about you, you need to know about 340 00:17:47,400 --> 00:17:50,719 Speaker 1: it in order to steer people away from discovering it. 341 00:17:50,840 --> 00:17:54,240 Speaker 1: Right Like if if you are not in if you're 342 00:17:54,280 --> 00:17:56,960 Speaker 1: not you're self aware of what people shouldn't be finding out, 343 00:17:57,040 --> 00:17:59,680 Speaker 1: you're not in a good defensive posture, right And if 344 00:17:59,720 --> 00:18:02,399 Speaker 1: you if you have to be alive and keeping the 345 00:18:02,480 --> 00:18:05,280 Speaker 1: secret to be a secret keeper, if someone tells you 346 00:18:05,320 --> 00:18:07,960 Speaker 1: the secret and it murders you, that you're not a 347 00:18:07,960 --> 00:18:11,760 Speaker 1: secret keeper anymore. Um so, And then again, well, I 348 00:18:11,800 --> 00:18:14,600 Speaker 1: can see what Orwell is getting at here, because Orwell 349 00:18:14,640 --> 00:18:18,000 Speaker 1: wrote about self deception a lot. You know, nine four 350 00:18:18,119 --> 00:18:20,680 Speaker 1: is full of these ideas of double think and uh, 351 00:18:20,720 --> 00:18:23,840 Speaker 1: and the ability to can convince oneself to believe what 352 00:18:23,880 --> 00:18:27,119 Speaker 1: one knows isn't true, right Uh, And that this is 353 00:18:27,320 --> 00:18:30,120 Speaker 1: sort of the final abjection of the self. I get 354 00:18:30,160 --> 00:18:34,320 Speaker 1: the feeling that that Orwell ultimately is not painting a 355 00:18:34,400 --> 00:18:37,959 Speaker 1: nice picture of what secrets are here. It's kind of 356 00:18:38,000 --> 00:18:40,240 Speaker 1: gets down to the idea that so, so to keep 357 00:18:40,240 --> 00:18:42,120 Speaker 1: a secret, you have to tell a lie. And maybe 358 00:18:42,119 --> 00:18:44,479 Speaker 1: what Orwell is saying is if you can make that 359 00:18:44,600 --> 00:18:47,320 Speaker 1: lie the truth of your heart, then you have become 360 00:18:47,320 --> 00:18:52,800 Speaker 1: a true secret keeper. Right, But you've also sacrificed your integrity. Right. Uh. 361 00:18:52,960 --> 00:18:56,160 Speaker 1: This reminds me of another quote, and this one comes 362 00:18:56,160 --> 00:18:59,560 Speaker 1: from James Joyce, and this is from Ulysses his His 363 00:18:59,720 --> 00:19:04,399 Speaker 1: you know, he says, secrets, silent stony, sit in the 364 00:19:04,520 --> 00:19:09,480 Speaker 1: dark palaces of both our hearts, secrets weary of their tyranny, 365 00:19:09,480 --> 00:19:13,560 Speaker 1: tyrants willing to be dethroned. Yeah, the secret wants to escape, 366 00:19:13,680 --> 00:19:16,680 Speaker 1: right like it it's rain, cannot go on forever. It 367 00:19:16,680 --> 00:19:20,440 Speaker 1: has a self destructive impulse. And I often do think 368 00:19:20,440 --> 00:19:26,000 Speaker 1: of secrets this way, that a secret is like a bomb, right, 369 00:19:26,040 --> 00:19:29,919 Speaker 1: It's like a bomb in fiction, and that it's possible 370 00:19:30,040 --> 00:19:32,600 Speaker 1: that a bomb will never go off, but the purpose 371 00:19:32,720 --> 00:19:35,680 Speaker 1: of a bomb is to go off, and like a secret, 372 00:19:35,720 --> 00:19:39,760 Speaker 1: almost psychologically for me, plays the role of a thing 373 00:19:39,880 --> 00:19:44,360 Speaker 1: that will be probably disclosed at some point in the future, 374 00:19:44,960 --> 00:19:48,760 Speaker 1: and you are just wondering the entire time when and 375 00:19:48,800 --> 00:19:52,240 Speaker 1: how that will happen. And then when it is revealed, 376 00:19:52,480 --> 00:19:54,600 Speaker 1: you have to choose. Then are you then are you 377 00:19:54,600 --> 00:19:56,400 Speaker 1: gonna come clean and say, oh, yes, I knew that 378 00:19:56,520 --> 00:19:59,520 Speaker 1: all along. It was a secret and I was its keeper, 379 00:20:00,240 --> 00:20:03,760 Speaker 1: and and and that brings various complications. Or do you 380 00:20:03,800 --> 00:20:06,199 Speaker 1: say you pretend that you didn't know, and now you 381 00:20:06,240 --> 00:20:09,840 Speaker 1: have a new secret. The original secret has been has 382 00:20:09,880 --> 00:20:12,560 Speaker 1: been you know, declassified, but you've created the new one, 383 00:20:12,880 --> 00:20:15,560 Speaker 1: the idea that you were never this keeper of this secret. Right, 384 00:20:15,720 --> 00:20:20,639 Speaker 1: So here's a question. What's the relationship of secrets to lying? 385 00:20:21,240 --> 00:20:23,040 Speaker 1: We were just talking about or well sort of gets 386 00:20:23,040 --> 00:20:26,400 Speaker 1: into this, Joyce sort of hints at this. Most ethical 387 00:20:26,440 --> 00:20:29,919 Speaker 1: systems would judge lying to be an immoral act, barring, 388 00:20:29,920 --> 00:20:33,159 Speaker 1: you know, extreme extenuating circumstances, like you might lie in 389 00:20:33,200 --> 00:20:35,800 Speaker 1: the same kind of circumstances where you would use violence 390 00:20:35,800 --> 00:20:38,520 Speaker 1: to defend yourself or others there something like that. But 391 00:20:38,680 --> 00:20:42,480 Speaker 1: generally lying is wrong. I think I feel that way. Um, 392 00:20:42,720 --> 00:20:45,359 Speaker 1: So if it's wrong to lie, is it wrong to 393 00:20:45,520 --> 00:20:49,280 Speaker 1: keep secrets? In other words, is it wrong to intentionally 394 00:20:49,440 --> 00:20:53,600 Speaker 1: prevent other people from discovering facts that you suspect they 395 00:20:53,640 --> 00:20:58,160 Speaker 1: would probably want to know or might want to know. Uh, 396 00:20:58,240 --> 00:21:00,520 Speaker 1: I feel like the answer is probably not right. So 397 00:21:00,600 --> 00:21:04,479 Speaker 1: that exposes another tension in secrecy, because some secrets are 398 00:21:04,480 --> 00:21:07,680 Speaker 1: about things that are just none of anybody else's business. 399 00:21:08,240 --> 00:21:10,880 Speaker 1: You know. It's not always like, well, I stole something, 400 00:21:10,960 --> 00:21:13,240 Speaker 1: or I cheated on my partner or something like that. 401 00:21:13,640 --> 00:21:16,640 Speaker 1: It might be things like there's a fact about you 402 00:21:16,800 --> 00:21:19,879 Speaker 1: that you wouldn't naturally feel bad about, but you feel 403 00:21:19,920 --> 00:21:24,680 Speaker 1: that other people might judge you unfairly if they knew it. Yeah, Well, 404 00:21:24,720 --> 00:21:27,040 Speaker 1: like the doc and example is good. You know. I 405 00:21:27,040 --> 00:21:28,840 Speaker 1: feel like a lot of us have these, uh, these 406 00:21:28,840 --> 00:21:31,600 Speaker 1: things in life we like, you know, you know, be 407 00:21:31,720 --> 00:21:35,160 Speaker 1: a a you know, a TV show or an album 408 00:21:35,280 --> 00:21:37,359 Speaker 1: or something, and we're nostalgic for it. Yeah, and then 409 00:21:37,400 --> 00:21:39,320 Speaker 1: there's this, there's this idea that we need to keep 410 00:21:39,320 --> 00:21:43,160 Speaker 1: it a secret at least from certain circles, excluding temporary 411 00:21:43,200 --> 00:21:46,720 Speaker 1: tactical secrets like planning a surprise party or something like that. 412 00:21:46,800 --> 00:21:51,240 Speaker 1: Does does this imply that a secret is always something 413 00:21:51,960 --> 00:21:56,199 Speaker 1: that suggests an injustice. Either you did something bad and 414 00:21:56,240 --> 00:21:59,560 Speaker 1: you don't want people to know, or there's something about 415 00:21:59,640 --> 00:22:03,360 Speaker 1: you that you think people would treat you unfairly or 416 00:22:03,440 --> 00:22:09,480 Speaker 1: unreasonably if they knew. Are there any exceptions to that? Um? Well, 417 00:22:09,600 --> 00:22:12,680 Speaker 1: I think you touched on strategic secrets, right, the things 418 00:22:12,680 --> 00:22:15,439 Speaker 1: that are not really something you want to keep secret forever, 419 00:22:15,600 --> 00:22:17,760 Speaker 1: but it's just like you know, it's a planning a 420 00:22:17,800 --> 00:22:20,240 Speaker 1: surprise or giving a gift or something. Yeah, I mean, 421 00:22:20,280 --> 00:22:22,960 Speaker 1: I guess one of my my sticking points that I 422 00:22:23,119 --> 00:22:25,240 Speaker 1: kept coming across, and this was, is just the idea 423 00:22:25,280 --> 00:22:28,600 Speaker 1: of unnecessary secrets that people attempt to burden you with. 424 00:22:29,440 --> 00:22:32,320 Speaker 1: I've I found I tend not to find these in 425 00:22:32,400 --> 00:22:35,040 Speaker 1: my own like social interactions, but I know that others have. 426 00:22:35,119 --> 00:22:36,800 Speaker 1: Where you're talking to somebody and they say, oh, but 427 00:22:36,840 --> 00:22:39,680 Speaker 1: don't tell anybody about this, And maybe you know, maybe 428 00:22:39,680 --> 00:22:42,119 Speaker 1: the secret they're sharing with you is something lady, But 429 00:22:42,160 --> 00:22:44,520 Speaker 1: a lot of times it's not, and it's something that 430 00:22:44,560 --> 00:22:47,960 Speaker 1: you're you're going to go and tell somebody else about anyway. 431 00:22:48,000 --> 00:22:50,560 Speaker 1: But they've they've they've put the burden of keeping the 432 00:22:50,600 --> 00:22:54,200 Speaker 1: secret on you. Also, in in workplace environments, I've encountered 433 00:22:54,200 --> 00:22:57,800 Speaker 1: this where you know someone's sharing just some really unimportant 434 00:22:58,080 --> 00:23:01,040 Speaker 1: bit of you know, short term stragg G for the company. Right, 435 00:23:01,320 --> 00:23:03,399 Speaker 1: don't tell anybody. I don't tell anybody. I was like, 436 00:23:03,440 --> 00:23:07,000 Speaker 1: why did you tell me? Because because it's a you 437 00:23:07,160 --> 00:23:09,480 Speaker 1: had to share your crummy secret with me, and now 438 00:23:09,520 --> 00:23:12,240 Speaker 1: I have to keep it or or break my vow 439 00:23:13,280 --> 00:23:16,080 Speaker 1: over something. So pitdling, you know, somebody should start a 440 00:23:16,080 --> 00:23:18,560 Speaker 1: website along the lines of post secret. You know about 441 00:23:18,560 --> 00:23:22,920 Speaker 1: post secret, right, pop secret? Popcorn? No? No, post secret. No. 442 00:23:23,080 --> 00:23:27,320 Speaker 1: That this website where this dude was collecting postcards of 443 00:23:27,400 --> 00:23:30,920 Speaker 1: people would anonymously write down secrets and send them. Oh yeah, 444 00:23:31,000 --> 00:23:33,399 Speaker 1: I do remember this. Yeah, I mean so that was 445 00:23:33,440 --> 00:23:37,240 Speaker 1: an interesting way of of people sharing their secrets without 446 00:23:37,280 --> 00:23:40,280 Speaker 1: actually disclosing to people who would know about them, you know, 447 00:23:40,359 --> 00:23:43,480 Speaker 1: anonymous secret sharing. Uh. And there are probably some good 448 00:23:43,520 --> 00:23:45,280 Speaker 1: questions we can talk about later in this episode when 449 00:23:45,280 --> 00:23:48,840 Speaker 1: we talk about the science about whether that properly relieves 450 00:23:48,880 --> 00:23:51,840 Speaker 1: any of the tension brought on by secret keeping. But 451 00:23:52,200 --> 00:23:54,960 Speaker 1: there should be an analogy of that. It's a website 452 00:23:55,000 --> 00:23:59,959 Speaker 1: that's just don't tell anybody yet for all work, Relay 453 00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:03,040 Speaker 1: did secrets where people as soon as you get an 454 00:24:03,080 --> 00:24:05,840 Speaker 1: email that says don't tell anybody yet or as soon 455 00:24:05,880 --> 00:24:08,280 Speaker 1: as you get out of that meeting, you anonymously go 456 00:24:08,400 --> 00:24:11,840 Speaker 1: and upload the facts. You can even have the time released. 457 00:24:11,880 --> 00:24:15,840 Speaker 1: I guess, um, now these are these are all excellent points. 458 00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:18,119 Speaker 1: Now I do want to throw in one thing here too, 459 00:24:18,200 --> 00:24:20,040 Speaker 1: Like when you get into secrets, you also get into 460 00:24:20,040 --> 00:24:23,320 Speaker 1: this idea of confessionals, right, Like to to unburden yourself 461 00:24:23,400 --> 00:24:26,480 Speaker 1: with the secret is to make a confession. And uh, 462 00:24:26,600 --> 00:24:29,760 Speaker 1: confessions have have played an important role, say in you know, 463 00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:32,760 Speaker 1: in Catholic tradition, like that instantly comes to mind, and 464 00:24:32,800 --> 00:24:34,320 Speaker 1: a lot of the studies that we looked at here 465 00:24:34,480 --> 00:24:37,400 Speaker 1: the idea of someone going and being able to unburden 466 00:24:37,440 --> 00:24:42,639 Speaker 1: themselves in an anonymous or semi anonymous fashion. Likewise, various 467 00:24:42,800 --> 00:24:46,359 Speaker 1: self help hotlines. If some if the secret that you're 468 00:24:46,440 --> 00:24:50,160 Speaker 1: keeping is something say bound up in personal identity or 469 00:24:50,560 --> 00:24:54,480 Speaker 1: or you know, feelings of say suicide, you might call 470 00:24:54,640 --> 00:24:58,440 Speaker 1: a suicide hotline or a um or say a sexual 471 00:24:58,480 --> 00:25:02,480 Speaker 1: abuse hotline. And these would be appropriate places to unburden 472 00:25:02,520 --> 00:25:07,040 Speaker 1: yourself with this information and uh, you know, receive expert 473 00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:09,080 Speaker 1: advice on what to do about it. Now, that might 474 00:25:09,119 --> 00:25:11,000 Speaker 1: be a good example of an exception to what I 475 00:25:11,040 --> 00:25:13,120 Speaker 1: was talking about earlier because I can imagine you talked 476 00:25:13,119 --> 00:25:16,000 Speaker 1: about abuse like people who have undergone a certain kind 477 00:25:16,040 --> 00:25:20,120 Speaker 1: of trauma. Now, obviously they didn't do anything bad. They 478 00:25:20,240 --> 00:25:24,560 Speaker 1: might suspect that other people would react unreasonably or judge them, 479 00:25:24,640 --> 00:25:26,960 Speaker 1: but they might not too. In that case, they might 480 00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:29,880 Speaker 1: want to keep a secret for some other reason. They 481 00:25:29,880 --> 00:25:32,399 Speaker 1: didn't do anything wrong, They don't think people will be 482 00:25:32,480 --> 00:25:35,080 Speaker 1: mean to them about it or think differently about them. 483 00:25:35,320 --> 00:25:39,840 Speaker 1: They just don't want people to know, right. Yeah, I 484 00:25:39,840 --> 00:25:42,000 Speaker 1: mean it just comes back around again to this the 485 00:25:42,240 --> 00:25:48,400 Speaker 1: very complex and and you know, a morphous quality of secrets, 486 00:25:48,440 --> 00:25:51,080 Speaker 1: like not all secrets are are equal. Now, one of 487 00:25:51,080 --> 00:25:53,359 Speaker 1: the things you mentioned earlier about about the idea of 488 00:25:53,760 --> 00:25:56,920 Speaker 1: a secret being harmful or not. Um, it's it's worth 489 00:25:56,960 --> 00:25:58,840 Speaker 1: noting that you know there are many parents out there 490 00:25:58,920 --> 00:26:01,879 Speaker 1: argue you should not teach young kids about secret keeping 491 00:26:02,280 --> 00:26:06,880 Speaker 1: because it might be exploited later on in abusive scenarios 492 00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:08,800 Speaker 1: or the abuse or is saying hey, you have to 493 00:26:08,880 --> 00:26:12,119 Speaker 1: keep this secret. Uh. I actually ran ran across some 494 00:26:12,160 --> 00:26:15,639 Speaker 1: advice regarding this from the National Crime Prevention Council, and 495 00:26:15,640 --> 00:26:18,520 Speaker 1: they stressed the following that you would want to teach 496 00:26:18,520 --> 00:26:21,040 Speaker 1: a small child. First of all, if a secret can't 497 00:26:21,119 --> 00:26:25,960 Speaker 1: hurt someone or something, you keep it. If a secret 498 00:26:26,080 --> 00:26:29,240 Speaker 1: can hurt someone or something, you tell an adult. And 499 00:26:29,480 --> 00:26:33,240 Speaker 1: if you're not sure, you're tell an adult. So it's 500 00:26:33,240 --> 00:26:37,200 Speaker 1: got like a default mode of tell yeah yeah, which 501 00:26:37,200 --> 00:26:39,840 Speaker 1: I think is a that kind of breaks down when 502 00:26:39,840 --> 00:26:43,320 Speaker 1: you start bringing into the more complex adult scenarios of say, 503 00:26:43,720 --> 00:26:47,119 Speaker 1: you know state secrets or workplace secrets, or you know 504 00:26:47,200 --> 00:26:50,399 Speaker 1: the secret desires of your heart, but you know, for 505 00:26:50,440 --> 00:26:53,159 Speaker 1: a childhood scenario, I think those those guidelines seem to 506 00:26:53,160 --> 00:26:54,800 Speaker 1: make a lot of sense. I think that might be 507 00:26:54,880 --> 00:26:57,399 Speaker 1: good guidelines for adults. I mean, think about that. You 508 00:26:58,119 --> 00:27:01,320 Speaker 1: if you're not sure it it's better to keep it 509 00:27:01,359 --> 00:27:03,800 Speaker 1: a secret, you should err on the side of telling. 510 00:27:04,520 --> 00:27:08,680 Speaker 1: Yeah yeah. I mean that seems logical to me. I mean, 511 00:27:09,240 --> 00:27:13,040 Speaker 1: it's the same reason that you wouldn't normally endorse lying, 512 00:27:13,160 --> 00:27:16,159 Speaker 1: except in some extenuating circumstance where you've got to, you know, 513 00:27:16,400 --> 00:27:20,080 Speaker 1: do something defensive or save lives or something like that. Generally, 514 00:27:20,119 --> 00:27:22,760 Speaker 1: it's better if people don't lie to each other. The 515 00:27:22,840 --> 00:27:25,399 Speaker 1: problem is that a child can tell an adult. The 516 00:27:25,400 --> 00:27:28,600 Speaker 1: adult is the default, you know, authority figure. But who's 517 00:27:28,600 --> 00:27:33,679 Speaker 1: an adult to tell God the police obviously called the cobs. 518 00:27:33,720 --> 00:27:37,520 Speaker 1: Every time you've got a secret, I'd like to report 519 00:27:37,520 --> 00:27:41,760 Speaker 1: a doc and poster in my apartment. Okay, well, I 520 00:27:41,760 --> 00:27:43,639 Speaker 1: think it's about time to start getting into the science 521 00:27:43,640 --> 00:27:47,120 Speaker 1: and maybe we can transition there by bringing up one 522 00:27:47,240 --> 00:27:50,919 Speaker 1: last thing that I think is also interesting. Why is 523 00:27:50,960 --> 00:27:55,399 Speaker 1: it so pleasurable to share secrets with a person or 524 00:27:55,440 --> 00:27:58,199 Speaker 1: a small group. I'm sure you've had this experience, Robert, right, 525 00:27:58,960 --> 00:28:02,400 Speaker 1: Like sharing secret it's a it's a well known bonding behavior. 