Olympic Athletes and Other Peak Performers Found to See World Differently When In the Zone

17. February 2010 by John Schinnerer.

Peak performers like Olympic athletes sense information differently.

New study at Colorado State University, finds that, to experts, people with over 10,000 hours of training in a particular area, the world looks like it is in super slow motion when performing at their peak.

http://www.today.colostate.edu/story.aspx?id=3190

Cheers,

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Posted in Visual perception, Visual Attention, Optimal Human Functioning, Emotion & Athletics, Alamo CA, Psychology and technology, San Ramon CA, Dr. John Schinnerer, Positive Psychology, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Subconscious mind, Danville CA, Sports Psychology | Print | No Comments »

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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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 »

Lines Between Waking & Sleeping States Blurring - Are You Really Awake?

8. October 2009 by John Schinnerer.

A fascinating, recent article from New Scientist and Laura Spinney on the recent findings around the blurred lines between being awake, being in REM state, and being in a non-REM sleeping state.

• 07 October 2009 by Laura Spinney, New Scientist

‘EARLIER this year, a puzzling report appeared in the journal Sleep Medicine. It described two Italian people who never truly slept. They might lie down and close their eyes, but read-outs of brain activity showed none of the normal patterns associated with sleep. Their behaviour was pretty odd, too. Though largely unaware of their surroundings during these rest periods, they would walk around, yell, tremble violently and their hearts would race. The remainder of the time they were conscious and aware but prone to powerful, dream-like hallucinations.

Both had been diagnosed with a neurodegenerative disorder called multiple system atrophy. According to the report’s authors, Roberto Vetrugno and colleagues from the University of Bologna, Italy, the disease had damaged the pair’s brains to such an extent that they had entered status dissociatus, a kind of twilight zone in which the boundaries between sleep and wakefulness completely break down (Sleep Medicine, vol 10, p 247).

That this can happen contradicts the way we usually think about sleep, but it came as no surprise to Mark Mahowald, medical director of the Minnesota Regional Sleep Disorders Center in Minneapolis, who has long contested the dogma that sleep and wakefulness are discrete and distinct states. “There is now overwhelming evidence that the primary states of being are not mutually exclusive,” he says. The blurring of sleep and wakefulness is very clear in status dissociatus, but he believes it can happen to us all. If he is right, we will have to rethink our understanding of what sleep is and what it is for. Maybe wakefulness is not the all-or-nothing phenomenon we thought it was either.

Received wisdom has it that at any given time, healthy people are in one of three states of vigilance: awake, in rapid eye movement (REM) sleep or in non-REM (NREM) sleep. Each state is distinct and can be recognised by a characteristic pattern of brain activity, as measured by an electroencephalogram (EEG) (see chart, right). Wakefulness is easy to detect. Apart from the fact that a person’s eyes are open and they are responsive, their EEG shows a pattern of high-frequency, low-amplitude waves. NREM sleep is divided into four stages, each of which has its own distinctive EEG pattern. REM is trickier to spot because in EEG terms it closely resembles stage 1 NREM sleep. So to be sure it really is REM, researchers also look for the telltale rapid eye movements and a slackening in the muscles of the chin and jaw.

Mahowald is not the only person to have questioned these neat distinctions. David Dinges, a psychiatrist at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, has probably deprived more people of sleep in the name of science than anyone else. In one such study in the late 1980s, Dinges and his team revealed how easily the different states of vigilance can become intermingled. When volunteers were subjected to tests of working memory in which they had to subtract numbers, they could do an average of 90 sums in 3 minutes with few errors. After 52 hours deprived of sleep, their performance fell to around 70 subtractions, with not many more errors. However, after they had slept for 2 hours the change was dramatic. “When we woke them up abruptly, and they rated themselves as alert and ready to go, they couldn’t do even one subtraction,” says Dinges. People even seemed to be dreaming as they attempted the task. One subject mused: “What if people ran faster than normal people run home,” in the middle of a string of incorrect responses.

Known as sleep inertia, a less extreme version of such disorientation is now generally recognised as the cause of the grogginess some people get after their alarm clock goes off. It is as if they are socially awake but functionally asleep; as if the brain circuits underlying responsiveness are up and running, but those mediating working memory are still offline. Mahowald is convinced that it is just one of many disorders that can be explained as a breakdown in the boundaries between sleep and wakefulness. He lists a whole raft of such conditions in the same issue of Sleep Medicine as Vetrugno’s description of people with status dissociatus (vol 10, p 159).

One is REM behavioural disorder (RBD), in which people in REM sleep act out their dreams because the temporary paralysis, or cataplexy, that normally accompanies this state is replaced by the full mobility of wakefulness. In sleep paralysis the opposite is true. Here, cataplexy intrudes into wakefulness, and a person wakes to find him or herself unable to move. It is estimated that up to 40 per cent of people have experienced this disturbing phenomenon. Also surprisingly common are hypnagogic hallucinations - sensory illusions that occur on the cusp of sleep when the dreaming component of REM intrudes into wakefulness. Mahowald’s list also includes sleepwalking, night terrors and narcolepsy, which is an inherent instability in vigilance state boundaries characterised by rapid cycling between states and the tendency to fall asleep mid-sentence. Controversially, the list also includes near-death experiences and alien abductions. It is no coincidence, he says, that alien abductions almost always occur in the recumbent position, in the transition from wakefulness to sleep.

