Who Do You Permit to Define You?

Most of us have heard some version of the adage, "Show me your company and I'll tell you who you are" whose elusive roots have been attributed to sources as diverse as the Bible and Vladimir Lenin.  In America, prior to the end of the 20th century the "who you are" mostly concerned one's moral standing.  Interlocutors wanted to know who could and could not be trusted, for instance.  In your great-grandparents' day, average citizens rarely were interested in details regarding minutiae of your sexuality or politics. That did not seem important to most of them.  By default, people passively were accepted as having some complex qualities and preferences that were "nobody else's business."

That attitude promoted cultural norms that encouraged accepting people as they were in the here-and-now.  A new acquaintance need not pass some overarching litmus test that incorporated a host of criteria about irrelevant personal preferences, such as gender beliefs or political affiliation. Individuals were free to isolate their gender and political ideas to the interactions with the few people in the few places where those issues were relevant and timely. Accordingly, Americans were comfortable in the company of persons with whom they chose to interact because they presumed that they did not need to pass a comprehensive, generic personality test in order to be accepted as a “good person.”  You could disclose to others what you wanted to, and keep private that which you did not want to disclose. No one feature of your being defined the totality of you.

Sadly, the freedom to be yourself in all your complexity increasingly has been under assault; no doubt in large part due to the internet in general and to social media in particular.  Few people today are willing and/or able to avoid deliberately or inadvertently revealing aspects of their identity that some powerful person or group will condemn.  The condemnation often is due to one small feature of your being that causes you to be saddled with a negative, global stereotype.

Some social psychologists refer to the problem as the attributing of a negative "mega-identity."  Your mega-identity was not your sole, autonomous creation.  It was crafted by adherence to rules dictated by so-called influencers, such as politicians, actors, or sports figures.  Mega-identity defines you not only by your attitudes toward political parties and gender but also such factors as race, religion, geographic location, and more.  Once you are labeled, some people will condemn or support you, regardless of the totality of your being; “your company” will define you in ways your great-grandparents never could have imagined.

 

When to Question, When to Answer

 “Don’t ask, don’t tell” was the colloquial term for official U.S. military policy from 1993 to 2011.  What was that all about?  Americans born on or before about 1973 probably remember—it concerned the armed forces approach to what then unapologetically was termed “homosexuality”.  Actually, the entire policy was “don’t ask, don’t tell, don’t pursue, and don’t harass,” and it was President Bill Clinton’s and the Legislature’s way simultaneously to both address and avoid the issue.

The policy is one obvious example of questioning and answering influences on human psychology and interpersonal relationships.  All people personally are inclined to ask about some issues and to avoid others.  Knowing those inclinations of your own can empower you to make good decisions.  For instance, given the current toxic social environment, most of us have learned to be very circumspect about what formerly would have been casual, harmless political questions and answers.  

Even folk wisdom and popular entertainment have touted the value of the avoidance technique.   For instance, in the Disney cartoon, "Bambi," (first released in 1942) a diminutive, shy bunny, Thumper, quietly advised, "If you can't say somethin nice, don't say nothin at all."

So, what does psychology say about avoidant questioning and answering?  As usual, I will discuss just an idea or two.  First, consider context.  Your status vis-à-vis your conversation partner is, of course, critical.  Can you obviously avoid answering without undue negative repercussions?  Is the topic very serious, marginally so, or light?  What about your interlocutor?  Is it important for you to save face or impress that person?  

Alison Wood Brooks and Leslie K. John (2018) divide questions as occurring within a cooperative context and within a challenging one.  In cooperative situations, the relative risk would be avoiding a correct uncomfortable answer but, in the process, inadvertently providing another one unfavorable to you.  That can happen if you are so relaxed that you do not sufficiently monitor that which you say, and, therefore, say too much.  The excess could be quantitative or qualitative, either by rambling on too long, or by revealing sensitive information.

Answering questions within a challenging context, of course, is more likely to produce negative consequences for you.  Accordingly, Brooks and John recommend, ideally, that you enter such conversations after having already decided what to keep private.  They also want you to be mindful of the importance of maintaining trust, and, therefore, try not to blatantly refuse answering proffered questions. 