526 00:28:02,760 --> 00:28:04,760 Speaker 1: You're a middle schooler and you get together with your 527 00:28:04,800 --> 00:28:07,080 Speaker 1: close friends and tell them who you've got a crush 528 00:28:07,160 --> 00:28:10,879 Speaker 1: on or when you have you know, one way that 529 00:28:10,920 --> 00:28:13,080 Speaker 1: you know you found your soul made not to get 530 00:28:13,119 --> 00:28:16,760 Speaker 1: too cheesy, is that you confess thoughts and opinions to 531 00:28:16,880 --> 00:28:19,520 Speaker 1: them that you would never say in front of anybody else. 532 00:28:19,640 --> 00:28:24,439 Speaker 1: It's fun and delightful to share your secrets with that person. Yeah, 533 00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:28,000 Speaker 1: you know, and it's also um you know. The counterpoint 534 00:28:28,040 --> 00:28:30,119 Speaker 1: is that it's disappointing, isn't it When you go to 535 00:28:30,160 --> 00:28:32,280 Speaker 1: share a secret with someone and they already know the 536 00:28:32,320 --> 00:28:36,400 Speaker 1: secret and you know your Your disappointment is is it's twofold. 537 00:28:36,480 --> 00:28:39,160 Speaker 1: On one hand, you don't get to share, be the 538 00:28:39,520 --> 00:28:42,600 Speaker 1: share of the secret, and they were maybe keeping it 539 00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:45,920 Speaker 1: from you. But but when the reaction is positive, and 540 00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:49,920 Speaker 1: when there's you know, mutual discovery between two people or 541 00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:52,840 Speaker 1: a small group of people, why does that feel so good? 542 00:28:52,920 --> 00:28:56,680 Speaker 1: It's intensely socially pleasurable. Well, I think I think a 543 00:28:56,720 --> 00:28:58,080 Speaker 1: lot of it is you have to you have to 544 00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:00,440 Speaker 1: boil down all of this to sort of, um, you know, 545 00:29:00,640 --> 00:29:05,080 Speaker 1: prehistoric human scenarios, right, like what we're secrets for For 546 00:29:05,120 --> 00:29:08,320 Speaker 1: the vast majority of human history, what did secrets consist of. 547 00:29:08,440 --> 00:29:10,960 Speaker 1: They had to do with what the location of food 548 00:29:11,040 --> 00:29:15,440 Speaker 1: and resources, um, the you know, the the position of 549 00:29:15,560 --> 00:29:20,520 Speaker 1: dangers that you face, be the predators or other human populations. 550 00:29:21,120 --> 00:29:24,200 Speaker 1: And therefore to share a secret was to share survival 551 00:29:24,280 --> 00:29:28,600 Speaker 1: with someone. I feel like disclosure of secrets to close companions. 552 00:29:28,640 --> 00:29:31,400 Speaker 1: It's so it's sort of like initiating Every time you 553 00:29:31,440 --> 00:29:35,360 Speaker 1: do it, it initiates a further traversal into the boundaries 554 00:29:35,400 --> 00:29:38,720 Speaker 1: of trust, Like you're going deeper into the trust landscape, 555 00:29:39,040 --> 00:29:41,880 Speaker 1: which probably I think feels good for the same reasons 556 00:29:41,920 --> 00:29:44,720 Speaker 1: that starting a new romantic relationship feels good. You know 557 00:29:44,800 --> 00:29:48,200 Speaker 1: that feeling of euphoria people often report when they're dating 558 00:29:48,240 --> 00:29:52,240 Speaker 1: somebody new. Um, it's like you're you're going into new 559 00:29:52,280 --> 00:29:56,200 Speaker 1: social territory and it feels good to forge newer, stronger, 560 00:29:56,240 --> 00:30:00,080 Speaker 1: better relationships. It's like playing like a card game and 561 00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:02,680 Speaker 1: in the opening hands like none of the cards have 562 00:30:02,760 --> 00:30:06,440 Speaker 1: been played, and every every play is something substantially new. 563 00:30:06,680 --> 00:30:10,840 Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah yeah. Um. But also there there's an 564 00:30:10,840 --> 00:30:15,600 Speaker 1: analogy to that, I think that is institutional secret knowledge. 565 00:30:15,600 --> 00:30:18,040 Speaker 1: It's that same principle of sharing with a person or 566 00:30:18,080 --> 00:30:20,640 Speaker 1: a small group and getting pleasure out of that, but 567 00:30:21,160 --> 00:30:24,560 Speaker 1: making it part of an organization, like the secret knowledge 568 00:30:24,600 --> 00:30:28,120 Speaker 1: that forms the basis of attraction to secret societies. And 569 00:30:28,600 --> 00:30:31,680 Speaker 1: one of my favorites gnostic religions. Like if you go 570 00:30:31,720 --> 00:30:34,840 Speaker 1: back to the first few centuries CE, you see these 571 00:30:34,880 --> 00:30:40,160 Speaker 1: gnostic forms of Christianity, which were these strange versions of Christianity. 572 00:30:40,200 --> 00:30:42,880 Speaker 1: They seem very alien to us now, but they're fascinating 573 00:30:42,920 --> 00:30:45,760 Speaker 1: to study because they were built all on the idea 574 00:30:45,800 --> 00:30:48,560 Speaker 1: of like you'd have a public version of the religion 575 00:30:48,600 --> 00:30:51,200 Speaker 1: that was accessible to the masses, and then you'd have 576 00:30:51,400 --> 00:30:54,880 Speaker 1: a private version of the religion based on secret knowledge 577 00:30:54,960 --> 00:30:58,120 Speaker 1: that was only available to the insiders. Oh yeah, I 578 00:30:58,120 --> 00:31:00,360 Speaker 1: mean you should. You saw this in Greek traditions as well, 579 00:31:00,440 --> 00:31:02,240 Speaker 1: like you see it, you really see see it. And 580 00:31:02,240 --> 00:31:05,160 Speaker 1: I guess in most major religions, there's there's there's the 581 00:31:05,640 --> 00:31:08,720 Speaker 1: public religion, and then there are various esoteric versions of it, 582 00:31:08,880 --> 00:31:14,040 Speaker 1: esoteric Buddhism, etcetera, and then branching cults and whatever ehressies 583 00:31:14,080 --> 00:31:16,960 Speaker 1: from there on out. I get intense pleasure just from 584 00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:19,760 Speaker 1: thinking about that and studying it. I can imagine it's 585 00:31:19,800 --> 00:31:23,160 Speaker 1: so much more intense to actually be a part of that, 586 00:31:23,440 --> 00:31:25,440 Speaker 1: to be one of the people who gets let in 587 00:31:25,520 --> 00:31:28,120 Speaker 1: on the secret. Yeah, and then just you, and to 588 00:31:28,160 --> 00:31:30,280 Speaker 1: be led by the secret, to the idea that there 589 00:31:30,320 --> 00:31:33,160 Speaker 1: are secrets that will be revealed to you if you 590 00:31:33,240 --> 00:31:36,520 Speaker 1: merely click on this article and learn the learn the 591 00:31:36,600 --> 00:31:39,120 Speaker 1: ten secrets of toning your abs or what have you, 592 00:31:39,240 --> 00:31:42,320 Speaker 1: and that the great way to clickbait you into submissions 593 00:31:42,440 --> 00:31:46,440 Speaker 1: just to promise the secret will be revealed. Yes. So 594 00:31:46,480 --> 00:31:49,280 Speaker 1: we talked a little bit about children and secrets, and 595 00:31:49,560 --> 00:31:52,640 Speaker 1: I started to think, like, at what point do children 596 00:31:53,200 --> 00:31:56,800 Speaker 1: actually gain a sense of secrecy? At what point do 597 00:31:56,880 --> 00:32:01,280 Speaker 1: they understand secrets and become capable of keeping them. Uh. 598 00:32:01,320 --> 00:32:04,240 Speaker 1: And I did find that there was a study by 599 00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:09,200 Speaker 1: Peskin and Ardno in Social Development in two thousand three 600 00:32:09,280 --> 00:32:12,920 Speaker 1: that tried to study the relationship between childhood development of 601 00:32:13,080 --> 00:32:16,120 Speaker 1: theory of mind and the ability to do two things. 602 00:32:16,200 --> 00:32:18,200 Speaker 1: One of them was play Hyden's which is a kind 603 00:32:18,200 --> 00:32:21,280 Speaker 1: of secret keeping, but the other one was explicitly keeping 604 00:32:21,320 --> 00:32:24,360 Speaker 1: a secret. So they tested children who were three, who 605 00:32:24,360 --> 00:32:28,200 Speaker 1: were four, and were five at playing hide and seek 606 00:32:28,400 --> 00:32:31,400 Speaker 1: and keeping a secret. And this was partially because those 607 00:32:31,400 --> 00:32:34,400 Speaker 1: are ages where there was some existing knowledge about how 608 00:32:34,480 --> 00:32:38,160 Speaker 1: much theory of mind children generally have at those ages, 609 00:32:38,240 --> 00:32:40,560 Speaker 1: And in theory of mind is the concept of being 610 00:32:40,600 --> 00:32:45,760 Speaker 1: able to imagine the thoughts and intentions of other people. Yeah, 611 00:32:46,040 --> 00:32:48,520 Speaker 1: it's interesting that hide and seek comes up, because I've 612 00:32:48,560 --> 00:32:50,280 Speaker 1: certainly played a lot of hide and Seek with my 613 00:32:50,360 --> 00:32:54,920 Speaker 1: son over the years, and he's five now, and earlier 614 00:32:55,000 --> 00:32:59,720 Speaker 1: on hide and seek tended to consist of of him 615 00:32:59,800 --> 00:33:03,040 Speaker 1: high and then running out and kept him getting me 616 00:33:03,560 --> 00:33:07,040 Speaker 1: Like it was really hard to to, you know, relate 617 00:33:07,240 --> 00:33:09,239 Speaker 1: the ideas that you're supposed to hide and wait for 618 00:33:09,280 --> 00:33:11,120 Speaker 1: me to find it. Like the excitement would build up 619 00:33:11,200 --> 00:33:13,480 Speaker 1: and then he would just jump up and come to me, right, 620 00:33:13,520 --> 00:33:16,000 Speaker 1: I mean hide and seek. We requires that you try 621 00:33:16,040 --> 00:33:19,640 Speaker 1: to think from the seekers perspective when you are a hider. Yeah. 622 00:33:19,640 --> 00:33:21,680 Speaker 1: And then likewise the keeping of secrets. You know, we 623 00:33:21,680 --> 00:33:26,200 Speaker 1: get a we you know, get get a gift for someone, um, 624 00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:27,719 Speaker 1: you know, it's generally gonna be like a gift from 625 00:33:27,720 --> 00:33:31,200 Speaker 1: me or a gift from my wife and uh, and 626 00:33:31,280 --> 00:33:34,440 Speaker 1: he would he would really like reveal the secret immediately 627 00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:37,000 Speaker 1: when he was when he was really young, or even 628 00:33:37,040 --> 00:33:39,400 Speaker 1: like want to unwrap the present right there, There was 629 00:33:39,760 --> 00:33:41,760 Speaker 1: that the idea of there being any kind of suspense, 630 00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:44,600 Speaker 1: that that there would be some pleasure and not knowing 631 00:33:44,640 --> 00:33:48,680 Speaker 1: and guessing was something that developed over the years. Well 632 00:33:48,720 --> 00:33:51,160 Speaker 1: that's what this study found. So they found that across 633 00:33:51,240 --> 00:33:54,280 Speaker 1: the span of three to five, your ability to do 634 00:33:54,360 --> 00:33:58,200 Speaker 1: both of these activities changes drastically. Three year olds just 635 00:33:58,320 --> 00:34:01,320 Speaker 1: are terrible at keeping secret. It's a playing hide and seek. 636 00:34:01,400 --> 00:34:04,560 Speaker 1: They couldn't really hack it, right, But by four, by 637 00:34:04,600 --> 00:34:07,640 Speaker 1: age four, most kids were on on the secret train, 638 00:34:07,680 --> 00:34:11,960 Speaker 1: and by five, five year olds could keep a secret. Yes, yeah, 639 00:34:11,960 --> 00:34:14,239 Speaker 1: that and that that manches up with my experience pretty well. 640 00:34:14,520 --> 00:34:17,400 Speaker 1: And this brings me to the secrets of kindergarten or 641 00:34:17,480 --> 00:34:20,960 Speaker 1: kindergarteners anyway. And then this is actually this is actually 642 00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:23,600 Speaker 1: really cool because today, as we're recording this, this is 643 00:34:23,640 --> 00:34:27,279 Speaker 1: my son's first day of kindergarten. Congratulations, well, thank you. 644 00:34:27,400 --> 00:34:30,680 Speaker 1: I mean, you know, there's not much you can say. 645 00:34:30,680 --> 00:34:32,520 Speaker 1: You can't say, like, well'm he's the first person in 646 00:34:32,520 --> 00:34:36,040 Speaker 1: my family to go to kindergarten, you know, but um no, no, 647 00:34:36,080 --> 00:34:38,360 Speaker 1: it is. It is a big deal. But but it 648 00:34:38,480 --> 00:34:40,480 Speaker 1: was interesting to go through all of this with these 649 00:34:40,560 --> 00:34:45,520 Speaker 1: various studies in mind, because, as you pointed out, various 650 00:34:45,719 --> 00:34:48,640 Speaker 1: studies point to this as a time, you know, age five, 651 00:34:49,120 --> 00:34:53,239 Speaker 1: moving in on six, when group related attitudes and behavior 652 00:34:53,320 --> 00:34:57,520 Speaker 1: begin to manifest. Group membership begins to influence their learning, 653 00:34:57,560 --> 00:35:01,959 Speaker 1: their expectations, and behavior. And this includes resource sharing within 654 00:35:02,000 --> 00:35:04,240 Speaker 1: their group. And this is where we get into secrets, 655 00:35:04,239 --> 00:35:07,600 Speaker 1: because the secret is a resource. That's interesting. I think 656 00:35:07,719 --> 00:35:11,359 Speaker 1: a secret as like an informational resource, has value. Yeah, 657 00:35:11,440 --> 00:35:12,719 Speaker 1: I mean, like I said, you take it back to 658 00:35:12,760 --> 00:35:16,400 Speaker 1: a prehistoric analogy, and like a secret is where where 659 00:35:16,440 --> 00:35:19,040 Speaker 1: the good hunting grounds, where the where the good berry bushes? 660 00:35:19,239 --> 00:35:21,480 Speaker 1: Where is their clean water? That's sort of thing, right, 661 00:35:22,680 --> 00:35:24,839 Speaker 1: So the study that I was looking at here. This 662 00:35:24,920 --> 00:35:30,280 Speaker 1: is comes from Antonia Mish, Harriet Over, and Melinda Carpenter 663 00:35:30,800 --> 00:35:33,600 Speaker 1: and it's titled I won't tell Young children show loyalty 664 00:35:33,640 --> 00:35:35,560 Speaker 1: to their group by keeping group secrets. And this is 665 00:35:35,600 --> 00:35:39,040 Speaker 1: published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology in two 666 00:35:39,080 --> 00:35:43,160 Speaker 1: thousand sixteen. Now, I'm sure this study sounds delightful, right 667 00:35:43,239 --> 00:35:48,600 Speaker 1: Kindergartner's interacting saying the darnedest things keeping secrets. But but 668 00:35:48,640 --> 00:35:51,960 Speaker 1: the paper is actually quite disturbing read at times, because, 669 00:35:52,280 --> 00:35:55,839 Speaker 1: for instance, it touches on racial bias. Oh like, so 670 00:35:55,880 --> 00:35:59,799 Speaker 1: that's part of in group variation on how children keep 671 00:35:59,880 --> 00:36:03,160 Speaker 1: or relate secrets. Yeah, it ends up not playing as 672 00:36:03,200 --> 00:36:05,440 Speaker 1: much into the study as our because they ended up 673 00:36:05,520 --> 00:36:08,240 Speaker 1: not they didn't record any racial information about the kids, 674 00:36:08,239 --> 00:36:11,239 Speaker 1: but they do point out some some sobering details here. Now, 675 00:36:11,320 --> 00:36:15,080 Speaker 1: I I previously read that implicit racial bias doesn't really 676 00:36:15,080 --> 00:36:18,120 Speaker 1: rear its ugly head uh and children until around age 677 00:36:18,120 --> 00:36:21,080 Speaker 1: seven or so. But the researchers here, they point to 678 00:36:21,120 --> 00:36:25,000 Speaker 1: a two thousand seven study that found quote, white children 679 00:36:25,120 --> 00:36:27,959 Speaker 1: between four and seven years of age favorite other white 680 00:36:28,000 --> 00:36:31,440 Speaker 1: children who positively interact with a racial in group member, 681 00:36:31,800 --> 00:36:34,399 Speaker 1: such as a white child over white children who hadn't 682 00:36:34,400 --> 00:36:37,880 Speaker 1: interact with a racial outgroup member, such as a black child. 683 00:36:37,960 --> 00:36:41,520 Speaker 1: Oh no, that's sad. Yeah, yeah, it's it's uh, it's 684 00:36:41,680 --> 00:36:44,759 Speaker 1: like I say, this is a quite quite quite some 685 00:36:44,800 --> 00:36:46,880 Speaker 1: details to have knocking around in your head when you're 686 00:36:46,880 --> 00:36:49,480 Speaker 1: doing your first day of kindergarden. Anyway, for the purposes 687 00:36:49,520 --> 00:36:53,360 Speaker 1: of this study, the researchers didn't include any racial information. 688 00:36:53,400 --> 00:36:56,400 Speaker 1: They set out to assess children's loyalty by testing their 689 00:36:56,400 --> 00:37:00,480 Speaker 1: willingness to keep a group secret. Previous studies cited in 690 00:37:00,480 --> 00:37:02,879 Speaker 1: the article indicated the children began to understand the idea 691 00:37:02,920 --> 00:37:06,759 Speaker 1: of privileged information around age four, and that children can 692 00:37:06,840 --> 00:37:10,160 Speaker 1: keep secrets in some context at this point. So that 693 00:37:10,160 --> 00:37:12,680 Speaker 1: goes pretty much with what we were saying earlier. Right 694 00:37:12,800 --> 00:37:15,799 Speaker 1: right age four, most kids could do it right. So 695 00:37:16,000 --> 00:37:18,719 Speaker 1: here's how the study broke down. Children were assigned to 696 00:37:18,800 --> 00:37:21,600 Speaker 1: color groups, you know, like green, red, yellow, and Sarah, 697 00:37:22,000 --> 00:37:25,120 Speaker 1: and they were told a secret by by by two 698 00:37:25,480 --> 00:37:28,400 Speaker 1: members of their own group or a member of an 699 00:37:28,400 --> 00:37:32,480 Speaker 1: out group. So that's the initial setup. And you have 700 00:37:32,480 --> 00:37:34,640 Speaker 1: a new neutral character who shows up and tries to 701 00:37:34,760 --> 00:37:39,919 Speaker 1: buy secrets with colorful stickers. So loyalty means you get 702 00:37:39,960 --> 00:37:43,440 Speaker 1: no stickers in this scenario because because the Tempter is 703 00:37:43,480 --> 00:37:46,239 Speaker 1: coming around and uh, the and I should point out 704 00:37:46,239 --> 00:37:49,240 Speaker 1: that the Tempter here's a puppet and the secret Shares 705 00:37:49,280 --> 00:37:53,799 Speaker 1: are also puppets, and the the the character whose name 706 00:37:53,840 --> 00:37:58,239 Speaker 1: is Siri, is attempting to to buy your secrets with 707 00:37:58,480 --> 00:38:01,839 Speaker 1: these stickers. Siri is going to have the gender of 708 00:38:01,960 --> 00:38:05,960 Speaker 1: the child that they're interacting with. And the stickers are 709 00:38:05,960 --> 00:38:09,279 Speaker 1: going to range from just like a red sticker, green sticker, 710 00:38:09,360 --> 00:38:12,080 Speaker 1: yellow sticker, et cetera, to uh, there's also a heart 711 00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:15,920 Speaker 1: shaped red sticker, which is you know, sounds like it's 712 00:38:15,920 --> 00:38:19,480 Speaker 1: pretty cool. Uh so, well, so one thing I think 713 00:38:19,520 --> 00:38:21,439 Speaker 1: we should say just to make clear if you're like, 714 00:38:21,800 --> 00:38:24,000 Speaker 1: how how motivated could you be? I think when you're 715 00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:27,440 Speaker 1: a little kids, stickers are. Stickers are a hot commodity. 