Positive Psychology – The Science of Optimal Human Functioning with Dr. John Schinnerer - One hour teleclass 12/8/09

9. December 2009 by John Schinnerer.

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Partial script for 1-hour teleclass on 12/8/09

Welcome to what I hope will be a wonderful talk on positive psychology. I will be your host tonight. My name is John Schinnerer. I hold a Ph.D. in educational psychology from U.C. Berkeley. In 2007, I wrote a positive psychology book called ‘Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide to Managing Emotion & Thought’ which was awarded Best Self-Help Book of the year. In 2006, I hosted a daily primetime radio show here in the SF Bay Area. Currently, I do keynote speaking, teach and see private clients.  I also collaborate with the University of New Zealand on the International Wellbeing Study which you can participate in at www.wellbeingstudy.com. 

Just a bit of housekeeping…If you have questions during the talk, please email me at john@guidetoself.com and I will do my best at the end to answer them. Your end of the phone has been muted as there are over 500 people on this call.

     I like to start off my talks with a joke to put you in a positive frame of mind. So here it goes…

A psychologist is holding a group therapy session in which there are four young mothers, each of whom has a small child with her. The psychologist gazes at the four women and blurts out “You’re all obsessed. And your obsessions show up in the names of your kids.”

He points to the first mother and calmly states “You are obsessed with spending money & shopping…you named your daughter Penny.”

The shrink points to the second mother and dryly adds “And you are stuck on the issue of eating. You went so far as to name your daughter Candy!”

As the remaining two mothers shift uncomfortably in their seats, the psychologist continues, pointing to the 3^rd mother, “While you have a drinking problem which shows itself in your daughter’s name – Brandy.”

     ……

At that point, the fourth mother, who can’t contain herself any longer, stands up, grabs her son by the hand and says …

“Come on Dick, we’re getting out of here!”

 

     I told this joke on the radio to thousands of listeners and got a landslide of positive feedback ….initially. One lady, who was driving when she heard it, said she had to pull over to the side of the freeway because she was laughing so hard. However, the show was rerun and then we started to get a few complaints. So the station owner called me in to tell me we couldn’t run the show anymore. I asked why not. He said because the joke was dirty. I knowingly asked what was dirty about it. He said it was the reference to sex. I told him that there was no mention in the joke as to whether or not the sex was taking place in a marriage. You see, the dirtiness of this joke is truly in the mind of the listener. If one assumes the sex is taking place within a marriage, there really is nothing dirty about the joke (unless you think sex in general is aversive).  The reason I tell this story is to point out that there are many different way of seeing the world, different ways of viewing the actions of others and even various ways of relating to your own mind, your thoughts, and your feelings.  And I’ll discuss a few of these points today.

Now that you are prepped to learn something new, let’s talk about positive psychology because it holds great promise. Just to be clear, positive psych is not a self-help movement. It is not as simple as positive thinking. It has no relation to books such as The Secret. It is not a passing trend.

Positive psychology is the scientific study of optimal functioning, the applied approach to human flourishing. The lessons of positive psychology are beneficial for everyone – teenagers, executives, managers and the elderly. Even the Army is currently training thousands of sergeants in positive psychology to boost the resiliency of troops and to decrease the possibility of post-traumatic stress disorder. While our Army troops have always been physically fit, we are now seeing a momentous shift in thinking which will enable them to become psychologically fit as well.

So this class and positive psychology in general definitely has something to offer you and it is as valuable in your personal life as in your professional life. At the heart of positive psychology are a number of research based findings into how and when people function at their very best.

Most of us spend a great deal of our time worrying over what might go wrong, or beating ourselves up over what we think did go wrong, or feeling disappointed over the inherent unfairness of life. Recent research shows that we are hard-wired to pay closer attention to this that go wrong than things that go right. And from an evolutionary standpoint, this makes sense. Being overly vigilant for threats and problems helped keep us alive from predators back when sabre-toothed tigers roamed the earth.

However, this hard wiring focused on the negative does not serve us well in modern day life.  Events such as childrens’ skinned knees, missed deadlines, speaking in public or bumper-to-bumper traffic may feel frustrating, scary or stressful but they are not matters of life and death.

So take a quick moment to ask yourself,

‘How much is my focus on what might go wrong helping me?’

‘How much are my negative emotions, such as fear and anger, assisting me in reaching my goals?’

To these questions, positive psychology provides a somewhat unusual answer:

spend more time focusing on what is going right with your life,

focus more on what may go well in the future,

and see how much that approach helps you reach your goals.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I am not suggesting that you only have a positive perspective. I am not suggesting that you be foolishly optimistic. There is a great deal of merit to accurately foreseeing and planning for potential problems. It’s a matter of balance. How much of your mental time is spent focusing on problems as compared to looking at the positives. Positive psychology has found that there are tremendous benefits to learning to focus more on what is right with us and what may go well in the future.

One of the basic assumptions of Positive psychology is that all people are ‘Born to be Good’ to quote the title of Dacher Keltner’s book and that we can become better, happier and more productive.  Let me repeat that, we can learn to be happier. Your happiness is not written in stone. You can learn techniques to increase your satisfaction with life.

What makes the crucial difference between positive psychology and traditional self-help books is the mountain of research upon which positive psychology is built. At this point, there are over 50,000 studies having to do with happiness, realistic optimism, human strengths, life satisfaction and more. Empirical researchers across the world are looking for testable theories and explanations supported by hard data. It is, in simplest terms, a powerful movement from faith to facts. So everything I write about, everything about which I speak, is based on scientific studies and replicable data.

The biggest shift towards a positive psychology took place in the late 1990s when Martin Seligman, as president of the American Psychological Association, began asking the question “what is right with people?” For over 100 years, medicine and psychology had both focused on what was wrong with people and how problems could be fixed. Seligman used his influence to create a new branch of science termed positive psychology focusing on what is right with us, how we can lead more thriving, fulfilling, and meaningful lives.

Seligman and Mike Csikszentmihalyi brought together some of the top young researchers in psychology to study topics such as hope, happiness, gratitude, wisdom, creativity and optimal human functioning. From there it spread to include researchers in humanistic psychology, philosophy, executive coaches, sports psychology, developmental psychologists and many more areas. It continues to spread to business, education and counseling.

The best part is that positive psychology works and works well. Positive psychology exercises have been shown in numerous studies to promote strengths, improve optimal functioning, to increase realistic optimism and to increase the frequency of positive emotions.

Some of you may be skeptical. I completely understand this. I was skeptical at first too.  I was brought up to focus on the negative.  Most of us were. And most clients that I see focus first and foremost on problems, such as how to help under-performing workers, or how to shore up the weaknesses of people they manage.

One of the greatest contributions of Positive psychology is the finding that by focusing energy and attention on strengths and by tapping into positive emotions, all of us will enjoy more success than if we focus on weaknesses and problems.

In terms of using positive psychology in the workplace, the Gallup Organization has shown that disengaged workers cost firms billions of dollars per year in accidents, sabotage, turnover costs, lost customers and healthcare. Engaged or happy workers have a higher probability of making more money, innovating, being on time to work, being healthier physically, receive higher ratings from supervisors and customers, and help out coworkers more frequently. Happiness doesn’t just feel good, it is good for the bottom line and good for employees.

To give you an example, last year, I did some consulting with the executive board of a large insurance company. They were having trouble with several vice presidents who were holding grudges over an incident that happened over many years ago. Two of the vice presidents were actively sabotaging one another’s projects resulting in increased costs to the company. As part of my time there, I gave a two hour talk to the executive board on positive psychology, and I specifically focused on what the research has to say about forgiveness  based on research from Stanford University – what it is, what it is NOT, how to do it and why you want to do it. To me, forgiveness is the best single way to wash out all that stale anger you’ve been hiding for years. At the end of my talk, I suggested to the 11 executives that they try forgiving each other for past transgressions. After a long pause, I watched as all of the executives stood up, and began forgiving every other person in the room.  They hugged; they apologized to each other; and they forgave one another. It was powerful. And it changed the way in which they interacted from that day forward. The vice presidents were more supportive of one another, more cooperative, and they stopped their internal sabotage.