Bitterly and Schweitzer (2020) elaborate the basic principles presented above, but they focus on describing five answer avoidance strategies much more than assessing their pros and cons.  The first is simply to decline answering, with its attendant risks.  The second is to blatantly lie and hope to get away with it.  Third, is to palter—provide a truthful answer or partial answer that deliberately avoids revealing information that the questioner clearly wants to know.  Fourth, one could dodge the question, avoiding it by giving an answer sufficiently close to the original question that the questioner readily accepts it.  Fifth, and finally, avoidance can be achieved via deflection.  There are two common approaches to do so.  One can evade answering a direct question by presenting a new one, or by injecting an emotional distraction, such as a joke.  

The aforementioned study offered some advice about question avoidance.  Those who avoided direct questions by deflection were less likely to be regarded as untrustworthy or unlikeable than were those who used the other assessed strategies.  However, with those findings in mind, Bitterly and Schweitzer provided some suggestions to questioners.  They encouraged questioners to anticipate deflection, to have plans to counter it, and to persist in those efforts.  If the deflection simply cannot be remedied, questioners should know how to interpret the deflections, and to factor that information into their judgements about the issue, the deflector, and the deflector’s sensitivities.

Perhaps, in some situations, “don’t ask, don’t tell, don’t pursue, and don’t harass” policy is good general advice.  Brooks & John and Bitterly & Schweitzer seem to agree.  But neither of their works said one word about my preferred method of avoiding difficult questions.  I would rather metacommunicate - communicate about the communication - to handle the to-be-avoided question. 

The metacommunication strategy allows one to be both honest and empowered.  Why not provide an authentic reason for your reluctance to answer? Ninety-nine percent of the time, your interlocutor will accept your legitimate reason, and agree to defer the question, at least temporarily.  Of course, that strategy will not suffice in some special situations.  But, more often than not, if your conversation partner cannot accept your wish to defer a question, maybe you need to rethink your relationship with them.   

 References

Bitterly, T. B., & Schweitzer, M. E. (2020). The economic and interpersonal consequences of deflecting direct questions.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 118(5), 945-990. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000200

Brooks, A. W. & John, L. K.  (2018). The surprising power of questions.  Harvard Business Review, May 17.

 

Evidence-Based Media Disseminated Science

"Follow the science" is the premier attention-grabbing meme used by popular media to inspire confidence in whatever is presented next.  The phrase amounts to a slightly more nuanced version of the renowned "evidenced-based science" appellation.  How might those characterizations affect you and your decisions?   You probably do sit-up and take notice, especially if the information promotes your preexisting confirmation bias. But perhaps that is understandable, since, after all, the media reports proceed from "science" and/or "evidence-based science."

Let's, for this posting, restrict our considerations to research that is reasonable science and that truly is evidence-based.  I specify that because much widely disseminated media-promoted research eventually is revealed to be illegitimate research.  For instance, many of us vividly remember reading or hearing about bogus Cornell University research suggesting that you will eat less food if it is served on a smaller vs a larger plate. If you are benevolent enough to forgive that single mistake by Professor Brian Wansink, the responsible researcher and director off Cornell’s Food and Brand Lab, good for you.  But what if you learn-- as is true -- that after the aforementioned revelations, Dr. Waansink retracted a total of 15 study results and then voluntarily retired from Cornell.

Okay, okay, but how about other meticulously structured research guided by well-vetted computerized numerical algorithms?  They must be reliable and valid.  Well, not necessarily.   

Since I am neither a computer programmer nor a mathematician, I defer to  and quote Dr .David A. W. Soergel’s “Rampant software errors may undermine scientific results.” (2014)

“… people show a level of trust in computed outputs that is completely at odds with the reality that nearly zero provably error-free computer programs have ever been written …even the most careful software engineering practices in industry rarely achieve an error rate better than 1 per 1000 lines. Since software programs commonly have many thousands of lines of code, it follows that many defects remain in delivered code–even after all testing and debugging is complete.”

Soergel then gives numerical examples and states” Multiplying these, we expect that two errors changed the output of this program run, so the probability of a wrong output is effectively 100%. All bets are off regarding scientific conclusions drawn from such an analysis. `”

I conclude that we must never accept any single study, especially one that reinforces our preconceptions.  What do you think?

My New Just-Published Book

 

Questioning & Answering: How, Who, When, & Where Paperback – January 10, 2023

by Dr. Peter James McCusker (Author)

 

It's a simple question, right? Wrong ! There are no simple questions and no simple answers. If you think so, you set yourself up for disappointment and failure. At minimum, questions and answers have multiple, layered implications. They all say something about you, about the person with whom you are communicating, and about your relationship together.