It is no coincidence that alien abductions tend to occur in the transition from wakefulness to sleep

Sleep is a highly complex phenomenon in which changes in sensory, muscular, hormonal and neural systems must be coordinated to create a particular state of vigilance. “When you think about it, there are billions of people in the world who are shifting between wakefulness, REM and non-REM multiple times every 24 hours,” says Mahowald. “It’s amazing that the switching is as accurate as it is.” This accuracy suggests that there is a strong adaptive drive to be fully in one state or another. But he also thinks that state dissociation - the presence of more than one vigilance state concurrently - is more common than anyone previously suspected.

The boundaries between sleep and wakefulness are particularly blurred when we are sleep-deprived. Around a decade ago, Dinges realised that although his sleep-deprived volunteers seemed to be awake, they were in fact experiencing momentary lapses, or microsleeps. Since then, he has discovered that these fleeting naps last between half a second and 2 seconds, and become increasingly frequent the longer we are deprived of sleep, until finally we cannot recover and nod off. Dinges sees them as the outward sign of a tug-of-war between neural systems that are trying to initiate sleep, and others that are trying to maintain wakefulness.

This chimes with the ideas of James Krueger of Washington State University in Pullman, who has argued that the individual processing units in the brain - known as cortical columns - fall asleep independently when they become tired. In his view, shifts between wakefulness and sleep occur when enough columns are in one state or the other (Nature Reviews Neuroscience, vol 9, p 910). Krueger believes this mosaic pattern of sleep explains sleep inertia and sleepwalking.

Some people are more prone to microsleeps than others. In a 2007 study, Dinges and his colleagues showed that there are enormous differences in people’s ability to resist the lure of sleep when tired. Among a group of healthy, non-sleep-deprived adults, the differences in alertness are small. “But as soon as we provoke the system with some sleep deprivation, those differences get larger and larger,” he says (Journal of Sleep Research, vol 16, p 170).

This has implications for all of us, especially those in professions where staying awake is a life-or-death matter. “If you’re doing 100 kilometres per hour on a highway and you have a lapse, your fingers go lax on the steering wheel and you drift off the road at a 4-degree angle,” says Dinges. “Two seconds is all it takes to be completely out of your lane.” Up to 20 per cent of traffic accidents are fatigue-related.

Brain imaging has recently revealed a mental back-up system in people who remain alert when sleep-deprived (Journal of Neuroscience, vol 29, p 7948). While other people have reduced brain activity when tired, sleep-resistant individuals manage to maintain their brain activity levels. More interestingly, they also recruit new areas to help compensate for having been awake for so long. These people were selected for the study because they had a gene variant found in around 40 per cent of people that is thought to be associated with resistance to sleep deprivation. It seems likely that such people are also less prone to state dissociation, although this has not yet been tested.

Another group who appear to be more vigilant than most are people who suffer from primary insomnia - insomnia not associated with any other condition. There is evidence to suggest they are in a constant state of hyperarousal, with relatively high metabolic rates and high levels of the stress hormone cortisol. “It’s as though somebody just cranked up their alertness over 24 hours, so they are more alert at night, but they are also more alert in the day,” says Mahowald.

As the blur between sleep and wakefulness becomes more widely accepted, researchers are devising techniques for capturing the brain’s fleeting lapses and vacillations. For example, neuroscientist Giulio Tononi of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, is eavesdropping on sleeping brains using EEGs with 256 electrodes rather than the more usual 32, to improve spatial resolution and help him catch the brain in the act of mosaic napping. Microsleeps are just the tip of the iceberg, Tononi says. He is particularly concerned by the possibility that parts of our brain might be going offline without us even realising it. “In many respects, it would be like having a temporary mental disorder without anybody, including yourself, being aware of it,” he says. Forgetfulness and daydreaming could be examples of this, but so could more bizarre and even criminal behaviours (see “When a crime is not a crime”).

It is like having a temporary mental disorder without anyone, including yourself, being aware of it.’

 

For full article, click here.

 

So, first we have microexpressions, where humans leak emotional expressions at a rapid speed (less than 1/3 of a second).

 

Now we have microsleeps, where we catch a 1-2 second snooze to rest the brain.

 

What’s next…micro-sex? Oh, wait, I’ve done that already (pre-premature arousal)! :>)

 

Say, I could use some 1 second micro-eating!

 

How about some grueling 3 second micro-exercise routines?

 

What new micro-routines can you come up with - real or imagined?

 

Have a great day!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Positive Psychology Coach

Guide To Self, Inc.

www.GuideToSelf.com

 

Posted in The human brain, San Ramon CA, Sleep research, Subconscious mind, Consciousness, Anxiety, Emotional management, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Body Posture Affects Your Belief In Your Own Thoughts, Ohio State Study Finds

6. October 2009 by John Schinnerer.

ScienceDaily (Oct. 5, 2009) — Sitting up straight in your chair isn’t just good for your posture – it also gives you more confidence in your own thoughts, according to a new study.

