WEBVTT - What Does Curiosity Really Do To Our Brains? 0:00:14.680 --> 0:00:18.120 You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:19.240 and iHeartRadio. 0:00:23.440 --> 0:00:24.520 Guess what Will? What's that? 0:00:24.560 --> 0:00:24.840 Mango? 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:27.720 If you've ever made a decision then wondered what might 0:00:27.760 --> 0:00:31.360 have happened if you'd made a different decision, you've experienced 0:00:31.400 --> 0:00:35.760 something called counterfactual curiosity. Is that something that's familiar to you? 0:00:36.080 --> 0:00:37.920 Yeah, that means nothing for me. I mean when I 0:00:37.960 --> 0:00:40.000 make up my mind, that is it. There is no 0:00:40.280 --> 0:00:44.360 second guessing, Mango. Yeah, Well, you are very unusual, and 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:49.479 counterfactual curiosity is also unusual because, unlike other types of curiosity, 0:00:49.760 --> 0:00:52.720 pursuing that line of thinking never leads to a reward. 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:56.560 Knowing what could have happened has zero real world benefit 0:00:57.040 --> 0:01:00.440 unless you own a time machine, and often it has 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:04.120 negative impact because it makes you feel regret. So you 0:01:04.200 --> 0:01:06.400 think that if there's something with no reward and a 0:01:06.440 --> 0:01:08.640 high risk of negativity, you'd want to avoid it. But 0:01:08.680 --> 0:01:10.959 studies have shown that just isn't true. 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:13.080 In one test, people were shown in an animation of 0:01:13.120 --> 0:01:15.240 a balloon and they had to choose a number of 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:18.600 times to pump the balloon, and if it burst, they lost, 0:01:18.880 --> 0:01:22.039 if it stayed intact, they won. So Afterwards, participants were 0:01:22.040 --> 0:01:24.160 given the option of seeing the correct number of pumps 0:01:24.200 --> 0:01:27.800 that would have inflated the balloon without bursting it, and 0:01:28.120 --> 0:01:31.880 over and over and over they requested that information, even 0:01:31.920 --> 0:01:35.800 though they also reported that knowing the answer made them 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:38.679 feel worse if their guests had popped the balloon. 0:01:39.120 --> 0:01:42.680 Wow, so that counterfactual curiosity was just too strong, unlike 0:01:42.720 --> 0:01:44.479 the blown I suppose exactly. 0:01:44.680 --> 0:01:47.080 And today we are kicking off a week long series 0:01:47.120 --> 0:01:50.520 all about curiosity, why we have it, how it changes 0:01:50.520 --> 0:01:53.160 over the course of our lives, whether animals experience it, 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:57.440 and where that saying curiosity killed the cat really came from. 0:01:57.560 --> 0:02:01.120 We've got lots of questions and all most as many answers, 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:02.160 So let's step in. 0:02:23.200 --> 0:02:25.639 Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm 0:02:25.639 --> 0:02:27.960 Will Pearson and as always I'm here with my good 0:02:27.960 --> 0:02:30.960 friend Mangesh hot Ticket and Mango. You won't believe this 0:02:31.160 --> 0:02:33.959 one thing our Palin producer, Dylan Fagan is doing over 0:02:33.960 --> 0:02:34.919 there in the booth today. 0:02:36.040 --> 0:02:36.639 What's he doing? 0:02:36.960 --> 0:02:39.480 He's doing one thing that'll blow your mind. 0:02:39.520 --> 0:02:42.320 Mango, I cannot see from where I'm saying. Will you 0:02:42.400 --> 0:02:42.760 just tell me? 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:44.399 Well, do you really want to know, yes, of course, 0:02:44.400 --> 0:02:46.560 I want to know you sound that you actually sound 0:02:46.880 --> 0:02:48.120 maybe a little bit annoyed. 0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:49.000 I have annoyed. 0:02:50.320 --> 0:02:54.240 Well, then my experiment is a success, Mango, I've successfully trapped. 