716 00:38:27,480 --> 00:38:29,400 Speaker 1: I mean, the stickers are what you get when you 717 00:38:29,600 --> 00:38:32,800 Speaker 1: get a shot at the at the doctor's office. Stickers 718 00:38:32,800 --> 00:38:35,000 Speaker 1: are what you get in as a prize for not 719 00:38:35,120 --> 00:38:38,279 Speaker 1: causing a disruption in the checkoutline. Yes, stickers are a 720 00:38:38,320 --> 00:38:39,919 Speaker 1: lot of fun. I mean I feel like when you're 721 00:38:39,920 --> 00:38:42,880 Speaker 1: four or five, stickers are basically cut up hot dogs 722 00:38:42,920 --> 00:38:47,320 Speaker 1: to an animal are a dog. So uh. They tested 723 00:38:47,360 --> 00:38:50,800 Speaker 1: forty eight five year olds gender split, and they also 724 00:38:51,200 --> 00:38:54,480 Speaker 1: tested forty eight four year olds. The prediction was that 725 00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:58,160 Speaker 1: we'd see more loyalty in the five year olds. Uh. 726 00:38:58,200 --> 00:39:00,759 Speaker 1: And the children were just from day care centers in 727 00:39:00,760 --> 00:39:04,440 Speaker 1: a midsized city. Again, no racial or ethnic details were recorded. 728 00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:07,880 Speaker 1: A human served as a moderator. The male female hand 729 00:39:07,920 --> 00:39:11,080 Speaker 1: puppets acted as secret keepers. The hand puppets Siri was 730 00:39:11,120 --> 00:39:14,360 Speaker 1: the briber and h you also had a book of 731 00:39:14,400 --> 00:39:16,960 Speaker 1: secrets factoring in the experiment, and this was provided by 732 00:39:16,960 --> 00:39:21,040 Speaker 1: the puppets. So they conducted the experiment. And oh and 733 00:39:21,080 --> 00:39:23,640 Speaker 1: by the way, children who could not remember their color 734 00:39:23,680 --> 00:39:26,560 Speaker 1: group were kicked out. So some of the children, well 735 00:39:26,560 --> 00:39:27,759 Speaker 1: they had to, you know, they had to because a 736 00:39:27,760 --> 00:39:29,280 Speaker 1: lot of it had to do. You need to identify 737 00:39:29,400 --> 00:39:32,479 Speaker 1: with group yellow or group green. But if you're asked 738 00:39:32,520 --> 00:39:34,600 Speaker 1: what group you're in and you say, you know, oh, 739 00:39:34,640 --> 00:39:38,400 Speaker 1: I'm in room seven of the kindergarten or whatever I'm in, 740 00:39:38,520 --> 00:39:41,120 Speaker 1: you know, Mrs Williamson's the class, that's not going to 741 00:39:41,200 --> 00:39:44,200 Speaker 1: cut it because you need to identify with the color 742 00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:48,520 Speaker 1: group for the experiment to work. So the results were 743 00:39:48,520 --> 00:39:51,680 Speaker 1: that overall across both ages and conditions, the majority of 744 00:39:51,760 --> 00:39:57,200 Speaker 1: children kept the secrets, no gender effects. Children were more 745 00:39:57,239 --> 00:40:00,600 Speaker 1: inclined to keep in group secrets than alt group see crets. 746 00:40:00,600 --> 00:40:04,359 Speaker 1: So among the five year olds who again performed better, 747 00:40:04,480 --> 00:40:07,200 Speaker 1: you had twenty one who kept in secrets within their group, 748 00:40:07,320 --> 00:40:09,920 Speaker 1: thirteen who kept out secrets. Among the four year olds, 749 00:40:09,920 --> 00:40:13,440 Speaker 1: fifteen kept in secrets, thirteen kept out secrets. And you 750 00:40:13,560 --> 00:40:16,760 Speaker 1: would be happy to know, parents, that all the children 751 00:40:16,800 --> 00:40:20,680 Speaker 1: went home with two super fancy stickers and not any 752 00:40:20,760 --> 00:40:24,239 Speaker 1: of the bribe stickers. So so hopefully nobody went home 753 00:40:24,320 --> 00:40:29,719 Speaker 1: thinking that ratting out secrets was a profitable venture. So 754 00:40:29,840 --> 00:40:32,080 Speaker 1: this is kind of interesting because it looks like at 755 00:40:32,120 --> 00:40:35,799 Speaker 1: least within this experiment, uh who knows what would happened 756 00:40:35,840 --> 00:40:37,920 Speaker 1: if you tried to repeat it, But within this experiment, 757 00:40:38,080 --> 00:40:41,560 Speaker 1: five year olds had learned a lot more in group 758 00:40:41,640 --> 00:40:44,440 Speaker 1: loyalty than the four year olds. Like there was there 759 00:40:44,480 --> 00:40:46,439 Speaker 1: was less of a difference in the four year olds 760 00:40:46,520 --> 00:40:48,880 Speaker 1: between whether they kept secrets in group and out group, 761 00:40:49,200 --> 00:40:52,239 Speaker 1: but with the five year olds, significantly more of them 762 00:40:52,360 --> 00:40:56,040 Speaker 1: kept secrets in the group. Right right, Yeah, so I guess, 763 00:40:56,080 --> 00:40:58,000 Speaker 1: you know, I guess we were seeing the you know, 764 00:40:58,040 --> 00:41:01,520 Speaker 1: the the the advancement they have alson of the individual's 765 00:41:01,560 --> 00:41:07,640 Speaker 1: ability to prioritize secrets and prioritize privileged information. To look 766 00:41:07,640 --> 00:41:09,560 Speaker 1: at the Green team and say you're not one of us, 767 00:41:09,600 --> 00:41:13,440 Speaker 1: I'll betray you. Uh. And I included a picture in 768 00:41:13,440 --> 00:41:15,960 Speaker 1: our notes here of the puppet, and maybe I can 769 00:41:15,960 --> 00:41:17,520 Speaker 1: throw this in the landing page for this episode of 770 00:41:17,560 --> 00:41:19,320 Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. But I should 771 00:41:19,320 --> 00:41:21,800 Speaker 1: point out the tempter. Is it a lifeful looking puppet 772 00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:25,360 Speaker 1: and is not a punch of strawberry witch you have? 773 00:41:25,440 --> 00:41:27,640 Speaker 1: But it's not like a Punch and Judy Show Devil 774 00:41:27,760 --> 00:41:31,560 Speaker 1: or anything. No, this thing, it's going to be in 775 00:41:31,600 --> 00:41:35,759 Speaker 1: the next Annabel movie, the Annabel's sidekick wave in. It's 776 00:41:35,800 --> 00:41:41,480 Speaker 1: a little cotton hands summoning pizzoo zoo. Alright, well we 777 00:41:41,520 --> 00:41:43,960 Speaker 1: have we have one more study on small children here, 778 00:41:43,960 --> 00:41:46,520 Speaker 1: I think to reference before we take our first break, 779 00:41:46,719 --> 00:41:49,280 Speaker 1: and that is a study title Secret Sharing Interactions between 780 00:41:49,280 --> 00:41:52,400 Speaker 1: a Child Robot and Adults. But yeah, and this is 781 00:41:52,440 --> 00:41:57,279 Speaker 1: by Cindy L. Bethel, Matthew R. Stevenson, and Brian Ceciletti. 782 00:41:57,960 --> 00:42:01,120 Speaker 1: So in this one, it basically as a question, Hey, 783 00:42:01,800 --> 00:42:05,400 Speaker 1: how are children going to deal with secrets if they're 784 00:42:05,520 --> 00:42:09,400 Speaker 1: um if they're interacting with a humanoid robot as well 785 00:42:09,440 --> 00:42:12,919 Speaker 1: as say a human adult, if they're interacting and specifically 786 00:42:12,920 --> 00:42:16,760 Speaker 1: to with a a stuffed animal dog or a robotic dog. 787 00:42:17,520 --> 00:42:20,120 Speaker 1: And this was this was a pretty interesting study to 788 00:42:20,120 --> 00:42:22,319 Speaker 1: look at. So there's just a quick quote from it 789 00:42:22,360 --> 00:42:25,879 Speaker 1: to give you an example. Here the quote, the qualitative 790 00:42:25,920 --> 00:42:28,840 Speaker 1: results from these studies indicate that the children were readily 791 00:42:28,880 --> 00:42:32,160 Speaker 1: able to apply their interaction style with an adult to 792 00:42:32,280 --> 00:42:35,440 Speaker 1: their interactions with the robot in both the pilot and 793 00:42:35,440 --> 00:42:38,360 Speaker 1: follow up studies. Future research needs to be conducted, but 794 00:42:38,440 --> 00:42:42,000 Speaker 1: it is expected that with longer interactions with the robot, 795 00:42:42,040 --> 00:42:44,359 Speaker 1: the children will treat the robot more as a peer, 796 00:42:44,600 --> 00:42:47,560 Speaker 1: which would be beneficial and gathering sensitive information. So I 797 00:42:47,560 --> 00:42:51,759 Speaker 1: guess the idea here is that maybe a robot could 798 00:42:51,840 --> 00:42:56,080 Speaker 1: be used to elicit the sharing of secrets, especially like 799 00:42:56,160 --> 00:42:58,960 Speaker 1: if children have been abused or something like that the 800 00:42:59,080 --> 00:43:02,960 Speaker 1: children might be in some cases able to admit that 801 00:43:03,000 --> 00:43:06,160 Speaker 1: to a humanoid robot. Yeah, I think so. It makes 802 00:43:06,160 --> 00:43:08,840 Speaker 1: me wonder though about like what would be the applications 803 00:43:08,880 --> 00:43:13,440 Speaker 1: for for adults, Like could we gain something by sharing 804 00:43:13,480 --> 00:43:16,560 Speaker 1: our secrets with robots who we have robot confessionals. I 805 00:43:17,120 --> 00:43:19,839 Speaker 1: was wondering the same exact thing, like, is that the 806 00:43:19,880 --> 00:43:23,279 Speaker 1: next step up from post secret you can you can 807 00:43:23,320 --> 00:43:27,680 Speaker 1: confess anonymously. Maybe better than that, but not as destructive 808 00:43:27,719 --> 00:43:30,080 Speaker 1: as confessing to a person is confessing to a non 809 00:43:30,160 --> 00:43:33,799 Speaker 1: judgmental terminator. Well, you know, it does remind me of 810 00:43:34,120 --> 00:43:36,719 Speaker 1: various I believe NASA studies that have looked into the 811 00:43:36,760 --> 00:43:42,280 Speaker 1: idea of creating like basically a computerized therapist and uh 812 00:43:42,320 --> 00:43:45,839 Speaker 1: that a virtual therapist that one would interact with on 813 00:43:46,080 --> 00:43:51,080 Speaker 1: lengthy space missions to check on your, uh psychological well being. 814 00:43:51,200 --> 00:43:53,719 Speaker 1: Isn't that in the movie Moon? Yeah it is. That's right. 815 00:43:53,719 --> 00:43:55,279 Speaker 1: That's a major plot point in that with the Kevin 816 00:43:55,320 --> 00:43:59,319 Speaker 1: Spacey voiced robot that he he speaks to and relates to. So, yeah, 817 00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:01,560 Speaker 1: it's not it's not too far far off. I think, 818 00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:03,120 Speaker 1: all right, well, I think we should take a quick 819 00:44:03,120 --> 00:44:05,240 Speaker 1: break and then when we come back we will get 820 00:44:05,280 --> 00:44:08,840 Speaker 1: into the weeds with some complicated research on the psychology 821 00:44:08,840 --> 00:44:17,239 Speaker 1: of secrets. Than alright, we're back, okay, Robert. Now we're 822 00:44:17,239 --> 00:44:20,600 Speaker 1: gonna get into research on secrets in a couple of 823 00:44:20,680 --> 00:44:23,799 Speaker 1: areas that I want to admit. At the outset, I 824 00:44:23,840 --> 00:44:28,040 Speaker 1: think is thorny and confusing. Um So, one of the 825 00:44:28,040 --> 00:44:31,400 Speaker 1: things that I want to focus on is the research 826 00:44:31,480 --> 00:44:36,400 Speaker 1: on the health effects of holding secrets and the supposed 827 00:44:36,440 --> 00:44:41,560 Speaker 1: health benefits of revealing secrets. Maybe before we get into this, Robert, 828 00:44:41,640 --> 00:44:44,720 Speaker 1: just what would your intuitions be, Would you just assume 829 00:44:44,840 --> 00:44:48,719 Speaker 1: that having secrets is bad for your health? Well, my 830 00:44:48,719 --> 00:44:51,680 Speaker 1: my initial reply is that, again, not all secrets are 831 00:44:51,719 --> 00:44:55,560 Speaker 1: created equally, and but I also know that yes, even 832 00:44:55,600 --> 00:44:58,920 Speaker 1: individuals carrying a lot of the anxiety in themselves. You know, 833 00:44:59,000 --> 00:45:01,360 Speaker 1: if you if you can't leap at night because of 834 00:45:01,440 --> 00:45:04,640 Speaker 1: the secret you're keeping, like, there are going to be 835 00:45:04,719 --> 00:45:07,960 Speaker 1: some health effects there. At the same time, I'm also 836 00:45:08,040 --> 00:45:10,920 Speaker 1: hesitant to like to make too many, you know, firm 837 00:45:10,960 --> 00:45:14,160 Speaker 1: declarations about about the health effects there without looking at 838 00:45:14,200 --> 00:45:17,279 Speaker 1: the research, because you do get in you potentially get 839 00:45:17,320 --> 00:45:20,799 Speaker 1: into the gray area of like, oh, negative thoughts cause 840 00:45:20,920 --> 00:45:24,960 Speaker 1: disease and and so forth that can be taken to 841 00:45:25,000 --> 00:45:29,200 Speaker 1: the extreme by by pseudo scientific ideas. One thing that 842 00:45:29,280 --> 00:45:32,120 Speaker 1: I do think is interesting right now is the body 843 00:45:32,120 --> 00:45:34,640 Speaker 1: of scientific research on the mind body connection. You know, 844 00:45:34,719 --> 00:45:39,520 Speaker 1: to what extent your mind affects physiological health. There's lots 845 00:45:39,560 --> 00:45:43,319 Speaker 1: of super solid research indicating that there is an extremely 846 00:45:44,120 --> 00:45:47,480 Speaker 1: serious link between the two, and yet that the whole 847 00:45:47,520 --> 00:45:50,760 Speaker 1: mind body medicine thing can definitely be taken to pseudo 848 00:45:50,840 --> 00:45:53,680 Speaker 1: scientific extremes like you say, and like people can start 849 00:45:53,719 --> 00:45:55,560 Speaker 1: to say like that you can you know, think your 850 00:45:55,640 --> 00:45:59,480 Speaker 1: cancer away and stuff like that, which, uh, no evidence 851 00:45:59,520 --> 00:46:02,560 Speaker 1: indicates that's the case. But at the same time, there 852 00:46:02,560 --> 00:46:04,920 Speaker 1: are tons of studies that do seem to be reliable 853 00:46:04,960 --> 00:46:09,719 Speaker 1: and do show that mindset has measurable health outcomes, right, 854 00:46:09,760 --> 00:46:11,520 Speaker 1: I mean, like I said, you can you can just 855 00:46:11,560 --> 00:46:14,200 Speaker 1: look at an extreme example and just imagine somebody having 856 00:46:14,200 --> 00:46:16,759 Speaker 1: to keep a secret and it's causing them such anxiety 857 00:46:16,800 --> 00:46:19,759 Speaker 1: that they have trouble either eating or sleeping, a very 858 00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:23,600 Speaker 1: realistic scenario, uh, and one that you has very would 859 00:46:23,600 --> 00:46:27,280 Speaker 1: have very obvious health effects. Yeah, or just simply causing stress. 860 00:46:27,320 --> 00:46:30,239 Speaker 1: And we know that stress. Stress causes the release of 861 00:46:30,320 --> 00:46:34,440 Speaker 1: neurotransmitters and hormones that can have effects within the body. 862 00:46:35,080 --> 00:46:38,680 Speaker 1: Having chronic stress is bad for you. But anyway, let's 863 00:46:38,680 --> 00:46:41,480 Speaker 1: look at the research. So back in two thousand two, 864 00:46:41,640 --> 00:46:45,360 Speaker 1: the psychologist Dr Anita Kelly, who is a professor of 865 00:46:45,400 --> 00:46:48,640 Speaker 1: psychology at Notre Dame published a book called The Psychology 866 00:46:48,680 --> 00:46:51,120 Speaker 1: of Secrets, and she spent a lot of her career 867 00:46:51,480 --> 00:46:54,400 Speaker 1: studying the effects of secrecy and what happens when people 868 00:46:54,480 --> 00:46:57,680 Speaker 1: reveal secrets. So I want to look at one particular 869 00:46:57,719 --> 00:47:02,359 Speaker 1: paper of hers from Current Directions and Psychological Science, called 870 00:47:02,440 --> 00:47:06,359 Speaker 1: Revealing Personal Secrets, and I thought this was interesting. So 871 00:47:06,520 --> 00:47:11,040 Speaker 1: in this paper, Kelly collects the research on the consequences 872 00:47:11,080 --> 00:47:14,600 Speaker 1: of revealing personal secrets. And a personal secret here is 873 00:47:14,600 --> 00:47:17,640 Speaker 1: a secret that directly involves the secret keeper. So it's 874 00:47:17,680 --> 00:47:20,880 Speaker 1: not one of those don't tell anybody yet things at work, right, 875 00:47:21,320 --> 00:47:24,440 Speaker 1: It directly involves you. It's a secret about you. And 876 00:47:24,520 --> 00:47:27,880 Speaker 1: then she does something fascinating. She begins to develop a 877 00:47:27,960 --> 00:47:32,400 Speaker 1: framework for win and under what circumstances you should reveal 878 00:47:32,560 --> 00:47:35,040 Speaker 1: a secret. I don't know if I've ever heard any 879 00:47:35,040 --> 00:47:37,839 Speaker 1: advice along those lines before. Well, I mean, aside from 880 00:47:37,880 --> 00:47:42,000 Speaker 1: the National Crime Prevention Council tips that we heard earlier 881 00:47:42,040 --> 00:47:44,279 Speaker 1: for children, all right, I've never heard anything like this 882 00:47:44,360 --> 00:47:49,040 Speaker 1: for adults. So she starts by acknowledging something interesting. For decades, 883 00:47:49,080 --> 00:47:51,319 Speaker 1: at the time this had been published, had been conventional 884 00:47:51,320 --> 00:47:55,760 Speaker 1: wisdom among psychologists and therapists that secret keeping was bad 885 00:47:55,800 --> 00:47:57,319 Speaker 1: for the mind and the body. Like we were just 886 00:47:57,320 --> 00:48:00,640 Speaker 1: talking about it, seems intuitive, right, uh, And Kelly points 887 00:48:00,680 --> 00:48:03,840 Speaker 1: out that research began to bear this out. For example, 888 00:48:04,080 --> 00:48:07,520 Speaker 1: UM research up to that point indicated that people who 889 00:48:07,600 --> 00:48:12,279 Speaker 1: tend to conceal personal secrets had more physical body complaints 890 00:48:12,320 --> 00:48:17,040 Speaker 1: like headaches, nausea, ulcers, and back pain, and they also 891 00:48:17,120 --> 00:48:20,640 Speaker 1: tended to have more anxiety, shyness, and depression than people 892 00:48:20,719 --> 00:48:25,759 Speaker 1: who didn't conceal information. She sites research showing that disclosure 893 00:48:25,800 --> 00:48:29,440 Speaker 1: of personal information is associated with better health outcomes, such 894 00:48:29,480 --> 00:48:33,560 Speaker 1: as better immunological function and fewer trips to the doctor, 895 00:48:34,239 --> 00:48:37,920 Speaker 1: and one experiment showed that even simply writing down a 896 00:48:38,000 --> 00:48:42,000 Speaker 1: disclosure of facts about a private traumatic event had an effect. 