 Positive psychology is filtering into education as well. I do a monthly speaking series at a continuation high school where the students are sent if they are behind on credits, if they have behavior problems, emotional difficulties, or are coming out of juvenile hall. So it’s a pretty hard crowd.  One of the more difficult cases was an African-American female student who challenged me during a presentation “You aren’t black. You aren’t female. And you don’t live in a group home. Why should I listen to anything you say?!” It was a valid question. My response? “You’re absolutely right. I’m a totally bald, white, 42 year old man who lives with his wife and four children. And on a physical level you are correct. We share little in common. Here is what I can tell you…that on an emotional level, everything you have ever felt in your life – fear, anger, despair, happiness, pride, love – everything you have felt, I have felt also. So, on an emotional level we are nearly identical. I have been studying emotions for the past 12 years and I’ve found some tools that really work to help manage negative emotions and cultivate more positive emotions. So it’s your choice – you can listen and try some of the tools for yourself, see if they work, or you can ignore me. Either way, it’s up to you.” From that moment on, she was a fan - engaged, interested and willing to learn. She went on to work at a hospital this summer and now is looking at attending community college when she graduates at the end of this school year.

The Power of Positive Emotions

One of the areas I have researched over the past dozen years with great curiosity and passion is emotions. I have found that there is tremendous power in our emotions. Emotions are the social glue that binds our relationships.  The effective use of emotions, or leveraging emotions to your benefit, is what draws people to leaders. Emotional leverage is what separates truly great leaders from average executives. Emotions may initially be a bit frightening. Many people spend a great deal of energy trying to suppress or contain emotion. Yet, emotions have been with the human race for millions of years. Each emotion serves a purpose. Anger, for instance, helps move past obstacles or challenges. It helps us stand up to social injustices. Sadness keeps us close to home after suffering a loss. Fear keeps us safe from perceived danger.

Take a moment to think back to the last time you experienced an intense emotion. It may have been surprise, fear, rage, disappointment, sorrow, joy, awe or pride. It may have been pride due to your child’s outstanding grades, or joy watching your team win a close game, or frustration at yourself for making a mistake at work, or the feeling of contentment while working in your yard. What we’re finding is that emotions transcend our physical bodies. They are contagious. You can catch feelings from others around you. Studies have shown that happiness is contagious just like anger. Emotions are also closely and powerfully linked to what and how you remember the past. Look through an old photo album and you will clearly see the sway emotions have over your memories. What’s more, emotions play a large role in learning, communication, and even in our morality.

So it is critical to understand and learn to leverage emotions. In particular, you must understand the purpose and strength of positive emotions, because you can put them to great use in your daily life. Expertly leveraging emotions will help you be more successful.  As Robert Biswas-Diener puts it, ‘positive emotion is one of the greatest resources you and your clients, colleagues or students are currently overlooking.’

Emotions may be best thought of as a guidance system for your life. When you experience guilt, for example, it’s a sign that your actions are not in keeping with your values. And the unpleasant feeling motivates you to bring your actions back in line with your values. When things are going smoothly, your guidance system lets you know with an all clear signal – positive emotions such as peacefulness or contentment.  Of course, this guidance system is not perfect. We occasionally misinterpret our emotions, and sometimes our emotions are just plain wrong like when we feel highly fearful before speaking in public. However, our emotions give us important and valuable feedback the majority of the time. And there is power in learning how to be aware of emotions, in learning how to correctly read emotions, and greater success lies in the ability to cultivate more positive emotions.

 

 

So what can positive emotions do for you?

One of the biggest breakthroughs for positive psychology comes from Barbara Fredrickson at UNC Chapel Hill who came up with an evolutionary explanation for the existence of positive emotions. Barbara’s hypothesis is that the primary function of positive emotion is to broaden and build.  That is, they broaden our thought processes and they build lasting internal resources. Positive emotions, such as awe, peacefulness and love, allow your mind to blossom, creating more options, more possibilities, in terms of thoughts and actions.  Positive emotions help us be more creative, imaginative, and innovative. If you need to brainstorm for a new marketing slogan, you’ll do a better job if you are happy when you do it.

In addition, positive emotions have long-term beneficial effects because they build internal resources which may be used to help assist others in need or to manage future threats. In other words, positive emotions fill up your gas tank.  This means that positive emotions fill your emotional reservoir with positive emotional energy to increase your sense of well-being and physical health and which you can share with others when they need support and love.

What’s more, positive emotions have been shown to undo the lingering physiological effects of negative emotions. Positive emotions act as the hidden RESET button to the bodily changes caused by negative emotions, changes such as elevated blood pressure and increased cortisol levels in the blood stream.

      In the workplace, positive emotions are related to higher salaries, less sick days, better relationships with coworkers, better supervisor ratings, better customer ratings, and reduced employee turnover.

      In terms of physical health, positive folks are less likely to get ill, live longer, experience less pain, have fewer hospital visits, and when in a good mood, have faster cardiovascular recovery times. On the other hand, those with depression are more likely to engage in smoking, drug abuse, suicidal attempts, and have more emergency room visits.

In psychology, it is generally understood that bad is stronger than good, or the negative is stronger than the positive.  Bad events have a greater power over us, our emotions, thoughts and behaviors, than do good ones. You are more motivated to avoid bad self-definitions than to pursue good ones. You are quicker to form bad judgments of other people than good ones. It takes approximately 5 compliments to undo the negative effects from one insult. Your brain processes negative information more thoroughly than it does positive information. So it’s great news that the harmful effects of negative feelings can be undone by positive emotions.

While we could come up with a list of hundreds of emotion words, there are ten positive emotions that have been verified in studies. From the most frequently occurring to the least frequent, they are… love, joy, gratitude, serenity, interest, hope, pride, amusement, inspiration and awe. And we know from research that positive emotions are fleeting and fragile. They are easily done away with and they are generally less powerful than negative emotions. So you have to increase your awareness of and be on the lookout for positive emotions throughout your day.

A Few Positive psychology Exercises:

Okay, let’s turn to some of the interventions that have been proven to boost your happiness.

The Blessings Exercise

One study done by Martin Seligman at the University of Pennsylvania sought to help 50 severely depressed people. These were folks that stayed in bed most of the day, crawled out occasionally to check their email, and then returned to bed. They were asked to do one thing every day for two weeks.

            Write down three things that went well today and why they went well.

This daily gratitude journal is a powerful yet simple way to redirect the mind to the positive instead of dwelling on the negative. After two weeks of doing this exercise, the majority saw a significant improvement in their depressive symptoms.  People frequently report feeling happier and more positive after this assignment.

Mental Scrapbook of Positive Memories

Another exercise that has been shown to increase positive emotions is reliving positive memories. This exercise is as simple as focusing your attention on a positive event in your past. It might be a big athletic event, a wedding, the birth of a child, finishing school or a promotion. This activity may be combined with actual physical reminders of the past, such as photos, ticket stubs, trophies, college degrees, and printed testimonials.  You can also create your own positive scrapbook using most cell phones these days. Simply create a folder in which you keep photos of positive events. Start your own collection today. The main idea here is to savor the experience, to pay close attention to sensory details, to squeeze every last ounce of positive emotion out of the experience.

The extent to which you experience positive emotions is largely based on your thinking. Overthinking kills positive emotions. Worry, doubt, and stress drown out positive emotions. Emotions are highly individualized. They vary from person to person and what evokes one emotion in one person may not do the same in another. What makes one person recoil in disgust may make another person laugh. Emotions depend on how you interpret events. You have to take a moment (in the moment) and look for the good in the situation. Once you find the good, you must intentionally magnify it, and let it grow.  You have the power to turn positive emotions off and on.

Look at the room you’re in right now.

Ask yourself:

What’s going right for me right now?

How am I fortunate/blessed to be here?

How does being here benefit me?

What meaning can I take away from this situation?

When you take time to think this way, it builds gratitude in you.

By the way, it is normal if positivity feels unusual or weird at first.

Capitalizing on Love

One of the foremost researchers in the area of love and marriage is Shelly Gable, an assistant professor of psychology at UCLA. Most researchers looking at marriage work on conflict management, how to create more harmony between partners, and how individuals in a couple cope with traumatic events.  Gable is one of a handful of researcher who looks at what makes a thriving marriage. Her work provides some valuable insights if you are interested in transforming your good relationship (e.g., friendship, marriage, parent or child) into a great one.

Gable looks to see how you respond when your spouse tells you that he’s just been promoted, or your child tells you that she won Class President, or when your mother tells you she won a tennis tournament, or when your friend tells you she just won a huge lawsuit. Gable puts your responses into four different categories which break down as follows:

1.      An enthusiastic reaction such as “Wow! That’s tremendous. That’s the best thing I’ve heard all week. I’m sure there are more great things to come for you. You’ve definitely earned it. Congratulations!” This reaction is called the active-constructive response by Gable.

2.      A more subdued reaction where you share your happiness but say little. For example, “That’s nice dear.” This is the passive-constructive response.

3.      Or perhaps you point out some of the potential pitfalls or negatives within the good event. For instance, “Wow, I sure hope you can handle all that extra responsibility. Does this mean you will have to work extra hours?” Gable refers to this as the active-destructive response.