Dr. McCusker asserts that “…questions are bridges from ignorance to knowledge. Questions are bridges to answers, and answers are bridges to further questions. Questions, therefore, are cognitive, emotional, and interpersonal bridges from idea to idea and from person to person. Without questions and answers to them, conversation would be parallel monologues. Questions and answers take us from monologue to dialogue—from social isolation to interpersonal connection. Imagine how tedious and unsatisfying it would be to listen to a person’s statements and stories without any verbal involvement on your part. Imagine the confusion that might occur if you could not ask clarifying questions. Imagine the boredom that might occur if you could not interject questions that direct discussion toward your interests and opinions.”

QUESTIONING & ANSWERING: How, Who, When, & Where is, itself, a bridge that will enable you to travel into heretofore unexplored communication realms. When you finish reading the book, you will be able to identify your questioning and answering style and those of persons with whom you interact. Such knowledge will help empower you toward greater personal fulfillment and interpersonal success. You will achieve that competence in part by exploring the proffered examples and analyses of questions and answers in nine “discourse domains” including: family of origin, spouses, friends, physician-patient, psychotherapist-client, supervisor-supervisee, teacher-student, media interviewer-guest, and interrogator-suspect.

 

Thank You for Your Service?

As with all blogposts, this one will resonate strongly, moderately, mildly or not at all with some of you.  Please note that although I am using the United States armed forces as the central organizing element, you can deduce obvious and important non-military conclusions from what I write here.  Although I will try to be as objective as I can, having spent four years as a Marine, you legitimately can question some of what I am about to say. 

During my psychology practice of over 40 years, I have treated thousands of patients with all kinds of cognitive and emotional challenges.  Many were veterans from World War II, Korea, Viet Nam, and the Middle East.  Only those from “Nam” returned to face jeers, bias, or indifference.  And, although I have heard the same basic complaint from all veterans of all the wars, those from Viet Nam have voiced it most often and most stridently.

The complaint is about being told “Thank you for your service.”  Surprised?  Perhaps you are; it seems to be a counterintuitive, harsh reaction to a gracious remark.  Why not be grateful ?”  The vets experience no gratitude due to the way they contextualize the “thanks.”  

Veterans sometimes tell me that they regard the “gracious” remark as hollow, mechanical, and generally unconvincing.  Sometimes they say that it is the subsequent sequence of interpersonal events that irritates them, especially when it involves a salesperson or institutional provider.  For instance, after the thanks,  the thanker might adopt a condescending, arrogant, or other negative tone when the veteran expresses an opinion or request.  Some vets say that the shift frequently is so abrupt that it almost shocks them.

If you are thinking that people always have uttered disingenuous, insincere comments encouraged by their culture, I agree.  In the 21st  century, however, disingenuous, insincere comments have acquired a significance very far beyond their value. Today, many people are hyperattentive to learning, practicing, and broadcasting any verbal behavior that will enhance their status.  Scan the media and/or internet and you readily can determine what is the current self-enhancing verbal meme.

Almost everyone reading this blog knows the definition of a "meme" but, just in case someone is unsure, the dictionary definition is "an element of a culture or system of behavior that may be considered to be passed from one individual to another by nongenetic means, especially imitation."  I must add, however, that the particulars of culture vary within subgroups, and, therefore, so do some memes. That certainly is true for political subcultures wherein one will promote words, phrases, and practices diametrically opposed to the other. For instance, one party's members might regard something as unamerican that another party's members believe is elementally American.

Try, at least occasionally, to listen carefully to yourself.  Determine where you got  your voiced memes and meme sound-alikes, and whether they truly express your views. Do this especially when you converse with someone "different" from you. Don't presume that following your sub-culture speak will ennoble you.  Know that it is not only veterans who recognize and are troubled by disingenuous, insincere speech and trite statements.  Recognize that parroting the meme of the month does nothing substantial for you or your loved ones.  Perhaps. rather than following the language of one or another person or group, you would prefer to think and speak in ways true to yourself.  And, please, don't tell a veteran, "Thanks for your service" unless you really, really mean it.  

 

Do You Think Rationally ?

If you read this blog post to the end, you will have read one unlike any I ever have written. My goal is not political. I am using China only because the subject is current and likely to have some emotional resonance with most people. The blogpost's genesis can be traced to my discussion with someone who regards any unflattering talk about the Chinese as racist, as attempting to elevate those who subscribe to “traditional American values,” and as denigrating everyone non-American.  For that reason, here I have chosen to cite only liberal, “progressive” sources for the data about China to which I refer.  Most of what follows merely are my literal quotes to information readily available to you from the URLs and webpages listed. 