897 00:48:42,200 --> 00:48:45,600 Speaker 1: They like, they took medical students and had them right 898 00:48:45,680 --> 00:48:49,920 Speaker 1: about personal traumas and then gave them a hepatitis B vaccine, 899 00:48:50,280 --> 00:48:54,319 Speaker 1: and those students had significantly higher antibody levels at four 900 00:48:54,360 --> 00:48:57,680 Speaker 1: and six months later than subjects who wrote about control 901 00:48:57,760 --> 00:49:01,120 Speaker 1: topics that had nothing to do with deeply hell emotional 902 00:49:01,160 --> 00:49:05,400 Speaker 1: events and then received the same vaccine. So if if true, 903 00:49:05,480 --> 00:49:09,080 Speaker 1: that's very interesting. And so if it's true that disclosing 904 00:49:09,080 --> 00:49:12,800 Speaker 1: personal secrets leads to better health outcomes on average. Why 905 00:49:12,960 --> 00:49:15,960 Speaker 1: is this the case? Based on our own research, Kelly 906 00:49:16,000 --> 00:49:19,240 Speaker 1: concludes that the reason revealing a secret can have positive 907 00:49:19,239 --> 00:49:22,560 Speaker 1: effects is that it allows the secret keeper to gain 908 00:49:22,680 --> 00:49:26,719 Speaker 1: new insights into the secret, leading to closure on the subject. 909 00:49:26,960 --> 00:49:29,799 Speaker 1: And in this model, a kept secret it's you know, 910 00:49:29,840 --> 00:49:32,239 Speaker 1: I use the analogy earlier, it's like a bomb that 911 00:49:32,280 --> 00:49:34,640 Speaker 1: hasn't gone off yet. But maybe a better way to 912 00:49:34,640 --> 00:49:36,920 Speaker 1: think about it is that it kept secret is an 913 00:49:37,000 --> 00:49:41,960 Speaker 1: unsolved problem or an unfinished task, and thus it occupies 914 00:49:42,000 --> 00:49:45,840 Speaker 1: an outsized space in the mind and requires frequent attention 915 00:49:45,960 --> 00:49:51,239 Speaker 1: and mental energy. And Kelly actually evokes the Zigarnic effective. 916 00:49:51,560 --> 00:49:53,400 Speaker 1: We've discussed that in the show before, Yeah, we have. 917 00:49:53,480 --> 00:49:56,520 Speaker 1: We talked about it in our Tetris episodes. And one 918 00:49:56,560 --> 00:49:59,520 Speaker 1: of the reasons that Tetris might be so compelling is 919 00:49:59,560 --> 00:50:03,080 Speaker 1: that it's an eternally unfinished project and it always wants 920 00:50:03,160 --> 00:50:07,040 Speaker 1: to call you back for more. Uh. But so the 921 00:50:07,160 --> 00:50:09,760 Speaker 1: terms Zigarnic effect. It comes to us from the Russian 922 00:50:09,760 --> 00:50:14,000 Speaker 1: psychologist and psychiatrist Bluma Wolfovna Zigarnic, who lived from nine 923 00:50:14,520 --> 00:50:18,000 Speaker 1: to nine. She first observed it in the nineteen twenties, 924 00:50:18,520 --> 00:50:22,280 Speaker 1: and there there's a quote from Roy Baumeister and Brad 925 00:50:22,320 --> 00:50:25,560 Speaker 1: Bushman in their two thousand eight textbooks Social Psychology and 926 00:50:25,680 --> 00:50:29,600 Speaker 1: Human Nature that says, quote zigarnic effect is a tendency 927 00:50:29,680 --> 00:50:34,080 Speaker 1: to experience automatic intrusive thoughts about a goal that one 928 00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:37,880 Speaker 1: has pursued, but the pursuit of which has been interrupted. 929 00:50:38,560 --> 00:50:41,120 Speaker 1: That is, if you start working toward a goal and 930 00:50:41,200 --> 00:50:44,239 Speaker 1: fail to get there, thoughts about the goal will keep 931 00:50:44,320 --> 00:50:47,160 Speaker 1: popping into your mind while you're doing other things, as 932 00:50:47,200 --> 00:50:49,759 Speaker 1: if to remind you to get back on track to 933 00:50:49,840 --> 00:50:53,800 Speaker 1: finish reaching that goal. So, I mean, keeping a secret 934 00:50:53,960 --> 00:50:57,000 Speaker 1: is a task, yeah, and and and therefore it requires 935 00:50:57,120 --> 00:51:01,440 Speaker 1: requires mental energy to varying degrees to uh to to 936 00:51:01,600 --> 00:51:07,960 Speaker 1: keep it. Like, I keep thinking of this analogy, and 937 00:51:08,000 --> 00:51:09,400 Speaker 1: I'm not the only one to come up with this, 938 00:51:09,480 --> 00:51:12,120 Speaker 1: actually encountered it in some of the studies. We're looking 939 00:51:12,160 --> 00:51:15,279 Speaker 1: at the idea of their being like a free flowing stream, right, 940 00:51:15,640 --> 00:51:17,480 Speaker 1: And then every secret you have to keep is like 941 00:51:17,560 --> 00:51:21,000 Speaker 1: putting a stone in there that has to be navigated around, 942 00:51:21,000 --> 00:51:25,680 Speaker 1: and it potentially changes the flow of social interaction. And uh, yeah, 943 00:51:25,719 --> 00:51:27,640 Speaker 1: if you have if you throw some big rocks in there, 944 00:51:28,160 --> 00:51:30,200 Speaker 1: if you if you throw a lot of little rocks 945 00:51:30,200 --> 00:51:34,000 Speaker 1: in there. Then you're gonna potentially alter the flow of 946 00:51:34,040 --> 00:51:37,840 Speaker 1: the river to you know, considerable, You're gonna catastrophic levels. 947 00:51:38,239 --> 00:51:40,560 Speaker 1: Well I know it's just a metaphor, but yeah, exactly. 948 00:51:40,600 --> 00:51:44,000 Speaker 1: I mean you you you essentially damn the river, and 949 00:51:44,160 --> 00:51:47,240 Speaker 1: a damn con burst right eventually will if there's nothing 950 00:51:47,239 --> 00:51:49,200 Speaker 1: to relieve the flow. Yeah, I think I think that 951 00:51:49,280 --> 00:51:50,800 Speaker 1: makes perfect sense that it would be tied in with 952 00:51:51,400 --> 00:51:54,359 Speaker 1: sigonic effect. Yeah, so this does feel very intuitive. Now. 953 00:51:54,520 --> 00:51:57,680 Speaker 1: I do think we might undercut this with more research 954 00:51:57,719 --> 00:52:00,680 Speaker 1: we talked about going forward, but it certainly feel is intuitive. 955 00:52:00,719 --> 00:52:03,640 Speaker 1: It's one of those things. It's got that truthiness, right, Yeah, 956 00:52:04,239 --> 00:52:07,480 Speaker 1: but truthiness can be deceiving. But so the idea here 957 00:52:07,520 --> 00:52:10,000 Speaker 1: at least is that when when people disclose a secret 958 00:52:10,080 --> 00:52:13,920 Speaker 1: and talk through it, and this is key for for Kelly, 959 00:52:13,960 --> 00:52:16,839 Speaker 1: it's not just that you reveal the secret, but that 960 00:52:16,880 --> 00:52:19,440 Speaker 1: you have the ability to talk through it with someone 961 00:52:20,080 --> 00:52:24,160 Speaker 1: and gain insights on it that allow you to achieve closure, 962 00:52:24,400 --> 00:52:28,279 Speaker 1: to sort of close the book and understand something. And 963 00:52:28,400 --> 00:52:31,600 Speaker 1: that's of course going to be more complicated than it sounds, 964 00:52:31,640 --> 00:52:34,040 Speaker 1: depending on what the secret is. I mean, for instance, 965 00:52:34,040 --> 00:52:36,160 Speaker 1: on one, on one hand, it would seem to indicate 966 00:52:36,160 --> 00:52:41,239 Speaker 1: that yes, seeking say professional help for whatever your quote 967 00:52:41,280 --> 00:52:43,880 Speaker 1: unquote secret might be. So, for instance, if if it 968 00:52:44,239 --> 00:52:46,839 Speaker 1: has some sort of you know, abuse connotation, and then 969 00:52:46,840 --> 00:52:49,960 Speaker 1: you you say, you know, call up the rain hotline, 970 00:52:50,280 --> 00:52:51,960 Speaker 1: you're able to talk with someone who can steer you 971 00:52:52,000 --> 00:52:55,000 Speaker 1: in the right direction of how best to to deal 972 00:52:55,040 --> 00:52:58,160 Speaker 1: with this. But on the other hand, like closing the 973 00:52:58,200 --> 00:53:01,360 Speaker 1: book on it is easier said than done, right right totally, 974 00:53:01,480 --> 00:53:06,040 Speaker 1: So yeah, well, in under what's you would to really 975 00:53:06,080 --> 00:53:08,359 Speaker 1: close the book on a secret? It has to be 976 00:53:08,400 --> 00:53:10,600 Speaker 1: a rather pointless secret, has to be one of those 977 00:53:10,680 --> 00:53:15,120 Speaker 1: dumb work secrets or or you know, mildly interesting social secrets. Well, 978 00:53:15,200 --> 00:53:17,000 Speaker 1: close to the book is my language. I mean that 979 00:53:17,000 --> 00:53:19,000 Speaker 1: that might not be the best metaphor, but what it 980 00:53:19,080 --> 00:53:21,920 Speaker 1: is is that you want to achieve some kind of resolution, 981 00:53:22,040 --> 00:53:25,960 Speaker 1: You gain new insights that make this no longer an 982 00:53:26,080 --> 00:53:29,279 Speaker 1: unsolved problem. So I think one example would be if 983 00:53:29,320 --> 00:53:33,440 Speaker 1: if someone has has been keeping their say, sexual orientation 984 00:53:33,880 --> 00:53:38,440 Speaker 1: a a secret there there closeted, and therefore like coming 985 00:53:38,480 --> 00:53:41,440 Speaker 1: out of the closet even did like a select group 986 00:53:41,480 --> 00:53:45,640 Speaker 1: of people that would enable you to then like own 987 00:53:45,680 --> 00:53:48,120 Speaker 1: it and deal with it. In a new way. But 988 00:53:48,200 --> 00:53:50,239 Speaker 1: it wouldn't mean that you're like you're done, you know, 989 00:53:50,680 --> 00:53:53,520 Speaker 1: like it's really the beginning of a new phase in 990 00:53:53,560 --> 00:53:56,759 Speaker 1: that particular journey. Yeah, totally. And that that's, as we've said, 991 00:53:56,800 --> 00:53:59,240 Speaker 1: not all secrets are created equally. That that's a different 992 00:53:59,320 --> 00:54:02,760 Speaker 1: kind of secret them many other secrets, like for example, 993 00:54:02,800 --> 00:54:04,880 Speaker 1: and some of the research we've looked at today shows 994 00:54:04,920 --> 00:54:07,760 Speaker 1: that sexual orientation is very often the kind of secret 995 00:54:07,840 --> 00:54:11,200 Speaker 1: where where a person feels they can reveal to some 996 00:54:11,280 --> 00:54:13,279 Speaker 1: people and not to others. So you have to you 997 00:54:13,320 --> 00:54:17,080 Speaker 1: have to play management of different revelation groups and and 998 00:54:17,160 --> 00:54:19,520 Speaker 1: to a certain extent, manage been a different identity, different 999 00:54:19,600 --> 00:54:22,600 Speaker 1: versions of yourself. I mean, of course that everyone does 1000 00:54:22,640 --> 00:54:26,520 Speaker 1: that to certain degrees, I think, but but we're talking 1001 00:54:26,560 --> 00:54:28,800 Speaker 1: about having to do it to an agree where it 1002 00:54:28,880 --> 00:54:34,560 Speaker 1: would have potentially negative effects on your on your psyche. 1003 00:54:34,719 --> 00:54:37,600 Speaker 1: And that's a great point because revealing a secret might 1004 00:54:37,640 --> 00:54:40,880 Speaker 1: not always lead to positive outcomes, right, And and Kelly 1005 00:54:40,880 --> 00:54:42,800 Speaker 1: acknowledges this. So she's trying to come up with the 1006 00:54:42,880 --> 00:54:45,600 Speaker 1: rubric of when should you reveal a secret? You've got 1007 00:54:45,600 --> 00:54:48,880 Speaker 1: a secret that's eating away at you, when and where 1008 00:54:48,920 --> 00:54:51,880 Speaker 1: and how should you reveal it. Uh, it appears that 1009 00:54:52,000 --> 00:54:55,160 Speaker 1: the circumstances under which you reveal the secret are important. 1010 00:54:55,200 --> 00:54:58,280 Speaker 1: So obviously you can imagine lots of revelations that would 1011 00:54:58,320 --> 00:55:02,319 Speaker 1: make everything worse. You can iagine a scenario where you 1012 00:55:02,320 --> 00:55:04,680 Speaker 1: know you've been cheating on your spouse with an alien 1013 00:55:04,760 --> 00:55:10,160 Speaker 1: robot from Enceladus, and you know you're happy in your marriage, 1014 00:55:10,200 --> 00:55:13,000 Speaker 1: but you know that happened. That happened maybe maybe not 1015 00:55:13,120 --> 00:55:16,560 Speaker 1: say it's ongoing, but it happened one time, and you 1016 00:55:16,640 --> 00:55:19,560 Speaker 1: reveal it to your spouse and your spouse is not forgiving, 1017 00:55:19,760 --> 00:55:22,840 Speaker 1: and he or she becomes angry, and this leads to 1018 00:55:23,000 --> 00:55:26,560 Speaker 1: alienation in your relationship, and maybe it ends the relationship. 1019 00:55:27,320 --> 00:55:30,520 Speaker 1: Are you better off then? I mean you might say 1020 00:55:30,560 --> 00:55:33,160 Speaker 1: maybe maybe it was worth it to be honest, But 1021 00:55:33,239 --> 00:55:35,400 Speaker 1: then you could also say, well what if it's destroyed 1022 00:55:35,440 --> 00:55:39,480 Speaker 1: the most important relationship in my life. Um, So there 1023 00:55:39,520 --> 00:55:41,080 Speaker 1: are a lot of questions. It comes back to the 1024 00:55:41,080 --> 00:55:44,000 Speaker 1: woman in the snow, right, because on one level, yeah, 1025 00:55:44,040 --> 00:55:47,080 Speaker 1: the husband gets to to live, you know, secret free, 1026 00:55:47,600 --> 00:55:49,799 Speaker 1: but he no longer has his wife and and he 1027 00:55:49,840 --> 00:55:52,640 Speaker 1: has to tell his children in the morning that hey, sorry, 1028 00:55:52,680 --> 00:55:56,000 Speaker 1: Mom's not here anymore because Dad's allowsy secret keeper. Yeah, 1029 00:55:56,040 --> 00:55:58,879 Speaker 1: so it's confusing, like it might better, might be better 1030 00:55:58,920 --> 00:56:01,319 Speaker 1: to be honest in the long run, but it might 1031 00:56:01,360 --> 00:56:03,719 Speaker 1: not be. I mean, it might be just destructive to 1032 00:56:03,800 --> 00:56:07,560 Speaker 1: people's lives in the long run. And so so taking 1033 00:56:07,640 --> 00:56:14,400 Speaker 1: into account complications and consequences is a real question. Another complication. 1034 00:56:15,320 --> 00:56:18,560 Speaker 1: Kelly points out, research is pretty clear people don't usually 1035 00:56:18,680 --> 00:56:22,120 Speaker 1: keep your secrets when you share them. One of one 1036 00:56:22,320 --> 00:56:25,200 Speaker 1: piece of research she sites is from which found the 1037 00:56:25,239 --> 00:56:27,960 Speaker 1: college students. So, okay, this is college students. Maybe they 1038 00:56:27,960 --> 00:56:30,880 Speaker 1: don't keep secrets particularly well, but at least in this group, 1039 00:56:31,520 --> 00:56:35,360 Speaker 1: when students shared an emotional event with a confidante, the 1040 00:56:35,440 --> 00:56:39,200 Speaker 1: confidante reported telling at least one other person about that 1041 00:56:39,280 --> 00:56:42,880 Speaker 1: disclosure in sixty six to seventy eight percent of the cases. 1042 00:56:43,600 --> 00:56:46,160 Speaker 1: So most of the time, you're gonna go tell somebody 1043 00:56:46,160 --> 00:56:50,640 Speaker 1: else about this deep emotional thing that somebody shared with you. Again, 1044 00:56:50,680 --> 00:56:52,520 Speaker 1: that's why we need the robots. The robot can be 1045 00:56:52,560 --> 00:56:54,840 Speaker 1: programmed to be a secret keeper. You have a robot, 1046 00:56:54,880 --> 00:56:58,400 Speaker 1: it's only purpose is to keep your secret. Then do 1047 00:56:58,440 --> 00:57:00,880 Speaker 1: you have to destroy the robot or is it important 1048 00:57:00,920 --> 00:57:03,200 Speaker 1: that the robot continue to exist. Well, because we come 1049 00:57:03,200 --> 00:57:07,640 Speaker 1: back to our our initial philosophical discussion that the robot 1050 00:57:07,680 --> 00:57:10,160 Speaker 1: has to know the secret, understand the secret. Otherwise the 1051 00:57:10,239 --> 00:57:13,760 Speaker 1: robot is not a secret keeper. It's just it's it's deleted. 1052 00:57:13,760 --> 00:57:16,640 Speaker 1: It's the same as telling somebody and then murdering them. Okay, 1053 00:57:16,680 --> 00:57:18,800 Speaker 1: so we cut to the chase here. When should you 1054 00:57:18,920 --> 00:57:22,840 Speaker 1: reveal a personal secret for maximum benefit? Well, Kelly thinks 1055 00:57:22,920 --> 00:57:25,600 Speaker 1: in in this paper at least, that you should reveal 1056 00:57:25,640 --> 00:57:28,240 Speaker 1: a personal secret when you've been able to identify a 1057 00:57:28,320 --> 00:57:32,040 Speaker 1: confidante who can be trusted not to tell your secret 1058 00:57:32,080 --> 00:57:35,120 Speaker 1: to others, and that's kind of rare, who you can 1059 00:57:35,160 --> 00:57:38,160 Speaker 1: depend on to be non judgmental, so they're not going 1060 00:57:38,200 --> 00:57:41,840 Speaker 1: to say, like you monster, and who you can expect 1061 00:57:41,920 --> 00:57:45,000 Speaker 1: to help you gain new insights into your secret and 1062 00:57:45,040 --> 00:57:49,640 Speaker 1: bring you feelings of closure. Uh So that's interesting because 1063 00:57:49,640 --> 00:57:54,240 Speaker 1: that sounds to me like she's basically describing a counselor therapist. Yeah, yeah, exactly, 1064 00:57:54,240 --> 00:57:56,400 Speaker 1: have the same thought, Like that would seem to line 1065 00:57:56,480 --> 00:58:00,640 Speaker 1: up with you know, a a certified you know, self 1066 00:58:00,680 --> 00:58:03,600 Speaker 1: help hotlines such as you know, suicide prevention or rain 1067 00:58:03,720 --> 00:58:07,160 Speaker 1: or something like that, or or like an individual counselor there. 