4.      Or, you might respond with disinterest and not respond to the good news at all. Most folks do this by merely changing the subject, “Yes, but what do you think about the weather outside?” This is known as the passive-destructive response.

The first type of response, the active-constructive one, is called “capitalizing” by Gable and here’s the fascinating part…capitalizing amplifies the pleasure of the good event and creates an upward spiral of good feelings.

Gable has shown that capitalizing is one of the keys to strong, supportive, thriving relationships. 

So how do you respond to good news from other people?

Are you a “capitalizer” who creates upward spirals of positive emotions?

Or do you turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the good news of others?

The consequences of learning how to be more of a “capitalizer” are impressive and robust. Couples who describe themselves as having a spouse who is active and constructive in response to their good news are more committed to the relationship, more in love, and happier in their marriage.  Think about that the next time your mate comes in the door with exciting news.

Closing Remarks

            I’ve found a large number of people are passionate and excited about positive psychology. It offers an energizing approach to your personal and professional life. Hopefully, by sharing some information about positive psychology, you’ve become excited about the possibilities also.

Again my name is John Schinnerer. I’m happy to speak to those interested in future keynote presentations or seeing clients privately. My book is entitled ‘Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide to Managing Emotion & Thought’ and may be purchased at Amazon.com, or Target.com. My email address is John@GuideToSelf.com.  My website is www.GuideToSelf.com. Please feel free to go and sign up for my newsletter by clicking on Email Sign Up on the left of the screen.

Now to your questions…

 

Hope you enjoyed it!

Have a wonderful evening,

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Guide To Self, Inc.

913 San Ramon Valley Blvd.

Danville, CA 94526

 http://www.guidetoself.com

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Emotions in Advertisement Must Match Emotions in Consumer to Sell Vacations Most Efficiently

20. October 2009 by John Schinnerer.

ScienceDaily (Oct. 19, 2009) — Most of us won’t respond to the call of adventure while soaking in a relaxing bath. According to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research, we’re more likely to book a weekend at a spa. 

“Imagine you are sitting in a bathtub, listening to calm music with gentle candlelight. Add lavender aroma. Then as you flip through a magazine, you come across an advertisement from an amusement park, promising you an exciting place full of adventurous offerings. How appealing would you find the prospect of visiting this amusement park?” write authors Hakkyun Kim (University of Concordia, Canada), Kiwan Park (Seoul National University, Korea), and Norbert Schwarz (University of Michigan). 

The authors found that people evaluate vacation products with adventurous appeals more favorably when they feel excited rather than peaceful, and vice versa. They found that processing advertising claims depends much on the consistency between the message and the consumer’s mood. 

The authors explain that people who see an advertisement that promises an exciting vacation ask themselves, “Would this vacation really make me feel that way?” They are more likely to think a vacation will really be exciting when they currently feel excited rather than peaceful. In other words, incidental emotions influence the perceived likelihood that the product will deliver on its emotional promises: When the current emotions match the promises of the product, people infer that it may really make them feel that way; but when the current emotions mismatch the promises, the discrepancy between their current feelings and the promises suggests that the product may fail to deliver what it promises. 

The researchers’ results suggest that marketers can facilitate the impression that products will deliver on their promises by displaying them in contexts in which consumers’ pre-existing feelings are likely to match the product’s claims. “Exciting sports events are a better arena for advertising exciting vacations than for advertising serene vacations, not only because an exciting vacation may match the audience’s general preferences, but also because an exciting vacation will match the audience’s current feelings,” the authors conclude.

For full article, please click here.

I suppose this makes accurate emotional measurement all the more important. Check out the work I’ve been doing with Resonance Strategies. Great work for marketing, branding, and change initiatives for those who aren’t too fearful. In the consulting work I’ve done, I’ve foudn that dealing with emotions in a business climate sends most business people running for the hills. It’s not rational, it’s emotional! Despite their fears, emotion is still a larger part of the human mind that reason (roughly 90-10%) and dominates most decision-making.

The next step will be matching internal branding campaigns to employee emotions to ensure greater employee productivity. Do I hear individualized internal branding calling? What about individualized external branding and advertising to match ads to consumer emotions and moods?

Savor the day!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Posted in National speakers, Organizational psychology, Emotional mind, Danville CA, Emotion & productivity, Executive coach, Subliminal messages, Employee engagement, Rational mind, Customer Engagement, Guide to Self, Dr. John Schinnerer, Measuring emotions, Innovative brand research, Unique marketing research, Brand Equity, Chief Marketing Officer, Positive Psychology | Print | No Comments »

Improve Your Brain After A Mere Week of Internet Use - New UCLA Study

20. October 2009 by John Schinnerer.

 ScienceDaily (Oct. 19, 2009) — You can teach an old dog new tricks, say UCLA scientists who found that middle-aged and older adults with little Internet experience were able to trigger key centers in the brain that control decision-making and complex reasoning after just one week of surfing the Web. 

The findings, presented Oct. 19 at the 2009 meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, suggest that Internet training can stimulate neural activation patterns and could potentially enhance brain function and cognition in older adults. 

As the brain ages, a number of structural and functional changes occur, including atrophy, reductions in cell activity and increases in deposits of amyloid plaques and tau tangles, which can impact cognitive function. 

Research has shown that mental stimulation similar to that which occurs in individuals who frequently use the Internet may affect the efficiency of cognitive processing and alter the way the brain encodes new information. 

“We found that for older people with minimal experience, performing Internet searches for even a relatively short period of time can change brain activity patterns and enhance function,” said study author Dr. Gary Small, a professor of psychiatry at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA and the author of “iBrain,” a book that describes the impact of new technology on the brain and behavior.

For full article, click here.

All the best!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

 

‘Man has never made any material as resilient as the human spirit’

 

– Bernard Williams

English Philosopher

 

Posted in Danville CA, Emotion & learning, Emotion & productivity, Executive coach, Therapist, Emotion and technology, Curiosity, Life coach, Creativity, Guide to Self, Rational mind, The human brain, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

The Human Mind is a Meaning-Making Machine

19. October 2009 by John Schinnerer.

This Is Your Brain on Kafka

 

By: Tom Jacobs  |  September 16, 2009  |  08:55 PM (PDT)  |

Absurdist literature, it appears, stimulates our brains.

Does absurdist literature make you smarter? Giraffe carpet cleaner, it does!

The befuddled tramps in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot are a poetic personification of paralysis. But new research suggests the act of watching them actually does get us somewhere.

Absurdist literature, it appears, stimulates our brains.

That’s the conclusion of a study recently published in the journal Psychological Science. Psychologists Travis Proulx of the University of California, Santa Barbara and Steven Heine of the University of British Columbia report our ability to find patterns is stimulated when we are faced with the task of making sense of an absurd tale. What’s more, this heightened capability carries over to unrelated tasks.

In the first of two experiments, 40 participants (all Canadian college undergraduates) read one of two versions of a Franz Kafka story, The Country Doctor. In the first version, which was only slightly modified from the original, “the narrative gradually breaks down and ends abruptly after a series of non sequiturs,” the researchers write. “We also included a series of bizarre illustrations that were unrelated to the story.”

The second version contained extensive revisions to the original. The non sequiturs were removed, and a “conventional narrative” was added, along with relevant illustrations.

All participants were then shown a series of 45 strings of letters, which they were instructed to copy. They were informed that the strings, which consisted of six to nine letters, contained a strict but not easily decipherable pattern.

They were then introduced to a new set of letter strings, some of which followed the pattern and some of which did not. They were asked to mark which strings followed the pattern.

Those who had read the absurd story selected a higher number of strings as being consistent with the pattern. More importantly, they “demonstrated greater accuracy in identifying the genuinely pattern-congruent letter strings,” the researchers report. This suggests “the cognitive mechanisms responsible for implicitly learning statistical regularities” are enhanced when we struggle to find meaning in a fragmented narrative.

[snip]

To Prolux and Heine, these finds suggest we have an innate tendency to impose order upon our experiences and create what they call “meaning frameworks.” Any threat to this process will “activate a meaning-maintenance motivation that may call upon any other available associations to restore a sense of meaning,” they write.

So it appears Viktor Frankl was right: Man is perpetually in search of meaning, and if a Kafkaesque work of literature seems strange on the surface, our brains amp up to dig deeper and discover its underlying design.

For full article, please click here.

Smile, you’re alive!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

A Curious Guy

Guide To Self, Inc.