0:02:53.880 --> 0:02:55.480 You in an information gap. 0:02:55.520 --> 0:03:00.000 That's a concept of curiosity, developed by behavioral economist George Lowenstein, 0:03:00.280 --> 0:03:03.480 who incidentally is the great grandson of Sigmund Freud. Now, 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:06.520 according to him, curiosity is a form of cognitive deprivation 0:03:06.639 --> 0:03:09.720 that occurs when you have some concrete information. 0:03:09.760 --> 0:03:11.480 But you don't feel like you have enough. 0:03:11.880 --> 0:03:14.000 So it's not a total absence of knowledge, but it 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:17.520 is an absence of satisfaction because the other key thing 0:03:17.639 --> 0:03:20.760 is you're aware that this gap could potentially be filled. 0:03:21.200 --> 0:03:23.600 So in your case, just now, I gave you a small, 0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:27.680 but you know, super tantalizing piece of information, and I 0:03:27.760 --> 0:03:30.320 told you that Dylan was doing a specific activity in 0:03:30.360 --> 0:03:32.120 the booth. I made it clear that I knew what 0:03:32.160 --> 0:03:35.680 it was that primed you for a sudden rush of curiosity. Now, 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:37.920 if I just said Dylan isn't here today, I don't 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:40.119 know where he is, you might still wonder what he's 0:03:40.200 --> 0:03:43.120 up to, but you probably wouldn't feel that strong urge 0:03:43.120 --> 0:03:45.400 to find out even though in the end it's the 0:03:45.520 --> 0:03:49.160 same basic scenario. Dylan's doing something and you have no 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:49.960 idea what it is. 0:03:50.000 --> 0:03:50.320 Mango. 0:03:50.880 --> 0:03:54.040 That is fascinating. But also I have this feeling that 0:03:54.080 --> 0:03:55.960 you're never going to tell me what he's doing. 0:03:56.840 --> 0:03:58.960 I'll tell you what at the end of the episode. 0:03:59.120 --> 0:04:01.200 We'll have Dylan self fill you in. 0:04:01.360 --> 0:04:04.480 That is an incredible treat. It's a deal. Okay. So, 0:04:04.640 --> 0:04:06.400 as I mentioned earlier, this is the beginning of our 0:04:06.440 --> 0:04:10.560 week long exploration of curiosity. And I'm really excited because 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:15.080 you know, I think we both are curious people. Our 0:04:15.120 --> 0:04:18.520 lives are animated by curiosity, right, Like it's such a 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:21.360 big part of our friendship too. I mean I know that, 0:04:21.560 --> 0:04:26.400 like just hearing the topics you were fascinated by, like history, religion, 0:04:26.400 --> 0:04:28.920 et cetera, and the classes you were interested in made 0:04:28.960 --> 0:04:31.520 me want to befriend you because like you picked out 0:04:31.560 --> 0:04:35.360 interesting things and you always had some like curious, fascinating 0:04:35.400 --> 0:04:36.279 thing to talk about. 0:04:36.360 --> 0:04:38.200 It's kind of wild to think about We're going on 0:04:38.520 --> 0:04:41.680 almost three decades of being curious about stuff together. 0:04:41.720 --> 0:04:42.600 When you think about that. 0:04:42.960 --> 0:04:45.480 First year dorm room in college and coming back from 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:49.320 those classes, like you mentioned, having learned something interesting. Cramming 0:04:49.320 --> 0:04:51.360 into a dorm room with other friends and talking about 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:52.880 it almost makes me feel like we were a little 0:04:52.920 --> 0:04:54.200 bit nerdy, But I can't decide. 0:04:54.279 --> 0:04:56.360 Yeah, not at all, just the time. 0:04:57.080 --> 0:04:59.279 But you're right, it's the best feeling in the world 0:04:59.360 --> 0:05:01.760 to learn something new, to have somebody share something that 0:05:01.800 --> 0:05:04.840 they've learned, and just to exercise that curiosity. 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:07.880 We were also curious about stupid things, right, like that 0:05:07.960 --> 0:05:10.520 bouncy ball that came into our dorm room and our 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:13.360 senior year, and we would just like all of us, 0:05:13.880 --> 0:05:15.839 wanted to see how many times you could bounce it 0:05:15.960 --> 0:05:18.599 from the ground to the ceiling and just keep it going. 