1068 00:58:07,640 --> 00:58:10,800 Speaker 1: It's like either way, it's somebody who it's their job 1069 00:58:10,880 --> 00:58:14,720 Speaker 1: to not be judgmental, but to just try to help you. Uh, 1070 00:58:14,760 --> 00:58:17,560 Speaker 1: it's their job to try to help you find insights 1071 00:58:17,640 --> 00:58:21,000 Speaker 1: and and understand things about yourself and about what you're 1072 00:58:21,040 --> 00:58:24,000 Speaker 1: telling them. And it's part of their job to keep 1073 00:58:24,040 --> 00:58:27,560 Speaker 1: you keep everything confidential. All right? So, well that sounds good. 1074 00:58:27,560 --> 00:58:30,320 Speaker 1: Then what's the what's the possible downside? Well, you know, 1075 00:58:30,440 --> 00:58:33,400 Speaker 1: so I mentioned a minute ago that part of what 1076 00:58:33,480 --> 00:58:36,000 Speaker 1: went into her study was the idea that their negative 1077 00:58:36,000 --> 00:58:39,800 Speaker 1: health consequences for from keeping secrets, and I think the 1078 00:58:39,840 --> 00:58:43,080 Speaker 1: picture on that is not entirely clear. There have been 1079 00:58:43,080 --> 00:58:48,000 Speaker 1: plenty of studies showing some kind of correlation between negative 1080 00:58:48,040 --> 00:58:53,320 Speaker 1: health outcome from keeping secrets, but just the results are 1081 00:58:53,360 --> 00:58:57,320 Speaker 1: scattered and inconsistent. Um, So, for example, what if it's 1082 00:58:57,360 --> 00:59:00,960 Speaker 1: not keeping a secret that does my charm to your health? 1083 00:59:01,280 --> 00:59:03,760 Speaker 1: But what if some of these results are triggered by 1084 00:59:03,800 --> 00:59:06,840 Speaker 1: a different level of correlation, meaning that the kind of 1085 00:59:06,880 --> 00:59:10,720 Speaker 1: people who keep more secrets naturally tend to be less 1086 00:59:10,720 --> 00:59:14,479 Speaker 1: healthy people to begin with? M hm, Does that make sense? 1087 00:59:14,480 --> 00:59:17,560 Speaker 1: So it's not that keeping a secret makes you unhealthy, 1088 00:59:17,600 --> 00:59:21,720 Speaker 1: but that unhealthy people are more likely to keep secrets. Okay, 1089 00:59:21,880 --> 00:59:25,080 Speaker 1: I mean that's like from a scientific standpoint, that's that's 1090 00:59:25,120 --> 00:59:26,920 Speaker 1: that makes perfect synse. That would be something you'd want 1091 00:59:26,960 --> 00:59:30,440 Speaker 1: to explore. Of course, it's hard to imagine a real life, 1092 00:59:30,880 --> 00:59:33,760 Speaker 1: like conscious version of this way, like, oh, that one 1093 00:59:33,800 --> 00:59:37,800 Speaker 1: looks sickly, that's my that's my secret keeper. Well, so, 1094 00:59:37,840 --> 00:59:41,520 Speaker 1: Anita Kelly was the same author as the earlier study. 1095 00:59:41,640 --> 00:59:43,400 Speaker 1: She was one of the authors of a later study 1096 00:59:43,440 --> 00:59:46,600 Speaker 1: along with Jonathan Yip, called is keeping a secret or 1097 00:59:46,680 --> 00:59:51,040 Speaker 1: being a secretive person linked to UH Psychological Symptoms in 1098 00:59:51,080 --> 00:59:53,800 Speaker 1: the Journal of Personality in two thousand six, And this 1099 00:59:53,880 --> 00:59:57,960 Speaker 1: study tried to compare negative health symptoms across time to 1100 00:59:58,240 --> 01:00:01,480 Speaker 1: figure out whether keeping a specif effects secret or generally 1101 01:00:01,520 --> 01:00:04,560 Speaker 1: being a secretive person had a greater effect on health outcomes. 1102 01:00:04,720 --> 01:00:07,720 Speaker 1: And in this study, keeping a specific secret so when 1103 01:00:07,720 --> 01:00:09,800 Speaker 1: when they found people said yeah, I have a secret 1104 01:00:09,840 --> 01:00:13,320 Speaker 1: I'm keeping, that did not in fact correlate to worse 1105 01:00:13,400 --> 01:00:16,880 Speaker 1: health outcomes. What they found was, in fact that people 1106 01:00:16,920 --> 01:00:21,600 Speaker 1: who were generally secretive people were more vulnerable to more 1107 01:00:21,760 --> 01:00:25,240 Speaker 1: symptoms to begin with, uh yeah. I also saw an 1108 01:00:25,320 --> 01:00:28,880 Speaker 1: article on Psychology today with the uh with with Kelly, 1109 01:00:28,960 --> 01:00:32,080 Speaker 1: and she she pointed out yet the workshow that keeping 1110 01:00:32,080 --> 01:00:34,520 Speaker 1: the major secret did not predict worse health at all, 1111 01:00:34,560 --> 01:00:36,520 Speaker 1: but that she did say that you can argue that 1112 01:00:36,600 --> 01:00:40,040 Speaker 1: secret keeping is still an important part of developing intimacy, etcetera. 1113 01:00:40,240 --> 01:00:43,560 Speaker 1: So you have to factor in all these other aspects 1114 01:00:43,560 --> 01:00:48,560 Speaker 1: of secret keeping, you know, in addition to the health obviously, right. Yeah. 1115 01:00:48,600 --> 01:00:50,720 Speaker 1: So this is not to say like, if if secrecy 1116 01:00:50,800 --> 01:00:53,920 Speaker 1: doesn't actually affect your health, then there's nothing to worry about. 1117 01:00:54,200 --> 01:00:56,760 Speaker 1: You know, it might affect relationships and everything like that, 1118 01:00:57,480 --> 01:01:00,360 Speaker 1: but then maybe it does affect health. And so this 1119 01:01:00,400 --> 01:01:03,200 Speaker 1: is where things just continue to be messy. Kelly is 1120 01:01:03,280 --> 01:01:06,080 Speaker 1: one of the authors of another paper with Robert Rodriguez 1121 01:01:06,160 --> 01:01:09,360 Speaker 1: from two dozen six called Health Effects of Disclosing Secrets 1122 01:01:09,400 --> 01:01:14,600 Speaker 1: to Imagine Accepting versus non Accepting Confidants in the Journal 1123 01:01:14,600 --> 01:01:18,120 Speaker 1: of Social and Clinical Psychology, And this one seems to 1124 01:01:18,160 --> 01:01:20,880 Speaker 1: go back in the other direction, and just to be 1125 01:01:21,000 --> 01:01:23,560 Speaker 1: real quick, basically what this study did is it had 1126 01:01:23,600 --> 01:01:29,200 Speaker 1: students write down confessions of personal secrets while imagining three 1127 01:01:29,200 --> 01:01:34,320 Speaker 1: different conditions, either imagining writing to an accepting confidante somebody 1128 01:01:34,320 --> 01:01:37,720 Speaker 1: who is there listening to you to what you confess 1129 01:01:37,800 --> 01:01:41,160 Speaker 1: and is not judging you to a non accepting confidant 1130 01:01:41,520 --> 01:01:44,600 Speaker 1: or to no confidant, just writing into the void. And 1131 01:01:44,640 --> 01:01:46,680 Speaker 1: what they found was that the students who wrote the 1132 01:01:46,720 --> 01:01:52,560 Speaker 1: confession to an imagined accepting confidant had reported fewer illnesses 1133 01:01:53,160 --> 01:01:56,360 Speaker 1: after eight weeks than did the ones who wrote to 1134 01:01:56,440 --> 01:01:59,760 Speaker 1: a non accepting confidant. And if that that seems kind 1135 01:01:59,760 --> 01:02:03,280 Speaker 1: of believable. But if that's true, that that makes you 1136 01:02:03,320 --> 01:02:06,760 Speaker 1: think that just like the imagining of having a secret 1137 01:02:06,840 --> 01:02:11,520 Speaker 1: accepted or rejected is incredibly powerful and and produces long 1138 01:02:11,600 --> 01:02:13,760 Speaker 1: running stress effects on the body. Well, I mean it 1139 01:02:13,800 --> 01:02:17,160 Speaker 1: comes back down to the idea of survival within groups. 1140 01:02:17,680 --> 01:02:20,480 Speaker 1: You know, for the vast majority of human history. So 1141 01:02:20,600 --> 01:02:22,640 Speaker 1: even in the study of the author's pointed out that 1142 01:02:22,880 --> 01:02:24,760 Speaker 1: you know, if you're if you're keeping personal secrets, you're 1143 01:02:24,800 --> 01:02:29,840 Speaker 1: basically running scenarios about being ostracized for for for the 1144 01:02:29,880 --> 01:02:32,120 Speaker 1: secret you're keeping, and therefore you're kind of in a 1145 01:02:32,440 --> 01:02:36,600 Speaker 1: constant state of fearing your survival. Because again, nowadays, if 1146 01:02:36,600 --> 01:02:40,000 Speaker 1: you're ostracized from your social group, it doesn't necessarily mean 1147 01:02:40,040 --> 01:02:42,760 Speaker 1: you're going to starve to death in the wilderness. But 1148 01:02:43,040 --> 01:02:45,360 Speaker 1: for the vast majority of human history that was more 1149 01:02:45,400 --> 01:02:47,120 Speaker 1: of a reality that was that was more of a 1150 01:02:47,200 --> 01:02:52,439 Speaker 1: legitimate possibility of of being ostracized by your immediate group. Yeah, 1151 01:02:53,400 --> 01:02:54,760 Speaker 1: so I don't know. What. What do you think about 1152 01:02:54,800 --> 01:02:58,080 Speaker 1: the health effects of secrecy, Robert, I'm getting a from 1153 01:02:58,120 --> 01:03:00,960 Speaker 1: the research I've looked at, I'm getting a very jumbled picture. 1154 01:03:01,600 --> 01:03:04,800 Speaker 1: I do think that there is some kind of there 1155 01:03:04,840 --> 01:03:08,440 Speaker 1: does appear to be some kind of correlation between secrecy 1156 01:03:08,480 --> 01:03:13,560 Speaker 1: and some negative health outcomes. But the research does appear 1157 01:03:13,600 --> 01:03:16,320 Speaker 1: to go back and forth, and it's not all always 1158 01:03:16,320 --> 01:03:19,920 Speaker 1: focused on the same question asked the same way every time. 1159 01:03:20,440 --> 01:03:22,560 Speaker 1: So this is one of those areas where I don't 1160 01:03:22,560 --> 01:03:27,000 Speaker 1: feel super confident to pronounce solid discoveries just yet. Yeah, 1161 01:03:27,120 --> 01:03:29,040 Speaker 1: and again, it just it comes back again to the 1162 01:03:29,120 --> 01:03:32,360 Speaker 1: unequal nature of secrets and even like it's going to 1163 01:03:32,440 --> 01:03:35,200 Speaker 1: be relative to the individual, because you could have one 1164 01:03:35,240 --> 01:03:38,040 Speaker 1: individual that can can keep the secret of what happened 1165 01:03:38,040 --> 01:03:40,600 Speaker 1: in the dark cave, uh, you know, and they can 1166 01:03:40,640 --> 01:03:43,040 Speaker 1: just file it away with a lot more ease, you know, 1167 01:03:43,080 --> 01:03:45,760 Speaker 1: maybe maybe maybe due to some sort of unique wiring 1168 01:03:45,800 --> 01:03:48,880 Speaker 1: of their you know, their cognitive equipment, but they're able 1169 01:03:48,920 --> 01:03:52,479 Speaker 1: to sort of compartmentalize it and keep that secret. Someone 1170 01:03:52,520 --> 01:03:54,360 Speaker 1: else they could They could be in the scenario where 1171 01:03:54,400 --> 01:03:56,880 Speaker 1: they cannot sleep at night because they keep remembering the 1172 01:03:57,160 --> 01:04:00,280 Speaker 1: glowing red eyes from the cave. Well, yeah, definitely. Because 1173 01:04:00,960 --> 01:04:03,840 Speaker 1: a secret, obviously, in many of the cases where it's 1174 01:04:03,840 --> 01:04:06,600 Speaker 1: going to be most destructive, is highly related to the 1175 01:04:06,640 --> 01:04:09,200 Speaker 1: idea of guilt or shame. And if you're a type 1176 01:04:09,240 --> 01:04:12,080 Speaker 1: of person who, say, has a low guilt quotient, I 1177 01:04:12,080 --> 01:04:14,400 Speaker 1: don't want to say you're a psychopath or something like that, 1178 01:04:14,440 --> 01:04:17,280 Speaker 1: but if you don't tend to experience much of a 1179 01:04:17,320 --> 01:04:20,880 Speaker 1: guilty conscience, I can't imagine secrets bothering you all that 1180 01:04:21,000 --> 01:04:26,120 Speaker 1: much unless you're just constantly worried about being discovered, you know, 1181 01:04:26,240 --> 01:04:30,680 Speaker 1: not so much worried about the original content of the secret. Yeah, 1182 01:04:30,720 --> 01:04:33,600 Speaker 1: and U. And one way to look at this might 1183 01:04:33,640 --> 01:04:35,680 Speaker 1: be to perform an exercise where you look at your 1184 01:04:35,720 --> 01:04:38,280 Speaker 1: own life and like, move your secrets out of the way, 1185 01:04:38,640 --> 01:04:41,920 Speaker 1: and then think of things that you don't recognize his 1186 01:04:42,040 --> 01:04:45,880 Speaker 1: secrets that but could be reclassified as secrets if you 1187 01:04:45,960 --> 01:04:48,800 Speaker 1: cared enough about them. You know what I'm saying, Give 1188 01:04:48,800 --> 01:04:51,840 Speaker 1: me an example, what do you mean? Okay, so say, 1189 01:04:52,400 --> 01:04:56,120 Speaker 1: let's let's see what would be an example. Um, I 1190 01:04:56,160 --> 01:04:57,880 Speaker 1: guess we guess one would be like what if I 1191 01:04:57,960 --> 01:04:59,800 Speaker 1: what if I stay up one night my wife is 1192 01:04:59,800 --> 01:05:02,800 Speaker 1: gon to bed and I watch say raw Head Rex 1193 01:05:02,920 --> 01:05:07,360 Speaker 1: or some some horror movie of questionable quality, and I'm 1194 01:05:07,400 --> 01:05:10,040 Speaker 1: not I'm not keeping it a secret. It's just in 1195 01:05:10,080 --> 01:05:11,800 Speaker 1: the background. Maybe I don't even tell her because she 1196 01:05:11,960 --> 01:05:15,000 Speaker 1: because I know that she probably doesn't care and doesn't 1197 01:05:15,000 --> 01:05:16,840 Speaker 1: want to hear about the plot of raw Head Rex 1198 01:05:17,080 --> 01:05:20,560 Speaker 1: r um. But if I were to, But but I 1199 01:05:20,560 --> 01:05:23,480 Speaker 1: could re classify that information and say, no, this is 1200 01:05:23,520 --> 01:05:27,080 Speaker 1: a secret. She cannot know about my watching raw Head Rex. 1201 01:05:27,120 --> 01:05:29,560 Speaker 1: You know, if you start sort of tweaking the reasoning 1202 01:05:29,680 --> 01:05:34,320 Speaker 1: for why you didn't reveal this, Uh, then it can 1203 01:05:34,360 --> 01:05:36,840 Speaker 1: it can take on new form. Yeah. I mean, as 1204 01:05:36,840 --> 01:05:39,680 Speaker 1: we talked about earlier, it seems very much that secrecy 1205 01:05:39,720 --> 01:05:42,160 Speaker 1: is in the mind not of the beholder, but of 1206 01:05:42,160 --> 01:05:45,320 Speaker 1: the secret keeper. Uh. And in what they want other 1207 01:05:45,360 --> 01:05:48,080 Speaker 1: people to know. I mean, so you might be a 1208 01:05:48,080 --> 01:05:50,560 Speaker 1: person who ate the whole sleeve of oreos or whatever, 1209 01:05:51,040 --> 01:05:54,000 Speaker 1: or the whole sleeve of saltines for some reason. Uh. 1210 01:05:54,040 --> 01:05:56,960 Speaker 1: And and that's just you know, you're a comedian, and 1211 01:05:57,040 --> 01:05:59,240 Speaker 1: you make it, you build a whole bit around that fact. 1212 01:05:59,280 --> 01:06:01,480 Speaker 1: It's funny I the whole slave of oreos, or you 1213 01:06:01,520 --> 01:06:04,560 Speaker 1: might be a person who's legitimately ashamed and embarrassed and 1214 01:06:04,640 --> 01:06:08,800 Speaker 1: wouldn't want people to know. I think that's a good example. Yeah, 1215 01:06:09,040 --> 01:06:11,400 Speaker 1: And it doesn't have anything to do with the opinions 1216 01:06:11,440 --> 01:06:14,280 Speaker 1: of other people as they exist outside you. It's just 1217 01:06:14,400 --> 01:06:17,120 Speaker 1: what you think about them and what kind of person 1218 01:06:17,160 --> 01:06:19,919 Speaker 1: am I. Yeah, alright, we're gonna take a quick break 1219 01:06:19,960 --> 01:06:21,840 Speaker 1: and we come back. We're going to get into the 1220 01:06:21,880 --> 01:06:25,640 Speaker 1: physical burdens of secrecy and uh and at the very 1221 01:06:25,760 --> 01:06:33,640 Speaker 1: end we'll briefly discuss nudity. Than all right, we're back. So, Robert, 1222 01:06:33,680 --> 01:06:38,760 Speaker 1: here's the thing. Do you ever think about metaphorical perception, Like, 1223 01:06:39,040 --> 01:06:43,040 Speaker 1: it's no surprise that when we perceive physical quantities are 1224 01:06:43,080 --> 01:06:46,720 Speaker 1: perceptions are colored by our thoughts, right, Like, for example, 1225 01:06:46,800 --> 01:06:49,840 Speaker 1: if you're tired, you might estimate that it's actually later 1226 01:06:49,920 --> 01:06:52,320 Speaker 1: in the day than it is, right, something like that 1227 01:06:52,800 --> 01:06:56,480 Speaker 1: makes sense. But one odd way of thinking about influences 1228 01:06:56,480 --> 01:07:01,360 Speaker 1: on our perception is when our metaphors color perception. Here's 1229 01:07:01,360 --> 01:07:04,960 Speaker 1: an example. A two thousand eleven study by Schneider at 1230 01:07:05,000 --> 01:07:08,720 Speaker 1: all I found that if you think the contents of 1231 01:07:08,760 --> 01:07:12,760 Speaker 1: a book are important, you judge the book to weigh 1232 01:07:12,800 --> 01:07:17,480 Speaker 1: more when you hold it. Like so importance. We have 1233 01:07:17,560 --> 01:07:21,240 Speaker 1: a metaphor that says something that's important is heavy. It's 1234 01:07:21,240 --> 01:07:24,439 Speaker 1: a weighty matter. So like someone who puts a lot 1235 01:07:24,520 --> 01:07:28,320 Speaker 1: of faith and say a Bible or a Koran or 1236 01:07:28,320 --> 01:07:31,040 Speaker 1: some of their sacred text like holding it in their hand, 1237 01:07:31,640 --> 01:07:34,920 Speaker 1: there on some level perceiving it as being heavier than 1238 01:07:34,960 --> 01:07:39,160 Speaker 1: an equal, you know, an equally sized, equally weighted volume 1239 01:07:39,280 --> 01:07:44,600 Speaker 1: of say vampire romance romance books. Yeah. Uh, And so 1240 01:07:44,880 --> 01:07:46,720 Speaker 1: I do want to point out that actually the authors 1241 01:07:46,720 --> 01:07:48,600 Speaker 1: of the study I just cited do think that the 1242 01:07:48,600 --> 01:07:51,680 Speaker 1: association between weight and importance is actually deeper than just 1243 01:07:51,760 --> 01:07:58,040 Speaker 1: metaphorical association. But clearly some amount of metaphorical association is there. So, 1244 01:07:58,160 --> 01:08:01,760 Speaker 1: if we conceive of secrets as a burden, as we 1245 01:08:01,880 --> 01:08:04,600 Speaker 1: often have throughout the episode, uh, you know, it's something 1246 01:08:04,640 --> 01:08:08,480 Speaker 1: you're carrying around with you, does that exact a metaphorical 1247 01:08:09,080 --> 01:08:12,960 Speaker 1: psychological toll on the body and the mind? Does your 1248 01:08:13,000 --> 01:08:16,920 Speaker 1: body treat you as if you're carrying something when you're 1249 01:08:16,960 --> 01:08:21,160 Speaker 1: carrying a secret, carrying something heavy? That's an interesting idea. 1250 01:08:21,200 --> 01:08:23,960 Speaker 1: I mean, I've actually heard people say, oh, so and 1251 01:08:24,000 --> 01:08:26,720 Speaker 1: so really laid some heavy stuff on me, you know, 1252 01:08:27,200 --> 01:08:29,080 Speaker 1: like bringing to mind the idea that you were you 1253 01:08:29,080 --> 01:08:31,439 Speaker 1: were on the ground, and they have they have physically 1254 01:08:31,439 --> 01:08:33,040 Speaker 1: placed a weight on your body, and now it is 1255 01:08:33,040 --> 01:08:35,280 Speaker 1: more difficult to move because of it. I want to 1256 01:08:35,280 --> 01:08:38,639 Speaker 1: cite a scientifically rigorous case study, which is that there's 1257 01:08:38,720 --> 01:08:41,800 Speaker 1: a scene where there's a character on The Sopranos who's uh, 1258 01:08:42,439 --> 01:08:45,040 Speaker 1: one of the early seasons, who's constantly having back pain, 1259 01:08:45,520 --> 01:08:48,600 Speaker 1: and it turns out this character is harboring a secret betrayal, 1260 01:08:49,160 --> 01:08:52,559 Speaker 1: and the psychiatrist character in the show, she says, you know, well, 1261 01:08:52,600 --> 01:08:55,960 Speaker 1: a secret is a heavy load. It might cause feelings 1262 01:08:56,000 --> 01:08:58,680 Speaker 1: like that. Now, of course that's fiction, but I can 1263 01:08:58,680 --> 01:09:01,920 Speaker 1: see things like that happening in real life. But of 1264 01:09:01,920 --> 01:09:05,240 Speaker 1: course that's just our intuition. How about if we test it. Well, 1265 01:09:05,400 --> 01:09:09,960 Speaker 1: some people have been testing this and the answers are complicated. 