Researchers found that people who were told to sit up straight were more likely to believe thoughts they wrote down while in that posture concerning whether they were qualified for a job.

On the other hand, those who were slumped over their desks were less likely to accept these written-down feelings about their own qualifications.

The results show how our body posture can affect not only what others think about us, but also how we think about ourselves, said Richard Petty, co-author of the study and professor of psychology at Ohio State University.

“Most of us were taught that sitting up straight gives a good impression to other people,” Petty said. “But it turns out that our posture can also affect how we think about ourselves. If you sit up straight, you end up convincing yourself by the posture you’re in.”

Petty conducted the study with Pablo Briñol, a former postdoctoral fellow at Ohio State now at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid in Spain, and Benjamin Wagner, a current graduate student at Ohio State. The research appears in the October 2009 issue of the European Journal of Social Psychology.

For full article, click here.

All the best!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Positive Psychology Coach

Danville, CA 94526

Guide To Self, Inc.

Posted in Danville CA, National speakers, Positive expectations, Employee engagement, Body posture & the mind, Awareness, Mindfulness, Happiness, Guide to Self, Consciousness, Subconscious mind, The human brain, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Negative Subliminal Messages More Powerful Than Positive Ones

1. October 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Science Daily

‘Today, the journal Emotion publishes a study by a UCL team led by Professor Nilli Lavie, which provides evidence that people are able to process emotional information from subliminal images and demonstrates conclusively that even under such conditions, information of negative value is better detected than information of positive value.

In the study, Professor Lavie and colleagues showed fifty participants a series of words on a computer screen. Each word appeared on-screen for only a fraction of second – at times only a fiftieth of a second, much too fast for the participants to consciously read the word. The words were either positive (e.g. cheerful, flower and peace), negative (e.g. agony, despair and murder) or neutral (e.g. box, ear or kettle). After each word, participants were asked to choose whether the word was neutral or ‘emotional’ (i.e. positive or negative), and how confident they were of their decision.

The researchers found that the participants answered most accurately when responding to negative words – even when they believed they were merely guessing the answer.

‘There has been much speculation about whether people can process emotional information unconsciously, for example pictures, faces and words,’ says Professor Lavie. ‘We have shown that people can perceive the emotional value of subliminal messages and have demonstrated conclusively that people are much more attuned to negative words.’

‘Clearly, there are evolutionary advantages to responding rapidly to emotional information. We can’t wait for our consciousness to kick in if we see someone running towards us with a knife or if we drive under rainy or foggy weather conditions and see a sign warning ‘danger’.’

This is a favorite subject of mine - the unconscious mind and things that affect it. Priming is an amazing example where the unconscious mind is influenced by messages that are flashed for less than .33 seconds (the point at which a stimulus is too quick for our eyes to consciously pick up and be aware of). The unconscious mind can be dramatically influenced by subliminal messages, and even sentences in which the words are mixed up.

When I present, I make a point of using such techniques to lead the audience to a more positive emotional state (e.g., joy, contentment, curiosity, awe, surprise, pride, happiness, or interest). I always tell the audience what I am doing and why. Then I let them know just how easy it is to influence the mind by way of these techniques. The scariest part, to me, is that Madison Avenue is aware of such techniques as well. And while there are laws to prevent the use of subliminal messages in advertising. There are no laws of which I know that prohibit techniques such as scrambling the words in a sentence or the letters in a word as was recently done in a Kaiser Permanente Thrive campaign ad. Fortunately, the word that is scrambled is ‘thrive’ so, in my mind, there is little or no negative impact on viewers.

However, it is to our benefit that we be mindful, cautious and aware of these techniques that speak to the unconscious mind as they do influence our behaviors, often outside of our conscious awareness.

Stay awake!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Guide To Self, Inc.

Positive Psychology Coach

Posted in Awareness, Mindfulness, National speakers, Emotion & learning, Subliminal messages, Danville CA, Subconscious mind, Consciousness, Innovative brand research, Dr. John Schinnerer, Unique marketing research, Brand Equity, Emotional management, Emotional mind, Positive Psychology | Print | No Comments »

Positive Psychology & Resiliency for Job Seekers - Dr. John Schinnerer presents - Video - Leadership Summit Danville CA

22. July 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Dr. John Schinnerer

Psychologist, Author, Radio Show Host, Entrepreneur

Danville, CA

Why should you care about positive emotions in business?

How do positive emotions help you to be more creative? More productive? More profitable?

How do you become more resilient in tough times?

How do you empty yourself of old, stagnant anger?

How do you flourish as an individual and as a management team?

Watch this complimentary video from Dr. John Schinnerer and find out now.

Click here to download Quicktime movie

Dr. John Schinnerer is President and Founder of Guide To Self, a company in Danville CA, that focuses on what makes people successful in life. Dr. Schinnerer coaches executives, individuals and groups to their potential using the latest in scientifically proven interventions. Most recently, Dr. John Schinnerer hosted over 200 episodes of Guide To Self Radio, a prime time radio show on positive psychology and emotional management, in the San Francisco Bay Area. He graduated summa cum laude from U.C. Berkeley with a Ph.D. in psychology. He wrote the award-winning book ‘Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide To Managing Emotion and Thought’.

The link to the quick time movie is http://www.jobconnections.org/speaker4.shtml.

