Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Psychology Podcast, where we give
Speaker 1: you insights into the mind of brain, behavior, and creativity.
Speaker 1: Each episode will feature a guest who will stimulate your
Speaker 1: mind and give you a greater understanding of yourself, others,
Speaker 1: and the world we live in. Hopefully we'll also provide
Speaker 1: a glimpse into human possibility. If you like what you
Speaker 1: hear today, please add a rating and review on iTunes.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening and enjoy the podcast. Since day I'm
Speaker 1: really excited to have Ruth Whitman on the show. Ruth
Speaker 1: is an author, journalist and documentary filmmaker from London who's
Speaker 1: currently living in the USA with Hilarious Consequences. Her essays
Speaker 1: cultural criticism and political journalism have appeared in The New
Speaker 1: York Times, The Guardian, Glamour Magazine and other places, and
Speaker 1: she's a regular contributor to Time dot com. Whitman is
Speaker 1: author of America The Anxious, How our pursuit of happiness
Speaker 1: is creating a nation of nervous wrecks. And just to
Speaker 1: be clear, that's the American title of the book, not
Speaker 1: the British title of the book, which is a different title.
Speaker 1: Thanks for so much for being on the show. Today, Ruth,
Speaker 1: thanks for having me. Yeah, it was enjoyable reading your book.
Speaker 1: And even when I have disagreements, I had disagreements and
Speaker 1: yet still laughed. So I don't know what that's what
Speaker 1: that means. Maybe I should be outraged, but instead I
Speaker 1: was like, it's funny. Even though you completely be fun
Speaker 1: of my whole field, I was like, that's funny, that's
Speaker 1: very nice. Yeah, than I am, well, no, I don't
Speaker 1: know about that. I don't know about that, but I
Speaker 1: you know, I should say I lived in England for
Speaker 1: basically my whole twenties was me living in England, and
Speaker 1: I felt a great affinity towards the sense of humor
Speaker 1: of the Brits and the cheekiness. And I think that
Speaker 1: I felt more comfortable with that sensibility then among my
Speaker 1: fellow Americans. So oh interesting. I think I identified with
Speaker 1: your sense of humor because I get it, like I
Speaker 1: get where it's coming from. Okay, so let me start
Speaker 1: one question with you. What was it like for you
Speaker 1: coming to America. It was only a couple of years ago, right,
Speaker 1: five years ago or so? Or five years ago now?
Speaker 1: Actually six years ago, six years yego, oh year just
Speaker 1: went without me even realized that. Yeah, so it was
Speaker 1: a culture shock. I mean a lot of that was
Speaker 1: not necessarily to do with the America part of it,
Speaker 1: because I mean I had a very busy job. I had,
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of friends, a lot of family
Speaker 1: in London, and then we moved to California completely cold,
Speaker 1: so we didn't know anybody. Suddenly, you know, I went
Speaker 1: from having all this you know, social network to having
Speaker 1: this kind of twelve cavernous hours a day to fill
Speaker 1: when you know, from when my husband left for work
Speaker 1: in the morning and until he came home and I
Speaker 1: could have an adult conversation. So that was one piece
Speaker 1: of it. But the other piece was it was quite
Speaker 1: a culture shock. I mean, I think California is probably
Speaker 1: the extreme of a lot of these trends that I
Speaker 1: talk about in the book. And so, you know, I
Speaker 1: was used to being a slightly jaded, slightly skeptical brit
Speaker 1: and suddenly I'm in the land of self actualization where
Speaker 1: everybody is pursuing happiness in a very very determined way. Well,
Speaker 1: what pretty California are you? In San Francisco? I live
Speaker 1: near San Francisco and Berkeley, which so yeah, not too
Speaker 1: farther by area. Well, I was going to say, not
Speaker 1: too far from Esslon Institute, which is all about the
Speaker 1: self potential movement. I know that was big in the seventies.
Speaker 1: You know, I said, stay up front, I'm a big personally,
Speaker 1: I'm a big fan of self actualization. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: self actualation doesn't have to be individualistic, doesn't have to
Speaker 1: be one hundred percent individualistic. It doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: that way. That's how it tends to That's what sells
Speaker 1: the most, seems to be, like when you look at
Speaker 1: marketing strategies, you tend to find like things that are
Speaker 1: individualistically happy or sell better than like, hey, join my
Speaker 1: Hey guys, please join my program. I'll teach you how
Speaker 1: to be a more compassionate, loving person who has social
Speaker 1: justice concerns, like if we did that experiment, you know,
Speaker 1: and try to sell you know, because you know, on
Speaker 1: Facebook it constantly pops up with people trying to sell
Speaker 1: like supplements. And why isn't like the more collective, communal
Speaker 1: aspect of it, Why doesn't that sell as much? Well,
Speaker 1: that's so interesting. It's a really interesting point. I think
Speaker 1: you're right, And you know, I've had this with my
Speaker 1: own book, you know, writing the book myself that the
Speaker 1: publishers are always wreaking. They're like, can't you make it
Speaker 1: a self help book? You know, can't you do a
Speaker 1: self help message? And I'm saying, well, you know, a
Speaker 1: lot of it is about do constructing that stuff. But
Speaker 1: there's still you know, the book. Did they read it? Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're real and you know, I can understand that. I'm not.
Speaker 1: This is not a criticism because you know, I think
Speaker 1: if people invest, you know, many hours and twenty dollars
Speaker 1: or whatever in buying a book, they probably want something
Speaker 1: that they can take home and use in their own lives.
Speaker 1: So there's nothing wrong with that. But I think that
Speaker 1: self actualization in America has become quite an individualistic thing.
Speaker 1: And I agree with you, it doesn't have to be.
Speaker 1: But I think that's partly this for various reasons. Partly, absolutely,
Speaker 1: it's commercially driven. It's something that sells it, you know,
Speaker 1: in many ways, feeding off the culture, which is quite individualistic,
Speaker 1: which believes in you know, individual hard work, in meritocracy
Speaker 1: and working hard at something to achieve results, you know,
Speaker 1: and in the rights and freedoms of the individual. So
Speaker 1: it's very culturally rooted. I think it is. It is.