0:05:18.800 --> 0:05:21.640 And we wanted to know what the limits of this 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:22.279 bouncy ball. 0:05:22.320 --> 0:05:24.520 Yeah, yeah, exactly, and we had the strong arms to 0:05:24.560 --> 0:05:27.080 test it out. My favorite part about that whole story, though, was, 0:05:27.440 --> 0:05:31.520 if you remember this, we lived upstairs from this certain 0:05:31.560 --> 0:05:34.440 fraternity at Duke and they had come upstairs right at 0:05:34.440 --> 0:05:35.960 the beginning of the school year and they were like, guys, 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:37.640 we just want to give you heads up. Sometimes we're 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:39.840 really loud and I we like to party. I hope 0:05:39.839 --> 0:05:41.640 that doesn't bother you too much. And we're like, it's 0:05:41.680 --> 0:05:44.240 cool whatever, and then like night three of being there 0:05:44.320 --> 0:05:47.360 is when we did this bouncy ball thing and two 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:49.760 of the guys walked up from that frat and they 0:05:49.800 --> 0:05:52.080 were like, guys, what is going on? And they walked 0:05:52.080 --> 0:05:53.200 into a room and we were. 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:56.320 Like one, two, three, four or five except watching the 0:05:56.320 --> 0:05:58.800 ball bounce between the floor and the ceiling. Yeah, boo 0:05:58.800 --> 0:06:01.760 boo boom boo boo boo boo boo. It was such 0:06:01.800 --> 0:06:03.120 a thrill, But that's what we were up to. 0:06:03.279 --> 0:06:07.640 Yeah, you're right, that seems like worthwhile curiosity to me anyway. 0:06:07.760 --> 0:06:10.240 So each episode for the series is going to take 0:06:10.240 --> 0:06:13.359 a look at different aspects of curiosity, and we're kicking 0:06:13.400 --> 0:06:17.240 things off with neuroscience and psychology, like what really goes 0:06:17.279 --> 0:06:20.040 on in our brains when we experience curiosity, How does 0:06:20.120 --> 0:06:22.320 that affect our minds and our behavior? And what does 0:06:22.360 --> 0:06:25.520 all of this have to do with impulse shopping. But 0:06:25.800 --> 0:06:27.640 before we get into the science, we asked our friend 0:06:27.680 --> 0:06:30.480 Mitra to take her microphone around the streets of Brooklyn 0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:33.880 to find out how some everyday people define curiosity. 0:06:35.120 --> 0:06:40.000 Curiosity to me means interest, whether it's being curious about 0:06:40.000 --> 0:06:45.760 a person, about a subject, about an object, whatever it is. 0:06:46.120 --> 0:06:51.919 It means interest, I would say maybe excitement for the unknown. 0:06:52.839 --> 0:06:55.240 I think it's a discipline because I think it needs 0:06:55.279 --> 0:07:00.120 to be cultivated, but like a discipline that ensures that 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:04.159 I am not doing the same thing over and over again, 0:07:04.200 --> 0:07:07.719 and I'm staying open to new ideas, new places, new 0:07:07.760 --> 0:07:08.800 thought processes. 0:07:09.800 --> 0:07:14.160 Curiosity is the desire to learn, to keep evolving, changing, 0:07:14.800 --> 0:07:18.320 collecting knowledge and insights some sort give. 0:07:18.160 --> 0:07:21.240 In my head right now, curiosities associate with like growth, 0:07:21.400 --> 0:07:24.200 you know, just trying to expand and learn more. 0:07:24.880 --> 0:07:26.960 For me, it's an actual need. 0:07:27.440 --> 0:07:30.400 I don't think I can go a day without being 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:32.440 curious about almost everything. 0:07:33.040 --> 0:07:36.000 I guess curiosity is just acknowledging all the things you 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:39.240 don't know and letting yourself wonder about them instead of 0:07:39.280 --> 0:07:41.280 being bummed you don't know it. 0:07:41.360 --> 0:07:41.880 I don't know. 0:07:43.080 --> 0:07:45.840 So I really like that quote that curiosity is desire 0:07:45.920 --> 0:07:48.600 to learn to keep evolving and changing, because I one 0:07:48.600 --> 0:07:52.240 thing I found with my grandparents and actually my great 0:07:52.240 --> 0:07:56.679 grandmother is that they were most alive when they were curious, 0:07:56.960 --> 0:07:59.800 you know, like they were reading the paper till the end. 