1266 01:09:10,000 --> 01:09:12,400 Speaker 1: This is another one, I'm sorry to say where the 1267 01:09:12,439 --> 01:09:15,320 Speaker 1: answers are not clear. Uh that there's gonna be some 1268 01:09:15,360 --> 01:09:17,680 Speaker 1: back and forth in complications. So you've gotta stick with 1269 01:09:17,760 --> 01:09:20,960 Speaker 1: us for a minute. So there's an original study from 1270 01:09:21,200 --> 01:09:24,360 Speaker 1: two thousand twelve in the Journal of experimental psychology by 1271 01:09:24,680 --> 01:09:29,080 Speaker 1: Michael Slapian at All called the Physical Burdens of Secrecy, 1272 01:09:29,240 --> 01:09:32,479 Speaker 1: in which the researchers found that people who kept big 1273 01:09:32,520 --> 01:09:37,439 Speaker 1: secrets such as marital infidelity or sexual orientation made different 1274 01:09:37,600 --> 01:09:43,200 Speaker 1: judgments of physical quantities having to do with work. So, 1275 01:09:43,280 --> 01:09:46,240 Speaker 1: for example, test subjects who were made to think about 1276 01:09:46,280 --> 01:09:49,160 Speaker 1: a secret that they kept, either a big secret or 1277 01:09:49,200 --> 01:09:52,439 Speaker 1: a small secret. They were then asked to look at 1278 01:09:52,520 --> 01:09:55,719 Speaker 1: some pictures. So the ones who had been thinking about 1279 01:09:55,760 --> 01:10:00,959 Speaker 1: a big secret judged a pictured hill to be steeper. 1280 01:10:01,920 --> 01:10:04,879 Speaker 1: Just looking at the photo of a head on hill slope, 1281 01:10:05,240 --> 01:10:08,879 Speaker 1: People who had been thinking about a quote big secret 1282 01:10:09,320 --> 01:10:12,240 Speaker 1: thought that the incline was about forty six degrees, as 1283 01:10:12,240 --> 01:10:15,400 Speaker 1: opposed to people who thought about a small secret, who 1284 01:10:15,400 --> 01:10:18,599 Speaker 1: thought that it was about thirty three degrees. They also 1285 01:10:18,680 --> 01:10:22,599 Speaker 1: apparently judge distances to be farther. Now, this was tested 1286 01:10:22,640 --> 01:10:26,360 Speaker 1: by having subjects toss bean bags towards a target. Those 1287 01:10:26,400 --> 01:10:29,840 Speaker 1: who thought about a big secret through their bean bags farther, 1288 01:10:30,600 --> 01:10:33,280 Speaker 1: which the researchers interpreted to mean that they judged the 1289 01:10:33,320 --> 01:10:36,760 Speaker 1: distance to the target to be greater. Also, in a 1290 01:10:36,840 --> 01:10:39,839 Speaker 1: separate test among subjects who had cheated on their partner. 1291 01:10:40,479 --> 01:10:44,479 Speaker 1: They found that the subjects who reported more psychological burden 1292 01:10:44,640 --> 01:10:47,599 Speaker 1: from their infidelity, meaning those who thought about it more, 1293 01:10:48,240 --> 01:10:52,200 Speaker 1: judge tasks like carrying groceries and helping someone move to 1294 01:10:52,360 --> 01:10:56,800 Speaker 1: require more effort. And then a final study found that 1295 01:10:57,280 --> 01:11:00,840 Speaker 1: a test group who had to conceal their sexual orientation 1296 01:11:01,479 --> 01:11:04,839 Speaker 1: was less likely to help with physical work like moving 1297 01:11:04,920 --> 01:11:07,760 Speaker 1: stacks of books than a control group who had to 1298 01:11:07,800 --> 01:11:13,840 Speaker 1: conceal an uncontroversial personality fact like your level of extra version. So, 1299 01:11:13,920 --> 01:11:18,000 Speaker 1: other studies have shown that people carrying a heavy load 1300 01:11:18,560 --> 01:11:21,719 Speaker 1: judge hills to be steeper and distances to be farther, 1301 01:11:22,400 --> 01:11:24,840 Speaker 1: and that you can kind of see why that would be, right. 1302 01:11:24,880 --> 01:11:28,200 Speaker 1: The implication here is that the mind is interpreting the 1303 01:11:28,280 --> 01:11:31,960 Speaker 1: secret as it would a literal burden. Yeah, and I 1304 01:11:32,000 --> 01:11:34,360 Speaker 1: mean you could also take it apart and say that 1305 01:11:34,960 --> 01:11:38,400 Speaker 1: it's almost as if the individual knows that it's going 1306 01:11:38,439 --> 01:11:40,679 Speaker 1: to not only there gonna have to climb that hill, 1307 01:11:40,680 --> 01:11:43,240 Speaker 1: but they have to climb the hill while thinking about 1308 01:11:43,240 --> 01:11:46,000 Speaker 1: this secret, like this secret around in their head. Yeah, 1309 01:11:46,000 --> 01:11:49,240 Speaker 1: and sorry if that point isn't clear. Like so one 1310 01:11:49,280 --> 01:11:51,320 Speaker 1: thing that's been shown in researches. You put a heavy 1311 01:11:51,360 --> 01:11:55,240 Speaker 1: backpack on. Somebody, once they've got that heavy backpack on, 1312 01:11:55,400 --> 01:11:57,960 Speaker 1: they think a hill looks steeper than the same person 1313 01:11:58,000 --> 01:12:01,280 Speaker 1: without a backpack, or they think a distant target looks 1314 01:12:01,320 --> 01:12:04,840 Speaker 1: farther away than without that backpack on. And and that 1315 01:12:04,840 --> 01:12:07,679 Speaker 1: that's physically, I mean, you can see why that would be. 1316 01:12:07,760 --> 01:12:11,640 Speaker 1: You're factoring in the expense of doing it with this 1317 01:12:11,760 --> 01:12:15,040 Speaker 1: extra weight. And so the question is does this psychological 1318 01:12:15,120 --> 01:12:18,800 Speaker 1: weight play a similar role in the mind. Now, none 1319 01:12:18,840 --> 01:12:21,400 Speaker 1: of these studies actually say you get a better workout 1320 01:12:21,479 --> 01:12:23,599 Speaker 1: with a heavy seat, because otherwise that's what you need 1321 01:12:23,600 --> 01:12:25,320 Speaker 1: in a personal training and be like, all right, you're 1322 01:12:25,320 --> 01:12:27,360 Speaker 1: gonna really get out, You're gonna kill it today. And 1323 01:12:27,400 --> 01:12:31,519 Speaker 1: speaking of killing, I want killed a Doberman pincher. Now, 1324 01:12:31,560 --> 01:12:33,640 Speaker 1: go out, go go go get it, go go go 1325 01:12:33,800 --> 01:12:37,479 Speaker 1: kill it. Uh, none of the research is saying that. No. 1326 01:12:37,600 --> 01:12:39,960 Speaker 1: In fact, you'd imagine it's probably the opposite, right, Like, 1327 01:12:40,040 --> 01:12:43,120 Speaker 1: you're you're not getting the physical benefits of of having 1328 01:12:43,439 --> 01:12:45,320 Speaker 1: you know, a weight belt on in your workout, but 1329 01:12:45,360 --> 01:12:49,519 Speaker 1: you're having the mental difficulty of getting through your workout 1330 01:12:50,200 --> 01:12:53,880 Speaker 1: bearing this this load. Right. Yeah, yeah, Now, I want 1331 01:12:53,880 --> 01:12:55,920 Speaker 1: to I want to stress, as I said, going in 1332 01:12:55,960 --> 01:12:58,839 Speaker 1: that there's some complications to this, and so we shouldn't 1333 01:12:58,880 --> 01:13:01,920 Speaker 1: just take these results at face value. But before we 1334 01:13:01,960 --> 01:13:04,280 Speaker 1: get to the complications, I want to talk about one 1335 01:13:04,320 --> 01:13:06,840 Speaker 1: more follow up study by Slapy and Massa Campo and 1336 01:13:06,920 --> 01:13:11,840 Speaker 1: Embody called Relieving the Burdens of Secrecy. Revealing secrets influences 1337 01:13:11,920 --> 01:13:15,160 Speaker 1: judgments of hill slant and distance, and so this was 1338 01:13:15,200 --> 01:13:17,719 Speaker 1: a follow up study, and the authors found that making 1339 01:13:17,840 --> 01:13:20,800 Speaker 1: test subjects think about a secret caused them to see 1340 01:13:20,840 --> 01:13:23,960 Speaker 1: distances is longer and hills is steeper yet again, but 1341 01:13:24,040 --> 01:13:27,879 Speaker 1: that anonymously revealing details of a secret seemed to mostly 1342 01:13:27,960 --> 01:13:31,919 Speaker 1: eliminate this effect. And as in the first study, estimates 1343 01:13:31,920 --> 01:13:36,320 Speaker 1: were altered for perceptions of physical space relating to body exertion, 1344 01:13:36,400 --> 01:13:39,120 Speaker 1: but not to numerical estimates generally, So you could have 1345 01:13:39,120 --> 01:13:42,479 Speaker 1: people estimate other kinds of things that aren't related to 1346 01:13:42,520 --> 01:13:45,160 Speaker 1: how your body would need to do some work, and 1347 01:13:45,320 --> 01:13:47,640 Speaker 1: it doesn't seem to affect that, so it wouldn't make 1348 01:13:47,640 --> 01:13:51,880 Speaker 1: you bad at math. It's not just not just that 1349 01:13:51,960 --> 01:13:56,320 Speaker 1: having a secret makes you generally estimate higher numbers. It's 1350 01:13:56,360 --> 01:13:59,120 Speaker 1: that specifically would make things that you might have to 1351 01:13:59,360 --> 01:14:04,559 Speaker 1: like distances or slopes, you'd after traverse look more difficult. Okay, 1352 01:14:04,600 --> 01:14:06,880 Speaker 1: so that's the follow up study. It seems like that 1353 01:14:07,040 --> 01:14:10,679 Speaker 1: they find that in addition to their original findings, if 1354 01:14:10,760 --> 01:14:14,120 Speaker 1: you if you reveal your secret, you might get some relief. 1355 01:14:15,040 --> 01:14:17,960 Speaker 1: But it's good to check for follow up research because 1356 01:14:17,960 --> 01:14:21,960 Speaker 1: in this case, other studies attempted to replicate slapians original 1357 01:14:22,000 --> 01:14:25,080 Speaker 1: research from two thousand twelve and failed to get the 1358 01:14:25,160 --> 01:14:29,960 Speaker 1: same results. Um, so I wanna cite this one by 1359 01:14:30,479 --> 01:14:34,080 Speaker 1: perture at all. The burden of secrecy, no effect on 1360 01:14:34,160 --> 01:14:36,720 Speaker 1: hills land estimation, and bean bag throwing. And this is 1361 01:14:36,760 --> 01:14:41,360 Speaker 1: in the Journal of Experimental Psychology. Some bean bag throwing 1362 01:14:41,400 --> 01:14:45,080 Speaker 1: in that in that that article title. Though, yeah, yeah, 1363 01:14:45,120 --> 01:14:46,839 Speaker 1: it's a little it might be a little bit salty. 1364 01:14:46,880 --> 01:14:49,560 Speaker 1: But they're also very polite and that they thank Slapian 1365 01:14:49,680 --> 01:14:52,320 Speaker 1: for they say he cooperated with them and trying to 1366 01:14:52,360 --> 01:14:56,360 Speaker 1: help them replicate the experiments exactly. So, yeah, they replicated 1367 01:14:56,400 --> 01:14:58,840 Speaker 1: the experimental procedure as closely as they could with the 1368 01:14:58,880 --> 01:15:02,360 Speaker 1: help of Michael Slapy, and they failed to replicate the 1369 01:15:02,400 --> 01:15:06,759 Speaker 1: findings of the original study, calling those results into question. Also, 1370 01:15:06,840 --> 01:15:10,759 Speaker 1: it's worth noting that these researchers had larger sample sizes 1371 01:15:10,800 --> 01:15:15,439 Speaker 1: in their replications study, giving their results greater statistical weight. Uh. 1372 01:15:15,520 --> 01:15:19,280 Speaker 1: They also performed a meta analysis combining with other existing 1373 01:15:19,280 --> 01:15:22,920 Speaker 1: attempts to replicate the original results, some of which claimed 1374 01:15:22,960 --> 01:15:25,760 Speaker 1: to find the same results. But they found that when 1375 01:15:25,800 --> 01:15:30,040 Speaker 1: results were combined across the existing studies, the correlation between 1376 01:15:30,080 --> 01:15:32,920 Speaker 1: having a big secret and the judgment of a steep 1377 01:15:32,960 --> 01:15:36,920 Speaker 1: looking hill was not significant. However, there may be some 1378 01:15:37,040 --> 01:15:39,800 Speaker 1: nuance here. So now everything's up in the air, right, 1379 01:15:39,840 --> 01:15:42,360 Speaker 1: you have this original study of claims to find this effect, 1380 01:15:42,479 --> 01:15:45,040 Speaker 1: people look for it with even larger sample sizes and 1381 01:15:45,080 --> 01:15:48,880 Speaker 1: don't find anything at all. Uh, And so what's going on? 1382 01:15:49,479 --> 01:15:52,720 Speaker 1: Are we just in bogus land here? Well, Slapian did 1383 01:15:52,800 --> 01:15:55,960 Speaker 1: try to introduce some nuance with another study, and this 1384 01:15:56,040 --> 01:15:58,720 Speaker 1: might get at what the problem was. So what he 1385 01:15:58,800 --> 01:16:02,519 Speaker 1: claims is in a study from that, Maybe it's the 1386 01:16:03,160 --> 01:16:07,080 Speaker 1: problem was dealing with this supposed size of the secret, Right, 1387 01:16:07,120 --> 01:16:09,879 Speaker 1: they were dealing with these concepts of a big secret 1388 01:16:10,040 --> 01:16:14,200 Speaker 1: versus a small secret. And maybe it's not actually that 1389 01:16:14,280 --> 01:16:16,920 Speaker 1: the size of the secret has any effect on how 1390 01:16:16,960 --> 01:16:19,240 Speaker 1: you judge the steepness of the hill, but that a 1391 01:16:19,360 --> 01:16:24,360 Speaker 1: person's level of preoccupation with the secret does more reliably 1392 01:16:24,439 --> 01:16:26,920 Speaker 1: predict how steep the hill seems. In other words, it's 1393 01:16:26,920 --> 01:16:31,000 Speaker 1: not really what the secret is, it's how much the secret, 1394 01:16:31,080 --> 01:16:33,719 Speaker 1: larger or small, is eating away at you and keeps 1395 01:16:33,760 --> 01:16:38,280 Speaker 1: intruding on your mind. Okay, so here's a possible example. Um, 1396 01:16:38,439 --> 01:16:43,320 Speaker 1: what if I told you do not tell Christian that 1397 01:16:43,360 --> 01:16:48,479 Speaker 1: I bought a new box of pins and pins of pens. 1398 01:16:48,520 --> 01:16:51,320 Speaker 1: Ink pens, Oh, ink pens, don't tell. I was imagining 1399 01:16:51,320 --> 01:16:53,800 Speaker 1: like pins like a pincushion, Like, what are you going 1400 01:16:53,840 --> 01:16:56,679 Speaker 1: to do with pens? Stick them into the Christian doll? 1401 01:16:56,880 --> 01:16:58,640 Speaker 1: We'll see. That's the thing. You wouldn't know, you, So 1402 01:16:58,760 --> 01:17:01,040 Speaker 1: you might find yourself running this through your head. Why 1403 01:17:01,040 --> 01:17:02,439 Speaker 1: does he want me to keep the secret of the 1404 01:17:02,479 --> 01:17:04,280 Speaker 1: inkpens and just a new box of ink pens? What 1405 01:17:04,280 --> 01:17:06,519 Speaker 1: could what could possibly be going on? So, even though 1406 01:17:06,520 --> 01:17:09,760 Speaker 1: there's no actual weight to it, you might return to 1407 01:17:09,840 --> 01:17:11,559 Speaker 1: it again and again just trying to figure out why 1408 01:17:11,640 --> 01:17:15,519 Speaker 1: it's a secret. So that that's that's my one possible 1409 01:17:15,560 --> 01:17:19,080 Speaker 1: take on that, because otherwise, if it's not an important secret, 1410 01:17:19,080 --> 01:17:20,960 Speaker 1: why would you come back to it unless there's something 1411 01:17:21,000 --> 01:17:25,400 Speaker 1: cantalizing about it, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, or you're 1412 01:17:25,400 --> 01:17:27,280 Speaker 1: really proud of it. That could be another example. So 1413 01:17:27,400 --> 01:17:29,519 Speaker 1: like the boss that you're you know, really hoping to 1414 01:17:29,520 --> 01:17:32,479 Speaker 1: be in the ends with, they share some just you know, dumb, 1415 01:17:32,640 --> 01:17:35,400 Speaker 1: sup work secret. But then you keep thinking, oh, man, 1416 01:17:35,840 --> 01:17:38,120 Speaker 1: they shared the secret with me. This is I'm on 1417 01:17:38,160 --> 01:17:41,080 Speaker 1: the inside. Now I'm I'm I'm in the upper echelon, 1418 01:17:41,160 --> 01:17:43,920 Speaker 1: this is I'm on my way up. Well that that's 1419 01:17:43,960 --> 01:17:47,320 Speaker 1: another thing is that the secrets in these studies are 1420 01:17:47,360 --> 01:17:50,040 Speaker 1: almost always just assumed to be negative. I mean in 1421 01:17:50,080 --> 01:17:53,120 Speaker 1: those few cases. And I think that's been our discussion 1422 01:17:53,160 --> 01:17:55,960 Speaker 1: so far as that most secrets do have negative connotations. 1423 01:17:56,000 --> 01:17:58,639 Speaker 1: But in those cases where you're keeping some positive secret, 1424 01:17:58,960 --> 01:18:01,760 Speaker 1: would that have the same kind of effect? Man, would 1425 01:18:01,760 --> 01:18:04,519 Speaker 1: that also make you feel weighed down? Like he like 1426 01:18:04,640 --> 01:18:07,400 Speaker 1: your secret is you were a part of the surprise committee. 1427 01:18:07,400 --> 01:18:10,719 Speaker 1: You're a part of this the surprise birthday party committee. 