I must underscore, again, that I am not writing this as a political statement, but rather as a way to encourage you to think about general emotion-charged pro- or anti- opinions that you automatically entertain.  You see, as a psychologist, I am interested in facilitating your insight into your mentation, not to your acceding to any particular political opinions. So, let’s try this and see what YOU think about what follows, since that’s all that really matters.

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 Confronting China’s Efforts to Steal Defense Information

Author: Jeff Jones | May 2020

https://www.belfercenter.org/publication/confronting-chinas-efforts-steal-defense-information

The Robert and Renée Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, also known as the Belfer Center, is a research center located within the Harvard Kennedy School at Harvard University, in the United States.

CONFRONTING CHINA’S EFFORTS TO STEAL DEFENSE INFORMATION

1. Introduction

China’s cyber espionage activities represent a significant threat to the United States military and the safety and security of this nation. Defense contractors, research institutes, and universities are failing to adequately secure their computer networks, allowing China to steal research and development pertaining to some of America’s most important military technology. This wholesale theft represents losses to the United States in the range of hundreds of billions of dollars per year.

So, why are contractors and research institutes so vulnerable to having their work product stolen? Given the technical and sensitive nature of these activities one would assume that these companies would take enormous care in protecting that information from being stolen or destroyed. What, after all, could be more important than information pertaining to the defense of the nation? However, the track record for many defense contractors in protecting classified information is abysmal and seems to suggest that the United States government values this information much more than the companies contracted to research and develop it. Simply put, the United States is not incentivizing the protection of this information, so contractors and research institutes are not making cybersecurity a priority…

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 POLITICS

Chinese hackers took trillions in intellectual property from about 30 multinational companies

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/chinese-hackers-took-trillions-in-intellectual-property-from-about-30-multinational-companies/#:~:text=The%20CCP%20continues%20to%20increase,China%20counterintelligence%20investigation%20every12%20hours.

 In May 2021, the Justice Department charged four Chinese nationals connected to APT 41 for their participation in a global computer intrusion campaign targeting intellectual property and sensitive business information. The FBI estimated in its report that the annual cost to the U.S. economy of counterfeit goods, pirated software, and theft of trade secrets is between $225 billion and $600 billion.

 But researchers from Cybereason say it is hard to estimate the exact economic impact of Operation CuckooBees due to the complexity, stealth and sophistication of the attacks, as well as the long-term impact of robbing multi-national companies of research and development building blocks. 

 "It's important to account for the full supply chain – basically selling a developed product in the future, and all the derivatives that you're gonna get out of it," Div said.

 "In our assessment, we believe that we're talking about trillions, not billions," Div added. "The real impact is something we're going to see in five years from now, ten years for now, when we think that we have the upper hand on pharmaceutical, energy, and defense technologies. And we're going to look at China and say, how did they bridge the gap so quickly without the engineers and resources?"

 Cybersecurity firms including Eset Research have previously detailed supply chain attacks carried out by APT 41. In August 2019, Mandiant released a report detailing the evolution of the group's tactics, and techniques, as well as descriptions of individual criminal actors.

 According to Cybereason's report, the APT group leveraged both known and previously undocumented malware exploits, using "digitally signed kernel-level rootkits as well as an elaborate multi-stage infection chain," comprising six parts. That clandestine playbook helped criminals gain unauthorized control of computer systems while remaining undetected for years.

 The FBI has consistently warned that China poses the largest counterintelligence threat to the U.S.

 "[China has] a bigger hacking program than that of every other major nation combined. And their biggest target is, of course, the United States," FBI Director Christopher Wray said Friday, during a public forum at the McCain Institute.

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 The Rise of English in China: A Threat to China’s National Unity?

 https://www.georgetownjournalofinternationalaffairs.org/online-edition/2017/8/16/the-rise-of-english-in-china-a-threat-to-chinas-national-unity#:~:text=This%20is%20a%20staggering%20statistic,100%20and%20300%20million%20people.