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:05.400 My grandfather was learning this language kinda just because he 0:08:05.680 --> 0:08:07.280 had a story he wanted to write. And he thought 0:08:07.320 --> 0:08:09.360 it would be best written in that language, you know, 0:08:09.480 --> 0:08:12.880 And so like, I think there's something incredible about curiosity 0:08:12.920 --> 0:08:14.680 that is really life affirming. 0:08:14.800 --> 0:08:15.760 Yeah, I think so too. 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:18.520 It's also fun to watch people whose curiosity may be 0:08:18.640 --> 0:08:21.560 exercised in a slightly different way than ours, Like for us, 0:08:21.600 --> 0:08:24.160 I think most of the time it's just knowing information. 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:27.880 But I also love watching people who are maybe fascinated 0:08:27.920 --> 0:08:31.440 by gear or how electronics work, or the types of 0:08:31.440 --> 0:08:33.480 things that it's not really how my brain works. 0:08:33.480 --> 0:08:34.320 I can't figure it out. 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:36.840 But like watching somebody who's super into and it's like 0:08:36.880 --> 0:08:38.720 this watch is broken, I'm going to open it up 0:08:38.720 --> 0:08:41.040 myself and try to figure out how to fix it, 0:08:41.160 --> 0:08:43.680 or that sort of curiosity. I just I love watching 0:08:43.760 --> 0:08:46.360 people exercise their version of curiosity. 0:08:46.440 --> 0:08:50.000 Yeah. I mean I had an uncle who, uh in India, 0:08:50.080 --> 0:08:53.560 microwaves weren't available in the seventies, I think, great indies, 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:57.719 and he went to the buy and got two microwaves 0:08:57.800 --> 0:08:59.320 and one was to use and one was just to 0:08:59.320 --> 0:08:59.760 take apart. 0:09:00.080 --> 0:09:02.880 Yeah that's so cool. No, I love that. That's pretty great. 0:09:02.960 --> 0:09:04.600 So in terms of curiosity, when it comes to the 0:09:04.640 --> 0:09:08.640 scientific definition, it's not as easy as you might think. 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:12.400 Some studies measure curiosity by tracking eye movement. In other words, 0:09:12.400 --> 0:09:14.360 they're saying that if you choose to look at something, 0:09:14.440 --> 0:09:18.280 that means you're curious about it. Many researchers define curiosity 0:09:18.280 --> 0:09:21.120 as the self reported desire for information that has no 0:09:21.280 --> 0:09:25.160 clear purpose or utility. Doctor Celeste Kidd is the director 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:28.040 of the Kid Lab at UC Berkeley, where she studies 0:09:28.080 --> 0:09:31.960 curiosity and knowledge acquisition, and she says, there's actually one 0:09:32.080 --> 0:09:33.640 big flaw with this approach. 0:09:34.280 --> 0:09:37.280 It's very hard to know in advance of encountering a 0:09:37.280 --> 0:09:40.800 particular situation whether a particular piece of information is going 0:09:40.840 --> 0:09:43.600 to be useful or not. A more concrete way of 0:09:43.640 --> 0:09:46.800 saying that is, maybe, to example, you might for some 0:09:47.000 --> 0:09:52.600 reason become fixated on tracking down a particular move that 0:09:52.640 --> 0:09:55.800 you remember seeing Usher do in the early two thousands 0:09:56.160 --> 0:09:58.400 and go on a deep dive trying to locate this clip. 0:09:58.600 --> 0:10:02.760 You don't need that runny direct purpose. However, knowing that 0:10:02.880 --> 0:10:07.319 piece of information could lead you to be interested in 0:10:07.400 --> 0:10:09.920 other pieces of information that's serve a function later. 