1428 01:18:10,760 --> 01:18:15,120 Speaker 1: Like that's it's just full of fun. Christian with pens, Yeah, yeah, 1429 01:18:15,160 --> 01:18:17,080 Speaker 1: he loves pens and these I didn't mention that these 1430 01:18:17,120 --> 01:18:19,479 Speaker 1: were all you know that each one's themed after his 1431 01:18:19,600 --> 01:18:22,439 Speaker 1: favorite uh, you know, comic book character. So he's gonna 1432 01:18:22,479 --> 01:18:27,280 Speaker 1: love him. Okay, is there like a pin man? That's 1433 01:18:27,320 --> 01:18:31,080 Speaker 1: the brand pin Man pens Yes, okay, well, anyway, one 1434 01:18:31,080 --> 01:18:33,479 Speaker 1: more thing about that study that they also said that 1435 01:18:33,520 --> 01:18:36,799 Speaker 1: the effect seemed to be mediated by the quote judged 1436 01:18:36,920 --> 01:18:40,559 Speaker 1: effort to keep a secret. So people subjectively report how 1437 01:18:40,640 --> 01:18:45,240 Speaker 1: much difficulty they're having keeping a secret, how much it takes. Uh. 1438 01:18:45,320 --> 01:18:48,600 Speaker 1: And so that may be a literal adaptation for resource conservation, 1439 01:18:48,680 --> 01:18:52,639 Speaker 1: because you're saying it's it's taking effort. Okay, so where 1440 01:18:52,640 --> 01:18:56,080 Speaker 1: are we now? I mean, this is frustrating because, as 1441 01:18:56,320 --> 01:18:58,920 Speaker 1: is often the case I'm sure you've experienced before, Robert, 1442 01:18:58,920 --> 01:19:02,040 Speaker 1: when you get into research, is especially in social psychology, 1443 01:19:02,080 --> 01:19:05,839 Speaker 1: that there are these these results that are just messy 1444 01:19:05,960 --> 01:19:09,320 Speaker 1: and all over the place, and I feel like methodologies 1445 01:19:09,360 --> 01:19:12,120 Speaker 1: are not always unified. You always feel like I wish 1446 01:19:12,120 --> 01:19:17,240 Speaker 1: people were asking the same question instead of related questions. Yeah. Well, 1447 01:19:17,240 --> 01:19:20,400 Speaker 1: it just it comes back again to just the changing 1448 01:19:20,479 --> 01:19:22,360 Speaker 1: nature of the secret and you cannot just put a 1449 01:19:22,360 --> 01:19:25,280 Speaker 1: secret in a Petri dish and and and use it 1450 01:19:25,320 --> 01:19:28,439 Speaker 1: in your experiment. Yeah. And you see that demonstrated time 1451 01:19:28,439 --> 01:19:31,040 Speaker 1: and time again with these results. And that actually is 1452 01:19:31,080 --> 01:19:33,599 Speaker 1: one of the things that feeds into the last paper 1453 01:19:33,640 --> 01:19:35,920 Speaker 1: I want to talk about, which is more work from 1454 01:19:35,920 --> 01:19:39,960 Speaker 1: Michael Slapian with Jen shock Chun and Miliam Mason in 1455 01:19:40,080 --> 01:19:42,439 Speaker 1: the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. I think this 1456 01:19:42,520 --> 01:19:46,000 Speaker 1: is just coming out called the Experience of Secrecy, And 1457 01:19:46,080 --> 01:19:49,919 Speaker 1: so this isn't following specifically on the burdensomeness of secrecy, 1458 01:19:49,960 --> 01:19:52,320 Speaker 1: whether there's anything to that or not. We can leave 1459 01:19:52,360 --> 01:19:54,800 Speaker 1: that up in the air for now. Yeah. This this 1460 01:19:54,880 --> 01:19:58,519 Speaker 1: is more this team trying to say, Okay, what is 1461 01:19:58,640 --> 01:20:02,160 Speaker 1: secrecy really? We need a new redefined theory of what 1462 01:20:02,240 --> 01:20:05,240 Speaker 1: secrecy is if we're going to study it. And so 1463 01:20:05,320 --> 01:20:07,920 Speaker 1: they start by saying, you know, attempts to describe secrecy 1464 01:20:08,080 --> 01:20:12,320 Speaker 1: are hampered by some problems. Why hasn't there been all 1465 01:20:12,360 --> 01:20:15,040 Speaker 1: that much research on secrecy? Well, one of the things 1466 01:20:15,160 --> 01:20:18,639 Speaker 1: is it's hard to study. By definition, secrets are things 1467 01:20:18,680 --> 01:20:21,720 Speaker 1: that people try to hide. So if you want to 1468 01:20:21,760 --> 01:20:24,880 Speaker 1: go with real secrets that people hold that are about 1469 01:20:24,920 --> 01:20:29,200 Speaker 1: their lives, it's difficult to reliably coax those secrets out 1470 01:20:29,560 --> 01:20:33,680 Speaker 1: in an experimental framework and manipulate them. You always wonder like, 1471 01:20:33,680 --> 01:20:38,120 Speaker 1: are people really being honest? Uh? And are people and 1472 01:20:38,120 --> 01:20:40,400 Speaker 1: and different secrets are going to have different weight to 1473 01:20:40,439 --> 01:20:44,840 Speaker 1: people write like it's hard to manipulate the secret variable yeah, 1474 01:20:45,560 --> 01:20:47,360 Speaker 1: it's hard to You probably are not having a lot 1475 01:20:47,360 --> 01:20:50,240 Speaker 1: of bring your own secret experiments here. You know you're 1476 01:20:50,240 --> 01:20:52,160 Speaker 1: going to provide something. It's going to basically come back 1477 01:20:52,160 --> 01:20:54,840 Speaker 1: to the kindergarten scenario where there's a puppet with a 1478 01:20:54,840 --> 01:20:57,559 Speaker 1: book of secrets, and this is a stand for secrets. Yes, 1479 01:20:57,640 --> 01:20:59,759 Speaker 1: that's what a lot of the research does, is provides 1480 01:20:59,800 --> 01:21:02,439 Speaker 1: you secret. But when you're provided with a secret in 1481 01:21:02,479 --> 01:21:05,120 Speaker 1: a research environment, the secrets trivial. I mean, it just 1482 01:21:05,160 --> 01:21:07,360 Speaker 1: doesn't really mean anything to you. So you're probably not 1483 01:21:07,400 --> 01:21:09,760 Speaker 1: going to treat it like you would a secret that's 1484 01:21:09,800 --> 01:21:13,040 Speaker 1: relevant to your personal life. And if it's relevant to 1485 01:21:13,080 --> 01:21:16,240 Speaker 1: your personal life, you might ask people, do you have 1486 01:21:16,280 --> 01:21:18,599 Speaker 1: a secret? You know, for the purpose of an experiment, 1487 01:21:18,640 --> 01:21:21,000 Speaker 1: think about that secret now, do X, Y and Z. 1488 01:21:21,720 --> 01:21:24,519 Speaker 1: One person might be thinking about I cheated on my spouse, 1489 01:21:24,600 --> 01:21:27,840 Speaker 1: and the other person might be thinking about I secretly 1490 01:21:28,000 --> 01:21:30,439 Speaker 1: want to write a comic book or something, you know 1491 01:21:30,479 --> 01:21:33,360 Speaker 1: what I mean. They're just not really equivalent. And if 1492 01:21:33,360 --> 01:21:36,400 Speaker 1: you were somehow able to draw in someone's actual secrets 1493 01:21:36,400 --> 01:21:38,599 Speaker 1: into the experiment, it ceases to be a scientific experiment. 1494 01:21:38,600 --> 01:21:42,400 Speaker 1: It becomes like a like a jigsaw killer s right, 1495 01:21:42,680 --> 01:21:45,200 Speaker 1: like that could basically be an entire horror movie, right there, 1496 01:21:45,280 --> 01:21:49,120 Speaker 1: someone experimenting on people and using their real dark secrets 1497 01:21:49,160 --> 01:21:51,920 Speaker 1: to their advantage. Right. So, so there's all this difficulty 1498 01:21:52,000 --> 01:21:56,360 Speaker 1: in this research area. Secrets are incredibly important psychological phenomenon. 1499 01:21:56,439 --> 01:21:58,920 Speaker 1: I think it totally matters to study them, but they're 1500 01:21:58,960 --> 01:22:02,320 Speaker 1: just hard to study to you rigorously. And another thing 1501 01:22:02,520 --> 01:22:04,639 Speaker 1: the author's point out is they think prior research has 1502 01:22:04,680 --> 01:22:09,400 Speaker 1: defined secrecy too narrowly. Uh So they make this point, 1503 01:22:09,400 --> 01:22:11,280 Speaker 1: and I think this gets into something we've actually been 1504 01:22:11,320 --> 01:22:13,760 Speaker 1: talking about throughout the episode. Now, they say, you know, 1505 01:22:13,840 --> 01:22:18,120 Speaker 1: previous research is focused almost entirely on secrecy as deliberate 1506 01:22:18,439 --> 01:22:24,760 Speaker 1: interpersonal concealment, preventing other people from finding out something, either 1507 01:22:24,840 --> 01:22:28,840 Speaker 1: omitting information or actively deceiving in order to hide a 1508 01:22:28,840 --> 01:22:32,559 Speaker 1: piece of knowledge from another person or persons. And the 1509 01:22:32,600 --> 01:22:35,839 Speaker 1: authors here propose a model of secrecy that is instead 1510 01:22:36,080 --> 01:22:40,080 Speaker 1: intra personal. While the ultimate goal of secrecy is to 1511 01:22:40,200 --> 01:22:45,040 Speaker 1: prevent other people from knowing something, the primary experience of secrecy, 1512 01:22:45,160 --> 01:22:49,480 Speaker 1: what it's like to have a secret, is mostly intra personal. 1513 01:22:49,600 --> 01:22:54,439 Speaker 1: It's inside. Uh it's again ala Lane and Wagner. I 1514 01:22:54,479 --> 01:22:57,960 Speaker 1: think we mentioned this earlier secrecy is something you can 1515 01:22:58,000 --> 01:23:01,160 Speaker 1: do alone in a room. It's just you rolling the 1516 01:23:01,200 --> 01:23:03,800 Speaker 1: secret back and forth in your head. Uh, you know, 1517 01:23:04,720 --> 01:23:07,720 Speaker 1: contemplating the contents of the secret. But also you know, 1518 01:23:07,760 --> 01:23:10,280 Speaker 1: what are they going to be effects if you share 1519 01:23:10,280 --> 01:23:14,800 Speaker 1: the secret with someone else, either intentionally or unintentionally, right, 1520 01:23:14,960 --> 01:23:18,840 Speaker 1: or thinking about the contents of the secret itself, not 1521 01:23:18,920 --> 01:23:22,120 Speaker 1: even just like the disclosures, like you might be obsessing 1522 01:23:22,120 --> 01:23:25,719 Speaker 1: over whatever it is that's bringing you trouble, how people 1523 01:23:25,760 --> 01:23:28,720 Speaker 1: would react. I mean, yeah, there's so much to roll 1524 01:23:28,880 --> 01:23:31,880 Speaker 1: through in your brain. And so the authors here try 1525 01:23:31,920 --> 01:23:36,519 Speaker 1: to redefine secrecy not as the act of concealment from others, 1526 01:23:36,520 --> 01:23:40,320 Speaker 1: but is the state of mind the intention to conceal 1527 01:23:40,439 --> 01:23:43,920 Speaker 1: information from others. So, and another thing they point out 1528 01:23:43,960 --> 01:23:47,640 Speaker 1: is that not every act of inhibition and conversation is secrecy. 1529 01:23:47,720 --> 01:23:50,000 Speaker 1: I think this is a very good point. Actually, there 1530 01:23:50,000 --> 01:23:53,760 Speaker 1: are hundreds of ways that you practice inhibition and keep 1531 01:23:53,840 --> 01:23:58,120 Speaker 1: yourself from saying certain kinds of things during interaction with others. 1532 01:23:58,160 --> 01:24:01,160 Speaker 1: But most of these don't have to with keeping specific 1533 01:24:01,240 --> 01:24:04,240 Speaker 1: personal information a secret, right. Most of them have to 1534 01:24:04,240 --> 01:24:08,920 Speaker 1: do with something like manners or appropriateness. You're not trying 1535 01:24:08,960 --> 01:24:11,880 Speaker 1: to prevent people from finding something out. You're just trying 1536 01:24:11,960 --> 01:24:16,559 Speaker 1: not to say something that would be not appropriate to say. Yeah, 1537 01:24:16,640 --> 01:24:18,599 Speaker 1: And to come back to what we're talking earlier about 1538 01:24:18,600 --> 01:24:20,360 Speaker 1: four or five and six year olds like you see 1539 01:24:20,400 --> 01:24:24,840 Speaker 1: all that coming online as well, the gradual realization that 1540 01:24:24,840 --> 01:24:28,680 Speaker 1: that not everything is that is appropriate, uh, you know, 1541 01:24:28,760 --> 01:24:31,559 Speaker 1: content for discussion. You know, you can't share every detail 1542 01:24:31,680 --> 01:24:35,599 Speaker 1: of your your latest bathroom break just because it happened, 1543 01:24:35,640 --> 01:24:38,920 Speaker 1: and you're that kind of like free sharing soul, right. 1544 01:24:39,600 --> 01:24:42,080 Speaker 1: So yeah, So if it's possible that there's a personal 1545 01:24:42,160 --> 01:24:45,800 Speaker 1: fact about you that you wouldn't want other people to know, 1546 01:24:46,720 --> 01:24:50,600 Speaker 1: and yet it never comes up in conversation and nobody 1547 01:24:50,680 --> 01:24:54,080 Speaker 1: ever asks you about it. If that's the case, is 1548 01:24:54,120 --> 01:24:56,840 Speaker 1: it a secret, Well, I'd still say yes, even if 1549 01:24:56,840 --> 01:25:00,280 Speaker 1: there's never any occasion where you have to act to 1550 01:25:00,360 --> 01:25:03,760 Speaker 1: conceal it. It's just because you don't want people to 1551 01:25:03,840 --> 01:25:06,479 Speaker 1: know that it is a secret, I would agree with that, yes. 1552 01:25:06,600 --> 01:25:09,040 Speaker 1: So yeah, in that case, it seems like secrecy is 1553 01:25:09,080 --> 01:25:12,519 Speaker 1: defined primarily by the intent of the concealer, not by 1554 01:25:12,560 --> 01:25:16,679 Speaker 1: the behavior of the concealer. I mean, for instance, your 1555 01:25:17,080 --> 01:25:21,559 Speaker 1: email password or your bank account information is essentially a secret, 1556 01:25:22,360 --> 01:25:24,920 Speaker 1: but I don't think it necessarily. I mean, it might 1557 01:25:24,960 --> 01:25:27,680 Speaker 1: bring a certain amount of physical or mental anguish to 1558 01:25:27,760 --> 01:25:30,479 Speaker 1: remember those passwords, but for the most part, you're not 1559 01:25:30,520 --> 01:25:34,000 Speaker 1: sitting around like anguishing over this secret keeping that's taking 1560 01:25:34,040 --> 01:25:37,559 Speaker 1: place regarding your Gmail password. That's a good point. I mean, 1561 01:25:37,640 --> 01:25:40,320 Speaker 1: if secrets do, if they are some kind of burden, 1562 01:25:40,439 --> 01:25:42,479 Speaker 1: or if they do have some kind of effect on us, 1563 01:25:42,800 --> 01:25:45,120 Speaker 1: why does it seem to be that these these studies 1564 01:25:45,160 --> 01:25:49,080 Speaker 1: are only focused on the sort of negative affect of 1565 01:25:49,439 --> 01:25:53,240 Speaker 1: facts about ourselves as opposed to just like secret information 1566 01:25:53,280 --> 01:25:57,120 Speaker 1: that has kept confidential for totally utilitarian reasons. Yeah, it's 1567 01:25:57,120 --> 01:25:59,400 Speaker 1: like most of the secrets tend to be story shaped 1568 01:25:59,479 --> 01:26:03,800 Speaker 1: secrets as opposed to just coded secrets or just informational secrets. Right. 1569 01:26:03,880 --> 01:26:05,640 Speaker 1: That's a really good point. I mean, I wonder what 1570 01:26:05,760 --> 01:26:09,160 Speaker 1: the difference is psychologically, How does your body react differently 1571 01:26:09,200 --> 01:26:11,960 Speaker 1: to them, if at all? Um So, Yeah, but we 1572 01:26:12,040 --> 01:26:14,519 Speaker 1: spend a lot of time alone with our secrets, and 1573 01:26:14,720 --> 01:26:18,080 Speaker 1: they can surface whenever the mind wanders, and of course 1574 01:26:18,560 --> 01:26:21,840 Speaker 1: we probably all know from experience that they often do. Right, 1575 01:26:21,960 --> 01:26:24,400 Speaker 1: You've I'm sure you've had this experience, Robert. You're alone, 1576 01:26:24,439 --> 01:26:26,639 Speaker 1: You're sitting in traffic or something like that. And if 1577 01:26:26,720 --> 01:26:29,160 Speaker 1: you have any secrets, they tend to just pop into 1578 01:26:29,200 --> 01:26:32,960 Speaker 1: your head uninvited. And this can happen a whole lot. 1579 01:26:33,080 --> 01:26:36,479 Speaker 1: I wanna cite just one study by a cane at 1580 01:26:36,520 --> 01:26:40,519 Speaker 1: All from two thousand seven in psychological Science where they 1581 01:26:40,520 --> 01:26:44,720 Speaker 1: were attempting to judge how often people's minds wandered off 1582 01:26:44,760 --> 01:26:46,680 Speaker 1: of whatever they were doing in daily life. And they 1583 01:26:46,760 --> 01:26:49,559 Speaker 1: use this digital assistant to prompt people throughout the day 1584 01:26:49,840 --> 01:26:51,960 Speaker 1: to see what was on their mind. And they found 1585 01:26:51,960 --> 01:26:55,040 Speaker 1: that people reported their minds were wandering almost about a 1586 01:26:55,160 --> 01:26:58,280 Speaker 1: third of the time, about thirty percent of the time. 1587 01:26:59,040 --> 01:27:01,760 Speaker 1: Uh So, most to the time, they reported that their 1588 01:27:01,760 --> 01:27:04,599 Speaker 1: minds were wandering to mundane day to day thoughts. But 1589 01:27:05,280 --> 01:27:08,120 Speaker 1: the contents of mind wandering vary from person to person. 1590 01:27:08,240 --> 01:27:12,839 Speaker 1: Sometimes they were wandering to plan, sometimes they're wondering, wandering 1591 01:27:12,880 --> 01:27:18,679 Speaker 1: to worries, and secrets are among these worries. So every 1592 01:27:18,680 --> 01:27:21,200 Speaker 1: time your mind wanders to a secret, you get to 1593 01:27:21,200 --> 01:27:24,320 Speaker 1: be reminded of your own lack of honesty, your own 1594 01:27:24,400 --> 01:27:28,240 Speaker 1: lack of authenticity, which can be very undermining to your 1595 01:27:28,280 --> 01:27:31,639 Speaker 1: sense of self worth. Right, Yeah, and also an incomplete task. 1596 01:27:31,720 --> 01:27:35,080 Speaker 1: Remember that as well, exactly right. So back to this paper. 1597 01:27:35,200 --> 01:27:39,160 Speaker 1: Based on the hypothesis of secrecy being primarily intra personal, 1598 01:27:39,439 --> 01:27:43,160 Speaker 1: you know, inside you instead of between you and other people, 1599 01:27:43,560 --> 01:27:47,120 Speaker 1: they make two predictions. Uh, they say, quote, first, people 1600 01:27:47,200 --> 01:27:51,600 Speaker 1: catch themselves mind wandering to secrets outside of relevant concealment 1601 01:27:51,680 --> 01:27:56,320 Speaker 1: settings more frequently than they encounter social situations that necessitate 1602 01:27:56,400 --> 01:28:00,439 Speaker 1: active concealment of secrets. So they're saying, bay stun their 1603 01:28:00,479 --> 01:28:02,960 Speaker 1: new model, we should expect to find that people think 1604 01:28:03,000 --> 01:28:07,160 Speaker 1: about their secrets way more than they actually have occasion 1605 01:28:07,360 --> 01:28:10,960 Speaker 1: to prevent people from finding out about them. Right. And 1606 01:28:11,000 --> 01:28:13,880 Speaker 1: then the second thing is quote the frequency with which 1607 01:28:13,920 --> 01:28:17,320 Speaker 1: people mind wander to their secrets predicts lower well being 1608 01:28:17,520 --> 01:28:21,840 Speaker 1: independent of the frequency with which they actively conceal their secrets. 