Danville CA 94526

Posted in Corporate Culture, Emotion & learning, Curiosity, Employee engagement, San Ramon CA, Meaning-making, Unsconscious mind, Executive coach, Awareness, Consciousness, Guide to Self, Creativity, Dr. John Schinnerer, Unique marketing research, Chief Marketing Officer, Rational mind, Customer Engagement, Business & psych | Print | No Comments »

When Unconscious Thought Is Superior To Conscious Thought - APA Study

16. October 2009 by John Schinnerer.

APA, Science Directorate, Volume 23: No. 10, October 2009

The Beautiful Powers of Unconscious Thought

by Ap Dijksterhuis

“When making a decision of minor importance, I have always found it advantageous to consider all the pros and cons. In vital matters however…the decision should come from the unconscious, from somewhere within ourselves.”

Sigmund Freud

When you are facing an important decision, others will sometimes tell you to postpone your decision and “sleep on it” first. In my case it was often my grandmother who gave me this advice. It is a belief many people intuitively share: It helps to put a problem aside for some time in order to arrive at a better decision. Somehow, waiting seems to help us to differentiate between the vital and the futile. Postponing a decision helps us to base our decisions on the appropriate reasons.

But does this “folk belief” hold in a scientific experiment? A few years ago, we conducted an experiment in which we had people choose between four hypothetical apartments. The information was constructed in such a way that one of the four apartments was objectively more desirable than the other three, in that it possessed more positive and fewer negative qualities. However, this was not immediately evident as the apartments were described with a great deal of information. After our experimental participants read all the information about the apartments, they chose their favorite one either immediately or after a period of distraction during which they did some other things. Our hypothesis was that the latter group would continue to “unconsciously think” about the apartments while they were distracted. Indeed, our findings showed that 37 % of the participants who decided immediately chose the appropriate apartment, whereas 60 % of the unconscious thinkers chose the best one (see Dijksterhuis, 2004; Dijksterhuis & Nordgren, 2006). Postponing a decision helps, even if one does not consciously think about it anymore.

The next question was whether unconscious thought could be even more helpful than an equal period of conscious thought. Traditionally, most scholars on decision making have assumed that thorough conscious thought is the best strategy to arrive at sound decisions. This is without doubt sometimes true, but as a general principle it needs to be qualified. We know that under some circumstances (e.g., Wilson & Schooler, 1991), conscious thought deteriorates the quality of decisions. In another experiment we conducted (Bos et al., 2009), our participants chose between six houses that were on sale in our home city, Nijmegen. We simulated the website on which these houses were advertised but removed the asking price. Our participants were given a few minutes time to navigate our “website,” and some participants were then given as much time as they wanted to think about the houses, and to further browse through the information. Others were distracted for about 45 minutes (they actually did other experiments) before they decided. Finally, participants chose their favorite house and they were asked to estimate the asking price for each of the six houses based on the information provided. The unconscious thinkers - that is, the ones that were distracted - performed significantly better than the conscious thinkers, a finding that has now been replicated a number of times (see Strick et al., 2009, for a meta-analysis).

In other experiments (Dijksterhuis, Bos, van der Leij & van Baaren, 2009), we asked immediate decision makers, conscious thinkers, and unconscious thinkers to predict the results of soccer matches that were to be played in the near future. The accuracy of the predictions did not differ much for people who didn’t know much about soccer. For fans, however, the results did differ. Fans who thought unconsciously made better predictions than fans who thought consciously or fans who guessed immediately. Interestingly, for both immediate decision makers as well as for conscious thinkers, knowledge of soccer did not correlate with the quality of the predictions. Only among unconscious thinkers was this correlation obtained, indicating that the benefits of expertise, at least within the confines of the present paradigm, become apparent when one thinks unconsciously rather than consciously.

For the entire article, including when, how and why unconscious thought may be better than conscious thought, click here to go to the APA site.

Become more aware. Cultivate mindfulness. Have an enjoyable weekend!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Guide To Self, Inc.

Executive Coach

Danville CA 94526

 

Posted in National speakers, Danville CA, Executive coach, Unsconscious mind, Awareness, Mindfulness, Psychology & soccer, Rational mind, Consciousness, Subconscious mind, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Champions of Free Will Celebrate! Seminal 1983 Study on Response Potential Called Into Question

24. September 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Apparently humans have some free will after all.

From New Scientist…

Champions of free will, take heart. A landmark 1980s experiment that purported to show free will doesn’t exist is being challenged.

In 1983, neuroscientist Benjamin Libet asked volunteers wearing scalp electrodes to flex a finger or wrist. When they did, the movements were preceded by a dip in the signals being recorded, called the “readiness potential”. Libet interpreted this RP as the brain preparing for movement

For full article, click here.

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Positive Psychology Coach

913 San Ramon Valley Blvd. #280

Danville, CA 94526

Posted in Curiosity, Danville CA, The human brain, Consciousness, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Rational mind, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Quantum Theory of Consciousness May Explain Wishful Thinking, Cognitive Dissonance

6. August 2009 by John Schinnerer.

What if ‘cognitive dissonance’ is actually related to subconscious emotional processes? Emotions may be behind the wishful thinking that the researchers relate to cognitive dissonance. Are we getting closer to a quantum theory of consciousness (emotion & cognition)?

 

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

 

April 14th, 2009 By Lisa Zyga

 

‘ (PhysOrg.com) — Humans don’t always make the most rational decisions. As studies have shown, even when logic and reasoning point in one direction, sometimes we chose the opposite route, motivated by personal bias or simply “wishful thinking.” This paradoxical human behavior has resisted explanation by classical decision theory for over a decade. But now, scientists have shown that a quantum probability model can provide a simple explanation for human decision-making - and may eventually help explain the success of human cognition overall.

If you were asked to gamble in a game in which you had a 50/50 chance to win $200 or lose $100, would you play? In one study, participants were told that they had just played this game, and then were asked to choose whether to try the same gamble again. One-third of the participants were told that they had won the first game, one-third were told they had lost the first game, and the remaining one-third did not know the outcome of their first game. Most of the participants in the first two scenarios chose to play again (69% and 59%, respectively), while most of the participants in the third scenario chose not to (only 36% played again). These results violate the “sure thing principle,” which says that if you prefer choice A in two complementary known states (e.g., known winning and known losing), then you should also prefer choice A when the state is unknown. So why do people choose differently when confronted with an unknown state?

In a recent study, psychologists Emmanuel M. Pothos of Swansea University in the UK and Jerome R. Busemeyer of Indiana University in the US have presented an alternative framework for modeling decision-making of this kind, based on quantum probability. As they note, the original motivation for developing quantum mechanics in physics was to explain findings that seemed paradoxical from a classical point of view. Possibly, quantum theory can better explain paradoxical findings in psychology, as well. In recent years, a growing number of researchers have investigated using quantum formalism in cognitive situations, such as in modeling human judgment and perception. Pothos and Busemeyer’s results are published in a recent issue of Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

“A few decades ago, Tversky and Kahneman (1974) challenged ubiquitous assumptions regarding what is the most suitable framework for modeling human cognition,” Busemeyer told PhysOrg.com. “Until then, most psychologists sought to understand cognition using classic probability theory. In our paper we raise the question, which mathematical framework is most appropriate for cognitive modeling? In this article, for the first time, we present a fundamentally different, and more powerful, approach to probabilistic models of cognition, based on quantum principles. Employing minimal assumptions, we derive a Hamiltonian directly from the parameters of the problem (e.g., the payoffs associated with different actions) and known general principles of cognition (e.g., a well known phenomenon of cognitive dissonance); every step in our model is psychologically interpreted and rigorously justified.”

Defecting Dilemma

In their study, the scientists compared two models, one based on Markovian classical probability theory and the other based on quantum probability theory. They modeled a game based on the Prisoner’s Dilemma, which is similar to the gambling game. Here, participants were asked if they wanted to cooperate with or defect from an imaginary partner. Overall, each partner would receive larger pay-outs if they defected, making defecting the rational choice. However, if both partners cooperated, they would each receive a higher pay-out than if both defected. Similar to the results from the gambling games, studies have shown that participants who were told that their partner had defected or cooperated on the first round usually chose to defect on the second round (84% and 66%, respectively). But participants who did not know their partner’s previous decision were more likely to cooperate than the others (only 55% defected). It seems as if these individuals were trying to give their partners the benefit of the doubt, at the expense of making the rational choice.

As the scientists showed, both classical and quantum probability models accurately predict an individual’s decisions when the opponent’s choice is known. However, when the opponent’s action is unknown, both models predict that the probability of defection is the average of the two known cases, which fails to explain empirical human behavior. The problem is that the models are purely rational, meaning they try to maximize utility.

To address this problem, the scientists added another component to both models, which they call cognitive dissonance, and can also be thought of as wishful thinking. The idea is that people tend to believe that their opponent will make the same choice that they do; if an individual chooses to cooperate, they tend to think that their opponent will cooperate, as well. If both partners cooperate, both will receive a higher pay-out than if both defected. (And if an individual thought that his opponent would cooperate and so decided to defect to maximize his own pay-out, he would then be compelled to assume that the opponent would also defect, according to cognitive dissonance.) In other words, an individual views his opponent as a mirror of himself.

The difference between the classical and quantum models lies in how the rational component and the cognitive dissonance component are combined. Even after adding the second component, the classical model predicts that the probability in the unknown scenario must equal the average of the probability for the two known cases. As such, the classical model continues to obey the law of total probability, and fails to explain the violations of the sure thing principle.

In the quantum model, on the other hand, the addition of the cognitive dissonance component produces interference effects that cause the unknown probability to deviate from the average of the known probabilities. While in the classical model an individual is committed to exactly one preference at any given time, in the quantum model an individual experiences a superposition of these preferences. Mathematically, the probability (or amplitude) of defecting in the unknown scenario is obtained from the superposition of probabilities (amplitudes) for the two known cases. These interference effects enable the probability of unknown events to be lower than the probability of either event individually, which is observed in the empirical studies.

“Cognitive dissonance can arise in other decision making situations and is not limited to games with an intelligent opponent,” Busemeyer said. “In the gambling game, you play against nature. In this case, however, your belief that you will win the game becomes coordinated with your intentions to play the game. Cognitive dissonance effects are not even limited to adult humans but have also been found with young children and even with nonhuman primates.” (See Egan, L. C., Santos, L. R. & Bloom, P. (2007). The origins of cognitive dissonance: evidence from children and monkeys. Psychological Science, 18, 978- 983.)’

Full article here

http://www.physorg.com/news158928941.html

All the best,

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Guide To Self, Inc.

 

Posted in Altruism, Awareness, Emotion & learning, Negotiation and emotion, Consciousness, Guide to Self, Rational mind, Emotional mind, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Temptation more powerful than individuals realize says Kellogg study

3. August 2009 by John Schinnerer.

August 3rd, 2009

 

Whether it’s highlighted in major news headlines about Argentinean affairs and Ponzi schemes, or in personal battles with obesity and drug addiction, individuals regularly succumb to greed, lust and self-destructive behaviors. New research from the Kellogg School of Management examines why this is the case, and demonstrates that individuals believe they have more restraint than they actually possess–ultimately leading to poor decision-making.

The study, led by Loran Nordgren, senior lecturer of management and organizations at the Kellogg School, examined how an individual’s belief in his/her ability to control impulses such as greed, drug craving and sexual arousal influenced responses to temptation. The research found the sample, on average, displayed a “restraint bias,” causing individuals to miscalculate the amount of temptation they could truly handle, in turn leading to a greater likelihood of indulging impulsive or addictive behavior.

“People are not good at anticipating the power of their urges, and those who are the most confident about their self-control are the most likely to give into temptation,” said Nordgren. “The key is simply to avoid any situations where vices and other weaknesses thrive and, most importantly, for individuals to keep a humble view of their willpower.”

For full article, click here http://www.physorg.com/news168523630.html

 

Posted in Awareness, Emotion & learning, Anger Management, Emotional management, Morals and values, Rational mind, Emotional IQ | Print | No Comments »

What’s Next? Hackers Tapping Into Your Brain

15. July 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Most of us have some experience with malicious hackers trying to steal passwords, credit card information, and expose our hard drives to worms, bugs and viruses. Given the advances in neuropsychology and technology, the next frontier may be hackers attempting to illegally gain entry into your brain.

Technology has been developed in the past two years that allow individuals to control a computer, a wheelchair and even web browsers with mere thoughts. The downside? As these neural devices become more advanced and involved, such as adapting wireless technology, there is a danger of evil doers hacking into users’ brains. Security must be at the forefront of our minds (pun intended) if we are to truly realize the enormous possibilities of this convergence of neuropsychology and technology.

 Read full article in Wired here…

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/07/neurosecurity/

Stay healthy! Stay cool! It’s supposed to be 109 degrees here in California (Bay Area) today.

Dr. John Schinnerer

Guide to Self, Inc.

Posted in Mindfulness, The human brain, Awareness, Emotion and technology, Neuropsychology, Consciousness, Emotional management, Emotional IQ, Guide to Self, Morals and values, Rational mind, Emotional mind, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Need Something Done? Don’t Speak To My Left Ear. Right Ear Better Suited For Requests

24. June 2009 by John Schinnerer.

ScienceDaily (June 23, 2009) — We humans prefer to be addressed in our right ear and are more likely to perform a task when we receive the request in our right ear rather than our left. In a series of three studies, looking at ear preference in communication between humans, Dr. Luca Tommasi and Daniele Marzoli from the University “Gabriele d’Annunzio” in Chieti, Italy, show that a natural side bias, depending on hemispheric asymmetry in the brain, manifests itself in everyday human behavior.

Full story at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090623090705.htm

I didn’t hear this one coming. But when I reflect upon my own experience, I do prefer people speaking to my right ear. And I thought it was just me!

Fight the fear! 

Don’t give up!

Have a thriving, smiling day!

You are worth every breath you take (and that’s saying something!).

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Posted in Emotional mind, Consciousness, The human brain, Rational mind, Emotional IQ, Life coach, Guide to Self, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Why Should You Care About Emotions?

22. January 2009 by John Schinnerer.

By John Schinnerer, Ph.D. 

 Why should you care about emotions? What’s the big deal about emotional mastery?  

Emotions influence everything you do, think, and perceive. Emotional mastery is the ability to be instantly aware of which emotion you are feeling and then to manage the emotion (or emotions) once you are aware of it. Once you can recognize your emotions, the next step is to learn to deal with them in an appropriate way. One of the most critical skills we learn as youngsters is the ability to soothe ourselves when we are upset. This means calming ourselves when we are irritated, angry, scared, anxious, sad, or depressed. People who fail to learn this skill are constantly fighting off ongoing anxiety, sadness or irritability. Those who learn to manage their emotions persevere to overcome life’s setbacks. Emotionally wise people are resilient and rebound from disappointments more quickly. They have a positive, optimistic outlook on life. 

Make Room for Both the Rational and the Emotional Minds 

The next step is to realize that each one of us has a thinking, or rational, mind and a feeling, or emotional, mind. At one point in time, scientists and researchers thought we only had a rational mind. How’s that for irony? The thinking mind only discovered itself.  

The Rational Mind 

The rational mind is the means that we usually use to understand the world – it is the thoughtstream that runs constantly behind the back of your forehead. It is the narrator that comments on your daily experience. It is the rational, analytical thinking part of your mind. For example, I can use this logical part of my mind to solve math problems, be logical and analyze data. Using Jon Haidt’s metaphor, the rational mind is the rider on the elephant where the rider is the thinking mind and the elephant is the emotional mind. Recently, Joseph LeDoux, one of the world’s leading researchers in neuroscience, said, “Consciousness may get all the focus but consciousness is a small part of what the brain does, and it’s a SLAVE to everything that works beneath it.” LeDoux is saying that the rider is a slave to the elephant, our rational mind is a slave to our emotional mind. LeDoux believes that our identities are formed from the unique set of learned fears, desires, associations and expectations that are most deeply engrained in our unconscious. For instance, teaching children catch phrases such as ‘Just say ‘no’’ is not going to do the trick because in emotionally-charged situations, the emotional mind will almost always win out. The emotional mind is stronger, faster and can last longer than the rational mind.  Simplistic solutions such as ‘just say ‘no” will not work.  What will work is finding ways to train the emotional mind.  

The Emotional Mind 

Alongside the rational mind is the emotional mind. The emotional mind is irrational, impulsive, creative and intense. It’s the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain pulling the strings of much of your behavior. It’s why you KNOW it’s wrong to steal but go home with office supplies taken from work. It’s why many people have a knee jerk reaction to words like sex, rape and torture. These are emotionally loaded words.   There are many times when the rider (the rational mind) is adequately steering the elephant (the emotional mind), that is, your thinking mind is working in cooperation with your emotional mind. These times take place when you are calm and thinking clearly. However, when you are struck by an emotion, such as fear, the elephant takes over and the rider loses control. The elephant may run from a mouse. He may go off the beaten path to look for grass to eat. Whatever he does, the rider has little input into the actual behavior. And you mind is like the rider and the elephant. When you are consumed by an intense feeling, your emotional mind takes over and your thinking mind is dead in the water.  It becomes nearly impossible to think clearly while in the grasp of a strong emotion such as rage. 

 

Feeling More Than One Emotion At A Time 

What’s more, science has now shown that we can experience more than one emotion at the same time about any given event, or person or memory. For instance, take your favorite song. You may feel happy when you hear the tune, melancholy when you focus on the lyrics and excited when you remember back to the time your first heard it. All of us have the ability to feel multiple emotions - constructive and destructive - simultaneously. Once you understand this point, emotions become quite complex, layered and interesting. 

 

The Human Brain is Hard-Wired for Emotions 

The brain is wired to make us emotional beings. We experience the emotional response to an event before it even reaches the thinking mind. There is a shortcut from the thalamus to the amygdala which bypasses conscious awareness to allow your body to be put on instant alert. A secondary, but slower circuit, in the brain runs from the thalamus (the brain’s receiving room for most information taken in by your senses) to the brain’s ‘thinking’ area, in the prefrontal cortex. That is why sometimes you are overcome by your emotions. When the emotion is strong enough, your emotional mind (the elephant) temporarily takes over control of your mind and body in order to keep you safe. The emotional mind errs on the side of caution. The emotional mind is always on the lookout for danger and possible threats. It picks up 2 or 3 key elements in a situation, and decides in less than .33 seconds whether or not there is a threat present. If a threat is determined to exist, or if there is a good probability that it exists, then the emotional mind takes over and prepares your body to fight or run away. When your emotional mind takes over in such an emergency, real or perceived, it’s known as an emotional hijacking. An emotional hijacking is impulsive, quick, strong, and raw.Your rational mind can help to stop such emotional takeovers. Ideally, you would have time to think about your emotions and your ensuing actions before acting. This enables us to respond to our emotions more appropriately.  This typically takes slightly more time than an emotional hijacking, but it allows us to consider a number of different responses and usually results in a more thoughtful course of action. These responses include whether to attack or run, and also whether to persuade, cajole, beg, plead, charm, seek sympathy, instill guilt, act brave, to be thoughtful, or to do nothing at all.  

The Need for Emotion in Rational Thought 

The fascinating piece of the puzzle is that we all need a balance between our rational and emotional minds in order to lead successful and happy lives.  Amazingly, the rational and the emotional mind, the elephant and the rider, need each other to function at their highest levels. This means that you need your emotions to think straight!I’ll tell you a story to show you what I mean. I know a man who is one of the smartest guys I’ve ever met. He could recite word for word anything he had read in his life. He read books by the boxful. Yet, he was unable to control his emotions. He had high IQ and low EQ.  He was impulsive which means that he acted before he thought about the possible consequences of his actions. So here is this incredibly smart person with terribly flawed decision-making skills and poor emotional control. As he grew older, he made awful choices in his life. He wound up alone and unsuccessful. Some would argue that he could not access his emotional learning.Your emotional learning is where you store your general likes and dislikes. Without a storehouse of prior emotional experiences to compare to present events, everything appears neutral — neither appealing nor unappealing. This means that feelings are essential to thought.Emotions steer us in the best general direction where logic can be put to its best (and more specific) use. Without emotions, we’d be overwhelmed by the dazzling array of choices we need to make every minute of every day. Our emotional learning helps us sift through these options and pulls out the best ones to be analyzed by our rational mind.  In this way, emotions work as an equal partner with logical thought. The better these two partners work together, the higher your intelligence and your emotional intelligence. The goal is to create the most powerful mind possible – one which balances strengths in rational thought with emotional wisdom. Stay tuned to this blog and I’ll share with you scientifically proven ways to train your elephant and develop your most powerful mind. 

About the AuthorDr. John Schinnerer

Dr. John Schinnerer is in private practice helping people learn anger management, stress management and the latest ways to deal with destructive negative emotions. He also helps clients learn ways to create happy, meaningful lives. His practice is located in the Danville-San Ramon Medical Center at 913 San Ramon Valley Blvd., #280, Danville, California 94526. He graduated summa cum laude from U.C. Berkeley with a Ph.D. in psychology. Dr. Schinnerer has been an executive and psychologist for over 10 years. Dr. John Schinnerer is President and Founder of Guide To Self, a company that coaches clients to their potential using the latest in positive psychology, mindfulness and attentional control. Dr. John Schinnerer hosted over 200 episodes of Guide To Self Radio, a prime time radio show, in the San Francisco Bay Area.  Dr. Schinnerer’s areas of expertise range from positive psychology, to emotional awareness, to moral development, to sports psychology. Dr. Schinnerer wrote the award-winning, “Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide To Managing Emotion and Thought,” which is available at Amazon.com, BarnesAndNoble.com and AuthorHouse.com.  He sits on the Advisory Board of Positive Music Imperative (PMI) and The Wellness Community.   

Posted in Alexithymia, Men's emotions, Subconscious mind, Consciousness, Anger Management, The human brain, Resiliency, Hope, Awareness, Assertiveness, Mindfulness, Altruism, Emotional management, Emotional mind, Life coach, Guide to Self, Dr. John Schinnerer, Forgiveness, Positive Psychology, Emotional IQ, Anxiety, Rational mind, Depression, Happiness, Staying calm, Counseling | Print | No Comments »

The Role of Emotion in Effective Negotiating - New Study from Columbia University

16. October 2008 by John Schinnerer.

Here is a recent study (as reported by Science Daily) on the positive effect that emotion can have on negotiating …

Deal Or No Deal? The Role Of Emotions In Negotiating Offers

ScienceDaily (Oct. 16, 2008)

We all negotiate compromises every day, but it often seems that certain people always get their way. Do these skilled negotiators simply go with their gut instinct every time or are they just extremely calculating, figuring out all possible outcomes before settling on the best option?  

Behavioral studies have shown that emotions play an important role in decision making. However, it was not known to what extent our negotiating skills depend on our emotions.  Columbia University scientists Andrew Stephen and Michel Tuan Pham decided to explore the interplay of emotion and reason in everyday deal-making. They designed a series of laboratory experiments to see if people who trust their feelings (and those who do not) handle themselves differently in the art of negotiation.  In this study, they used a classic negotiation game called the “ultimatum game.”

In the ultimatum game, one person (the “proposer”) has a given amount of cash, which he is told to divide with a second person any way he likes. The catch is that the second person must either accept the offer or reject it entirely, no negotiation allowed. If he rejects it, both players walk away with nothing. To test how emotions influence deal-making (or in some cases, deal-breaking!), the researchers manipulated how much participants trusted their feelings before they played a series of ultimatum games for real money. They asked some of the participants to think of two occasions in their past when trusting their feelings to make decisions resulted in good outcomes.

People generally find it easy to think of two such occasions, giving participants greater confidence in trusting their own emotions while making decisions. Other participants were told to think of 10 occasions when trusting their feelings to make decisions resulted in poor outcomes—this made participants wary of trusting their feelings. Then all the participants played a computerized version of the ultimatum game, in the role of “proposer.” The results, as reported in the October issue of the journal Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, were intriguing. The participants who were more confident in following their emotions offered somewhat less money than the others. This is because they were more focused on the “gist” of the offer itself (and what felt good), rather than on estimating the other player’s possible reaction and calculating the probabilities of payoff. In short, the immediacy of the offer trumped the more complicated calculation.  When the researchers tried two other variations of the ultimatum game (one with more room for negotiation and one with less), they found similar results. When the participants were primed to trust their emotions, they saw the transaction as simpler and cleaner — rather than complex, abstract and cognitively demanding. The researchers believe that emotional negotiators actually have an easier time visualizing the offer itself: They picture themselves offering someone $20 from their $50 pot and it feels “okay.”  “We believe that when proposers rely on their feelings, the relative power implied by the rules of the game is central to their gist representation of the negotiation, and this representation shapes whether offers ‘feel right’ to them,” the authors stated. Interestingly, the negotiators who were guided by their emotions did not fare worse than the others financially. Indeed, they ended up with at least as much, and often more, than their more calculating counterparts, suggesting that emotional decision making may not only be simpler, but may also be more lucrative.

Association for Psychological Science (2008, October 16). Deal Or No Deal? The Role Of Emotions In Negotiating Offers. ScienceDaily. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2008/10/081015100049.htm

I hope you are thriving today!

All the best,

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Guide To Self, Inc.

Posted in Emotional management, Subconscious mind, Men's emotions, Negotiation and emotion, Emotional mind, Rational mind, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Emotional management lets you choose how to behave following anger

16. October 2008 by John Schinnerer.

The best emotional responses allow you to quickly achieve your goal, while causing no harm to others who may be involved. It’s not easy. If it were, everyone would have it. It begins with increasing your awareness … mindfulness…and practice.

Emotions are best understood as action scripts. Human bodies and brains have been developing these action scripts over millions and millions of years, far longer than our rational minds have been around. The limbic system, where much of emotional processing takes place, has been around for 3 - 10 million years, the cortex, where much of our rational thinking takes place, has been only been around for 40,000 to 2 million years.

Emotional management …is the skill of turning down the

  1.) Intensity

  2.) Duration and

  3.) Frequency of your negative, destructive emotions.

Emotional management allows you to have more of a conscious choice in which emotions you feel, when you feel them and to what degree. It is about inserting a third of a second between the time you experience the emotion in the moment and the behavior which follows.

For instance, anger is an action script to remove obstacles which are preventing us from reaching our goals. It has been honed over millions of years to prepare us to attack or confront. This is highly useful when we are out hunting or being hunted (such as our prehistoric ancestors were). Yet, it is not overly helpful when we are flying to anger due to traffic, standing in line or the misbehavior of a child.

Research has shown that the anger cycle can be interrupted within the first .33 seconds.

You become aware of the anger signs within your body (e.g., blood rushing to hands and feet to prepare for attack, heart rate increases, brow furrows, overfocusing on situation that incited anger, shallow breathing).

You label the anger (the simple act of properly labeling negative emotions has been shown to reduce their intensity).

Honor it (”Hey, I’m feeling angry here. Let’s take a time out and come back later”).

Breathe deeply and turn your thoughts towards something pleasant (a distraction).

This reduces the intensity of the anger and allows you to insert some conscious thought between the feeling of anger and the way in which you behave as a result of the anger.

Emotional management is one of the most important skills you can learn in this lifetime. Check it out. You’ll be happy you did!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Guide To Self, Inc.

Posted in Emotional management, Anger Management, Emotional mind, Rational mind, Parenting, Subconscious mind, Alexithymia, Resiliency, Relationships, The human brain, Men's emotions, Depression, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Life coach, Dr. John Schinnerer, Managing stress, Forgiveness, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Infinet Assessment, Happiness, School age bullies, Staying calm, Bullies | Print | No Comments »

New Guide To Self Blog - A Unique Blend of Sports and Positive Psychology!

10. October 2007 by John Schinnerer.

Welcome to my new blog!

I had a prior blog but when I shifted it to an updated version of Blogger, it wouldn’t let me access it anymore to add new posts.

So here I am again. My name is Dr. John Schinnerer, a psychologist out of U.C. Berkeley.

Here is my brief bio so you know a little bit of my background…

Dr. John Schinnerer is President and Founder of Guide To Self, a company that focuses on coaching individuals and groups to their potential using the latest in psychology, psychoneuroimmunology and physiology. Most recently, Dr. John Schinnerer hosted over 200 episodes of Guide To Self Radio, a prime time radio show, in the San Francisco Bay Area. He graduated summa cum laude from U.C. Berkeley with a Ph.D. in psychology. Dr. Schinnerer has been a coach and psychologist for over 10 years.Dr. Schinnerer is also President of Infinet Assessment, a psychological testing company to help firms select the best applicants. Infinet was founded in 1997 and has worked with companies such as UPS, CSE Insurance Group and Schreiber Foods.Dr. Schinnerer’s areas of expertise range from positive psychology, to emotional awareness, to moral development to sports psychology. He is a noted speaker and author on topics such as emotional intelligence, sports psychology, and executive leadership. Dr. Schinnerer wrote, “Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide To Managing Emotion and Thought,” which was recently awarded the “Best Self-Help Book of 2007” by East Bay Express.  He has written articles on corporate ethics and EQ in the workplace for Workspan magazine, HR.com, and Business Ethics. He has given numerous presentations, radio shows, workshops and seminars to tens of thousands of people for organizations such as Kaiser Permanente, Starbucks, Cisco, SHRM, KNEW and KDIA.

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How to Manage Your Emotions with Dr. John Schinnerer

4. September 2006 by John Schinnerer.

Yes! At long last, my first book is available at http://www.authorhouse.com/BookStore/ItemDetail~bookid~38496.aspx! It’s called “Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide to Managing Emotion and Thought.”
I know, it’s a bit lenghty of a title. Yet the content is fascinating. Here’s the thing, the illiterate of the next century will NOT be those who can’t read nor write. The illiterate will soon be those who cannot harness the power of their emotion to improve their performance. This is the first step on the journey master your mind. Take a look! It will shatter your worldview.

Guide To Self(C) 2005-2006.

Copyright 2005-06 Guide To Self, John Schinnerer, PhD.

Posted in Depression, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Rational mind, Emotional mind, Emotional management, Infinet Assessment, Happiness, Dr. John Schinnerer, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Staying calm, Positive Psychology | Print | No Comments »

Who is really in charge - the rational or emotional mind?

29. August 2006 by John Schinnerer.

Dr. John Schinnerer on another difference within the marvelous human brain – automatic or conscious processes. Who is really in charge - your “old” emotional brain or your “new” rational brain?

Close the gap between how you think your brain works and how it ACTUALLY works. You THINK you have free will. What if it were the case that you don’t have as much free will as you think? What if 90% of what you do and say is automatic?

A fascinating and novel approach to radio. Dr. John borrows Jim Gaffigan’s method of speaking the thoughts of the audience making for humorous and helpful radio. Best ever?!

Look for Dr. John’s recent book, “Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide to Managing Emotion and Thought” available Sept. 5, 2006. More info is at http://www.guidetoself.com.

Guide To Self radio is sponsored in part by Infinet Assessment, the premier firm for employee testing. More is available at
http://www.infinetassessment.com.

Interested in booking Dr. John as a speaker? Call us at (925) 944-3440
Duration:29 minutes, 25 seconds

MP3 File

Copyright 2005-06 Guide To Self, John Schinnerer, PhD.

Posted in Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Infinet Assessment, Depression, Rational mind, Emotional mind, Happiness, Customer Engagement, Dr. John Schinnerer, Forgiveness, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Anxiety, Counseling | Print | No Comments »

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Anger (But Were Too Angry to Ask!)

18. July 2006 by John Schinnerer.

We know there are four types of anger - anger at self, anger at
others, disappointment (anger and sadness), and constructive anger -
but HOW do we deal effectively with anger?

Join Dr. John for the latest info on anger management, tips and tricks
to manage your inner beast!

For more info on Dr. John Schinnerer and presentation availability, go
to http://www.guidetoself.com or call
(925) 944-3440.

Look for Dr. John Schinnerer’s new book coming soon. “Guide To Self:
The Beginner’s Guide to Managing Emotion and Thought.” Available
September 2006 at www.guidetoself.com.
Duration:27 minutes, 43 seconds

MP3 File

Copyright 2005-06 Guide To Self, John Schinnerer, PhD.

Posted in Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Infinet Assessment, Happiness, Victims of bullying, Depression, Rational mind, Anger Management, Managing Anxiety, Emotional management, Emotional mind, School age bullies, Tips to help anxiety, Managing stress, Realistic optimism, Forgiveness, Positive Psychology, Dr. John Schinnerer, Life coach, Staying calm, Emotional IQ, Guide to Self, Bullies | Print | No Comments »

Dr. John Schinnerer speaks with Dan Millman, author of The Way of the Peaceful Warrior

13. July 2006 by John Schinnerer.

Dr. John Schinnerer speaks with Dan Millman, former world champion gymnast, martial arts expert, coach of the U.C. Berkeley gymnastics team and author of 12 books.

Dan began by writing Way of the Peaceful Warrior back in 1980. The Peaceful Warrior is just now being released as a movie starring Nick Nolte.

Dan just finished the long-awaited prequel, ‘Journeys of Socrates.’ Dan also wrote a tremendous book called ‘Body, Mind Mastery’ which Phil Jackson called a ‘must-read’ for his Chicago Bulls players back in the day.

Guide To Self radio airs on KDIA, 1640 AM in the San Francisco Bay Area. More info on Guide to Self and Dr. John Schinnerer is available at http://www.guidetoself.com. (925) 944-3440.

MP3 File

Copyright 2005-06 Guide To Self, John Schinnerer, PhD.

Posted in Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Happiness, Rational mind, Emotional mind, Managing Anxiety, Emotional management, Emotional IQ, Guide to Self, Forgiveness, Positive Psychology, Realistic optimism, Managing stress, Dr. John Schinnerer, Sports Psychology | Print | No Comments »

How to replace your damaging core beliefs

6. July 2006 by John Schinnerer.

Changing Destructive Core Beliefs About Yourself
Dr. John Schinnerer
Coach and counselor

Coaching is a means to assist individuals in identifying their core values and using those values to set long-term goals. Each long-term goal is broken up into smaller, achievable tasks. In this manner, I can assure the eventual success of my clients by continuing to break down larger, more imposing challenges into smaller and smaller acts. Coaching is a major asset for reprogramming the mental tapes, or thoughts, that run through your head. Oftentimes, these thoughts are so quick you aren’t even consciously aware of them. Most times, these thoughts are negative and cause a negative reaction in our body. Ninety-nine percent of the time thoughts are laced with emotion. Negative thoughts lead to negative emotions (i.e., sadness, anger, and fear primarily). Positive thoughts lead to positive emotions (i.e., happiness, contentment and relaxation). Coaching helps you to reprogram your old tapes and their accompanying feelings so you can feed your brain healthy messages and increase the amount of time you spend in positive emotions. Recent research has shown that the goal for a thriving life is 3 times as much positive emotion as negative emotion.

Change Your Negative Habits

Did you know that by changing your brain, you can change your life? You can. The brain relies on pathways between brain cells (neurons) to communicate messages from one area to another. You can create new pathways in your brain. You are capable of learning new ways of doing and being. To do so, you only need to do three things:

1. Become aware of your bad habit
2. Substitute a new and improved habit for the old one
3. Rehearse the new habit until it becomes automatic

When you learn new skills and attitudes, new pathways are created in your brain. The most efficient way to create these new pathways is by practicing the new task. The more you practice, the deeper engrained the pathway becomes in your brain.
The downside is that the more you continue to do the same old negative thoughts and behaviors, the more deeply engrained they become as well. However, you can change this at any moment by merely being aware of those thoughts you want to change and then consciously and intentionally substituting in a more positive thought.
Research has shown that our brain has the capability to create new pathways for as long as you live. This is exciting news because we used to believe the brain was incapable of growth and change after early adulthood. We now know that the brain continues to grow and adapt every day of our lives. Your brain is just like a muscle that needs exercise if you want to keep it in shape. And, believe me; you definitely want to keep your brain in shape!

Blazing a New Trail in Your Brain

At first, it seems difficult to learn a new skill or attitude. When you begin learning a new skill, the baby pathway between brain cells is like a hiking path in your brain. It’s made of dirt and has pebbles and rocks on it. It is not very well-traveled so messages have a more difficult time “walking” from one place to another. The more you try out the new skill, the stronger the pathway becomes. After some practice, the pathway grows from a hiking trail into a two-lane highway. Now the messages move quickly and easily between the brain cells. Over time, the new skill becomes automatic and the two-lane highway solidifies into a super highway where the messengers of the brain rocket back and forth. The more you practice a new behavior, the more automatic and easier it becomes.

Just as physical skills such as running, jumping and playing sports become automatic through repetition, so too do thoughts, emotions and attitudes. As you repeat positive thoughts, your underlying pathways in the brain become stronger. Eventually, these paths become hardwired into your brain’s circuitry.

Revisit Your Essential Core Beliefs

Your core beliefs, your stealthy, silent thoughts, matter tremendously. Take a close look at your core beliefs because they fuel your thinking. If your core beliefs are negative (e.g., “I always get the short end of the stick.”), then your thinking will be negative. Negative thoughts lead to destructive emotions. So take a close look at your core beliefs, those things that you believe deep down in the core of your being.

While not scientifically proven, there seems to be a triad of negative beliefs which are at the root of all other destructive beliefs. These three beliefs stem from a confusion that arises when you mistake who you are with what you do. You are not what you do. You are not merely what you believe. You are not only what you feel. Those are aspects, facets, of you, but they are not the essence of you. You are far more than mere actions, beliefs, or feelings.

Many people make the serious error of rating how well they achieve followed by rating themselves as a good or bad person. Most folks judge their worth based on their achievements, their successes, and their failures. It’s a ubiquitous error in judgment; everyone makes it unless taught otherwise. Logically, it seems to make sense. I, the individual, kick the ball well or poorly. The ball doesn’t kick itself. So I ‘logically’ judge my kicking ability as good or bad. Then, I ‘illogically’ rate myself as a bad kicker, a bad athlete, or even a bad person. It’s a mistake of overgeneralization. Most people overgeneralize from doing a bad act to being a bad person. That’s a fallacy. It’s wrong. Learn to separate your worth as an individual from your individual actions.

For example, I’m working with my nine year old son on the concept that he is far more than his ability on the baseball diamond. Whether he hits the ball well or not, he is still a great person. A bad day at the ballpark does not make him a bad individual. A bad act does not a bad person make. In the same vein, a good act does not make you a good person.

In order to be a bad person, you would have to consistently and frequently perform bad acts such as breaking the rules, not cooperating, and hurting others. This is hard to do and highly improbable. So even if you are responsible for a bad act, say kicking the ball poorly, you cannot judge yourself as a bad person. It’s impossible to be what you do. A bad person would only and always behave in a negative manner. And a good person would act in a positive manner towards everyone at all times. Neither of these two extremes is possible.

Three Most Damaging Core Beliefs

The three most damaging core beliefs that you can hold are as follows:

1) Other people MUST treat me fairly or they are bad people.
2) I MUST do well or else I am a bad person.
3) My life conditions MUST be the way I WANT them to be or I can’t deal with it and will NOT be happy.

There are many other irrational beliefs that you might hold, but these three seem to be at the bottom of nearly every one of them. Integral to each and every one of your irrational, negative beliefs are the words “must”, “should”, or “ought.”
The goal is to become aware of your negative core beliefs. Once you are aware of them, you can consciously substitute positive core beliefs for old, ineffective, untrue beliefs. Certain core beliefs have been proven to lead to greater well-being. The core beliefs that have been proven to work well are as follows:
Core Beliefs That Work Towards Well-being

1. You are incredibly important and matter tremendously to the rest of us.
2. You are not alone. You are surrounded by others who care.
3. There is no failure, only delayed success.
4. Lessons are repeated until learned.
5. Learning never ends.
6. The present is a better place to live than the past or the future.
7. You can handle it.
8. What you do with your life is entirely up to you.
9. All the answers lie within you. You have but to listen.
10. Always look for the good in people and events. You find what you look for.
11. Life is a roller coaster ride. Enjoy the ride.
12. Energy is limitless. You can tap into it at anytime.

Dr. John’s new book is coming out end of this summer. Look for it!

For coaching with Dr. John, call for an appointment at 925-944-3440. For individuals, fees run $150 per hour. Most appointments are done via phone.

Guide To Self(C) 2005-06.

Copyright 2005-06 Guide To Self, John Schinnerer, PhD.

Posted in Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Infinet Assessment, Happiness, Tips to help anxiety, Depression, Rational mind, Anger Management, Managing Anxiety, Emotional management, Emotional mind, Nervousness, Staying calm, Realistic optimism, Forgiveness, Positive Psychology, Counseling, Managing stress, Dr. John Schinnerer, Anxiety, Emotional IQ, Guide to Self, Sports Psychology | Print | No Comments »

How to Identify the Four Types of Affect (or Emotion)

25. May 2006 by John Schinnerer.

There are four types of affect, or emotional phenomena. You may know of a few. Yet, you need to be intimately familiar with all of them if you want to learn to be an emotional genius. Research is showing over and over just how important emotional management is for success and happiness - at work, at home, and in your relationships.

Find out if you’re familiar with all four types of affect. There is emotion which is the zing of feeling you get in the moment. Emotions last from a split second to a few minutes.

There are moods which last from days to weeks and are more diffuse than emotions.

There is your temperament which you are born with but can influence to be more realistically optimistic.

And then there are the emotional masks you wear.

Check them all out on this amazing edition of Guide To Self radio with your host, Dr. John Schinnerer.

Dr. John provides coaching for executives, couples, individuals, and those looking for more happiness and purpose in life. Dr. John is finishing up his first book which should be ready by Summer 2006. You can find out the latest information by visiting
http://www.GuideToSelf.com or calling 925-944-3440.

Thank you for listening! You’re making the world a better place!
Duration:29 minutes, 56 seconds

MP3 File

Copyright 2005-06 Guide To Self, John Schinnerer, PhD.

Posted in Depression, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Infinet Assessment, Happiness, Rational mind, Emotional mind, Anger Management, Managing Anxiety, Emotional management, Tips to help anxiety, Staying calm, Managing stress, Realistic optimism, Forgiveness, Positive Psychology, Dr. John Schinnerer, Life coach, Anxiety, Emotional IQ, Guide to Self, Counseling | Print | No Comments »