0:10:10.640 --> 0:10:12.760 Okay, no disrespect to Usher, but I don't see how 0:10:12.800 --> 0:10:15.440 tracking down an old video of him dancing would make 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:16.960 an impact on your life. 0:10:17.520 --> 0:10:21.680 Well, clearly you haven't watched enough Usher, But what if 0:10:21.720 --> 0:10:25.079 that video reawakens your love of dance, so you start 0:10:25.080 --> 0:10:27.880 looking for adult dance classes in your area and eventually 0:10:27.960 --> 0:10:29.720 quit your job and build a new career as a 0:10:29.720 --> 0:10:32.640 backup dancer. What if the Usher video sends you down 0:10:32.679 --> 0:10:34.920 a rabbit hole of nineties R and B and use 0:10:34.960 --> 0:10:37.600 that knowledge to make a killer playlist for someone you're dating, 0:10:37.720 --> 0:10:40.400 and that helps you eventually get married. I mean, they're 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:41.599 also got this whole. 0:10:41.360 --> 0:10:44.959 Thing that I think you just explored your dream there, 0:10:44.960 --> 0:10:46.520 and I mean it may seem a little far fetched, 0:10:46.559 --> 0:10:48.600 but I guess stranger things have definitely happened. 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:51.240 Yeah, I mean, that's I guess Kid's point. Right. We 0:10:51.280 --> 0:10:53.800 can't say with one hundred percent certainty that any given 0:10:53.840 --> 0:10:57.199 piece of information won't have meaningful value in the future 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:00.320 because all of this is so subjective. Instead of trying 0:11:00.360 --> 0:11:03.679 to land on one perfect clinical definition, it actually might 0:11:03.720 --> 0:11:07.720 be simpler to focus on different flavors of curiosity. So 0:11:07.840 --> 0:11:11.640 over the years, there have been various attempts at categorizing curiosity, 0:11:11.720 --> 0:11:15.000 but one of the most prominent frameworks separates it into 0:11:15.000 --> 0:11:18.240 two types, state versus trait curiosity. 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:21.040 Actually this came up just this morning because we were 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:22.959 looking at a list of the states, and I would say, 0:11:23.000 --> 0:11:26.400 my biggest state curiosity is why is Arkansas pronounced that way? 0:11:26.440 --> 0:11:27.920 Do we want to spend the rest of the episode 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:28.520 exploring that? 0:11:28.720 --> 0:11:30.319 Yeah, I mean it's because it was derived from the 0:11:30.360 --> 0:11:32.720 French name for native tribes who lived in the region. 0:11:32.800 --> 0:11:35.560 The folks in Arkansas kept the French pronunciation and up 0:11:35.559 --> 0:11:38.080 the river in Kansas they decided to anglicize it. But 0:11:38.320 --> 0:11:39.280 that is not. 0:11:39.360 --> 0:11:42.360 I love you knew the answer to that. That's impressive. 0:11:42.679 --> 0:11:46.480 State curiosity is when your curiosity is activated by a 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:50.760 particular topic or situation, Like if you realize that you 0:11:50.760 --> 0:11:53.080 have a deep interest in the origin of place names, 0:11:53.600 --> 0:11:57.520 that would be state curiosity. Trait curiosity is what it's 0:11:57.520 --> 0:12:00.480 called when you're just naturally curious about lots of things. 0:12:00.760 --> 0:12:03.000 So basically, some people are curious all the time, like 0:12:03.040 --> 0:12:05.240 it's part of their personality, and then other people are 0:12:05.240 --> 0:12:07.719 only curious when something comes along that. 0:12:07.480 --> 0:12:09.439 I don't know that really interests them exactly. 0:12:10.040 --> 0:12:11.600 So I guess you and I would rank pretty high 0:12:11.600 --> 0:12:13.040 on the trait curiosity scale. 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:14.920 Yeah, definitely, I mean, it's why we do the show. 0:12:15.000 --> 0:12:18.120 So as someone who experiences a lot of curiosity, one 0:12:18.120 --> 0:12:20.240 of the things I wanted to know was why does 0:12:20.280 --> 0:12:22.080 it feel so good to get an answer to a 0:12:22.160 --> 0:12:24.800 question you're curious about, even if it's something you know 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:27.920 is kind of pointless. And according to doctor Kid, it's 0:12:27.960 --> 0:12:32.880 because satisfying your curiosity releases all these feel good brain chemicals, 0:12:32.920 --> 0:12:35.960 including dopamine, which is the newer transmitter that's associated with 0:12:35.960 --> 0:12:39.800 feelings of pleasure and motivation, reward, all those things. 