1609 01:28:21,880 --> 01:28:25,720 Speaker 1: So here they're predicting, the more your mind just intrusively 1610 01:28:26,320 --> 01:28:30,840 Speaker 1: features secrets content, the more secrets just pop into your head, 1611 01:28:31,280 --> 01:28:34,360 Speaker 1: the lower your well being is going to be. Um. 1612 01:28:34,479 --> 01:28:38,000 Speaker 1: So this paper had ten studies throughout it, too many 1613 01:28:38,000 --> 01:28:42,160 Speaker 1: details to go into here, just a few highlights, and 1614 01:28:42,200 --> 01:28:45,639 Speaker 1: they came up with thirty eight categories of secrets after 1615 01:28:45,680 --> 01:28:48,280 Speaker 1: a little pilot study, and they would ask, you know, 1616 01:28:48,360 --> 01:28:50,799 Speaker 1: have you done this is it a secret? The categories 1617 01:28:50,800 --> 01:28:57,760 Speaker 1: of secrets would be things like uh, emotional infidelity, sexual infidelity, theft, uh, 1618 01:28:57,960 --> 01:29:03,040 Speaker 1: work cheating, things like that uh And across the multiple samples, consistently, 1619 01:29:03,040 --> 01:29:06,000 Speaker 1: more than nine pc of people admitted to having at 1620 01:29:06,080 --> 01:29:08,400 Speaker 1: least one secret. So it seems like when you really 1621 01:29:08,520 --> 01:29:11,559 Speaker 1: drill down and give people categories to choose from, most 1622 01:29:11,600 --> 01:29:14,400 Speaker 1: people are keeping at least one secret, and lots of 1623 01:29:14,400 --> 01:29:17,760 Speaker 1: people are keeping multiple secrets. The most common types of 1624 01:29:17,760 --> 01:29:20,920 Speaker 1: secrets people had that they reported never having shared with 1625 01:29:20,960 --> 01:29:29,080 Speaker 1: anyone were sexual behavior, lies, romantic desires, and extra relational thoughts. 1626 01:29:30,600 --> 01:29:35,040 Speaker 1: No big surprises are right, Um? So people did generally 1627 01:29:35,120 --> 01:29:38,000 Speaker 1: mind wander to secrets they found much more than they 1628 01:29:38,040 --> 01:29:41,320 Speaker 1: actively concealed them and interactions. And this was true for 1629 01:29:41,400 --> 01:29:44,560 Speaker 1: all kinds of secrets except for one, which was surprises, 1630 01:29:45,520 --> 01:29:47,879 Speaker 1: which is kind of sweet. People spend more time actively 1631 01:29:47,920 --> 01:29:51,360 Speaker 1: concealing surprises than than letting their mind wander to them. 1632 01:29:51,680 --> 01:29:54,280 Speaker 1: Well that's yeah, Well that that makes sense too, because 1633 01:29:54,280 --> 01:29:56,000 Speaker 1: again those are like those are the positive as are 1634 01:29:56,000 --> 01:29:59,080 Speaker 1: the bright spots in the secret keeping universe. Right, So, 1635 01:29:59,120 --> 01:30:02,160 Speaker 1: according to self reports, the more people mind wandered to 1636 01:30:02,200 --> 01:30:05,160 Speaker 1: their secrets, the more they claim their secret harmed their 1637 01:30:05,200 --> 01:30:07,920 Speaker 1: well being, and this was true for mind wandering, but 1638 01:30:08,120 --> 01:30:11,840 Speaker 1: not for active concealment. So the general findings here where 1639 01:30:11,920 --> 01:30:16,000 Speaker 1: that having a secret leads to active concealment and mind 1640 01:30:16,040 --> 01:30:18,919 Speaker 1: wandering of the subject to the secret, but mind wandering 1641 01:30:18,960 --> 01:30:22,479 Speaker 1: to the secret happens much more often, and mind wandering 1642 01:30:22,520 --> 01:30:25,680 Speaker 1: to the secret appears to have a negative effect on 1643 01:30:25,800 --> 01:30:29,720 Speaker 1: well being. Now I had a big question about this. Uh, 1644 01:30:29,760 --> 01:30:31,800 Speaker 1: I guess we're we're going to wrap up in a 1645 01:30:31,840 --> 01:30:35,320 Speaker 1: minute here, But I'm wondering in these mind wandering events, 1646 01:30:35,360 --> 01:30:38,240 Speaker 1: what's the phenomenology there? Because there you're just talking about 1647 01:30:38,280 --> 01:30:42,240 Speaker 1: the mind wandering to a subject. When people's mind wanders 1648 01:30:42,280 --> 01:30:45,400 Speaker 1: to a secret, what are they generally thinking of? Are 1649 01:30:45,439 --> 01:30:48,760 Speaker 1: they thinking about the subject of their secret, like the 1650 01:30:48,800 --> 01:30:52,040 Speaker 1: thing it is they're they're keeping secret, or they thinking 1651 01:30:52,080 --> 01:30:55,520 Speaker 1: about how the secret would be perceived if it were discovered, 1652 01:30:56,000 --> 01:30:58,200 Speaker 1: or are they thinking about how to keep it from 1653 01:30:58,240 --> 01:31:01,120 Speaker 1: being discovered? Like what is the prime merry feeling of 1654 01:31:01,200 --> 01:31:04,160 Speaker 1: your mind wandering to a secret? I mean, I imagine 1655 01:31:04,200 --> 01:31:05,960 Speaker 1: a lot of it's tied up in you know, the 1656 01:31:06,240 --> 01:31:09,439 Speaker 1: nature of the default mode network, and that we're sort 1657 01:31:09,479 --> 01:31:13,800 Speaker 1: of continually worrying about the past and the future. So 1658 01:31:14,479 --> 01:31:17,519 Speaker 1: it's going to basically color like, what does this say 1659 01:31:17,560 --> 01:31:20,200 Speaker 1: about who I am in the past or the future, 1660 01:31:20,439 --> 01:31:23,519 Speaker 1: the keeping of this secret or the nature of the secret? 1661 01:31:23,680 --> 01:31:25,880 Speaker 1: Right that would be my read on it. Yeah, I 1662 01:31:25,880 --> 01:31:27,559 Speaker 1: think that's a really good read. And the who I 1663 01:31:27,600 --> 01:31:30,439 Speaker 1: am is a big factor because the the So in 1664 01:31:30,479 --> 01:31:33,400 Speaker 1: the study I just talked about, the authors, they're presenting 1665 01:31:33,560 --> 01:31:38,640 Speaker 1: an authenticity model of secrecy that is interesting to me 1666 01:31:38,720 --> 01:31:43,400 Speaker 1: because it's basing the whatever potential harmful effects of secrecy 1667 01:31:43,439 --> 01:31:46,840 Speaker 1: there are, they say are are maybe largely rooted in 1668 01:31:47,160 --> 01:31:51,599 Speaker 1: not necessarily like a spending cognitive resources thinking about the secret, 1669 01:31:51,920 --> 01:31:55,479 Speaker 1: but in the secret undermining our sense of authenticity and 1670 01:31:55,520 --> 01:31:59,160 Speaker 1: self worth, Like it hurts our self esteem to think 1671 01:31:59,160 --> 01:32:01,920 Speaker 1: about the fact that we have to keep things secret. 1672 01:32:02,240 --> 01:32:04,360 Speaker 1: So in the study, like I said, they define secrecy 1673 01:32:04,439 --> 01:32:07,280 Speaker 1: not as the act of concealing information from others, but 1674 01:32:07,360 --> 01:32:10,280 Speaker 1: the desire to conceal information from others. And I wonder 1675 01:32:10,320 --> 01:32:13,439 Speaker 1: if you could take that a step farther insofar as 1676 01:32:13,520 --> 01:32:16,960 Speaker 1: that information relates to facts about yourself, could you go 1677 01:32:17,080 --> 01:32:21,200 Speaker 1: even more basic and say that secrecy is an intentional 1678 01:32:21,320 --> 01:32:27,800 Speaker 1: mismatch between your public and private self. Huh yeah, I 1679 01:32:27,800 --> 01:32:30,519 Speaker 1: think you could, you know, and that that actually naturally 1680 01:32:30,520 --> 01:32:33,000 Speaker 1: plays in within the final example I want to bring 1681 01:32:33,080 --> 01:32:35,360 Speaker 1: up for our podcast episode here. Oh yeah, well what 1682 01:32:35,479 --> 01:32:38,160 Speaker 1: is that? That's we're talking about public and private itself? 1683 01:32:38,200 --> 01:32:42,360 Speaker 1: What is more public and privateself than the clothed self 1684 01:32:42,400 --> 01:32:45,200 Speaker 1: and then nakedself? The clothes the version of you that 1685 01:32:45,280 --> 01:32:47,080 Speaker 1: is literally wearing clothes and the version of you that 1686 01:32:47,200 --> 01:32:49,320 Speaker 1: is literally naked. Well, I guess if you're never nude, 1687 01:32:49,360 --> 01:32:53,400 Speaker 1: even the privateself isn't always clothed. Well, that's that's true. 1688 01:32:53,400 --> 01:32:56,160 Speaker 1: The never nudes of arrested development that they put an 1689 01:32:56,200 --> 01:32:59,360 Speaker 1: additional spin on this. I'm not sure that Georgio Agambin 1690 01:32:59,479 --> 01:33:02,560 Speaker 1: actually thought about this, but he is, Okay, he is. 1691 01:33:02,800 --> 01:33:07,000 Speaker 1: He is an Italian philosopher of the century. He was 1692 01:33:07,000 --> 01:33:10,080 Speaker 1: born in two so he's still with us, and he's 1693 01:33:10,120 --> 01:33:13,920 Speaker 1: written a good bit on this idea of nudity as 1694 01:33:13,960 --> 01:33:18,160 Speaker 1: a secret, so he uh, it's really really fascinating stuff. 1695 01:33:18,160 --> 01:33:21,120 Speaker 1: He gets into it at you know, far greater philosophic 1696 01:33:21,200 --> 01:33:23,599 Speaker 1: depth than we have time to discuss here. But for instance, 1697 01:33:23,600 --> 01:33:25,880 Speaker 1: he points to the myth of Adam and Eve is 1698 01:33:25,920 --> 01:33:28,880 Speaker 1: the birth of shame and the beginning of ethics. Uh 1699 01:33:28,920 --> 01:33:32,000 Speaker 1: He says, quote, if nudity results in us being ashamed, 1700 01:33:32,000 --> 01:33:34,719 Speaker 1: it is because we cannot hide that which we would 1701 01:33:34,720 --> 01:33:38,160 Speaker 1: prefer to hide from the glance of the eye, because 1702 01:33:38,400 --> 01:33:42,720 Speaker 1: the unrestrainable impulse of escaping from oneself is encountered by 1703 01:33:42,720 --> 01:33:46,959 Speaker 1: an equal certain impossibility of evasion. Now, can you translate 1704 01:33:47,000 --> 01:33:49,760 Speaker 1: that for me again? He goes, He goes pretty deep 1705 01:33:49,760 --> 01:33:52,200 Speaker 1: into it. He talks about nudity and clothing as metaphors 1706 01:33:52,240 --> 01:33:55,080 Speaker 1: for the original state of humanity and divine grace. But 1707 01:33:55,840 --> 01:33:59,840 Speaker 1: his basic argument for nudity here or denudation is that 1708 01:34:00,439 --> 01:34:06,040 Speaker 1: uh quote forms of human engagement can become substantively democratic 1709 01:34:06,120 --> 01:34:11,479 Speaker 1: it enacted through an unconcealed disclosedness. So he's saying that, 1710 01:34:11,520 --> 01:34:15,200 Speaker 1: you know, nudity is about like it's like basically boils 1711 01:34:15,200 --> 01:34:18,280 Speaker 1: down to you know, letting the absence of secrets be seen. 1712 01:34:18,720 --> 01:34:22,519 Speaker 1: So like nudity is the ultimate honesty. Yeah, in in 1713 01:34:22,520 --> 01:34:24,240 Speaker 1: a sense it is. If you're trying to get to 1714 01:34:24,360 --> 01:34:30,840 Speaker 1: ultimate disclosure, ultimate honesty, ultimate equality of information, you should 1715 01:34:30,920 --> 01:34:33,400 Speaker 1: not only tell all your secrets and never tell lies, 1716 01:34:33,439 --> 01:34:35,120 Speaker 1: but you should take your clothes off. That's what we 1717 01:34:35,160 --> 01:34:37,360 Speaker 1: do with the voider plates, right, we sent off images 1718 01:34:37,400 --> 01:34:39,800 Speaker 1: of naked human beings to say and and that was 1719 01:34:39,880 --> 01:34:43,280 Speaker 1: of course controversial. Uh, but we were saying, this is 1720 01:34:43,320 --> 01:34:47,000 Speaker 1: what human beings are, these naked ape creatures. But of 1721 01:34:47,040 --> 01:34:50,960 Speaker 1: course that's a little dishonest because look around you, you know, 1722 01:34:51,040 --> 01:34:53,439 Speaker 1: and maybe you're a nudist colony listening to this, but 1723 01:34:53,880 --> 01:34:57,559 Speaker 1: or you're in a traditional sauna. But by and large 1724 01:34:57,840 --> 01:34:59,960 Speaker 1: it's probably is not the case. People were probably wearing 1725 01:35:00,080 --> 01:35:03,559 Speaker 1: clothes around you. And that's kind of a Gammon's argument here. 1726 01:35:03,600 --> 01:35:07,720 Speaker 1: He says humanity for humanity, nudity has become quote unevent 1727 01:35:08,200 --> 01:35:11,200 Speaker 1: not a state. In the same way you could basically 1728 01:35:11,200 --> 01:35:14,559 Speaker 1: say that, like secrets have become the state. You know, 1729 01:35:14,800 --> 01:35:17,160 Speaker 1: we could we possibly expend this off and say that 1730 01:35:17,360 --> 01:35:19,880 Speaker 1: the keeping and trade of secrets has become the state 1731 01:35:19,920 --> 01:35:24,440 Speaker 1: of humanity and the so these secrets are the skins 1732 01:35:24,479 --> 01:35:26,960 Speaker 1: that we have done as we march eternally out of 1733 01:35:27,120 --> 01:35:29,559 Speaker 1: the garden of Eden. Wow. Well, I would not have 1734 01:35:29,640 --> 01:35:32,679 Speaker 1: predicted that we were going to end up with nudity Roberts, 1735 01:35:32,720 --> 01:35:38,439 Speaker 1: but I think that's actually highly relevant. Yeah, it's um, 1736 01:35:38,479 --> 01:35:43,560 Speaker 1: I mean, clothing is sort of the it's the embodiment 1737 01:35:43,680 --> 01:35:46,679 Speaker 1: of one of the more benign secrets, right, because you're 1738 01:35:46,720 --> 01:35:51,160 Speaker 1: when you when you wear clothes, you're not really betraying anyone, right, 1739 01:35:51,240 --> 01:35:55,200 Speaker 1: You're not like covering up something horrible. I don't know, 1740 01:35:55,240 --> 01:35:58,000 Speaker 1: maybe some of us are. You're you're not covering up 1741 01:35:58,000 --> 01:36:01,639 Speaker 1: a crime or something like that, something people should know about. 1742 01:36:02,960 --> 01:36:05,520 Speaker 1: But I can see what he's saying that the enclothed 1743 01:36:05,640 --> 01:36:09,640 Speaker 1: state is naturally an inauthentic state. I guess yeah. And 1744 01:36:09,680 --> 01:36:12,960 Speaker 1: it has become the norm, so that the actual like 1745 01:36:13,120 --> 01:36:17,559 Speaker 1: physical honesty and openness has become an event. It has 1746 01:36:17,600 --> 01:36:21,680 Speaker 1: become like these rare occurrences in the timeline of human existence. 1747 01:36:21,880 --> 01:36:23,840 Speaker 1: So what are people more likely to give up their 1748 01:36:23,880 --> 01:36:27,479 Speaker 1: secrets or their clothing? Oh, that's a great question. That's 1749 01:36:27,520 --> 01:36:29,360 Speaker 1: kind of kind of comes down to like a you know, 1750 01:36:29,400 --> 01:36:32,000 Speaker 1: a jigsaw kind of scenario. Give up your clothing and 1751 01:36:32,040 --> 01:36:35,120 Speaker 1: your secrets, so you're gonna you're gonna walk down the street. 1752 01:36:36,000 --> 01:36:38,320 Speaker 1: There's a whole other thing too. He goes crazy on 1753 01:36:38,400 --> 01:36:41,639 Speaker 1: the Emperor's new clothing and all the connotations there. But yeah, 1754 01:36:41,680 --> 01:36:43,360 Speaker 1: would you get do you give up your your clothing 1755 01:36:43,400 --> 01:36:45,960 Speaker 1: or your secret? I don't know. I would imagine if 1756 01:36:46,000 --> 01:36:48,439 Speaker 1: the secret is weighty enough, you'd probably give up the clothing. 1757 01:36:49,439 --> 01:36:52,000 Speaker 1: Man Horrobert, this has been an interesting discussion, but I'm 1758 01:36:52,040 --> 01:36:54,639 Speaker 1: frustrated by the science in this one. This is one 1759 01:36:54,680 --> 01:36:57,000 Speaker 1: where I mean, this has happened before, especially when we 1760 01:36:57,040 --> 01:36:59,840 Speaker 1: get into social psychology. I feel like it happens all 1761 01:36:59,840 --> 01:37:04,599 Speaker 1: the time that they're The literature is replete with studies 1762 01:37:04,640 --> 01:37:07,280 Speaker 1: that I'm kind of skeptical of the reported results, and 1763 01:37:07,320 --> 01:37:10,640 Speaker 1: then studies that fail to replicate, and then studies that 1764 01:37:10,720 --> 01:37:14,559 Speaker 1: get conflicting results or that aren't exactly asking the same 1765 01:37:14,680 --> 01:37:18,200 Speaker 1: question but being applied to each other. I don't know. 1766 01:37:18,240 --> 01:37:21,000 Speaker 1: It's one of those where what's there seems interesting, but 1767 01:37:21,040 --> 01:37:24,879 Speaker 1: I don't know what's true or what to make of it. Well, welcome, 1768 01:37:24,920 --> 01:37:28,639 Speaker 1: welcome to the modern age. That's that's our in clothed age. 1769 01:37:29,360 --> 01:37:31,400 Speaker 1: But you know the great thing about this topic is 1770 01:37:31,439 --> 01:37:34,400 Speaker 1: that everybody is going to have some insight for this. 1771 01:37:34,680 --> 01:37:38,160 Speaker 1: People are gonna have thoughts on, uh, your children and 1772 01:37:38,160 --> 01:37:40,240 Speaker 1: their ability to keep secrets or not keep secrets. The 1773 01:37:40,240 --> 01:37:43,759 Speaker 1: weight of secrets is an adult um. The nudity scenario. 1774 01:37:43,880 --> 01:37:46,240 Speaker 1: I would love to hear from any nudists out there, 1775 01:37:46,320 --> 01:37:49,160 Speaker 1: or individuals who have you know, participated in nudist events 1776 01:37:49,160 --> 01:37:52,000 Speaker 1: and how how that makes them feel in terms of 1777 01:37:52,439 --> 01:37:55,720 Speaker 1: you know, uh, you know personal psychic burdens that we've 1778 01:37:55,760 --> 01:37:58,639 Speaker 1: been talking about here today. Yes, seriously, you have got 1779 01:37:58,640 --> 01:38:00,920 Speaker 1: me wondering about this now. So like for someone with 1780 01:38:00,960 --> 01:38:03,600 Speaker 1: the with the new dist orientation, might you might you 1781 01:38:03,640 --> 01:38:07,680 Speaker 1: actually come to see shedding your clothing with the same 1782 01:38:07,720 --> 01:38:10,519 Speaker 1: kind of relief that a person might feel admitting a 1783 01:38:10,600 --> 01:38:13,160 Speaker 1: secret that they've kept for a long time. Yeah, I 1784 01:38:13,360 --> 01:38:16,160 Speaker 1: mean I would imagine stuff. All right, Well, hey, let 1785 01:38:16,240 --> 01:38:18,000 Speaker 1: us know. You can get in touch with us all 1786 01:38:18,040 --> 01:38:19,600 Speaker 1: the usual ways. First of all, go to stuff to 1787 01:38:19,600 --> 01:38:21,559 Speaker 1: Blow your Mind dot com. That is the mothership. That's 1788 01:38:21,560 --> 01:38:24,280 Speaker 1: where we'll find all the podcast episodes, as well as 1789 01:38:24,360 --> 01:38:30,040 Speaker 1: links out to various social media accounts including Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler, Instagram, etcetera. Uh, 1790 01:38:30,160 --> 01:38:32,400 Speaker 1: certainly interact with us on Facebook. We have a Facebook 1791 01:38:32,400 --> 01:38:35,160 Speaker 1: group there the Stuff to Blow Your Mind Discussion module, 1792 01:38:35,200 --> 01:38:37,360 Speaker 1: and you can pop in there with you know, some 1793 01:38:37,439 --> 01:38:40,640 Speaker 1: more detailed, longer form thoughts about everything, And if you 1794 01:38:40,680 --> 01:38:43,120 Speaker 1: want to get in touch with us directly, as always, 1795 01:38:43,160 --> 01:38:45,519 Speaker 1: you can email us at blow the Mind at how 1796 01:38:45,600 --> 01:38:58,200 Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. For more on this and thousands 1797 01:38:58,240 --> 01:39:07,960 Speaker 1: of other topics. Does it, How stuff dot com, the 1798 01:39:08,680 --> 01:39:12,120 Speaker 1: big