Currently between 440-650 million Chinese citizens are learners of English. This is a staggering statistic, not only because it implies that thirty to fifty per cent of China’s population of 1.35 billion is currently learning English, but also because this number surpasses the English-speaking population of the United States by between 100 and 300 million people…

 English permeates many facets of Chinese culture. It can be found in advertisements, brands, and business names as an indicator of international prestige. English is also increasingly used in both local and national television and print news. For example, the national television broadcaster Central China Television (CCTV) replaced its 30-minute daily programming in English with a channel offering 24-hour English programming.

The dominant role of English in China is perhaps most visible in education. In 2001, when China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO), the country adopted a policy of mandatory English education for primary school children starting from grade three (age eight or nine).  English is also a key component of college admissions and matriculation in China, as it is one of three compulsory subjects in the National University Entrance Qualifying Exam along with Chinese and Mathematics.  All university students must also pass Level 4 of a standardized English examination called the College English Test (CET4) to graduate from university. English proficiency is tied to employment opportunities and in some cases employees must pass the higher level of CET6 to advance to a better post. This increased emphasis on proficiency in English has generated a booming market for private English language schools and the development of private bilingual preschools and kindergartens that introduce English to children at the age of three or four.  The English language market in China is the largest in the world, worth an estimated worth 4.5 billion USD with growth at a rate of 12-15% over the next two years.

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Statista

 2019-2020            number of United States students studying in China =2,481    

https://www.statista.com/statistics/372900/number-of-chinese-students-that-study-in-the-us/

 2019-2020            number of Chinese students studying in the United States =372,900

 https://www.statista.com/statistics/372900/number-of-chinese-students-that-study-in-the-us/

United States Students in China

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 https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/01/chinese-purchase-of-north-dakota-farmland-raises-national-security-concerns-in-washington.html

Chinese company’s purchase of North Dakota farmland raises national security concerns in Washington

PUBLISHED FRI, JUL 1 20229:55 AM EDT UPDATED FRI, JUL 1 20225:54 PM EDT

Eamon Javers

KEY POINTS

Chinese food manufacturer Fufeng Group bought 300 acres of land near Grand Forks, North Dakota, to set up a milling plant.

The project is located about 20 minutes from the Grand Forks Air Force Base, raising national security concerns.

Both the Democratic chairman and the Republican ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee told CNBC they are opposed to the project.

… when the three North Dakotans who owned the parcels of land here sold them for millions of dollars this spring, the transaction raised alarm bells as far away as Washington, D.C.

Grand Forks Air Force Base

That’s because the buyer of the land was a Chinese company, the Fufeng Group, based in Shandong, China, and the property is just about 20 minutes down the road from Grand Forks Air Force Base — home to some of the nation’s most sensitive military drone technology.

The base is also the home of a new space networking center, which a North Dakota senator said handles “the backbone of all U.S. military communications across the globe.”

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Now for brief personal proselytizing comments for you to consider, if you choose.

Whether or not you believe in traditional American values, you might support people, such as the mostly Muslim, 12 million Uyghurs and 7 million Tibetans, living under China’s despotic control.   If nothing else, I trust that almost all of you love your children and grandchildren, if you have any.  I think that the Uyghurs, Tibetans, your children, and your grandchildren would be better off living in a world more American-like than China-like. Unfortunately, based on what I wrote here, the current odds strongly favor China’s surpassing the USA in power and influence.

 In any case, I hope that whenever you are told something- political or non-political- that you instinctively view as emotion-charged you, at least temporarily, put the brakes on mindless, emotional preconceptions and engage your cognitive data-driven rationality before reaching your conclusions.  More important, insights from this blogpost will serve you best if you find ways to apply them in your everyday life, such as in your interpersonal opinions.

 

 

I Know What You Really Are Thinking and Why !

Sometimes, the most important mental activity is not what you think, but what you think about what you think. Let's unpack that contention.

Suppose you are walking along the avenue, and a friend drives past.  You wave and your friend does not acknowledge you.  Your automatic thought is "What's wrong with him?" You then proceed to thinking: "The last time we talked, he asked me to come over to his house to help him, and I declined. I bet he's still irritated about that” You then might think about something else while retaining the belief in your friend's irritation. You also could ruminate about your friend not-waving-to-you problem for minutes, hours, or days. When you see your friend again, you mention that you waved and he did not respond, and he answers, "Oh, I don't remember seeing you."  At that point you could accept his explanation, be satisfied, and banish the not-waving-incident from your mind. However, it also is possible that you do not believe his "excuse" and consider him merely to be avoiding an uncomfortable discussion.