0:12:40.200 --> 0:12:41.640 Yeah, I mean, I did some reading about that, and 0:12:41.640 --> 0:12:44.120 there have actually been studies that try to show exactly 0:12:44.160 --> 0:12:46.760 how this process works. So I think my favorite was 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:49.040 one where they put people in an MRI machine and 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:52.480 then they made them read trivia questions. It's kind of cool, right, 0:12:52.960 --> 0:12:55.559 like a terrible trivia I'm glad I wasn't one of them, 0:12:55.600 --> 0:12:58.439 but I'm also glad they did this. But perhaps unsurprisingly, 0:12:58.440 --> 0:13:01.920 people who reported higher level of curiosity about the trivia 0:13:02.000 --> 0:13:04.920 questions showed clear activation in the parts of the brain 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:08.200 associated with reward anticipation, so. 0:13:08.320 --> 0:13:11.440 They were all ready for that big dopamine hitting. 0:13:11.559 --> 0:13:14.120 Yes, that's exactly right, but brains are complicated, and our 0:13:14.160 --> 0:13:18.120 brains on curiosity appear to be very complicated. For example, 0:13:18.160 --> 0:13:21.240 in another experiment, people were shown blurry images, which made 0:13:21.240 --> 0:13:24.000 them curious about what they were looking at until clear 0:13:24.160 --> 0:13:27.760 versions of the images were finally revealed. Now, during that test, 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:30.360 researchers found the activation in the parts of the brain 0:13:30.440 --> 0:13:34.840 related to unpleasant events. In other words, from a neurochemical standpoint, 0:13:35.080 --> 0:13:37.320 curiosity can be a quest for that good feeling that 0:13:37.360 --> 0:13:40.400 comes from getting information you really want, or it can 0:13:40.440 --> 0:13:42.840 be more like an aversion, an attempt to avoid the 0:13:42.880 --> 0:13:45.839 bad feeling of not knowing something. So in two thousand 0:13:45.840 --> 0:13:48.559 and five, a psychologist named Jordan Littman suggested that there 0:13:48.559 --> 0:13:52.160 are actually distinct types of curiosity, which he called interest 0:13:52.200 --> 0:13:57.960 curiosity or eye curiosity, and deprivation curiosity or de curiosity. 0:13:58.640 --> 0:14:01.320 That's really fascinating. I can definitely think of times when 0:14:01.400 --> 0:14:05.680 not knowing something has energized me, right like even late 0:14:05.679 --> 0:14:07.680 at night you fall into a rival hole or whatever, 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:10.800 and you're more excited to learn. But other times, not 0:14:10.840 --> 0:14:13.040 knowing the answer to a question can be really negative 0:14:13.120 --> 0:14:15.120 and often a frustrating experience. 0:14:15.240 --> 0:14:18.079 And that's true, but remember curiosity isn't always tied to 0:14:18.120 --> 0:14:21.840 specific questions. So as humans, we crave novelty, and if 0:14:21.840 --> 0:14:24.400 our brains don't have enough stimulation in general, we can 0:14:24.440 --> 0:14:27.600 also get really frustrated. Like I read about these experiments 0:14:27.600 --> 0:14:31.080 at McGill University back in the nineteen fifties, where researchers 0:14:31.080 --> 0:14:34.400 paid healthy college students twenty dollars a day to sit 0:14:34.440 --> 0:14:37.080 in a room. They were comfortable, they had plenty of food, 0:14:37.400 --> 0:14:40.560 but there was nothing to see, hear, or touch, and 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:42.840 for the first four to eight hours people were fine, 0:14:43.160 --> 0:14:46.160 but then the need for stimulation, any kind of stimulation, 0:14:46.320 --> 0:14:50.239 became pretty unbearable, so subjects were offered recordings of incredibly 0:14:50.320 --> 0:14:53.480 boring material, like a lecture for kids on the dangers 0:14:53.480 --> 0:14:57.000 of drinking or an outdated stock market report. One student 0:14:57.040 --> 0:14:59.640 asked to listen to the drinking lecture twenty times and 0:14:59.720 --> 0:15:01.040 a already hour period. 