Speaker 1: I want to say, though, you said at some point
Speaker 1: that like in England, there's a different sort of tone
Speaker 1: to more skepticism surrounding mindfulness and stuff. Again, I don't
Speaker 1: know if that's true of all of England, just like
Speaker 1: you said, you know, you Organs are probably not true
Speaker 1: of all of America either. You know. I was in
Speaker 1: a bookstore in Cambridge, England recently, and half of the
Speaker 1: bookstore were books on mindfulness. Yeah. Well, I was just
Speaker 1: going to say to you absolutely. I mean I think
Speaker 1: that even in the five years since we've been away,
Speaker 1: mindfulness has crazy really huge in the I would say
Speaker 1: it's bigger in the UK right now than it is
Speaker 1: in America. Yeah. And they've rolled it out in schools,
Speaker 1: in workplaces. I mean, they've invested a lot of taxpayer
Speaker 1: money and to bring it into public institutions in our
Speaker 1: national health service. And I believe that, you know, that
Speaker 1: has really outstripped the evidence that exists for it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I just want to bring up because I was shocked
Speaker 1: with how proportion of the what was it called, It's
Speaker 1: a British name of a bookstore over there in the
Speaker 1: Waterstones water Stones, Yeah, Yeah, I was amazed at that,
Speaker 1: and a lot of that actually is due a large
Speaker 1: part to my colleague Martin Seligman, who has a relationship
Speaker 1: with your prime minister or your prior prime minister. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: and here is very influenced. So Debby Cameron was very
Speaker 1: influenced by Martin Seligman's work and I write about that
Speaker 1: a bit in the book as well. So yes, it's
Speaker 1: interesting because I think generally British culture is more skeptical
Speaker 1: about new trends, and you know, the Brits are hard sell.
Speaker 1: I think they are harder sell than Americans as a
Speaker 1: general rule. But mindfulness definitely has you know, managed to
Speaker 1: make that cell and I think British culture, you know,
Speaker 1: when it comes not just mindfulness, but the happiness industry
Speaker 1: in general has become you know, the UK has embraced
Speaker 1: a lot of these trends, and you know the cynicism
Speaker 1: is kind of on its way out in a way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, you're right, And I wonder if you're going
Speaker 1: to see like a flip, you know, like you're going
Speaker 1: to have to like read a book Britain The Anxious
Speaker 1: or something. I know. Yeah, America, Well, you know I
Speaker 1: always said that when we first moved here, you could
Speaker 1: blindfold me and read me out the Facebook statuses of
Speaker 1: my friends and I could tell you which ones were
Speaker 1: British and which ones were American, and the American ones
Speaker 1: were always incredibly positive and yeah, life is great. My
Speaker 1: husband's the cutest guy I've ever seen, and my kids
Speaker 1: are beautiful, and you know, everything's wonderful and I'm feeling blessed,
Speaker 1: and the British ones would always be you know, I'm
Speaker 1: waiting for a bus and it's raining and everything's rubbish.
Speaker 1: But now, even within five years, that's changed again, and
Speaker 1: the British statuses are becoming a lot more positive and
Speaker 1: thankful and happy and all the rest of it. So
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, the cultural difference is definitely blessing. You're
Speaker 1: talking about cultural pressures on self presentation strategies. That was
Speaker 1: a mouthful, what I just said, but that's in how
Speaker 1: I would frame mentions of the psychological literature, since this
Speaker 1: is the psychology podcast. But who are who are people
Speaker 1: really like? You know, it sounds like people Britain and
Speaker 1: Australia I've noticed tend to self deprecate themselves as a
Speaker 1: self presentation strategy, because that's associated with higher status interesting,
Speaker 1: whereas in America the opposite is the associated with higher status.
Speaker 1: But we all want higher status. I mean, that's still
Speaker 1: a fundamental human need. We kind of just like present
Speaker 1: ourselves in whatever way the society, you know, like appreciates more. Yes,
Speaker 1: I think that's an excellent point and really interesting because
Speaker 1: I think you're right. I think in Britain, you know,
Speaker 1: it's a classic thing that someone who's you know, I
Speaker 1: remember reading something somewhere where this woman was talking about
Speaker 1: her husband who is a brain surgeon, and the guy says, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, I just do a little bit of plumbing
Speaker 1: here and there and obviously downplaying it, and you know,
Speaker 1: but everybody recognizes those social keys and that, you know,
Speaker 1: here's a brain surge of thekinness. Like. But it would
Speaker 1: be embarrassing in Britain to walk into a party and
Speaker 1: say I'm a brain surgeon, I on top of my field,
Speaker 1: I'm fantastic, and well, well that makes me wonder is
Speaker 1: there a difference? Is there a different flavor between motivational
Speaker 1: speakers in England and motivational speakers in America? Because I've
Speaker 1: noticed the motivation speakers in America their whole brand and
Speaker 1: everything is just how many awards they've won. Who they know,
Speaker 1: my good friend Oprah or my good friend the Dalai Lama,
Speaker 1: you know, like you know, constantly name dropping. I mean,
Speaker 1: you'll see this phenomenon among American motivational speakers, and that
Speaker 1: is important for their brand to do that in America
Speaker 1: because it seems to be working, right. It seems to
Speaker 1: that that's when people eat up, you know, but and
Speaker 1: they want to be associated with that. Yeah, that's such
Speaker 1: an interesting point. I'm now picturing a British motivator. I'm
Speaker 1: rubbish and I'm useless. This is awful, and you know
Speaker 1: you're a rubbish, you know. I don't think there's so
Speaker 1: much of a trend for motivational speakers as they exist
Speaker 1: in the US. I think some of the US speakers
Speaker 1: like Tony Robbins and some of the an Oprah as
Speaker 1: well have made in roads in the kaper. I don't
Speaker 1: think there's so much of a sture of homegrown British
Speaker 1: motivational speakers as such. I'm sure they do exist, but
Speaker 1: I'm struggling to wish to do a parody of what
Speaker 1: a British motivational speaker would be like that I think
Speaker 1: that would go viral, that would be a viral video.
Speaker 1: I'm rubbish or rubbish ted x Britain. I do nothing special,
Speaker 1: but you know it's not really well, but it might
Speaker 1: change some small part of your I felt I felt
Speaker 1: happy the other day, but I am very sorry about that.
Speaker 1: I promise, I promise it won't happen again. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you said the whole process of being happy has
Speaker 1: become painfully comically neurotic. You still stand by that statement. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I think that we agonize and I do
Speaker 1: this as much as you know. This is not me
Speaker 1: standing apart from this trend and saying this is not
Speaker 1: you know, nothing to do with me. I do this
Speaker 1: all the time that I'm sitting there thinking, you know,
Speaker 1: am I as happy as I could be? Would I
Speaker 1: be happier if I had a different part I don't know,
Speaker 1: or if I had a different different you know, if
Speaker 1: my kids were different, or if I had a different job,
Speaker 1: or if I did this, or if I did that.
Speaker 1: And I think we overthink happiness to the point where
Speaker 1: it's anxiety inducing. I agree with that in the large part.
Speaker 1: I find if I focus too much on you know,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, I haven't meditated yet today, or like, oh,
Speaker 1: like the Apple Watch has all these notifications. The new
Speaker 1: Apple Watch every freaking ten minutes it says, have you
Speaker 1: just a stand up, breathe, breathe, et cetera. I don't
Speaker 1: need do I need a reminder to breathe? I mean
Speaker 1: it gets. I mean, my son actually won an award
Speaker 1: in school. He's in first grade. He won an award
Speaker 1: for breathing at school, which there you go. But I mean,
Speaker 1: I do think that, you know, wearable technology is a
Speaker 1: big thing. I don't have a watch like that, but
Speaker 1: I think it can just make you quite obsessive about
Speaker 1: your own happiness, and I don't think that is particularly healthy.
Speaker 1: So you're not just a mean spirited enemy of joy then,
Speaker 1: as you say in the book, as I say, I
Speaker 1: think so, I mean, I completely you know. I hope
Speaker 1: that people realize that this is coming from a place
Speaker 1: of loving being here. I love living in America. I
Speaker 1: admire the American zest for life and friendliness and openness.
Speaker 1: I think those things are get and I hope people
Speaker 1: see that in what I've written. And this is not
Speaker 1: a kind of criticism, I think as much. It's a
Speaker 1: journey about myself to understand and you know, my own
Speaker 1: neuroticism about happiness and how I can work with that
Speaker 1: then to criticize anybody else. So, do you have any
Speaker 1: friends in America or anyway not in America? I do.
Speaker 1: I have a lot of friends now, and you know,
Speaker 1: I've been so lucky that and I always say that
Speaker 1: I think it's much easier to move here as a
Speaker 1: British person than it would be to move from California
Speaker 1: to London and do the thing the other way around.
Speaker 1: I've got some great friends here now, which has made
Speaker 1: a huge difference. And that was partly, you know what
Speaker 1: drove one of the main conclusions of the book, which
Speaker 1: is that our happiness is so fund mentally based on
Speaker 1: our social relationships that this very individualistic approach is kind
Speaker 1: of slightly steering us in the wrong direction. And I
Speaker 1: could see just from my own experience that going from
Speaker 1: being socially isolated and lonely to being part of a
Speaker 1: community and having friends and all the rest of it
Speaker 1: just made such a tremendous difference to my happiness that
Speaker 1: all of the rest of it, you know how often
Speaker 1: I meditated on my Apple watch or whatever, really kind
Speaker 1: of paled into insignificant. So the specific practice put in
Speaker 1: callte spiritual practices that you criticize are tend to be
Speaker 1: the ones that are most individualistic, because there is so yoga, meditation.
Speaker 1: Give me the list of the things that irk you
Speaker 1: the most. I think it's not that these things irk me.
Speaker 1: It's just that I believe that they've been very, very
Speaker 1: very heavily oversold and sometimes in as a commercial prospect,
Speaker 1: which I think in a way that really outstrips the
Speaker 1: evidence for what these things can actually do for people.
Speaker 1: But I think a lot of it is to do
Speaker 1: with trying to change the way people think. So mindful now,
Speaker 1: a positive thinking, these kinds of trans gratitude, these sorts
Speaker 1: of things which are all about, you know, don't change
Speaker 1: your circumstances. It's all about what's going on inside your head,
Speaker 1: so change your attitude. And that I think is a
Speaker 1: phenomenon which I think is problematic and has led. There
Speaker 1: is nothing wrong with any of these things in isolation,
Speaker 1: but I think the overemphasis on them can lead to
Speaker 1: a culture where we don't actually consider people's circumstances. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but why are you going to hit on gratitude journals?
Speaker 1: I mean, what did gratitude journals do to you? That's right? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I said this in the book. I said,
Speaker 1: picking on gratituy journals is like picking a fight with
Speaker 1: a fridge magnet. I mean, it just seems ridiculous. Well,
Speaker 1: I think that what the issue is there's nothing wrong
Speaker 1: with writing gratity of journal. If you want to write
Speaker 1: question journal, do it great. But I think where we
Speaker 1: run into problems. I mean I interviewed this woman who
Speaker 1: was really living the poverty line. She was working in
Speaker 1: this terrible job in fast food service. She couldn't afford
Speaker 1: to go to the doctor. She her kids were, you know,
Speaker 1: had their teeth, they couldn't go to the dentist and
Speaker 1: their teeth were hurting, and she literally couldn't afford to
Speaker 1: take them to the dentists because she had no healthcare,
Speaker 1: planet work, et cetera, et cetera. This is quite a
Speaker 1: common situation for many Americans. And then she would go
Speaker 1: into work and they instead of paying them vacation benefits
Speaker 1: and healthcare and all the rest of it, they said,
Speaker 1: write a gratitude journal, be grateful for what you have,
Speaker 1: change your attitude, and it just for her felt like
Speaker 1: this incredible gaslighting of her real experiences. You know, she's saying, actually,
Speaker 1: these things are shitty and hard and difficult. To tell
Speaker 1: me to be more grateful is really not to fundamentally
Speaker 1: acknowledge what the problems are. So that's one piece of it.
Speaker 1: The other piece of it is that it just kind
Speaker 1: of annoyed me that I read all these positive psychology
Speaker 1: books and people say that gratitude write a gratitude journal
Speaker 1: is makes a huge difference to people's happiness. They really
Speaker 1: sell this concept as being this huge, great thing, and
Speaker 1: then you go and look at the actual academic studies
Speaker 1: that there's a boy start and it's bullshit. I mean,
Speaker 1: there is very little evidence to show that these things work,
Speaker 1: and there are plenty of studies that show that they
Speaker 1: actually make people feel worse. And so this is what
Speaker 1: bothered me. I was like, fine, you know, if these
Speaker 1: things are helpful, but let's be honest about how helpful
Speaker 1: they really are. Maybe they worn't for some people not
Speaker 1: for others. All of this is fine, but to really
Speaker 1: go out and say this is the answer to happiness,
Speaker 1: and then I think, if you're not doing it, then
Speaker 1: you're not grateful enough. Yeah, it's just it seems like
Speaker 1: you're criticizing the cultural manifestation of it, not the science
Speaker 1: of it. I mean, if you actually look at I
Speaker 1: don't know if we're looking at the same literature, but
Speaker 1: if you look at you know, some of Bob Emmons's
Speaker 1: writings on gratitude, and I mean, it's incredibly nuanced stuff.
Speaker 1: And in fact, like Sonya l Bimirski, who will get
Speaker 1: to you later. I know you talk about her, but
Speaker 1: she's done. She presented at the latest Positive Psychology Conference
Speaker 1: from really truly interesting nuanced workshowing dosage effects of gratitude,
Speaker 1: journaling and stuff where yes, there's a curblylinear effect, like
Speaker 1: too much of it and it loses its effect. There's
Speaker 1: the opposite of the dosage effects. So it's not like
Speaker 1: you know, the more you do, the better you do.
Speaker 1: You know that there's an optimal dosage during the week
Speaker 1: or so yeah, well, I don't know. I mean I
Speaker 1: think that her results. So I went and pulled up
Speaker 1: I mean, that was a good example because I read her. Sorry,
Speaker 1: there's lots to unpack in what you said that in
Speaker 1: the book. I went and looked at her work, specifically
Speaker 1: because she wrote a popular book called The Hell of Happiness,
Speaker 1: which really, really heavily sells gratitude as a major component
Speaker 1: of what you can do to improve your own happiness,
Speaker 1: and you know in the book. And I think there's
Speaker 1: a problem here because I think there is a problem
Speaker 1: when there's same people doing the lab work are the
Speaker 1: same people writing the self help books that sell the
Speaker 1: lab work, because that is the natural conflict of interest. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think if you're making money from selling gratitude,
Speaker 1: you are incentivized. And I'm not saying that she's doing this,
Speaker 1: but I think there is a financial incentive to oversell
Speaker 1: the results of what you're doing. And if it was
Speaker 1: a drug company, if the drug companies were doing the
Speaker 1: research and publishing it and selling it, I think that
Speaker 1: they would be made to disclose the financial interest in that.
Speaker 1: So I think there's a conflict of interest problem inherent there.
Speaker 1: So you're saying that you don't think scientists should be
Speaker 1: writing about the work, is that right? I think they
Speaker 1: should be writing about their work. But I think when
Speaker 1: you take a scientific study that happens, so you have
Speaker 1: the same people who are saying, we are researching gratitude
Speaker 1: and the importance of it, and then they're also going
Speaker 1: out and selling a course and an app and a
Speaker 1: self help book and whatever that sells you. You know,
Speaker 1: do your gratitude journal. And if you do these five
Speaker 1: things and a self help book for a popular audience,
Speaker 1: that is a conflict of interest. And I'm not saying
Speaker 1: that scientists shouldn't write about their work, but I think
Speaker 1: they need to disclose in their academic work what their
Speaker 1: financial interest is in the in topic. I mean, I mean,
Speaker 1: surely you would agree interesting, it's so interesting. I don't
Speaker 1: know if I agree with that, because I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: thinking this through. I think it's a it's a complicated issue.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to think of where exactly the conflicts of
Speaker 1: interest or like, really where the conflicts of interests are,
Speaker 1: So there'd be a conflict. I suppose if the courses
Speaker 1: you were selling, et cetera were somehow coloring your science.
Speaker 1: But if you're doing good science and you find in
Speaker 1: your laboratory that there are certain interventions that are scientifically affected,
Speaker 1: you think there's a conflict if you then try to
Speaker 1: monetize that finding. No, I don't think that you should
Speaker 1: be prevented from monetizing it. I think you should disclose
Speaker 1: your financial interest in it. And I think what happened,
Speaker 1: And this is not a criticism of Sonia lu Bumersky
Speaker 1: in particular at all, but what I did find was
Speaker 1: that in her popular book, you know, there was this
Speaker 1: huge chapter or multiple chapters about gratitude in particular and
Speaker 1: how incredibly effective it was and how useful it was.
Speaker 1: And this is the best selling broke that sold, you know,
Speaker 1: I think it's on its fifty three print. You know,
Speaker 1: it's a very you know, it's a classic. It's a classic,
Speaker 1: and it's it's sold to your average sort of armchair
Speaker 1: happiness seeker, and it's sold to students, well when you're
Speaker 1: gynecologist reading it or something else? Am I making that up?
Speaker 1: Ganic Colleges was actually really a different book. But yes,
Speaker 1: my Gandic colleguere is probably has read that book because
Speaker 1: she's very interested in that topic. But when I went
Speaker 1: back and checked the footnotes and went back to all
Speaker 1: those studies and looked at the day and had people
Speaker 1: helped me go through the statistics, it was nothing remotely
Speaker 1: like how it had been presented there, gotcha, And there
Speaker 1: was a very mixed and even in her own lab work,
Speaker 1: there were studies that showed that some gratitude generally made
Speaker 1: people feel worse rather than better. There were some studies
Speaker 1: that showed that there was no effect, no difference between
Speaker 1: the gratitude group and the control group. There were some
Speaker 1: which showed a small difference, but only under very very
Speaker 1: select conditions. There were somewhere that she didn't actually publish
Speaker 1: the data. There were others where she quoted other people's studies. So,
Speaker 1: for instance, on Martin Sulliman's study, which sounded absolutely phenomenal,
Speaker 1: as if it was going to completely change the world
Speaker 1: and nobody would ever be depressed or unhappy again if
Speaker 1: they just got the Gratitude Journal. And when I started
Speaker 1: digging around trying to find this study, it had never
Speaker 1: been published and never been peer reviewed. I mean, it
Speaker 1: didn't exist anywhere to even look at the data. So
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that anything in bad faith happened, but
Speaker 1: I'm saying that, you know, you should proceed with caution. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so it sounds like you're arguing, you know, you're saying
Speaker 1: there's a lot of overclaiming of effects, and that could
Speaker 1: be a very valid point. I'm trying to think of,
Speaker 1: like you know, you're holding the scientists are such a height, Like,
Speaker 1: you're not criticizing Tony Robbins for overclaiming he doesn't do
Speaker 1: any such Robins. Yeah, I mean so Tony Robbins, I
Speaker 1: think is a different thing because I think most people
Speaker 1: but maybe this is not fair, but Tony Robbins is
Speaker 1: not claiming to be a scientist. I mean Tony Robbins is.
Speaker 1: You know, he's a motivational trainer. He says, this is
Speaker 1: his own experience, these things work. I think he's massively overselling.
Speaker 1: Would you rather have someone who does good science and
Speaker 1: over sells their science or someone who doesn't do science
Speaker 1: at all and sells everything that they say. I mean,
Speaker 1: which would you rather have? So you won an ideal
Speaker 1: world where people do the good science and then they
Speaker 1: state in their publicity materials are effects size zero point
Speaker 1: four to five. Let's going to know what effect size means,
Speaker 1: what it means. But I think if you're writing a book,
Speaker 1: a popular book, with a chapter saying you know, gratitude
Speaker 1: is the best thing ever and this is substantially change
Speaker 1: her life, I think it's only fair to say, well,
Speaker 1: out of the five lab studies that I did at
Speaker 1: my lab, three of them showed no effect. One of
Speaker 1: them showed a very very small effect, but only if
Speaker 1: you do it on Tuesdays and only after very complex
Speaker 1: statistical analysis. And one of them showed you know, a Actually,
Speaker 1: I don't think she replicated the Emma's McCulloch findings in
Speaker 1: any of her studies. So in a one of ways,
Speaker 1: it's actually a back ended compliment on what you're saying.
Speaker 1: You're actually saying you're holding scientists up to an honesty
Speaker 1: standard that you don't necessarily hold anyone else in your
Speaker 1: life up to. Yeah, yeah, I think so, because I
Speaker 1: think a scientist is making claims that nobody else is making.
Speaker 1: And so, yes, of course it's a whole separate issue.
Speaker 1: You know, the self help industry and the Tony Robbins
Speaker 1: and the you know, the hucksters and the motivational speakers.
Speaker 1: That's something that really needs to be looked into. But
Speaker 1: I feel like I, yes, of course, I'm holding a
Speaker 1: Harvard scientist up to a hired standard than I am.
Speaker 1: You know. Cool. I'm trying to like this is great
Speaker 1: because I'm trying to like really pinpoint the argument to
Speaker 1: see where or not agree with it or not, Like
Speaker 1: I don't know if I agree with something or not
Speaker 1: unless I really understand it, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Sometimes I want to also make clear and I want
Speaker 1: to officially say I'm not calling Tony Robins a huckster normally,
Speaker 1: and I think a lot of people, you know, and
Speaker 1: I think this is and this is obviously something that
Speaker 1: you will be far more of an expert in the
Speaker 1: note because you know, if you say to someone, well,
Speaker 1: it's all in the mind, your effect is all in
Speaker 1: the mind. Well, great, so it's happiness. You know, if
Speaker 1: it works for you, then it works. You know, there's
Speaker 1: no higher standard than it working. You know, and you
Speaker 1: think it's working if that makes sense. So yeah, so
Speaker 1: it doesn't make sense, it does. So just talking about
Speaker 1: the gratitude research for a second, I think that there's
Speaker 1: a kind of a lot of people have been making
Speaker 1: a false dichotomy that like you can't have gratitude and
Speaker 1: also appreciate the circumstances, Like it doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: one or the other. Bob Emmons has done some really
Speaker 1: really good work. I mean, I'll send you after this call,
Speaker 1: I'm going to send you papers and I will even
Speaker 1: put in the show notes some recent review papers where
Speaker 1: he in the review papers is explicitly like, there's this
Speaker 1: conceptualization of gratitude in the general public, and then there's
Speaker 1: I'm going to present with the nuance of the science.
Speaker 1: I'll send you that paper. Yeah, I'd love to see that. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I can see what irks you. And I think a
Speaker 1: lot of that does irk me too, so if I
Speaker 1: really understand it, and a lot of it sounds like
Speaker 1: so there is some of it, like there is some
Speaker 1: culpability with scientists, so that that's true, but also a
Speaker 1: lot of it really is sort of how people are
Speaker 1: simplifying this science in the general public. They're making it
Speaker 1: so reductionistic and black and white. But I would say
Speaker 1: you're kind of making a black and way too when
Speaker 1: you pit gratitude against or having things that taking responsibility
Speaker 1: for your own actions self as well as caring about
Speaker 1: social justice, et cetera. You can have both as well.
Speaker 1: You can you can. But I think that and the
Speaker 1: reason why I've made this into a kind of psychotomy
Speaker 1: in a way, rather than just saying yes, of course
Speaker 1: you can have both. And that's a very very fair
Speaker 1: and important point. But in this particular book, The How
Speaker 1: of Happiness, that we're looking about. She draws this pie chart,
Speaker 1: which I don't know if you're familiar with it, but
Speaker 1: it's this circle, and it's divided into which what proportion
Speaker 1: of our happiness is based on on what? And she
Speaker 1: allocates ten percent for circumstance, which is a tiny sliver,
Speaker 1: and she allocates forty percent for what's under your own control. Now,
Speaker 1: I went back and looked at the research and a
Speaker 1: lot of detail as to what this is actually based on,
Speaker 1: and it's complete nonsense. I mean, the estimates and it
Speaker 1: comes from very old papers from the eighties that you know,
Speaker 1: and this is the most generous I mean, even if
Speaker 1: you accept that those are the best and most current
Speaker 1: thinking on the topic, it's really taken the absolute lowest
Speaker 1: pos possible possible estimate of circumstance and the highest highest
Speaker 1: possible estimate of control. I don't think these things fit
Speaker 1: neatly into a pie chart anyway. But I think that
Speaker 1: this whole narrative of individual responsibility has been taken up
Speaker 1: by the positive psychology movement, and they are the ones
Speaker 1: pushing that. So that's what I was pushing back against. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I gotcha. I do like pie By the way, I'm
Speaker 1: a big fan of pie. Pie. Oh my gosh, a pie.
Speaker 1: Oh you know, I'm thinking like Pecan. I had a
Speaker 1: delicious peakmpie yesterday. But I'm so I'm very heavily pregnant
Speaker 1: at the moment, and there wasn't enough ram and my
Speaker 1: body for this pie. I've shot you down for the
Speaker 1: circumstance slice rather than the control slices. Makes the circumstance
Speaker 1: slice well, watches. There's another reason why that cover is
Speaker 1: misleading that you didn't even mention. I can even add
Speaker 1: more into your arsenal if you want. There's a great
Speaker 1: misconception about what Herod ability coefficients mean, or what twin
Speaker 1: study findings mean. No one is talking about parceling different
Speaker 1: things within one person, Like you can't cut up a
Speaker 1: piece of pie within yourself and say, oh like, forty
Speaker 1: percent of the reason why you act this way is
Speaker 1: due to this, twenty percent is due to this. All
Speaker 1: that is showing is that in general populations, the source
Speaker 1: of variance that has explained in a general population. So
Speaker 1: even if that was true, I would say that in
Speaker 1: a general population, ten percent of the circumstances of the
Speaker 1: millions of people in that population is explained by variable
Speaker 1: X and Y, But that could still leave room for
Speaker 1: like many many people in that society for like most
Speaker 1: of the circumstances to explain, like to impact impact on
Speaker 1: them individually. So I think people do get really confused
Speaker 1: about So I agree that's a silly chart and that
Speaker 1: was probably a marketing ploy. There's so many pressures just
Speaker 1: to be fair, for second to science writers, they go
Speaker 1: through a lot of getting beaten down, you know, through
Speaker 1: so maybe like it gets exciting to like get a
Speaker 1: chance for once to just step out and be like,
Speaker 1: oh I'm gonna like yeah, like you know, or even
Speaker 1: like there's these pressures from the publishers to name title books.
Speaker 1: I know what the process is like, and I try
Speaker 1: my best to resist those pressures. But you have to
Speaker 1: fight your battles sometimes because the publisher wants to sell
Speaker 1: the book, you know, they and you you want to
Speaker 1: sell the book too. I want to sell my but yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's totally fat And there's nothing wrong with wanting
Speaker 1: to sell the book. I mean, you know, you want
Speaker 1: your ideas to go to a wider audience. I think
Speaker 1: it's great the books sell. You know, nobody wants the
Speaker 1: publishing industry to die. And no books to sell. And
Speaker 1: you know, I think it's important. Would you want the
Speaker 1: publishing industry to cut out all the scientists or overclaiming
Speaker 1: and only have the self help industry exists? Absolutely? No.
Speaker 1: I just think that there should be maybe a little
Speaker 1: bit more you know, putting back. And this isn't just
Speaker 1: in positive psychology, you know. I mean you must have
Speaker 1: seen all the stuff about the replication crisis, you know,
Speaker 1: the big article that was in the New York Times
Speaker 1: about Amy Cuddy and the power poses and all of
Speaker 1: these things. You know, I think it's a good moment
Speaker 1: for psychology to have some self reflection because it's an
Speaker 1: incredibly exciting field. It's so compelling to the public. People
Speaker 1: want to know this stuff. You know, we all want
Speaker 1: to know about ourselves and understand ourselves. And so I
Speaker 1: think it is a good moment to step back and yeah,
Speaker 1: this is good. Now, this is really helpful. And I
Speaker 1: think that this illustrates a couple of things. One of
Speaker 1: illustrates that the scientists are human too. Sometimes people get
Speaker 1: shocked when they hear that, you know, like, yeah, oh
Speaker 1: my gosh. Humans are prone to the same sort of
Speaker 1: power motive as others, you know, so I want to
Speaker 1: say that's one thing this reveals is that, you know,
Speaker 1: and that's important for scientists to recognize amongst themselves that
Speaker 1: they could be they too confall pary to the thrill
Speaker 1: of status and power, and trying to keep that in
Speaker 1: check and staying true to the science is really important.
Speaker 1: And I think that's a good point. So I think
Speaker 1: they're like, yeah, there are lessons here. It's good people
Speaker 1: like you, you know, who can like keep scientists honest, right.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm a journalist by China, and you know
Speaker 1: that's where I have a big role to play in
Speaker 1: this as well, because I think we take a scientific paper,
Speaker 1: we take the most exciting finding when we hype it up.
Speaker 1: So I think everybody has a part to play in this.
Speaker 1: But you know, and as you say, I mean, writing
Speaker 1: a questions to journal is probably not going to do
Speaker 1: you any harm. You know. It's not as though you know,
Speaker 1: if you if you write down the good things that
Speaker 1: happen in your day, something terrible is going to happen.
Speaker 1: Of course that's not true. So you know, of all
Speaker 1: the battles to fight, this probably isn't the biggest. I mean,
Speaker 1: I would argue the science does suggest that all things equal,
Speaker 1: ray and gradude will make it more likely that you'll
Speaker 1: show a lot of positive outcomes. I mean, the data
Speaker 1: does suggest that is the case. The idea of that
Speaker 1: a lot of our thoughts do influence our happiness and
Speaker 1: our outcomes in life is a true idea. You know,
Speaker 1: it sounds like you're really arguing for a balance. I'm
Speaker 1: marking for a balance because I think it became very,
Speaker 1: very heavily biased one way. So I think we lived
Speaker 1: or we are living in an age you know, oprah
Speaker 1: of self factualization, self determination, self all of these things
Speaker 1: where it's you know, you just buy this book, download
Speaker 1: this app, do this thing, I think the right thoughts,
Speaker 1: and then everything will be fine. But meanwhile, you know,
Speaker 1: the fabric of American society has kind of been crumbling
Speaker 1: a little bit. And we saw this with the recent election.
Speaker 1: I've done it. Whatever your listeners think about him or
Speaker 1: you know, you could see that there's a lot of
Speaker 1: people who are very upset and angry about the actual
Speaker 1: circumstances of their life. And you know, I think there's
Speaker 1: been too much emphasis on individual control and not enough
Speaker 1: on social circumstance personally, So okay, Yeah, that's a fair point.
Speaker 1: It's a fair point. I think about if I just
Speaker 1: saw the title of your book in the bookstore with
Speaker 1: no other context, yeah, I would agree with the title.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have thought the book would be about what
Speaker 1: you wrote, but I would agree that, Wow, you know,
Speaker 1: all humor aside, there is real suffering. Like I feel
Speaker 1: like a lot of this belies a deeper point about
Speaker 1: perhaps the failure of a lot of clinical psychology to
Speaker 1: address our problems, which is really what the motivation for
Speaker 1: the field of pods psychology was in the first place.
Speaker 1: If I can defend pod psychology at all, it would
Speaker 1: be that at least the spirit of it was. You know,
Speaker 1: the field of psychology has focused so much on the
Speaker 1: anxious and on the depressed and not looked at what
Speaker 1: we can do to get north of zero, right, or
Speaker 1: to really flourish, Like does it mean to flourish in
Speaker 1: our lives? Now? You're not anti flourishing, right? Yeah? And
Speaker 1: I think that's and it's a very laudable thing, you know,
Speaker 1: it's a great thing to think, you know, what is
Speaker 1: the potential for human beings and for an individual life
Speaker 1: and for people to live their best life? All of
Speaker 1: those things are right, but it's very hard to flourish
Speaker 1: when you don't have health insurance, for example. I couldn't
Speaker 1: agree more. And you know, one of my personal heroes,
Speaker 1: Abraham Maslow, he very much talked about you know, those needs,
Speaker 1: those other needs that need to be satisfied first, and
Speaker 1: we shouldn't neglect them. So I am like one hundred
Speaker 1: percent on the same page with you when it comes
Speaker 1: to we kind of are neglecting that when we focus
Speaker 1: just on the positive. I think that's a great point, great,
Speaker 1: great point. Yeah, okay, thank you. Well, you know, actually, interestingly,
Speaker 1: I just went to a conference all about Maslow's pyramids
Speaker 1: and who yeah, And it was just a small thing.
Speaker 1: It was at Princeton, and I wrote a paper for
Speaker 1: Society of the Journal. It's like an academic paper. And
Speaker 1: one of the things that I was arguing was that,
Speaker 1: you know, you've got this pyramid where obviously, as you've
Speaker 1: described it, you know, you've got food and shelter and
Speaker 1: all of these important things at the bottom, and then
Speaker 1: you've got self actualization at the tip. But certain, especially
Speaker 1: in the corporate world, certain employers are selling self actualization
Speaker 1: almost as an alternative to the to the important things
Speaker 1: at the bottom, you know. So it's like, you know,
Speaker 1: you get paid rather than and this is happening a lot.
Speaker 1: So in a lot of workplaces in America, you do
Speaker 1: not have health insurance, paid vacation, job security, all the
Speaker 1: rest of it. But you do have mindfulness classes, wellness seminars,
Speaker 1: you know, you do get gratitude lessons, whatever. And so
Speaker 1: that's a great point. It's almost replacing these basics. I
Speaker 1: think it's a great point. And you know, if Masil
Speaker 1: was alive, he would that would drive him crazy, and
Speaker 1: he would probably call a lot of that pseudo growth.
Speaker 1: You know, he has he has a towards Psychology Being.
Speaker 1: I've read a lot of Muzzlow, and in this book
Speaker 1: Towards the Psychology of Being, he talks about in passing
Speaker 1: the idea of too many people trying to shoot too
Speaker 1: hot to the top of the pyramid too quick without
Speaker 1: getting the foundations first. And he called that, he called
Speaker 1: that pseudo growth. So I would actually, I would rail
Speaker 1: against that, and I think we're very much aligned in
Speaker 1: that vein. I would rail against pseudo growth. I'd rail
Speaker 1: against pseudo transcendence. I mean, you see a lot of
Speaker 1: people who are seeking spiritual transcendence, not built on a
Speaker 1: firm foundation, and you see a lot of very narcissistic
Speaker 1: gurus that have pseudo grown. You know. It's a great description. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: so I think, you know, maybe back channel afterwards, if
Speaker 1: you could tell me some more information on that conference,
Speaker 1: I'd be really interested. Here. Yeah, it was just a
Speaker 1: very small thing, but yeah, of course I'll send it
Speaker 1: to I'll put that on the show notes if you
Speaker 1: want me to the paper that wrote let's talk about
Speaker 1: the parenting happiness rat race. Oh yeah, what is that? Well,
Speaker 1: do you have goods? Yeah? So I when we first
Speaker 1: moved here to California, we had a one year old.
Speaker 1: I had a one year old son. Now I have
Speaker 1: another one and another one on the way, so we'll
Speaker 1: end up with three children. So this is kind of
Speaker 1: a tough thank you. So this was pretty close to
Speaker 1: my heart, and this is probably the part of the
Speaker 1: book that was based the most of my own experiences.
Speaker 1: So it seems as though parenting styles and I'm very
Speaker 1: much a part of this. You know, I am so
Speaker 1: caught up in this. I can't I don't know how
Speaker 1: to break through. But it seems like we have the
Speaker 1: same attitude about parenting that we do about our own happiness,
Speaker 1: which is that it's our kind of responsibility to build
Speaker 1: the perfectly happy child. You know that we can if
Speaker 1: we do everything right, and if we do all the
Speaker 1: right activities and the like this, and the right parenting methods,
Speaker 1: and we read the right books, and if we just
Speaker 1: try to try to try to try hard, then we
Speaker 1: can turn out this, you know, flawlessly happy baby, college student, whatever.
Speaker 1: And I think that the research is shown that this
Speaker 1: is kind of backfiring. Oh yeah, we don't appear to
Speaker 1: be backfiring. So what is the alternative to that? How
Speaker 1: should you? What's the best way of raising a child?
Speaker 1: I mean, there's no easy answer on that. It's easier,
Speaker 1: it's almost easier to criticize than to take. So much
Speaker 1: easier to criticize than it is to do it. And
Speaker 1: you know, it's interesting. So when my mom comes over
Speaker 1: to visit from England, and I can see that the
Speaker 1: way my parent must drive her absolutely crazy. I mean,
Speaker 1: when we were kids, you know, she left us to
Speaker 1: our own devices a lot, and she was a wonderful
Speaker 1: mother and extremely kind and generous with her time and
Speaker 1: all the rest of it. But she was not there
Speaker 1: playing with me every moment and doing you know, painting
Speaker 1: and finger painting and puzzles and this and that, you know,
Speaker 1: the stuff that I do constantly with my kids, and
Speaker 1: so and I can see, I sort of see it
Speaker 1: through her eyes, and you know, she never says anything,
Speaker 1: but it must just look like I was such a
Speaker 1: helicopter about that happiness. So I think part of it
Speaker 1: is standing back a bit and just letting them make
Speaker 1: their own mistakes and get on with things, and not
Speaker 1: trying to fix things and not trying to, you know,
Speaker 1: to make epything perfect all the time. I find that hard.
Speaker 1: You know, it is hard. I mean not that I
Speaker 1: know because I'm a parent, but I can imagine it's hard.
Speaker 1: And I mean it's hard. I'm a teacher, right, that's close, right,
Speaker 1: I mean right, yeah, And so you'll see ideal, I
Speaker 1: guess a college student. Yeah, college student, yeah, exactly. But
Speaker 1: your point while taking about the parenting happiness, right, race,
Speaker 1: But are you familiar with Lee waters research at all
Speaker 1: or her book on playing positles Ecology to Parenting. It
Speaker 1: is actually a very well reasoned, helpful book, I think,
Speaker 1: because it's it's all about bringing out the strengths and
Speaker 1: kind of bringing out the best in your child. And
Speaker 1: I see that as a very worthy goal. And that's
Speaker 1: a somewhat different goal than just happiness. Yes, and I
Speaker 1: think so too. I mean, it's funny when you said that,
Speaker 1: you know, and you said, oh, you're probably roll your eyes.