As I have written in several previous blog postings, psychologists use the term "metacognition" to describe one's thoughts about their own thoughts. It is important for you to understand that metacognition can operate unconsciously and/or consciously.  Most often it is unconscious, and, therefore, outside your deliberate control.  So, when you wave to your driving-by friend you might not be aware of details of the thoughts that briefly raced through your mind.  Instead, you might only experience a vague, negative, fleeting sensation.  In that case, you are unlikely to be able to rationally process the experience. Even if you are conscious of the entire cognitive and emotional experience, your enduring or current personality condition could make rational processing difficult for you.

Those who are savvy about metacognition could be at an advantage in processing the non-waving-friend situation.  Yes, no, maybe?  As you might guess, that is a "maybe."

Although I, of course, cannot cite research directly relevant to your personal, idiosyncratic metacognitive style, I can mention a study that illustrates some important metacognitive considerations. First, let's think briefly about research by Sabnam Basu and Shikha Dixit (2022).  Their study included139 male and female MBA students from top tier business schools in India. Analysis of their data underscored the importance of knowledge about cognition and regulation of cognition in explaining the decision-making styles. That is, whether knowing about decision processes and being able to control your cognition are singly or jointly important for decision outcome.

They suggested the while knowledge about cognition was positively associated with intuitive and spontaneous decision-making styles, regulation of cognition emerged to be positively related to rational decision-making style. Both knowledge and regulation of cognition could explain these decision-making styles over and above the demographic variables of age, gender and work experience. The maladaptive decision styles of dependent and avoidant decision-making, however, could neither be explained by knowledge about cognition nor regulation of cognition.  For example, those with knowledge of cognition who usually depended on their intuition and spontaneous “feeling” performed better than other intuitive and spontaneous types who had poor cognition knowledge.  And those with good regulation of cognition who usually depended on their rational analysis skills performed better than other rationally-oriented types who had poor regulation of cognition skills.  In short, a strong regulation of cognition orientation was not enough; one needed to be able to actively apply rationality in ways directly relevant to the decision task at hand.

My point in introducing these ideas is to suggest implications for everyday interpersonal interactions and relationships. When someone says or does something that involves you substantively, at that moment you consciously or unconsciously decide how to respond. If you are more of an intuitive and spontaneous type, you are inclined to respond without much deliberation.  Your intuition and/or spontaneity has the best chance of producing a constructive outcome when you have had a great amount of experience with the particular person and particular context present. On the other hand, if you are more rationally oriented, you will seek “data” on which to make your interpersonal decision.  The critical issue then is whether there is data that is valid and reliable. You might think that you methodically have performed all the necessary “calculations “to decide rationally, but be sorely mistaken.  Imagine that someone failed to deliver on what you perceived as their promise to you, and after parsing the available information, you conclude that they deliberately lied.  However, they might never have made an explicit promise; your data was faulty.

So, whether you attempt to reach interpersonal decisions via intuition, spontaneity, or rationality, you will arrive at the most adaptive conclusions by first seeking feedback and testing your tentative conclusions before speaking or acting upon them.  You must use internal and external metacommunication as effectively as possible.  As for what Sabnam Basu and Shikha Dixit called the “maladaptive decision styles of dependent and avoidant decision-making,” you know that there are particular people and particular contexts when a dependent or avoidant strategy can be useful, if only in the short-term.

The bottom line suggestion is for you neither to presume you know what other people are thinking or why they are thinking what they are, in fact, thinking.  An easy recommendation for me to make; a difficult behavior for you to enact.  So, it might be an interpersonal strategy that you are willing to apply to interactions involving only the most important people and important people-oriented decisions.  If you do, you will find it well worth the effort.         

Reference

Basu, S. & Dixit, S. (2022).  Role of metacognition in explaining decision-making styles: A study of knowledge about cognition and regulation of cognition. Personality and Individual Differences, Volume 185, February 2022, 111-318

Hold Me

It's early morning, you are in bed with your partner, and you both have just awakened.  What do you immediately do?  That depends on the state of your heart and mind.  One partner might reach out for, hold, and embrace the other, savoring some precious moments together. To do so provides more than mutual warmth and comfort.  The activity communicates powerful messages—you are top of my mind, my day begins with you, you have my undivided attention and time.  If instead, you awaken, reach for, and become engrossed in your mobile device, you also are communicating clearly to your partner.

Attention and time.  No matter how rich or poor you are, these are life’s most precious, unreplenishable resources.  In the 21st century, our limited attention and time are stolen. 