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:02.440 That's how desperate he was. 0:15:04.080 --> 0:15:08.440 Wow. So we really are hardwired for mental stimulation and 0:15:08.520 --> 0:15:10.640 we want to engage with the world beyond ourselves. 0:15:10.720 --> 0:15:13.240 It's exactly right, And it seems that curiosity benefits our 0:15:13.280 --> 0:15:16.240 brains in other ways beyond just boosting dopamine and helping 0:15:16.360 --> 0:15:19.400 us avoid the discomfort of being uncertain or bored. Some 0:15:19.440 --> 0:15:21.800 of those blurry image studies I mentioned earlier found the 0:15:21.840 --> 0:15:25.600 link between curiosity and enhanced memory, so people had an 0:15:25.640 --> 0:15:28.080 easier time recalling images that they saw when they were 0:15:28.160 --> 0:15:30.760 curious about what they were looking at. So after we 0:15:30.800 --> 0:15:33.400 take a quick break, we'll talk more about what triggers 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:37.120 curiosity and how that can affect everyday situations like drinking 0:15:37.120 --> 0:15:39.720 oat milk and scrolling through cat photos online. 0:15:40.000 --> 0:15:54.560 So don't go anywhere. 0:15:55.920 --> 0:15:58.240 Welcome back to Part Time Genius. It is day one 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:01.680 of our week long dive into the fin phenomena of curiosity, 0:16:01.920 --> 0:16:04.160 and I hope you've enjoyed what you've heard so far. 0:16:04.680 --> 0:16:07.600 If you have, we are curious for how you feel 0:16:07.640 --> 0:16:10.360 about the show. Please leave us a nice rating and 0:16:10.400 --> 0:16:13.520 review and share this episode with a friend. We appreciate 0:16:13.560 --> 0:16:16.800 it so much, so will. Before the break, we were 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:19.760 talking about how curiosity can give us a hit of dopamine. 0:16:19.920 --> 0:16:22.200 It can also improve our memory and of course make 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:25.800 us better at trivia games. So if curiosity is so 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:28.960 good for us, why aren't we curious about everything all 0:16:29.040 --> 0:16:32.680 the time. Well, Celeste Kid, the academic we were talking 0:16:32.680 --> 0:16:36.720 to before, says that triggering curiosity requires a specific set 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:39.040 of conditions that vary from person to person. 0:16:39.800 --> 0:16:42.160 One of the things that we know from my lab's 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:45.720 research is that you are not just curious about anything. 0:16:45.840 --> 0:16:49.000 Any information gap is not equally attractive. You are, in 0:16:49.120 --> 0:16:54.600 particular drawn to resolve the information gaps that are just 0:16:54.840 --> 0:16:57.840 right with respect to what you currently know. So the 0:16:57.880 --> 0:16:59.680 things that are the most attractive were things that are 0:16:59.680 --> 0:17:02.600 a little different from what you currently understand, but not 0:17:02.920 --> 0:17:05.240 so different that it would be difficult to encode them. 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:10.679 I don't know the entire Swedish language, and while I 0:17:10.720 --> 0:17:12.920 do think it would be cool if I learned some Swedish, 0:17:13.040 --> 0:17:15.359 I'm not super motivated till I drop everything and do 0:17:15.400 --> 0:17:17.679 that right now. Because I don't know any of it. 0:17:18.080 --> 0:17:22.000 That makes it less attractive than learning something about a 0:17:22.080 --> 0:17:23.560 topic that I have some background in. 0:17:24.680 --> 0:17:27.240 And apparently the inverse is true too, so if we 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:30.840 think we already know everything about a topic, it's less 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:34.199 likely to make us curious. In a study involving trivia questions, 0:17:34.240 --> 0:17:37.240 people who had no clue about the answers and people 0:17:37.240 --> 0:17:40.360 who were confident they knew the answers were least curious 0:17:40.440 --> 0:17:43.760 during the test. Curiosity