Speaker 1: Today. It's great to chat with Kristin Jarrett on the podcast.
Speaker 1: A cognitive neuroscientist by training, Christian is deputy editor of Psyche,
Speaker 1: a global digital magazine that illuminates the human condition. Christian
Speaker 1: has written about psychology and neuroscience for publications across the world,
Speaker 1: including BBC, Future, Wired, New York Magazine, New Scientist, GQ
Speaker 1: Italia and The Guardian. He was the founding editor and
Speaker 1: creator of the British Psychological Society's Research Digest, presenter of
Speaker 1: their Psyche Crunch podcast, and an award winning journalist on
Speaker 1: The Psychologist magazine. His books include The Rough Guide to
Speaker 1: Psychology and Greatness of the Brain. His most recent book
Speaker 1: is called Be Who You Want, Unlocking the Science of
Speaker 1: Personality Change. Christen, So nice to finally meet you and
Speaker 1: talk to you you two school. Thank you for having
Speaker 1: me talk to you on the podcast. I should say
Speaker 1: we've talked on Twitter, DMS. We have. Yeah, And I
Speaker 1: think I wrote for you many years ago when you
Speaker 1: launched the creativity post. Wow, that that was a lifetime ago. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know. Yeah, So we go right back, we do?
Speaker 1: We do? So is it true that I can be
Speaker 1: who I want? I think within reason, you can definitely
Speaker 1: become a better version of yourself, and you can you
Speaker 1: can change yourself in ways to help you live according
Speaker 1: to your values and what matters to you most in life. Okay,
Speaker 1: so that was my cheeky question, But I want to
Speaker 1: like back up to like your childhood for a second.
Speaker 1: You said that when you were a child you were
Speaker 1: characterized as too quiet by your teachers when you were
Speaker 1: when you were a teenager, Is that right? So how
Speaker 1: did you burst out of the shell when you started university? Yeah?
Speaker 1: My teacher reports when I was at school, they all
Speaker 1: basically said the same thing that I don't talk enough
Speaker 1: and I'm hiding in the shadows and trying to get
Speaker 1: me to contribute more. Yeah, which I think was true
Speaker 1: to an extent. And yeah, when I went to university, Well,
Speaker 1: I think one thing is some of the crowd that
Speaker 1: I fell in with, I made good friends from the
Speaker 1: beginning with a real out and out extrovert, and I
Speaker 1: think that speaks to the fact that one of the
Speaker 1: strongest influences on our personalities is the people that we
Speaker 1: mix with. I also, I think, you know, my own
Speaker 1: goals changed. I wanted to have fun when I arrived
Speaker 1: at university and the whole media there was. It was
Speaker 1: encouraged and more sociable lifestyle. But I think the fact
Speaker 1: that I was so influenced by some of the friends
Speaker 1: I had is consistent with some theory, like and findings
Speaker 1: in the psych research that our personalities are to a
Speaker 1: large degree affected by our relationships and the and the
Speaker 1: the personalities of our friends and so on rub off
Speaker 1: on us. And also the kind of you know, the
Speaker 1: kind of role you play in your friendship group. I
Speaker 1: think if if you're caricatured a certain way, it can
Speaker 1: make it. It can be especially in a way that
Speaker 1: you don't like. I mean, it can almost make you
Speaker 1: start to play a certain role and live up to
Speaker 1: your a certain reputation. So I think when I started university,
Speaker 1: you know, I had a whole new set of friends
Speaker 1: and new environment, and that helped me do what I
Speaker 1: wanted to do, which was, you know, build more outgoing,
Speaker 1: be more gregarious. And yeah that's that's how I managed
Speaker 1: it at that time. But a little bit of alcohol
Speaker 1: probably helped as well. It does and also living in England,
Speaker 1: I this this happened to me too. I broke out
Speaker 1: of my show when I was in England and I
Speaker 1: was about twenty five on a scholarship to Cambridge just
Speaker 1: to drop that there. Yeah, but I I really I
Speaker 1: I went wild. I became friends with this big like
Speaker 1: punk rocker looking like English British extrovert, and we'd go
Speaker 1: you know, out all the time, and and I was like, wow,
Speaker 1: I can do this, you know. But but it didn't
Speaker 1: last too It didn't last too long. I feel like
Speaker 1: my my introverted tendencies kept calling you back. But look,
Speaker 1: let me ask you something you know about the biological
Speaker 1: aspect of this. You know, in the research that that
Speaker 1: you did for this book, what role did you find
Speaker 1: for biology? And uh and temperament? Yeah, well, personality definitely
Speaker 1: gets beneath the skin, as they say, so I think
Speaker 1: often it feels personality can seem very abstract, like is
Speaker 1: it a real thing or is it just a description?