Enjoy!

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Posted in The human brain, Organizational psychology, Subconscious mind, Consciousness, Managing Anxiety, Managing Sadness, Resiliency, Mindfulness, Curiosity, National speakers, Gratitude, Psychology humor, Hope, Awareness, Emotional management, Emotional mind, Dr. John Schinnerer, Creativity, Managing stress, Realistic optimism, Forgiveness, Business & psych, Life coach, Guide to Self, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Depression, Happiness, Customer Engagement, Emotional IQ, Anxiety, Positive Psychology | Print | No Comments »

Comcast to Air Dr. John Schinnerer’s Positive Psychology talk - 7/19/09 at 8 pm on Channels 26 & 28

18. July 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Exciting news! Comcast cable is going to air the CPC Leadership Summit at which I spoke on television channels 26 & 28 on 8 pm on the evenings of 7/19/09, 7/23/09 and 7/24/09.

You’ll be able to watch Paul Kingsman, Dr. John Schinnerer (myself!), and Lt. Governor John Garamendi speak to a packed house of 1500 individuals.

My presentation was on Using Positive Psychology to Increase Resiliency During Job Search.

Truly, the tools I share are good practice for all of us, regardless of our position, age, gender or race.

Hope you enjoy it!

Dr. John Schinnerer

Posted in Anger Management, Emotional management, Emotional mind, Subconscious mind, The human brain, Gratitude, Mindfulness, Resiliency, Happiness, Emotional IQ, Managing stress, Realistic optimism, Forgiveness, Dr. John Schinnerer, Creativity, Guide to Self, Life coach, Positive Psychology | Print | No Comments »

How Do Song Lyrics Affect Your Brain? Lyrics Prime The Brain for Good and Bad

29. June 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Dr. John Schinnerer

Guide To Self, Inc.

June 30, 2009

As I write this article, I am listening to the new Black Eyed Peas song, ‘I Gotta Feeling’, which begins with the lyrics,

‘I gotta feeling that tonight’s gonna be a good night,

tonight’s gonna be a good night,

tonight’s gonna be a good, good night.’

 

 The song makes me feel optimistic, energizes me, and gives me hope. This begs the question, how do music lyrics prime the mind to receive and interpret information?

 

Hundreds of studies have shown that words powerfully influence thinking, behavior, and mood, and much of it occurs without conscious awareness. Favorite songs are listened to over and over hundreds or thousands of times so it makes good sense to speculate that music lyrics may have a profound impact on the listener’s perception of the world, other people, and which emotions are experienced as well as the frequency of those emotions.

 

In psychology, researchers are beginning to grasp the significance of the workings of the mind beyond the conscious experience. Conscious awareness is merely the jumping off point when exploring the mind. There is now considerable agreement among neuroscientists that most cognitive processing takes place outside of conscious awareness. Roughly 90-95% of mental activity occurs outside conscious awareness. Much of this ‘back office’ activity is automatic and emotional. Much of this activity is taking place just below the level of our awareness.

Despite the lack of awareness, subconscious activity has a tremendous impact on how the world is perceived through the senses, day-to-day behaviors, emotions felt and satisfaction with life. For example, numerous studies have been done on the phenomenon known as priming. Priming is when a person is exposed to certain stimulus, such as words, lyrics, or surroundings, and their subconscious mind is activated. Once activated, the person tends to act in ways that are consistent with the stimulus without awareness of why they are behaving in that manner.  Priming has been shown to influence behavior in dramatic ways. Let me explain these types of studies by way of example. Imagine you volunteered for the following experiment:

You are given four jumbled sentences by a researcher who tells you to come get her when you’ve finished unscrambling them (so that the sentences are meaningful).  There is one extra word in each sentence does not need to be used.  For instance, you may be presented with something such as …‘her  interrupt   bother  usually  they’ As the subject, you would translate this mess into something meaningful such as… ‘They usually interrupt her’ or ‘They usually bother her.’ A few minutes later, you finish the task of unscrambling the four sentences and walk down the hallway to find the researcher. You find her but she’s in the midst of a conversation with a stranger and isn’t paying any attention to you. What do you do?

For those people who unscrambled sentences which contained one word per sentence having to do with rude behavior, such as ‘rash,’ ‘aggressive,’ ‘bother,’ and ‘intrude,’ you are far more likely to interrupt the researcher within 2 minutes and say, ‘Hey, I’m done. What’s next?’ On the other hand, if you unscrambled sentences in which the one rude word was swapped with a polite word such as ‘respect,’ ‘nice,’ or ‘courteous,’ the odds are that you will sit there passively for up to 10 minutes until the researcher finishes her conversation.  And you will have no idea what influenced you to be so docile. These experiments have been replicated over and over.

One experiment had a group of people simply read a list of words where some of the words had to do with stereotypes of elderly people, such as ‘retirement,’ ‘Florida,’ and ‘bald.’  Sure enough, participants who were ‘primed’ with elderly-related words instantly began acting consistent with the elderly stereotype. They walked more slowly down the hallway, they walked with their shoulders slightly more hunched over, and their short-term memory became worse than the control group.  Merely reading the list with words related to old age led to forgetfulness and other behavioral changes.