Contemporary attention and time bandits, many of whom are multi-millionaires and billionaires are organized into a variety of cartels.  A few of these thieving conglomerates are tech hardware manufacturers, internet providers, and entertainment producers.  A mafia of others - marketers and similar influence purveyors - assist those who traffic in attention and time theft.

Attention and time crooks have preferred devices: personal electronic devices, such as cellphones and computer tablets.  These so-called mobile devices have an addictive allure and permit unprecedented intrusive manipulation by persons seeking to exploit us. Virtually all tech hardware manufacturers, internet providers, and entertainment producers create and disseminate methods and memes to keep us perennially focused on whatever they are promoting.  The more they can do so, the more they earn.  Compulsively attached to their items and agendas, we have little attention and time for personal activities that occupied us in the 20th century.  To cite one well-publicized and obvious example: We rarely talk at length on the telephone anymore, and we tend to keep our face-to-face meetings to a minimum.  When we must be in the presence of another flesh and blood person, we often interpose an electronic device between them and us at every opportunity.  Our electronic hardware, software, and internet are specifically structured to continually present a never-ending array of enticing stimuli to capture and monopolize our attention and time.

If you believe that the attention and time robbers are satisfied with their success, think again.  Consider the research of Nicholas H. Lurie and his colleagues (2016).  Their paper, Everywhere and at All Attention and times: Mobility, Consumer Decision Making, and Choice explicitly targets electronic mobile devices and consumer decision making.  They seek to advise on ways to advance strategies to steal our attention and time through mobile electronics by better understanding mobile ecosystems, their contexts, and the interactions between the ecosystems, contexts, and the minds of the consumers.  To directly quote three of the many questions that they seek to answer and exploit:

"How does mobility affect cognitive capacity and the influence of incidental information?"

"Are mobile decision-makers more myopic?"

"How do mobile ecosystem capabilities and pervasivity affect socially undesirable and personal choices?"

If Lurie and his group succeed in their quest, electronic hardware, software, and the internet will be all the more effective in monopolizing your attention and time.  Please note that I am not condemning all electronic devices and the persons who make, distribute, or use them.  The devices actually can and do save us attention and time, if used with discretion.  My point is that the "system" promulgates indiscriminate, continuous, compulsive use. 

Every minute of indiscriminate, continuous, compulsive electronic device use is a minute not spent on anything else.  Only you can determine the physical- and mental-health consequences of your personal, unique electronic device usage.  Do your devices keep you in your chair rather than moving about?  Do the devices interpose a barrier between you and authentic, in vivo human experiences?  On the other hand, do you use devices sparingly and prudently - think Fitbit - in ways that can enhance your health?  When you awaken in the morning will you first hold, attend to, and spend time with your partner or with your device? The choice is yours to make.

Reference:

Nicholas H. L., et al. (2016).  Everywhere and at All Times: Mobility, Consumer Decision-Making, and Choice.  Invitational Choice Symposium, Lake Louise, Canada, May, 2016

 

Seeking to Please

For purposes of this posting, let’s presume that most people prefer to be liked, accepted, or, at least, tolerated. That begs the question, “By whom?”  Who is the person or persons who determine your worth?: family? friends? neighbors? co-workers?  Do you believe that all the valued ones want to see the same attitudes and behaviors from you?  When their expectations conflict, which, if any, members of the multitude exert the greatest influence?

Where are you, yourself, in the “how to be” equation?  When you realize that someone or some group expects you to exhibit a particular attitude or behavior, do you start with them or start with you?  What parameters do you apply when attempting to reach your conclusion?  Equally important, what parameters do you ultimately apply when acting upon your decision?  If your decision and/ or action is contrary to expectations of valued others, do you explicitly address the discrepancy or not?

Of course, you rightly can reply that your decision and/or action “depend” on specifics of the situation.  True, but, in that case, you would do well to understand what contextual features are determinative for you and when.

Focusing on others vs. on oneself has many potential implications. Here we only consider influences on our self-regulation (how we manage our feelings and self-esteem) and our motivation as reported by Diel, Grelle, and Hofmann (2021).  The study included 5400 subjects who were presented with everyday scenarios that required them to compare their personal standards with others’ standards.  Would they make their decisions primarily by looking within themselves or by looking to others?