Speaker 1: And there are quite a few findings coming out now
Speaker 1: on I mean, the neuroscience of personality is a real
Speaker 1: burgeoning area. So you know, true, Yeah, strong introverts, you know,
Speaker 1: their brains will if you scan their brains and a
Speaker 1: brain scanner, you'll find their brains really are more sensitive
Speaker 1: to stimulation. For example, if you compare like high scorers
Speaker 1: and neuroticism, whoseff you know, who experience highs and lowers
Speaker 1: of emotion compared with someone lower neuroticism, who's very emotionally stable,
Speaker 1: even down to the level of the myelination of nerve fibers.
Speaker 1: You kind of see these differences between these groups. Even
Speaker 1: things like gut bacteria, Like people high in neuroticism tend
Speaker 1: to have more so called bad bacteria in their guts.
Speaker 1: Things like that inflammate market biological markets of information are
Speaker 1: higher and people lower in conscientiousness, people higher and neuroticism.
Speaker 1: So you know, whether it's brain activity or brain structure,
Speaker 1: or your you know, your inflammation in your body and
Speaker 1: your go bacteria, all these different levels, You've got personality
Speaker 1: manifesting at these different levels. Yeah. Sure, did you come
Speaker 1: across my colleague Colin de Young's work at all? It
Speaker 1: doesn't ring a bell? Well what she found? His name
Speaker 1: is Colin and he he Colin the Young, really leading
Speaker 1: leading the charge in the field of personality. Yeah, I have. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think he's I think I cite his work in
Speaker 1: the book. Oh no, I'm actually I'm actually talking to
Speaker 1: him today for the podcast oh brilliant. I think he
Speaker 1: did a kind of a neat review of the kind
Speaker 1: of neuroscience for us. Now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I
Speaker 1: was in that lab in grad school. That was the
Speaker 1: lab I was in, and he was the post doc
Speaker 1: in the lab. Yeah, really, really awesome. Guy deserves a lot,
Speaker 1: a lot of credit. So there's lots of do you
Speaker 1: know with the miss unpacking the mysteries of personality sciences,
Speaker 1: It's like, well we could there's so many different entry
Speaker 1: is you know, so we just discussed biology a little
Speaker 1: bit in the effect the biology doesn't doesn't make destiny though, right,
Speaker 1: I think it's important important to point out too. You
Speaker 1: know this that's nurse Yeah, oh well, I mean the
Speaker 1: biology of personality. One thing it points to is how
Speaker 1: important our health and kind of sport behaviors are if
Speaker 1: you want to change your personality for the better. So
Speaker 1: you it might not seem directly related to personality, but
Speaker 1: by working on your physical health you can actually benefit
Speaker 1: your personality. Yeah, yeah, that's that's that's very true. Do
Speaker 1: you do you work on your physical health? If anything,
Speaker 1: I'm probably a little bit prone to big, a bit
Speaker 1: addicted to I'm one of those people who doesn't like it,
Speaker 1: you know, if I miss the chance. So yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I like I'm guilty of one of the being one
Speaker 1: of the annoying people who have joined the Peloton family. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I thought about that. I thought about the Peloton world. Okay,
Speaker 1: So there are a lot of things that can influence personality.
Speaker 1: What about like that the whole research literature on changing roles,
Speaker 1: like if you go to a new job or an
Speaker 1: or you like, change your identity, you know, your work
Speaker 1: identity changes. That could be one thing, right, definitely. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's one of the sort of strongest theories in the
Speaker 1: personality change literature and better supported theories, I would say, yeah,
Speaker 1: social investment theory, I think they I think they call it. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: the job, the roles we take on in life do
Speaker 1: shape us. We get feedback on how we're expected to
Speaker 1: behave and so yeah, if you begin a new job, especially,
Speaker 1: I think if you find it rewarding and you enjoy it,
Speaker 1: and you're given clear feedback on how you what is
Speaker 1: expected of you, I think you're bound to see increase
Speaker 1: in trade conscientiously. Yes, And that's what you see with
Speaker 1: graduates when they get their first jobs. Their conscientiousness typically
Speaker 1: increases after a job promotion, you tend to see people
Speaker 1: get an increase in trade conscientiousness, And I meant more
Speaker 1: extreme examples would be things like people who go into
Speaker 1: special forces training or military training. You know, then you
Speaker 1: get to see even sharper increases and maybe lower neuroticism,
Speaker 1: that kind of thing. So at what leadership positions again,
Speaker 1: you get these kind of changes. So yeah, definitely, I
Speaker 1: think it doesn't have to be work, of course, but
Speaker 1: I think the roles that we take on in life
Speaker 1: because because they demand certain things of us, and if
Speaker 1: we are motivated and we're rewarded for certain kinds of behavior,
Speaker 1: because a lot of personality is ultimately built on the
Speaker 1: habits of our thinking and our emotions and our behavior.