The frightening thing about these experiments is that the group given the words related to elderly stereotypes could not remember any words about the elderly in the original list of words. So they were influenced by the words and then forgot all about what it was that influenced them. All of this groundwork brings me to the latest research, which came out June 25, 2009, demonstrating that song lyrics prime behavior as well. When asked to fill in the missing song lyrics for different songs, participants’ behaviors and attitudes changed in startling ways.

 

Donald Saucier at Kansas State University found that when people filled in the lyrics for patriotic songs, such as ‘The Star-Spangled Banner,’ they became more close-minded, prejudiced and less empathetic. They did not put themselves in the shoes of another person to view the world through different eyes.

 

What’s more, when folks filled in lyrics to songs such as ‘The Itsy Bitsy Spider’, they became more pro-social, reporting more accepting attitudes towards other people and more empathy. The hypothesis is that this is due to the strong association most people have with such childhood songs to happiness or contentment in their own childhood.

 

In conclusion, musical lyrics have an impact on attitudes towards others, emotions felt and how frequently they are experienced, and how the world is perceived. Given the research, it makes sense to closely look at the lyrics of the songs you listen to frequently. They may be impacting you more than you ever realized.  To this end, I have created a list of over 600 songs which support and augment pro-social behaviors based on the latest findings of positive psychology. If you’d like a complimentary copy, pick it up at  http://tinyurl.com/n2dtsn.

About the Author

Dr. John Schinnerer

Dr. John Schinnerer is in private practice helping clients learn anger management, stress management, the latest ways to deal with destructive negative emotions and ways to cultivate positive emotions such as love, curiosity and contentment. 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 12 years. Dr. John Schinnerer is President and Founder of Guide To Self, a company that coaches clients to achieve optimal human functioning 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. John Schinnerer sits on the Advisory Board of Positive Music Imperative as well as consults with Resonance Technologies around the latest ways to measure and quantify human emotions for commercial application. Dr. Schinnerer is President of Infinet Assessment, a psychological testing company to help firms select the best applicants. 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.  

Posted in Hope, Resiliency, Awareness, Music psychology, Curiosity, The human brain, Subconscious mind, Dr. John Schinnerer, Guide to Self, Happiness, Positive mood music, Positive Psychology | Print | No Comments »

Golf Clubs Change How You Perceive Your Physical Body, New Possibilities Emerge for Amputees

27. June 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Next time you pick up your golf club your brain may do more than look for a long fairway.

Recent studies suggest that the brain views tools as extensions of the body.

The simple act of holding a mechanical tool, such as a golf club, “temporarily modifies the cerebral representation of a subject’s arm,” said Lucilla Cardinali, lead author of the study.

Essentially, individuals think their arm is temporarly longer. The cognitive schema for ‘body’ momentarily adapts and grows in size. And all of this takes place without your conscious awareness.

For more, check out the story on Yahoo…

http://news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20090626/hl_hsn/grabatoolandchangeyourbrain

John Schinnerer

Posted in The human brain, Mindfulness, Subconscious mind, Emotional mind, Guide to Self, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | 1 Comment »

Dwelling on Loving-Kindness Increases Social Connection, Offsets Societal Changes Which Create Growing Distrust - Stanford Study

6. March 2009 by John Schinnerer.

John Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Positive Psychologist, Author, Entrepreneur

A study out of Stanford University reported in the journal Emotion (Vol. 8, No. 5, 2008) that seven minutes of meditation on the Buddhist notion of loving-kindness can increase one’s feelings of interconnectedness.

Roy Baumeister showed that connection with other people, to trust and be trusted, is a fundamental need of human beings (Baumeister and Leary, 1995). The feeling of interconnectedness, that feeling of shared humanity, improves physical, mental and emotional health. It also ups the degree to which we feel empathy for others. It also increases the frequency with which people act in a trusting and compassionate manner. And all of these lend themselves to a positive, socially constructive upward spiral of thought, emotion and action. 

The study, by Hutcherson, Seppala and Gross, found that the simple act of focusing one’s attention for 7 minutes on the feeling of love between oneself and a loved one has some amazing benefits…

It increases feelings of social connection.

It increases one’s frequency and intensity of positive emotions experienced.

It  increased feelings of positivity towards strangers.

And it did so on conscious and unconscious levels of awareness.

Thus, loving-kindness meditation is simple and inexpensive method to increase positive social emotions, such as compassion and thoughtfulness, and reduce alienation.

Take a look at the study at http://www-psych.stanford.edu/~psyphy/pdfs/Hutcherson_08_2.pdf. 

Keep bouncing!

Dr. John Schinnerer 

Guide To Self

Where meaning thrives

Dr. John is currently building a new private practice in Danville, CA. For an appointment, please email John AT GuideToSelf.com.

Dr. John Schinnerer is in private practice helping people with anger management, stress management and the latest, scientifically proven ways to deal with destructive negative emotions (anger, fear, sadness, guilt, shame). He also helps people learn ways to create a happy, meaningful life. 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.  