was highest among participants who thought 0:17:43.800 --> 0:17:46.760 they might have some idea about the answers. But weren't 0:17:46.920 --> 0:17:48.280 entirely certain, you. 0:17:48.240 --> 0:17:51.480 Know, I know when we would do live trivia events 0:17:51.480 --> 0:17:54.639 and things like that related to mental flows. I always 0:17:54.640 --> 0:17:56.680 thought that was fun, like that sort of the science 0:17:56.680 --> 0:17:59.199 of coming up with just the perfect question. So people like, 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:01.040 maybe I don't know, I want to know that, but 0:18:01.400 --> 0:18:03.720 I feel like maybe I could guess it, but I really. 0:18:03.440 --> 0:18:04.439 Want to know the answer to that. 0:18:04.680 --> 0:18:05.879 Yeah, yeah, all right. 0:18:05.920 --> 0:18:08.320 So we know that certain things pique our curiosity more 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:11.920 than others, and that getting our curiosity satisfied rewards us 0:18:11.920 --> 0:18:14.520 with a rush of dopamine. But actually wanted to know 0:18:14.560 --> 0:18:17.080 how does all of this affect our behavior? And to 0:18:17.160 --> 0:18:19.080 answer that question, we turn now to a group of 0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:23.040 people who are extremely interested in this topic, marketing experts, 0:18:23.560 --> 0:18:28.280 not scientists. Well, marketing often involves psychology and behavioral science, 0:18:28.280 --> 0:18:31.000 and people who study consumer behavior spend a lot of 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:34.680 time thinking about curiosity because it's such a powerful motivator. 0:18:34.920 --> 0:18:37.679 You obviously know the term impulse by right, Yeah, of course, 0:18:38.200 --> 0:18:41.040 what's actually the last thing that you impulse bought? 0:18:41.760 --> 0:18:45.000 I keep buying gadgets and gear related to tennis because 0:18:45.000 --> 0:18:47.679 I'm like, oh, maybe this could help me improve a little, 0:18:47.680 --> 0:18:50.320 but maybe this will dampen the strings. As I play 0:18:50.640 --> 0:18:53.240 and I see some demonstration, I'm like, oh, yeah, maybe 0:18:53.280 --> 0:18:53.920 I tried that out. 0:18:54.000 --> 0:18:56.520 I wish mine was healthy like that, and I could 0:18:56.600 --> 0:18:58.400 make up one. But I'm going to be honest. It's 0:18:58.400 --> 0:19:03.080 always just a candy bar, right, just always, always a 0:19:03.160 --> 0:19:03.680 candy bar. 0:19:03.960 --> 0:19:05.920 What's so funny is you're so much more fit than. 0:19:06.400 --> 0:19:09.280 It's just they're so good, and you sit there and 0:19:09.280 --> 0:19:11.400 you're like, I don't need it, but there it is, 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:13.640 and I haven't had that one, or it's like yesterday, 0:19:13.640 --> 0:19:15.400 I was like, I bet it's been five years since 0:19:15.440 --> 0:19:16.359 I've had a butterfinger. 0:19:16.440 --> 0:19:18.520 So I had a butterfinger. You know, it was curious. 0:19:18.560 --> 0:19:21.719 It tastes still good, still good, same formula thing from 0:19:21.760 --> 0:19:22.440 what I can tell. 0:19:22.800 --> 0:19:26.600 But anyway, obviously, sometimes we make impulse bies to satisfy 0:19:26.800 --> 0:19:28.840 a different kind of need or want. So you're at 0:19:28.840 --> 0:19:32.240 the checkout, you see that candy bar and you realize 0:19:32.240 --> 0:19:34.920 you're hungry and that lunch isn't for another couple of hours. 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:38.239 But marketing studies have shown that curiosity itself is a 0:19:38.359 --> 0:19:42.440 powerful driver of impulse purchasing that's really hard to resist. 0:19:42.880 --> 0:19:44.960 Like you're at the checkout, you just ate lunch. 0:19:45.000 --> 0:19:47.760 But you see your favorite candy bar, has you know 0:19:47.840 --> 0:19:50.240 some new seasonal pumpkin spice flavor? 0:19:50.280 --> 0:19:51.920 Is it any good? You want to know? And there's 0:19:51.960 --> 0:19:53.080 only one way to find out? 0:19:53.400 --> 0:19:55.240 And if I buy it, I got that little jewelt 0:19:55.280 --> 0:19:58.040 of satisfaction from finding out what it tastes like. Even if, 0:19:58.200 --> 0:20:00.520