Speaker 1: If we are rewarded for behaving in certain ways over
Speaker 1: period of time, it's going to shape us over time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: ultimately changing our personalities. Yeah, but didn't like the behavioral
Speaker 1: genetics research kind of change our ideas about what exactly
Speaker 1: has the biggest influence on our personality differences as we like,
Speaker 1: you know jeth Rich Harris's book with seminal in saying, well,
Speaker 1: our peers, you know, have a lot more influenced their parents.
Speaker 1: That's what she said. Yeah, what do you think about that? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's I think that's right. I think, of course,
Speaker 1: there's a whole industry built around, you know, how to parent,
Speaker 1: how to be a good parent, and it can which
Speaker 1: I think it can be very anxiety provoking for parents.
Speaker 1: And yeah, the research, a lot of it suggests parents
Speaker 1: influence on their kids' personality besides what they hand down
Speaker 1: in their genes is relatively modest. Exactly as you say,
Speaker 1: it seems to be the unique experiences outside the home,
Speaker 1: including peer influences, which have more more of an influence.
Speaker 1: So I don't think that's to say of obviously, parenting
Speaker 1: is irrelevant, but I think it's more it comes down
Speaker 1: to more like are you an authoritative parent? Are you
Speaker 1: are you warm and encouraging and consistent that will be
Speaker 1: beneficial to your child's personality versus are you authoritarian? Are
Speaker 1: you cold and distant and inconsistent? You know? And I
Speaker 1: think those two broad things you can you could say
Speaker 1: that the warmer, encouraging style is beneficial for a child's
Speaker 1: personality and the cold, distant, inconsistent is harmful. But beyond that, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't think parents kind of and for a second,
Speaker 1: kind of deliberately sculpt their kids to have certain kind
Speaker 1: of personalities. And I've seen I've seen for myself. I
Speaker 1: have seven year old twins, and I've seen for myself
Speaker 1: the limit the limits of parental influence. It's amazing to
Speaker 1: see what they what, you know, what children bring to
Speaker 1: the equation in their own obviously their own genetic endowment,
Speaker 1: that what personality dispositions and proclivities they have that they
Speaker 1: start out with. But if things are too extreme, you
Speaker 1: really can mess mess them up, right, Like, like, what's
Speaker 1: the research on divorce on on and that effect of personality. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so when I say the influence of parents is relatively modest, yeah,
Speaker 1: obviously extremes of you know, neglect and abuse and that
Speaker 1: kind of thing is going to have no question harmful impact,
Speaker 1: especially on as you you know, as you know on
Speaker 1: for example, attachment, a person's attachment through their life. So divorce,
Speaker 1: I don't think there there's like a specific consistent outcome.
Speaker 1: You know, it will depend on how well the parents
Speaker 1: navigate their separation and how supportive they are of the
Speaker 1: kids and so on. So I don't think parents should
Speaker 1: agonize about that too much. But more extreme forms of
Speaker 1: maltreatment for children, unfortunately can lead especially yeah, to attachment problems.
Speaker 1: And as I say, you know, children bring their own
Speaker 1: side to the equations. So I'm sure you'll have heard
Speaker 1: of the concept of all kids children. Yeah, there are
Speaker 1: probably you know, a minority of kids will be extra
Speaker 1: sensitive to a difficult upbringing, difficult circumstances. The majority of
Speaker 1: so called dandelion kids will fare better in difficult circumstances.
Speaker 1: They'll w relatively impervious whether things are incredibly good or
Speaker 1: terribly bad, whereas the or kid kids, their personalities and
Speaker 1: their mental health will suffer more in bad times. But
Speaker 1: if they are if they have a supportive, loving, nourishing upbringing,
Speaker 1: they will thrive even more than the dandelion kids. So
Speaker 1: you get these into it's an interaction between one once
Speaker 1: genetics and environment through upbringing. Is it's the two, as
Speaker 1: you know, interacting with one another. Is that true though,
Speaker 1: because is that true among dandelions though you just you
Speaker 1: just said there are some that, regardless of the environment,
Speaker 1: tend to be really upright and not affected as much.
Speaker 1: So within reason, maybe there's the whole point there. I
Speaker 1: think was really cool, A good point. There's individual difference
Speaker 1: is an extent to which genes and environment interact. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right. So the in the sense that if you
Speaker 1: if your genetic disposition inclines you to or kid hie. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then the environment is you're more sensitive to the environment,
Speaker 1: right right, right, But then but then the dandelion, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not as not as there's more of an inner
Speaker 1: core there. So I think I think there's there's even
Speaker 1: just more nuanced than than just kind of like the
Speaker 1: usual saying like, well, of course environment and genes interact,
Speaker 1: which they do, which they do, you know, but but
Speaker 1: I think it's I think what you pointed out is
Speaker 1: even more interesting, though, is that there's individual differences in
Speaker 1: the extent to which they interact. Yeah, it's not the
Speaker 1: same for all of us. Yeah, the the role of
Speaker 1: the environment. Environment is more important for some than others,
Speaker 1: and we tend to talk about it in terms of children,
Speaker 1: but of course it last through life. Yeah. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: another really interesting part of that research is that the
Speaker 1: very same uh environment that if you're if you have
Speaker 1: the kind of temperament where you can be swayed very easily,
Speaker 1: if you are raised in a very malnourished environment, you
Speaker 1: can you develop anxiety, you can develop you're more likely
Speaker 1: to develop anxiety kind of like traits. But if you
Speaker 1: grow up in a support of environment, you're more likely
Speaker 1: to develop curiosity and exploration like traits. So that's pretty important.
Speaker 1: You know, fighting is there, you know, I'm sure you
Speaker 1: read the Summer Camp study on that finding these kids
Speaker 1: depending on their their genotype, depending on how they were
Speaker 1: raised and and and and treated, you know, it could
Speaker 1: go in two very different directions. Yeah, and I think
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's so important because it's it's a
Speaker 1: reminder that people on you know, they're not stuck. The
Speaker 1: personality isn't sort of one permanent thing. It can be
Speaker 1: channeled in different directions depending on their experiences in life
Speaker 1: and how supportive or not they are. And obviously as
Speaker 1: we get older we can start to be more intentional
Speaker 1: about that for ourselves. Yeah. So, are there happy events
Speaker 1: in life that don't necessarily translate to positive effects on personality? Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: we've been speaking about parenthood, so one let's brings to
Speaker 1: mind immediately. Yeah, is so that that whole social investment
Speaker 1: theory to do with the roles we take on shaping
Speaker 1: us in a beneficial ways. You would think becoming a parent,
Speaker 1: with all the demands that entails, would be like a
Speaker 1: perfect training camp for trait conscientiousness. But if any, if anything,
Speaker 1: the research seems to show it goes off the cliff.
Speaker 1: You know, parents personality tend to in some ways you
Speaker 1: could say, suffer in the immediate aftermath of parenthood self esteem.
Speaker 1: There's this research with mothers suggests self esteem goes down,
Speaker 1: neuroticism goes up, conscientious goes down, all this kind of stuff.
Speaker 1: So it's a joyful, happy time, but it's obviously not easy,
Speaker 1: and I don't think there's a clear explanation in the literature.
Speaker 1: Of my own take on it would be that the
Speaker 1: social investment theory research is based on when you have
Speaker 1: a role where the demands on you are very clear
Speaker 1: of what is expected of you, and you get these
Speaker 1: kind of rewards for behaving in the way it's expected
Speaker 1: of you. I think with parenthood it's just such a messy,
Speaker 1: overwhelming time. It's too confusing and chaotic, and it's not
Speaker 1: clear what's the right thing to do or the wrong
Speaker 1: thing to do. Us factoring sleep deprivation and such a
Speaker 1: radical change in lifestyle and freedom and all these things.
Speaker 1: I don't think when you, if you pause and think
Speaker 1: about it, is not so surprising that it comes with
Speaker 1: these at least short lived challenges with personality. Yeah, well
Speaker 1: what about dandelions? Can they do they deal with it better?
Speaker 1: Dandelion parents? Yeah? Yeah, that's something I don't I don't
Speaker 1: think anyone's looked at that, like as far as I yeah, like,
Speaker 1: what is an orchid child? What kind of parent do
Speaker 1: they become? Or I know, I'm curious. Yeah, and yeah,
Speaker 1: maybe maybe you would imagine a dandelion parent would maybe
Speaker 1: cope better, or they'd be more show more trait stability maybe,
Speaker 1: whereas maybe an orchid parent would, depending on how things
Speaker 1: are going, show more very you know, more variation. I mean,
Speaker 1: of course, parenting is very different for different people, depending
Speaker 1: on their own circumstances. So you know, whether they're juggling
Speaker 1: work or not, and whether they have support you know,
Speaker 1: you have a supportive partner or not. And of course,
Speaker 1: some children, although we all want to think our kids
Speaker 1: are bundles of joy, some kids are more of a
Speaker 1: challenge to raise than us. Well, you know, but there's
Speaker 1: a strong genet component there, so the difficult children, you're
Speaker 1: probably a difficult parent, absolutely, and then there's an interaction
Speaker 1: so the two end up being very difficult with each other. Yeah, absolutely, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right. Yeah, you can get some difficult child parent
Speaker 1: dynamics unfolding for sure. I think, yeah, you know, high
Speaker 1: trate and neuroticism, it's going to be handed down and
Speaker 1: then yeah, you can have all sorts of fire works.
Speaker 1: What is the lemon juice personality test? Well, this goes
Speaker 1: this goes back to hands isainc and you know he
Speaker 1: had this theory that the key difference between introverts and
Speaker 1: extroverts is to do it there how sensitive they are
Speaker 1: to stimulation. So the lemon juice personality test is you
Speaker 1: use a Q tip and you put you hang it
Speaker 1: from a thread, and you put lemon juice on one side,
Speaker 1: and you put the the plain side in your mouth
Speaker 1: for a short time, switch it around, put the lemon
Speaker 1: juice side in your mouth for a short time, and
Speaker 1: then dangle the QUE tip and see how evenly balanced
Speaker 1: it is. And the idea is introverts being much more
Speaker 1: sensitive to stimulation. They salivate a lot more in response
Speaker 1: to the lemon juice, which makes that side heavier, So
Speaker 1: the idea being if you're an introvert, the lemon juice
Speaker 1: side of the Q tip will dangle down lower. But
Speaker 1: I've tried this in a tool on personality and in
Speaker 1: a London bar and it was a disaster. It was.
Speaker 1: It didn't work out. I mean, if I thought about
Speaker 1: it more carefully, I should have known. I mean, imagine
Speaker 1: people don't want to put a Q tip in their
Speaker 1: mouth in public and start mucking They're they're issues even
Speaker 1: pre pandemic. There are issues of cleanliness, understandably and all
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. People don't particularly want to rock
Speaker 1: about with putting things in their mouth and dangling from
Speaker 1: threats and things. So yeah, it didn't go too well.
Speaker 1: It became more a test I think of extra version.
Speaker 1: Probably it was willly or well all No, it's many
Speaker 1: be a test extra version. I mean, maybe more a
Speaker 1: test of conscientiousness. You know, how squeamish. Yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: like how squeamish people. You know. Heines Hans isainc is
Speaker 1: a bit of a controversial figure. Now a lot of
Speaker 1: his work has been found to not you know, replicate,
Speaker 1: and I think he had abhorrent views on certain issues.
Speaker 1: But anyway, it doesn't mean no one's all good and
Speaker 1: no one's all bad, is what I like to say.
Speaker 1: That's true. Yeah, it's a bit, it's a bit of fun. Really,
Speaker 1: I don't think it's I wouldn't take the lemon juice
Speaker 1: test very seriously. It's not a controversy, as you would say.
Speaker 1: It's not this one. The lemon juice test is not
Speaker 1: is one of his least controversial things. Uh okay, Well,
Speaker 1: you know this whole idea of cancel culture, right, that
Speaker 1: like we should cancel people who because they've done something
Speaker 1: stupid at one point in their life, or you know,
Speaker 1: we dig up something they did and high school and
Speaker 1: it's like, as a fifty year old, cancel them. Now
Speaker 1: what do you How does that kind of mentality dovetail
Speaker 1: with your research on personality change and the idea that
Speaker 1: maybe people can actually grow over their life. Well, the
Speaker 1: research and thesis that I put forward in my book
Speaker 1: is directly against cancel culture. I would say, because I
Speaker 1: suppose I'm all, I would be all in favor of
Speaker 1: giving people a second chance. So I mean, I profile
Speaker 1: various public figures in the book who had you know,
Speaker 1: real lows in life or did bad things in their
Speaker 1: life and who turn managed to turn themselves around, change
Speaker 1: their personalities for the better. One would be, for example,
Speaker 1: Marjid Nawaz, who I mean he does. He does remain
Speaker 1: a controversial figure, but yeah, he was a one time
Speaker 1: extremist is a miss, you know, in favor of killing homosexuals.
Speaker 1: And he went around with a night as a teenager
Speaker 1: with a knife strap to his back. He ended up
Speaker 1: jailed for trying to foment terrorism and what have you.
Speaker 1: He he had this experience in jail where he educated
Speaker 1: himself intensely. He read, he read widely. He kind of
Speaker 1: changed his values and goals in life, and he really
Speaker 1: he became that same you could maybe call it, you know,
Speaker 1: extreme extra version and almost obsessive drive that he had.
Speaker 1: He channeled it into being a force for promoting peace
Speaker 1: and tolerance. So he co founded the world's first kind
Speaker 1: of counter extremes organization. Well he's a post. I mean,
Speaker 1: they may well still be people who would like to
Speaker 1: cancel him, but you could say if he'd been canceled
Speaker 1: as a young, very young man, then the world will
Speaker 1: never have benefited from his peace work. But of course
Speaker 1: there are less extreme examples than that, and yeah, so
Speaker 1: I would and what every you know, everyone makes mistakes.
Speaker 1: We're all make mistakes, so I and we all have
Speaker 1: the potential to grow and improve ourselves and become better
Speaker 1: versions of ourselves. So I yeah, Unfortunately, the cancel culture
Speaker 1: is you know, anathema to all that. Thanks for not
Speaker 1: canceling me, for fumbling your bio. I was panted, I know,
Speaker 1: I know, I saw you. Well, what do I want
Speaker 1: to talk about next? Well, here's something that a topic
Speaker 1: that I that I that I that I'd like to discuss.
Speaker 1: You know what about people with personality disorders? Don't they
Speaker 1: have unique challenges in trying to change their personalities? Yeah,
Speaker 1: they do so well. For a long time, personality disorders
Speaker 1: were considered untreatable. It was almost part of the definition.
Speaker 1: So yeah, narcissistic personality disorder or borderline personality disorder, there
Speaker 1: are quite a long quite a lot of them. Anti
Speaker 1: social personality disorder. Yeah, so it's been a controversial area
Speaker 1: in psychiatry and clinical psychology actually for a number of
Speaker 1: years over whether such people can be helped or helped,
Speaker 1: can help themselves, or can change themselves. There is I think,
Speaker 1: you know, I looked at the whole literature, and I
Speaker 1: think there's growing evidence that even yes, these people who
Speaker 1: have particularly problematic personalities that can be helped and can
Speaker 1: help themselves. There are ways, But what are the new challenges? Like, Like,
Speaker 1: for instance, if you're a narcissistic personality disorder and you
Speaker 1: think there's nothing that needs to be changed. Let's say
Speaker 1: you think you're perfect, you think that you're the best,
Speaker 1: you're winning, you're winning. Why would you want to change
Speaker 1: if you're winning? But let's say you're wreaking havoc everywhere
Speaker 1: you go. What do you do with that person? Or
Speaker 1: how does that you know what's going on there? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that there are unique challenges with such people, and I
Speaker 1: would say I have to say intentional, deliberate personality change
Speaker 1: is always going to be so much harder, if not impossible.
Speaker 1: If a person does not want to change, it almost
Speaker 1: goes without saying. So, you're quite right. If someone is
Speaker 1: does not have insights into there being anything wrong, that
Speaker 1: is such a huge hurdle to get over in the
Speaker 1: first place. I think there are the question of insight
Speaker 1: in different personality, in different personality disorders, and it will
Speaker 1: mental health problems in general is a fascinating one. I
Speaker 1: think there are some people with personality disorders who will
Speaker 1: have a degree of insight, and so you can you
Speaker 1: can build on that, you know, can you can work
Speaker 1: on that and build on that. There will be people
Speaker 1: with those narcissistic personality disorder for example, I'm not saying
Speaker 1: all of them by any means, but especially over time,
Speaker 1: they might come to see that their way of relating
Speaker 1: to others and the world is harming them. Over time,
Speaker 1: actually they will experience more stress, you know, in their life,
Speaker 1: stressful events than average. They will see that they might
Speaker 1: thrive early in their social relationships. That tends to be
Speaker 1: the pattern people. We tend to like narcissists early on.
Speaker 1: They make a splash at the beginning, and then we
Speaker 1: tire of them very quickly. And you know, some narcissists,
Speaker 1: people who score high and narcissism will will recognize that
Speaker 1: over time and they might want help and they they
Speaker 1: can be helped. Besides that, without insight, you know, there
Speaker 1: are some devious ways to try and work with people
Speaker 1: with narcissism or psychopathy because you you can try and
Speaker 1: play things to their motivation. You know, you if you
Speaker 1: could try and show them that it's in their interest,
Speaker 1: for example, to work on certain skills that such as
Speaker 1: their empathy for example, and if you if you can
Speaker 1: show them that by increasing their empathy for others, they
Speaker 1: will be more successful, you know, in their goals, even
Speaker 1: though they're remaining kind of selfish. You're you can sneak
Speaker 1: under the radar, you can you can sneak things like
Speaker 1: empathy training into and so to them, which of course,
Speaker 1: if the if things like the empathy training is successful,
Speaker 1: it will have it will help lower narcis system and
Speaker 1: psychopathy for example, for example, so that there's a way
Speaker 1: of framing the interventions in a more tantalizing way for
Speaker 1: people who are more self interested and self centered. That's
Speaker 1: somewhat hopeful. Well, so are there US presidents that are
Speaker 1: are US presidence in general more likely to display psychopathic traits?
Speaker 1: And so why yeah, there is evidence to suggest they
Speaker 1: are especially well, especially a subtrait of psychopathy called fearless
Speaker 1: dominance there is. So that's the kind of it's a
Speaker 1: trait that's also found high levels in for example, surgeons
Speaker 1: and special forces operatives and that kind of thing. So
Speaker 1: that the one way of looking at it is as
Speaker 1: extremely low neuroticism, like almost unnerving levels of emotional stability.
Speaker 1: So you can you can see why it might be
Speaker 1: beneficial to a president or a surgeon who has to
Speaker 1: make life or death decisions or yeah, well, in the
Speaker 1: case of a president, obviously make decisions that are going
Speaker 1: to affect millions of people. In case of a surgeon,
Speaker 1: you know, slicing with a scalpel into someone's body. And
Speaker 1: so it's the subtrate or facet of psychopathy that is
Speaker 1: probably most associated with what some reach research is called
Speaker 1: like successful psychopathy or success that they talk about so
Speaker 1: called successful psychopaths. I mean any of these traits in
Speaker 1: isolation of the others are not are not the whole, right,
Speaker 1: I mean like you can have you can score high.
Speaker 1: Let's say the only the only facet of psychopay you
Speaker 1: score high in is fearless dominance. It doesn't mean you
Speaker 1: score high in psychopathy, right, It just means you score
Speaker 1: high in ferist dominance. I guess on average, if you know,
Speaker 1: if you took a large sample of people, you would
Speaker 1: expect the fills dominance to correlate with the other subtrates
Speaker 1: as well. On our surgeon isn't a psychopath I hope
Speaker 1: my surgeon just scores high in freist dominance coupled with compassion.
Speaker 1: That would be the ideal. Yeah, there there there there
Speaker 1: was a general paper looking at psychopathy insurgents that it,
Speaker 1: you know, suggesting it is yeah, higher than average insurgeons,
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, and we can see ce CEOs, you know,
Speaker 1: compathy is supposedly on our retire among CEOs. And but yeah,
Speaker 1: if you break it down into these subtraits, yeah, the
Speaker 1: idea would be that you can. You don't score uniformly
Speaker 1: across all the different subtraits, but you could in theory.
Speaker 1: You have some individuals who have a profile where they're
Speaker 1: they're high on the freest dominance and not so high
Speaker 1: on the less favorable subtrates. But I mean, some of
Speaker 1: this is constrable. I know you will know this. You know.
Speaker 1: People argue about how finally we can break down these
Speaker 1: different traits, you know, and how much it makes sense
Speaker 1: to talk about subtraits or not and what have you.
Speaker 1: You know, some people are skeptical about the dark triad
Speaker 1: at all, the dark triad. Yeah, have they never met
Speaker 1: an asshole before? Well, I think they would lump it
Speaker 1: into like low agreeability for example, they would, you know,
Speaker 1: collapse it into the big five. Some people who will
Speaker 1: more you mean that more likely collapse into hexaco honest
Speaker 1: humility factor. Yeah, well that's the yeah, for those who
Speaker 1: favor the sixth Yeah, the big sort of the sixth trait.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, okay, okay. So what is a challenge
Speaker 1: mindset versus a threat mindset? Oh? Well, a challenge mindset
Speaker 1: is this is this pertains when you have an event
Speaker 1: ahead of you that you're fretting about that is very demanding.
Speaker 1: So it could be a sports event, giving a public speech,
Speaker 1: doing a podcast interview, whatever it might be. And a
Speaker 1: challenge mindset is if you have a challenge mindset, you
Speaker 1: see it as within your abilities, within your You believe
Speaker 1: your capabilities exceed what is going to be demanded of you.
Speaker 1: You see it as a learning experience. You see it
Speaker 1: in terms of what you're going to get out of
Speaker 1: the experience. A threat mindset is like the reverse of
Speaker 1: all those So threat mindset you worry that you don't
Speaker 1: have the skills and abilities to cope. You worry about
Speaker 1: what the bad things that are going to happen to
Speaker 1: you out of this situation. You know, all that can
Speaker 1: go wrong, that would be the threat mindset. So I
Speaker 1: encountered this way of looking at things in the realm
Speaker 1: of sports psychology. I think that's where it originates. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure. So a sports psychologist might work with an
Speaker 1: athlete to try and encourage them to have a challenge
Speaker 1: mindset when they have an event coming up, versus a
Speaker 1: threat mindset. And there are various things you can do
Speaker 1: to try and encourage yourself to have one mindset or another,
Speaker 1: for example, in in this keep keeping the sports context.
Speaker 1: Athletes for example, can perform certain rituals before an event
Speaker 1: to help them feeling you know, somewhat familiar and in control,
Speaker 1: so that they're not feeling fearful, to encourage those feelings
Speaker 1: of confidence and that they can cope. And obviously, a
Speaker 1: sports psychologist can coach an athlete to try and see
Speaker 1: it as a you know, a learning opportunity rather than
Speaker 1: seeing it as you know, what are you what am
Speaker 1: I going to lose today in this race? You know
Speaker 1: what's going to go wrong for me today in this
Speaker 1: race or this giving this speech, or or whatever it
Speaker 1: might be. You can think, well, what am I going
Speaker 1: to learn? You know, what am I going to learn?
Speaker 1: I'm going to I'm going to grow from this experience
Speaker 1: rather than suffer from it. And yeah, I mentioned it
Speaker 1: in my book because I think, for example, I think
Speaker 1: extroverts are probably inclined more to see things as a
Speaker 1: challenger than a threat. They're more optimistic by nature, so
Speaker 1: they naturally see things as a chance that you know,
Speaker 1: they're hungry for reward, and they see things as an
Speaker 1: opportunity for reward and pleasure. They go seeking that out
Speaker 1: and they're they're willing to take risks. And I suppose,
Speaker 1: but those of those of us with more introverted inclinations,
Speaker 1: I see the challenge of us as threat mindset as
Speaker 1: a way of maybe trying to come out of your
Speaker 1: shell a little bit, trying to be a bit more
Speaker 1: willing to take risks and have a more positive, optimistic
Speaker 1: attitude towards opportunities that come your way in life. I mean, clearly,
Speaker 1: neuroticism plays a huge role and strong strongly correlated with
Speaker 1: the threat mindset. Yeah, exactly. So you've got where extroverts
Speaker 1: are drawn are drawn to reward, You've got neurotic. Neurotic
Speaker 1: people are very sensitive to and fearful of punishment. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and things going badly. Yeah, but there are two different dimensions,
Speaker 1: so you can get cases like me where I'm a
Speaker 1: neurotic extrovert. Yeah, you can, I know, and I think
Speaker 1: that that's probably not recognized enough. It's the personality interactions
Speaker 1: that are much more interesting to me than any of
Speaker 1: these one dimensions in context of the others or devoid
Speaker 1: of context of the others. I actually wrote an article
Speaker 1: for Scientific American called Confessions of a Neurotic extra did Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The our motto, the motto of neurotic extroverts is act
Speaker 1: first and then worry immediately. I like that. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: sometimes wonder if I am, yeah, like rather than being
Speaker 1: an introvert, like maybe I'm a kind of a neurotic
Speaker 1: narcissist or something, you know, like a vulnerable narcissist. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Like I'd really like to have more attention and be
Speaker 1: out there more. But I'm just, yeah, my nuaticism is
Speaker 1: too high, and I find it. I find it too scary.
Speaker 1: I've read a lot about vulnerable narcissism and which is
Speaker 1: mostly a disorder of neuroticism. It really is. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people like I wrote about that
Speaker 1: my book Transcender wrote I had a checklist for vulnerable narsial.
Speaker 1: A lot of people were like memailing me be like
Speaker 1: that's me. Yeah, Well I think we're all. Look, we're
Speaker 1: all there's a fun, something fundamentally human about these all
Speaker 1: these personality traits. I think it's important to recognize that
Speaker 1: they're all continuums, and we all lie somewhere on these continuums.
Speaker 1: So we can at least identify moments when we've been introverted,
Speaker 1: moments we've been extrovert, moments we've been bold psychopaths, and
Speaker 1: moments we've been you know, less bold, you know, moments
Speaker 1: when we've been conscientious. So it's we're just talking about
Speaker 1: density distributions, right, Yeah, And actually I remember you you
Speaker 1: describe it in those terms in your book Transcend. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I really yeah, I really like that way of
Speaker 1: looking at it, because, as you say, it's like we
Speaker 1: all have these little rather than seeing ourselves as one type.
Speaker 1: We have all the different types within us, but we
Speaker 1: just vary and how often we express them, you know,
Speaker 1: And I think part of intense personality changes it can
Speaker 1: be a question of just shifting those distributions. It doesn't
Speaker 1: have to be a profound change. You know, from one
Speaker 1: extreme to the other, from black to white. You know,
Speaker 1: it can be just shifting the distributions a little bit
Speaker 1: could have I think, massive consequences for your life. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, that's one way I've looked at it with
Speaker 1: myself is trying to, for example, increase my willingness to
Speaker 1: take risks, so to be an extrovert, to be that
Speaker 1: kind of low low nuticism extrovert a little bit more often.
Speaker 1: And who knows if that makes the difference between you
Speaker 1: having a willingness to go up to someone you know
Speaker 1: at a networking event, or if it makes the difference
Speaker 1: to you accepting an invitation one day that you might
Speaker 1: not have done if you hadn't been working on your
Speaker 1: personality development. I think the consequences could be meaningful, even
Speaker 1: with quite subtle shifts, as you put it, in that
Speaker 1: kind of distribution of your behavior profile in life. Okay,
Speaker 1: maybe that's a good place to end this episode today.
Speaker 1: What do you think? Did that feel? That felt good? Christian?
Speaker 1: I really appreciate you writing this book and just shining
Speaker 1: a spotlight on the fact that personality change is possible,
Speaker 1: not unwimited, unlimited, like some self help gurus claim, but
Speaker 1: within the realm of science scientific parameters, it's still shining
Speaker 1: an important spotlight on this topic. And I wish you
Speaker 1: all the best in this book tour. Well. Thank you
Speaker 1: very much, Scott. And you know my book it's you know,
Speaker 1: I'm standing on the shoulders of giants in the sense
Speaker 1: that you know, I'm drawing on the work of personality
Speaker 1: psychologists and researchers like yourself, and you're one of them.
Speaker 1: And so I'm really grateful for all the work you've
Speaker 1: done and I'm really grateful to talk to you today.
Speaker 1: Thanks Christian M.