Posted in The human brain, Subconscious mind, Consciousness, Relationships, Mindfulness, Energy psychology, Awareness, Hope, Anger Management, Emotional management, Life coach, Dr. John Schinnerer, Positive Psychology, Guide to Self, Happiness, Emotional mind, Depression, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Counseling | Print | No Comments »

Music and the Mind: The Psychology of Music – A Field in It’s Infancy

5. March 2009 by John Schinnerer.

The Beginnings of Neuroscience, Music and the Mind

“Rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul…”

Plato (circa 400 BC)

 

Music engages many brain functions…

Emotion

Memory

Learning & Plasticity (the ability of the brain to change, grow and develop over time)

Attention

Motor Control

Pattern perception

Imagery

And more…

Check out this groundbreaking presentation by Aniruddh Patel, Ph.D., of the Neurosciences Institute on how music shares some common neural ground with language.

What’s more, music may even enable us to construct the bridge to connect

1)      the mind (our subjective experience of the world around us, our thoughts, feelings and perceptions, that which emerges from the brain) and

2)      the brain (the physical organ made up of neurons and synapses inside the skull).

It is available free on youtube at http://tinyurl.com/6z4g7c

Just bounce to the music!

Dr. John Schinnerer

Guide To Self, Inc.

“Where Meaning Thrives”

www.GuideToSelf.com

Emotional Management Coaching for Executives, Men, Athletes, Teens and more. For greater performance in all areas of life, learn how to dump out anger, fear and sadness and replace them with happiness, inspiration and joy.

Posted in Subconscious mind, The human brain, Mindfulness, Music psychology, Consciousness, Emotional management, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Positive mood music, Emotional mind, Dr. John Schinnerer | Print | No Comments »

Influences on My Work in Positive Psychology and Reproduceable Happiness

26. February 2009 by John Schinnerer.

Having a strong skeptical personal makeup, I have made a point throughout my career of backing up everything of which I write and speak upon with peer-reviewed scientific studies.  I have sought to put together a comprehensive theory of a happy, thriving and meaningful life. I have worked towards ways to dump out negative, destructive emotions and ways to cultivate positive, constructive emotions.

Many folks ask me for the names of the shoulders of the giants upon whom my work stands. For those individuals, and for others who might be interested, here are a few of the tremendous researchers to whom I am eternally grateful.

Forgiveness based on work of Dr. Fred Luskin, Director of Stanford Forgiveness Project. Dr. Luskin’s work has been successfully applied and researched in corporate, medical, legal and religious settings. He currently serves as a Senior Consultant in Health Promotion at Stanford University.

Positivity and Positive Emotions based on work of Barbara Fredrickson, Ph.D., University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Kenan Distinguished Professor. She is the “genius of the positive psychology movement” according to Martin Seligman. She came up with the ‘broaden and build” theory for positive emotions as well as the 3:1 ratio for a flourishing life. Amazing work.

Mindfulness based on work of Jon Kabat-Zinn, Professor of Medicine Emeritus and founding director of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

Realistic Optimism, Happiness, Disputing Catastrophic Thoughts based on the work of Martin Seligman, founder of the field of positive psychology in 2000, devoted his career since then to furthering the study of positive emotion, positive character traits, and positive institutions. Seligman directs the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania.

Sustainable Happiness based on the work of Sonja Lyubomirsky, Ph.D., professor of psychology at U.C. Riverside. She won the 2002 Templeton Positive Psychology Prize and multiyear grant from NIMH. She recently wrote The How of Happiness: A New Approach to Getting the Life You Want.

Emotional Awareness based on the work of Paul Ekman, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology at UCSF. Ekman is a world-renowned expert in emotional research and nonverbal communication. His research has been supported by the National Institute of Mental Health for 46 years.

Emotions Within Relationships based on work of John Gottman,  Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of Washington, where he founded the Family Research Lab. He is well known for his work on marital stability and divorce prediction, which involves study of emotions (particularly disgust and contempt) and physiology as well as communication. His break-through research on marriage and parenting has earned him numerous national and international awards, including four NIMH Research Scientist Awards.

Moral Development and Positive Psychology based on the work of Jonathan Haidt, one of the world’s foremost authorities on positive psychology (the scientific study of human flourishing) and moral psychology (the study of why people care so much about right and wrong, and sometimes choose to do wrong). He is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia. He is the author of The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding modern truth in ancient wisdom, a widely-acclaimed book about how to construct a life of virtue, happiness, fulfillment and meaning.

Gratitude and Thankfulness based on the work of Robert Emmons, Ph.D. Dr. Emmons is currently a Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Davis. His research focuses on personal goals and purpose, spirituality, the psychology of gratitude and thankfulness, and subjective well-being.  Robert Emmons is the founding editor and editor-in-chief of The Journal of Positive Psychology. Widely regarded as the world’s foremost expert in the study of gratitude, Dr. Emmons was one of the early pioneers in the positive psychology movement.  Dr. Emmons has received research funding from the National Institute of Mental Health and the John M. Templeton Foundation.

Please feel free to take a look at the mountain of papers, books, and talks that these outstanding individuals have done. The world is a better place for them. All the best,
Dr. John L. Schinnerer

Guide To Self, Inc.