Speaker 1: Actually the complete opposite was happening. I was kind of
Speaker 1: adjusting it down and thinking, oh, I've got to buy
Speaker 1: that book, because parenting is one area where people, even
Speaker 1: the most sort of skeptical, you know, the person who
Speaker 1: can never buy a self help book under any other circumstances,
Speaker 1: suddenly will eat up self help parenting books because we're
Speaker 1: just desperate to get it right. And you know, the
Speaker 1: stakes feel so high you don't want to do your
Speaker 1: child any damage. You know, I would be very interested
Speaker 1: to be the one thing that I've noticed from having kids,
Speaker 1: and I, you know, in my obviously enormous sample of
Speaker 1: two children, it's really led me to feel that your
Speaker 1: basic attitude, whether it's positive or negative, is innate. My
Speaker 1: kids are so different in that I felt like one
Speaker 1: of them automatically is just so positive about everything. Everything's
Speaker 1: it's fine, don't worry. I fell over. I get up again.
Speaker 1: Everything's fine, you know, it's a sunny day, it's great,
Speaker 1: and it just is like that. And the other one
Speaker 1: is like very brooding, tends to focus on the negative
Speaker 1: in a situation, you know, and they just kind of
Speaker 1: came out like that, and I, I mean, maybe I
Speaker 1: have parented them differently or responded to them differently, but
Speaker 1: it feels like there's something about our attitude which is
Speaker 1: you know, that was an eye opener for me. Anyway.
Speaker 1: That speaks to the role of genes, differentiating different personalities
Speaker 1: influencing that. Going back to the pie, the pie pie,
Speaker 1: let's talk a little bit God's plan for happiness. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so one thing that I looked at when I was
Speaker 1: writing the book was that the data really shows that
Speaker 1: religious people are happier than non religious people. I just
Speaker 1: this is pretty consistent across societies, and especially in the
Speaker 1: United States, the effect is even bigger that you know
Speaker 1: that this is true kind of across the board. And
Speaker 1: as somebody who's not religious myself, you know, I'm Jewish
Speaker 1: but not spiritual, and this was really fascinating to me,
Speaker 1: so I kind of wanted to know why. And then
Speaker 1: I also found out that amongst religious people, the most
Speaker 1: happy of all religious people. So religious people are happier
Speaker 1: than non religious people, and the happiest religion of all
Speaker 1: is are Mormons, So Mormons are amongst the happiest people
Speaker 1: in America. So I went to Salt Lake City and
Speaker 1: I spent some time with a Mormon family there, and
Speaker 1: I spent some time there and it was a really
Speaker 1: fascinating experience and very counterintu too in lots of ways.
Speaker 1: But I think the reasons why religious people are happy
Speaker 1: than non religious people kind of speak to all of
Speaker 1: us in a way, which is that they tend to
Speaker 1: come down to the fact that religious people have stronger
Speaker 1: social networks and social connections than non religious people. But moments,
Speaker 1: as well as being the happiest people in America, also
Speaker 1: have the highest rate of antidepressant use. So it's kind
Speaker 1: of complicated. That's interesting, you know what's driving what? You know?
Speaker 1: Do religious individuals are they more likely to take aydepressants
Speaker 1: than Yeah, who knows. I think that one of the
Speaker 1: things that I found was that in Mormon culture, there's
Speaker 1: a very very strong cultural pressure to be happy, and
Speaker 1: it's sort of seen as being godly, so you know,
Speaker 1: to admit to not being that happy is quite a
Speaker 1: big admission. So I think when they do these happiness
Speaker 1: polls and they call people up and say, you know,
Speaker 1: on a scale at one stent, and how happy are you?
Speaker 1: You know, I think you're probably more likely to answer
Speaker 1: a higher score if you're a moment then if you're not,
Speaker 1: because you feel like it's the virtuous thing to say.
Speaker 1: And I think there's also a good point. That's a
Speaker 1: very good point, yeah, you know, and I think there's
Speaker 1: a big cultural pressure, especially on mom and women, to
Speaker 1: look very very happy with your lot. You know, you
Speaker 1: have several kids, you stay home, you look after them,
Speaker 1: and you have to not just do it, but you
Speaker 1: have to look happy about it. And so I think
Speaker 1: that is a lot of pressure on people, and I
Speaker 1: think that might explain part of the reason why the
Speaker 1: antidepressant use as well. Fair enough, So I want to
Speaker 1: just make clear about happiness is. In the field positicology,
Speaker 1: we kind of view well being as a broader umbrella
Speaker 1: than just happiness is. You know, I think you're equitting
Speaker 1: with like feeling good, and I think you're very quite
Speaker 1: right that we focus too much on having to feel
Speaker 1: good all the time. And you also make a good
Speaker 1: point about neglecting or communal values, and so I think
Speaker 1: we are agreeing that. I also did want to make
Speaker 1: clear that you know, there are so many scientists in
Speaker 1: the field of podsitecology that are trying to look at
Speaker 1: various aspects of well being that you would very much
Speaker 1: think is worthy of investigating, including communalized I mean, there
Speaker 1: are researchers that are studying the things that you care about. That. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: so that's all the case. I'd be happy to send
Speaker 1: to your references. Yea, So I want to that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm really appreciative of your time, and I want to
Speaker 1: I like to usually end with some of my favorite
Speaker 1: quotes from my guests, so let me just finish here
Speaker 1: and read one of my favorite quotes of yours. We
Speaker 1: need to think of all being as a shared responsibility
Speaker 1: rather than an individual quest, and to develop a discourse
Speaker 1: of happiness that engages with people's problems rather than dismisses them,
Speaker 1: acknowledging privilege and injustice, and work against them rather than
Speaker 1: blaming people for their own misfortunes, and developing a vision
Speaker 1: of happiness that is inclusive and generous and socially aware.
Speaker 1: I couldn't be more on board with that goal. So
Speaker 1: thanks for chatting with me today. Thank you. Great to
Speaker 1: be here, Thank you. Thanks for listening to the Psychology Podcast.
Speaker 1: I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you like to
Speaker 1: react in some way to something you heard, I encourage
Speaker 1: you to join in the discussion at the Psychology podcast
Speaker 1: dot com. That's the Psychology podcast dot com. Also, please
Speaker 1: add a rating and review of the Psychology Podcast on iTunes.
Speaker 1: Thanks for being such a great supporter of the podcast,
Speaker 1: and tune in next time for more on the mind
Speaker 1: of brain, behavior and creativity.