The answers depended on the value they ascribed to how they perceived self-others discrepancies. One group of subjects engaged in “upward comparison” by which they saw others’ standards as “better” than their own.  Many of these persons pushed themselves to reach that higher standard of others but some did not.  The latter had made extreme demands of themselves and soon gave up when failing to achieve their unreachable goals.  Failure within that group was all the more disappointing for a subgroup who perceived that they had strong personal control within the presented situation or when they strongly valued that situation. 

Another group of subjects engaged in “downward comparison” by which they saw their own standards as “better” than those of others.  Such people were generally more content with their performance in the presented situation than were the upward comparison group.  On the other hand, the downward comparers put forth less effort in attempting to satisfy the expected standards.

So, what might this mean for you?  How much of your self-regulation and motivation are strongly or primarily determined by what you believe others prefer or by what you independently prefer?  But before you answer those questions, consider an issue that I have saved for last.  Maybe in addition to, or in lieu of, family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers, there are “remote” others that strongly influence your self-regulation and motivation.  For instance, do so-called identity leaders that reach you via media—for example, celebrities, politicians, and “tribal” group trendsetters—exert such powerful effects that you want to believe and act in ways consistent with them?

Important, too, is the possibility that identity leader influences steer you so automatically and unconsciously that you do not even personally consider what they are presenting, but rather, you mindlessly adopt their positions without personal reservation or deliberation.  You might also upwardly or downwardly compare yourself to the identity leaders with negative implications for your self-regulation and/or motivation. 

In sum then, be on guard against mindlessly, uncritically allowing your attitudes and/or behaviors to be altered by family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers whose knowledge in any given area is no more informed than yours.  And be exponentially more guarded when uninformed and/or agenda-driven identity leaders try to sway you toward their positions. 

Reference

Diel, K., Grelle, S., & Hofmann, W. (2021). A motivational framework of social comparison. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 120(6), 1415–1430. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspa0000204

How and When to Use Your Mobile Phone

 Most evolution scientists assert that human language began 200,000 to 300,000 years ago and they use speech development as a defining feature, if not the defining feature of homo sapiens. People, of course, could communicate via body language and physical signaling of various kinds at some undefined period, as well.  And pictorial communication, such as by cave paintings, are conventionally dated to about 30,000 years ago. 

Before 1844, real time talk required real time physical, in-person interaction.  That meant that people were consciously or unconsciously perceiving not only the literal content of their verbalizations but also their body language and prosody (vocal pitch, length of sounds, loudness, and timber [quality of the voice]).  Ancient wisdom acknowledges the importance of body language and prosody as expressed in the advice, “It’s not what you say but how you say it.”

Not until the invention of the telegraph approximately in 1844 could people could do anything close to real-time “talking.”  We all now are acutely aware of and preoccupied with our ability to talk to almost anyone on earth at virtually any time.  Progress?  Yes and no.

The contemporary telephone that provides real-time vocal conversation also makes texting possible as an alternative to vocal talk.  We all know the misunderstandings that can arise when texting.  When texting, there obviously is no way to confidently perceive the body language or prosody that face-to-face conversation enables, especially critical communication nuances, such as facetiousness or sarcasm.

Whether used for vocal talk or texting, however, the mobile phone has profoundly changed the dynamics of human communication.  Each contact attempt invites the sender and the target to evaluate the quality of their relationship according to the frequency and rapidity of sending and receiving.  Both communicators commonly presume that the message has been delivered and that their counterpart virtually has total control over deciding the next step.  Thus, as expected, Emma M. Templeton and associates (2022) found that people who received faster responses regarded themselves as “more connected” to their response partner than did those with slower responses.  Also, unsurprisingly, people who prized quick responses from their response partner did not necessarily believe that their own speed was as important.  One might infer that such people were operating according to the “fundamental attribution error” (Miller, J. G., 1984), finding reasonable external excuses for their own delayed responses but believing that the speed of others’ responses were determined by enduring personality characteristics of those others.  It is worth mentioning, too, the Templeton group’s belief that extremely short response times, such as those less than 250 milliseconds, are made without conscious control and thus are considered to be an honest signal as to how well and easily two people relate to one another.

Consider the “texted” information that I presented within this blog when you are deciding how and when to communicate, particularly when interpersonal and/or other adaptive issues are important to you.

References:

Miller, J. G. (1984). Culture and the development of everyday social explanation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 46(5), 961–978.

Templeton, E. M., et al. (2022).  Fast response times signal social connection in conversation. 

PNAS January 25. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2116915119.