Where Meaning Thrives

Posted in Consciousness, Subconscious mind, Emotional management, Emotional mind, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Men's emotions, The human brain, Hope, Awareness, Mindfulness, Resiliency, Relationships, Morals and values, Ethics, Realistic optimism, Measuring emotions, Forgiveness, Positive Psychology, Counseling, Dr. John Schinnerer, Creativity, Staying calm, Happiness, Emotional IQ, Guide to Self, Life coach, Sports Psychology | Print | No Comments »

Positive Uplifting Music for a Happy, Relaxed and Contented Mood to Benefit Education

31. January 2009 by John Schinnerer.

John L. Schinnerer, Ph.D.

Positive psychologist

Amateur musicologist

Music heavily influences how we feel.

The mood of a song can influence emotion in a constructive or a destructive direction.Joyful, energetic songs elicit happiness.

Sad, slow tempo songs elicit sadness.

Emotion influences how we perceive people and things.

Destructive emotions, such as sadness, anger and fear, greatly narrow attention to a sharp point.

Constructive emotions, such as happiness, surprise and curiosity, broaden attention.

When attention is broadened, we take in new information more effectively.

Positive, uplifting music helps to create constructive emotions which aid the learning of new information.

Here are a few positive psychology songs to keep your spirits elevated throughout the day…

Feel free to add your own suggestions!

Sun Is Shining                                                 Bob Marley

Peace Love and Happiness                            Bob Marley

Don’t Worry, Be Happy                                  Bobby McFerrin

Hallelujah (Your Love Is Amazing)                Brenton Brown

Darlin` Do Not Fear                                        Brett Dennen

Jump Jive An’ Wail                                         Brian Setzer Orchestra

Rock This Town                                              Brian Setzer Orchestra

Child Of Mine                                                 Carole King

Peace Train                                                     Cat Stevens

Love Can Move Mountains                           Celine Dion

I’m Every Woman                                           Chaka Kahn or Whitney Houston

Zoot Suit Riot                                                 Cherry Poppin’ Daddies

Dreamer                                                          Chris Brown

Remember, happiness is contagious! Smile!

About the Author

Dr. John Schinnerer is in private practice helping individuals learn happiness by mitigating destructive emotions and fostering constructive emotions. 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 12 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 ethical development, to marketing and 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.  

Posted in Men's emotions, Subconscious mind, Emotional management, The human brain, Resiliency, Music psychology, Energy psychology, Mindfulness, Emotional mind, Positive mood music, Life coach, Creativity, Dr. John Schinnerer, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Happiness, Customer Engagement, Staying calm, Positive Psychology | 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 »

Harvard Study Shows Happiness is Transmittable As In A Wireless Network

6. December 2008 by John Schinnerer.

Happiness is catching. Happiness spreads through friends, spouses, siblings and neighbors. There is a ripple effect whereby happiness extends widely through social networks, even between people who may not know one another. One’s happiness depends on the degree of happiness of those surrounding her.

A study performed at Harvard University, by Nicholas Christakis, is the first of its kind to demonstrate the existence of clusters of happy and sad individuals. Happiness depends upon the happiness of those around them. What’s more, individuals who surround themselves with happy people are more likely to be happy in the future. One’s future happiness can actually be predicted by the number of happy people surrounding them and the degree to which the social network as a whole experiences constructive emotions, such as happiness.  These findings come from an analysis of the Framingham Heart Study social network, a longitudinal study that has followed nearly 5,000 people for over 20 years.

Study findings suggest that happiness results from the spread of happiness throughout social networks and not merely from individuals choosing to surround themselves with like-minded individuals. For example, if your next door neighbor becomes happier due to a job promotion, your likelihood of becoming happier increases by 34%. And this happiness effect can linger for up to one year.

This relationship between individual’s happiness holds true for the first three degrees of separation. For example, when John becomes happier, it buoys the happiness of John’s friends as well as the friends of John’s friends. So there is a ripple effect of happiness within social circles where happiness is contagious and spreads similar to the waves of a wireless network. And we are consciously aware of little, if any, of it.

In the past five to ten years, more and more studies have looked at happiness and what determines it (e.g., genetics, money, elections, marital status and emotional management). However, no study has looked at human happiness as it relates to the happiness of others. While the study is the first of its kind and needs to be replicated to ensure the accuracy of these findings, the findings are remarkable and exhilarating.

Emotional contagion, the process by which one person picks up the feelings of another, has been scientifically documented since 1994. Emotions may be ‘caught’ from others for a length of time ranging from seconds to weeks.  This is particularly true of destructive emotions - anger, fear and sadness. In fact, the hard part is not ‘catching’ the emotions but in protecting oneself from them, keeping them at bay. Until this study, emotional contagion had not been documented for any of the positive, constructive emotions such as joy, contentment, peacefulness or happiness.  

The difficulty is that most people primarily feel destructive emotions. Most people experience more destructive emotions than constructive emotions.  

On the other hand, roughly 10% of adults in the United States feel three times as much positive emotion as negative. This 3:1 ratio is the measuring stick for a thriving happy life as set by Barbara Fredrickson at UNC Chapel Hill. It appears that this top 10% is raising the level of happiness of many others. Imagine if it were possible to raise this thriving, happy portion of the population to 15% or 20%.

Assuming the percentage of the populace experiencing happiness could be improved, here are just a few of the possible societal benefits:

·        The economy would improve (e.g., higher ratios of positive, open-ended inquiries are present in executive teams in highly successful firms)

·        Creativity would increase (e.g., happiness is linked to greater innovation)

·        Productivity would soar (e.g., a happy employee is a productive employee; optimistic salespeople outsell pessimistic ones by approximately 38%)

·        The burden on the health care system would be eased (e.g., happiness improves immune system functioning).

·        People would live longer (e.g., happy, optimistic people live 7 – 10 years longer than those who are pessimistic and unhappy)

·        The educational system would show significant academic gains (e.g., students taught to be more happy and optimistic showed significant gains on achievement testing and received better grades)

The exciting part is that happiness can be taught. It can be learned. People can learn to feel positive emotions more frequently and more intensely. Emotional management is a learnable skill. Just as one practices a sport and improves over time so it is with emotions.   As individuals learn to string together more and more happy moments, the ripple effect spills over and one person’s happiness positively influences others.  It even influences the happiness of other people they don’t know.

The goal is emotional management. The goal is happiness. The goal is to learn to mitigate destructive emotions and encourage positive emotions. Happiness is social phenomena. The more individuals experience positive emotions, the more society as a whole is happier, healthier, and more productive and that is no small feat.

About the Author

Dr. John Schinnerer is in private practice helping individuals learn happiness by mitigating destructive emotions and fostering constructive emotions. 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 is President of Infinet Assessment, a psychological testing company to help firms select the best applicants. 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.  

Posted in Subconscious mind, Alexithymia, Consciousness, Managing Sadness, Managing Anxiety, Anger Management, Men's emotions, The human brain, Mindfulness, Assertiveness, Altruism, Resiliency, Relationships, Emotional management, Emotional mind, Dr. John Schinnerer, Life coach, Realistic optimism, Positive Psychology, Counseling, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Depression, Happiness, Anxiety, Organizational change initiatives, Sports Psychology | Print | No Comments »

If You Want To Get Some Lovin’, Give Some Lovin’

16. October 2008 by John Schinnerer.

Another intriguing study. This one found that altruistic behavior may be considered sexually attractive by both sexes in potential mates…

Being Altruistic May Make You Attractive

Oct. 15, 2008

Displays of altruism or selflessness towards others can be sexually attractive in a mate. This is one of the findings of a study carried out by biologists and a psychologist at The University of Nottingham. 

In three studies of more than 1,000 people, Dr Tim Phillips and his fellow researchers discovered that women place significantly greater importance on altruistic traits than anything else. Their findings have been published in the British Journal of Psychology. 

Dr Phillips said:  “Evolutionary theory predicts competition between individuals and yet we see many examples in nature of individuals disadvantaging themselves to help others. In humans, particularly, we see individuals prepared to put themselves at considerable risk to help individuals they do not know for no obvious reward.” 

Participants in the studies were questioned about a range of qualities they look for in a mate, including examples of altruistic behaviour such as ‘donates blood regularly’ and ‘volunteered to help out in a local hospital’. Women placed significantly greater importance on altruistic traits in all three studies.

 Yet both sexes may consider altruistic traits when choosing a partner. One hundred and seventy couples were asked to rate how much they preferred altruistic traits in a mate and report their own level of altruistic behaviour. The strength of preference in one partner was found to correlate with the extent of altruistic behaviour typically displayed in the other, suggesting that altruistic traits may well be a factor both men and women take into account when choosing a partner. 

Dr Phillips said: “For many years the standard explanation for altruistic behaviour towards non-relatives has been based on reciprocity and reputation — a version of ‘you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours’. I believe we need to look elsewhere to understand the roots of human altruism. The expansion of the human brain would have greatly increased the cost of raising children so it would have been important for our ancestors to choose mates both willing and able to be good, long-term parents. Displays of altruism could well have provided accurate clues to this and genes linked to altruism would have been favoured as a result.” 

Dr Phillips concluded: “Sexual selection could well come to be seen as exerting a major influence on what made humans human.” 

Dr Tom Reader in the School of Biology said: “Sexual preferences have enormous potential to shape the evolution of animal behaviour. Humans are clearly not an exception: sex may have a crucial role in explaining what are our most biologically interesting and unusual habits.” 

From Science Daily. University of Nottingham (2008, October 15). Being Altruistic May Make You Attractive. ScienceDaily. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2008/10/081014134027.htm

 

 Cheers,

Dr. John Schinnerer

Guide To Self, Inc.

Posted in Subconscious mind, Emotional management, Men's emotions, The human brain, Altruism, Emotional mind, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Life coach, Dr. John Schinnerer, Guide to Self, Emotional IQ, Happiness, Positive Psychology | 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 »

Automatic versus the Conscious Mind - Who is really in control of you?

25. April 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?!

Guide To Self airs on KDIA 1640 AM at 5 pm in the SF Bay Area. 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.

(925) 944-3440
Duration:29 minutes, 25 seconds

MP3 File

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

Posted in Nature vs. nurture, Guide To Self Beginners Guide To Managing Emotion, Emotional mind, Emotional management, Subconscious mind, Happiness, Emotional IQ, Positive Psychology, Dr. John Schinnerer, Life coach, Guide to Self, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »