Think Like a Freak

In their bestselling book Think Like a Freak, the authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner explain their title like this:

"The modern world demands that we all think a bit more productively, more creatively, more rationally; that we think from a different angle, with a different set of muscles, with a different set of expectations; that we think with neither fear nor favor, with neither blind optimism nor sour skepticism. That we think like -- ahem -- a Freak." (p. 7)

Makes sense, but didn't we already know that? Why is it necessary to write a book about that? Well, because...

"A growing body of research suggests that even the smartest people tend to seek out evidence that confirms what they already think, rather than new information that would give them a more robust view of reality." (p. 10)

So if you're a really smart person, you need this book. And if you're not so smart, well, then you really need to read it. Here are some of the things you'll learn:

... what the three hardest words in the English language are (hint: it's not "I love you").
... why Protestants in Germany earn more than their Catholic counterparts.
... why it's a good idea to start thinking like a child.
... what King Solomon and David Lee Roth have in common (besides being Jewish).
... what you can learn from a hot-dog-eating champion or an ulcer detective.
... how to convince people who don't want to be convinced.

A couple of key quotes:
"When people don't pay the true cost of something, they tend to consume it inefficiently." (p. 15)

"The key to learning is feedback. It is nearly impossible to learn anything without it." (p. 34)

"Thinking like a Freak means you should work terribly hard to identify and attack the root cause of problems." p. 65)

As George Bernard Shaw used to say: "Few people think more than two or three times a year. I have made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week." (p. 10) Trust me though, you don't need to think too much about the decision to get this book. As always, if you'd like to support this blog, you can buy it here or in my bookstore. I appreciate it!

The Power of Habit

Every single day of your life you do things without really thinking about them. The way you get dressed, what you have for breakfast and the route you take to work: for most people, there is no need to think before engaging in these activities - they've become habits. How powerful these and other habits actually are and how we can create new and change old habits is the subject of Charles Duhigg's book The Power of Habit: Why we do what we do and how to change.

If you read the book, you will learn...

... how habits work and how they can help combat Alzheimer's.
... how to create new habits, like starting to exercise on a regular basis.
... why some people are able to stop overeating and others aren't.
... which habits matter most and how Starbucks uses good habits.
... how movements like the Saddleback Church and the Montgomery Bus Boycott happen.

And lastly, Duhigg will discuss the question of whether we are responsible for our habits or not. This was one of my favorite chapters in the book, which I highly recommend reading.

Here are a few quotes from the book...

The power of habits:
"Habits are powerful, but delicate. They can emerge outside our consciousness, or can be deliberately designed. They often occur without our permission, but can be reshaped by fiddling with their parts. They shape our lives far more than we realize - they are so strong, in fact, that they cause our brains to cling to them at the exclusion of all else, including common sense." (p. 25)

The power of believing:
"Belief was the ingredient that made a reworked habit loop into a permanent behavior." (p. 85)

"But we do know that for habits to permanently change, people must believe that change is feasible. [...] Belief is easier when it occurs within a community." (p. 89)

No one-size-fits-all solution:
"Individuals and habits are all different, and so the specifics of diagnosing and changing the patterns in our lives differ from person to person and behavior to behavior." (p. 275)

Change is possible:
"Change might not be fast and it isn't always easy. But with time and effort, almost any habit can be reshaped." (p. 276)

So now that you want to get the book (I know you do ;-)), let me help you out: if you get it here, you will also be supporting this blog. Thanks!

When You Were Born Matters....

Why are some people more successful than others? What's the recipe for becoming what some people may call a genius? Are they born or made? If you're willing to believe Malcolm Gladwell, it's a little bit of both -- but not in the way you're probably imagining it. In his bestselling book Outliers. The Story of Success, he makes it clear that success isn't handed to you at birth -- but it can have something to do with the day you were born...

If you look in the dictionary, you'll find the following definition for the term Gladwell chose as his title:

outlier  |ˈaʊtlʌɪə|
noun
1. a person or thing situated away or detached from the main body or system
2. a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the others of the sample

Early on in the book, the English-Canadian journalist makes it clear that successful people don't come out of nowhere:

People don't rise from nothing. We do owe something to parentage and patronage. The people who stand before kings may look like they did it all by themselves. But in fact they are invariably the beneficiaries of hidden advantages and extraordinary opportunities and cultural legacies that allow them to learn and work hard and make sense of the world in ways others cannot. It makes a difference where and when we grew up. The culture we belong to and the legacies passed down by our forebears shape the patterns of our achievement in ways we cannot begin to imagine. It's not enough to ask what successful people are like, in other words. It is only by asking where they are from that we can unravel the logic behind who succeeds and who doesn't. (p. 19)

In his first chapter, entitled "The Matthew Effect", Gladwell tries to make his point by using the example of Canadian ice hockey.

Prepaying for Happiness?

A while ago I posted a video by my favorite behavioral economist Dan Ariely about the pain of paying. Now I've come across an article by Elizabeth Dunn and Michael Norton that is related to said video. In "Happier Spending", they argue that "...we derive greater happiness from goods we pay for immediately, but don't use for some time, than we do from goods we use now but pay for later." Or as I like to call it: prepaying for happiness :-)

There are mainly two reasons for why this works. First of all, it doesn't take away the pain of paying, which helps you to not overspend as you might be tempted to do if you can delay payment until after having used/enjoyed the purchased good/service.

Just as the sensation of burning tells you to pull your hand from the stove, the pain of paying can keep spending in check. This isn't just a metaphor. Paying high prices for goods and services activates the region of the brain associated with the anticipation of actual physical pain.

The World At Our Fingertips, But Far From Our Hearts?

Not too long ago I was browsing the New York Times website when I stumbled upon this interesting article by Jonathan Safran Foer. It's about technology and gadgets and their influence on how (or if) we interact with our fellow human beings. Foer believes that "technology celebrates connectedness, but encourages retreat." And he seems to have the field of psychology on his side regarding this assumption:

Psychologists who study empathy and compassion are finding that unlike our almost instantaneous responses to physical pain, it takes time for the brain to comprehend the psychological and moral dimensions of a situation. The more distracted we become, and the more emphasis we place on speed at the expense of depth, the less likely and able we are to care.

Motivate Me!

At the end of his book Drive. The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Dan Pink lists nine things you can do to motivate yourself. Because, as he says, Type I's (intrinsically motivated people) aren't born, they're made...

1. Give Yourself a "Flow Test." Here's how it works: Set a reminder on your cell phone or computer to go off at forty random times in a week. Every time it does, write down what you're doing, how you're doing and whether you're in "flow" or not (check this post for an explanation of the concept of flow). Look at the patterns of your observations and think about how you can incorporate more moments of "flow" into your life. 
2. Ask a Big Question... What is the one sentence that should define your life? To make it easier, here are a few examples: "He preserved the union and freed the slaves" (Abraham Lincoln). "He raised four kids who became healthy and happy adults." "She taught two generations of children how to read". What's your sentence?
3. ...Then Keep Asking a Small Question. To ensure that you're continually improving, ask yourself this every night before you go to bed: Was I better today than yesterday? You don't have to be flawless every day, but try to look for small measures of improvement that show you that you're progressing towards your goal.

So What's The Purpose?

If you've read my recent blog entries, you may remember that the first two "nutrients" of intrinsically motivated behavior are autonomy and mastery. But if you're willing to believe Daniel Pink and his bestselling book Drive. The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, there's one more element that should not be overlooked: Purpose.

Autonomous people working toward mastery perform at very high levels. But those who do so in the service of some greater objective can achieve even more. The most deeply motivated people -- not to mention those who are most productive and satisfied -- hitch their desires to a cause larger than themselves. (p. 133)

One example that Pink uses to prove this is the sharp rise in volunteerism, i.e. ever more people working for free, doing something that gives them purpose. While making money is still important to them, it seems to not be enough to really motivate:

The Pursuit of Happy... eh, Mastery

Merriam-Webster calls it the "possession or display of great skill or technique." The dictionary on my computer says it's the "comprehensive knowledge or skill in a particular subject or activity." And Daniel H. Pink, in his bestselling book Drive. The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us defines it as "the desire to get better and better at something that matters." According to him it is the second (the first was autonomy) vital element of intrinsically motivated behavior: mastery.

In other words, if you want someone to be motivated about a task or a job, give them a chance to get better and better and better at it. Pursuing perfection, you might call it. But is that really such an important attitude to have? Pink is convinced it is:

Solving complex problems requires an inquiring mind and the willingness to experiment one's way to a fresh solution. Where Motivation 2.0 sought compliance, Motivation 3.0 seeks engagement. Only engagement can produce mastery. And the pursuit of mastery, an important but often dormant part of our third drive, has become essential in making one's way in today's economy. (p. 111)

Doing It Your Way

According to the dictionary on my Macbook, autonomous means "having the freedom to act independently." Synonyms include self-governing, independent, sovereign, free, self-ruling and self-determining. For most of us, those are words that we associate with positive emotions. So I think it's safe to say that we like to have autonomy in our lives. And according to Daniel Pink in his book Drive. The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, it is a vital component to being motivated and successful at the workplace.

Blessed Are The Givers

Adam Grant likes to help people. He's a professor at the Wharton School and author of the new book Give and Take. A Revolutionary Approach To Success. And according to him, helping other people is the best thing you can do, if you want to be productive and successful in life. I recently came across an article on Grant written by Susan Dominus in the New York Times that is well worth the read (even though it's quite long). Below are just a few highlights:

"Grant might not seem so different from any number of accessible and devoted professors on any number of campuses, and yet when you witness over time the sheer volume of Grant's commitments, and the way in which he is able to follow through on all of them, you start to sense that something profoundly different is at work. Helpfulness is Grant's credo."

I'm Just Not That Type of Person

You've heard it before. "I don't feel attracted to him. He's just not my type." Or maybe "I would definitely not feel comfortable doing that. I'm just not that type of person." But what do we actually mean when we label someone as "not our type" or announce that "we're not that type of person"? Are we talking about their personality, character, looks (not attractive), worldview (distinct from our own), etc.? Or maybe a mixture of all of the above?

How about someone being a Type X instead of a Type I? Never heard of them before? According to Daniel Pink, who wrote the New York Times bestseller Drive. The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, these two terms stand for people who are generally either extrinsically (Type X) or intrinsically (Type I) motivated. And he has pretty strong opinions on what we need to do in regards to our motivation in order to make our world a better place:

Be Smart When You Reward

There are some things in life that are black and white. Either right or wrong. Good or bad. Helpful or not. Achieving its objective or not. And then there are situations where it depends. According to Daniel Pink, author of Drive. The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, using extrinsic rewards as motivation is one of those things. He's generally not a big fan of the so-called "carrots and sticks" approach: rewarding for good and punishing for bad behavior in order to get the behavior you want. There are just too many things that can go wrong, leading him to sum it up in his seven reasons why carrots and sticks usually fail*:

Paying Your Kids To Take Out The Trash

Ok, so people are complicated creatures. Sometimes they do what you expect them to do and sometimes they don't. And then every once in a while they totally surprise you... by doing the exact opposite of what you expected them to do. Need an example? In 2000 a couple of economists studied a child care center in Haifa, Israel for several months. It opened at 7:30 a.m. and closed at 4 p.m. every day and parents were asked to pick up their children by this closing time, or a teacher would have to stay late. During the first month, the economists observed how many parents arrived late to get their kids. Then, with the permission of the day care center, they put up a sign announcing a fine of 10 Israeli shekel (about 3 U.S. dollars at the time) for each child that was picked up after 4:10 p.m.

When Extrinsic Rewards Fail... Or Worse

It's one of the most popular exercises that psychologists like to use when it comes to testing someone's ability to solve a problem: in this case, the "candle problem." The subject is given a candle, some tacks in a box and matches (see the image). They are then asked to attach the candle to the wall in such a way that the wax doesn't drip onto the table. Most people take about five to ten minutes to find the solution. How long does it take you?

Painting Fences and Drawing For Rewards

Sometimes things can backfire on you. Your actions may have unintended consequences that you really didn't expect. Maybe you gave someone an incentive to do something and it didn't work. Or even worse: he did the exact opposite of what you wanted him to do. When an attempted solution to a problem actually makes the problem worse, economists call this the cobra effect (for an interesting podcast on the subject, click here). And as Daniel Pink notes in his book Drive. The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us something similar can happen when it comes to motivation:

Mechanisms designed to increase motivation can dampen it. Tactics aimed at boosting creativity can reduce it. Programs to promote good deeds can make them disappear. Meanwhile, instead of restraining negative behavior, rewards and punishments can often set it loose -- and give rise to cheating, addiction, and dangerously myopic thinking. (p. 35)

How a Group of Volunteers Beat Microsoft

In the early 1990s Microsoft had a great idea: create a digital encyclopedia to be distributed on CD-ROM and online. There would be hundreds of well-paid employees working on this important project. It looked and sounded like a great idea at a time when people still connected to the internet via dial-up modems and the thought of having the information of twenty of more heavy books (think Encyclopaedia Britannica) on one CD was truly revolutionary. But less than twenty years later, in October of 2009, Microsoft pulled the plug on MSN Encarta. What had happened?

When Cash Hurts

Dan Ariely on the "Pain of Paying". Very interesting and practical video. Some of the highlights include:

• What's more painful? Cash or credit card? Prepayment or paying after the event?
• How to increase the pain of paying (and when that might make sense)
• How to decrease the pain of paying (and when that might make sense)
• Method and timing of payment matters more than you think
• What's an ideal gift?
• And the interesting case of America Online (AOL) and its modem users

Source: danariely.com

Play Offense Instead of Defense

The annual Superbowl (championship game of the National Football League) is approaching fast, but don't worry: this will not be a post on American Football strategy or on what my team needs to do on Sunday night in order to win the title. Instead it's a summary of what I have learned from the reading of Willpower: Why Self-Control is the Secret to Success by Roy F. Baumeister and John Tierney. I have made a list of 15 things you should keep in mind and rules you should follow if you want to improve your willpower and self-control. If it's not all clear, post your questions in the comments section or go and read the book for yourself! ;-)

Receiving Help From Above

The famous English guitarist and singer-songwriter Eric Clapton was an alcoholic and drug addict. "Drinking was in my thoughts all the time," he writes in his autobiography. All the time... until, that is, he started praying. Here's how he describes the night he finally sank to his knees and started asking for help from above: "I had no notion who I thought I was talking to, I just knew that I had come to the end of my tether. I had nothing left to fight with. Then I remembered what I had heard about surrender, something I thought I could never do, my pride just wouldn't allow it, but I knew that on my own I wasn't going to make it, so I asked for help, and, getting down on my knees, I surrendered." According to Clapton, he's never again even seriously considered taking another drink.

Where did all the willpower to quit (which he didn't have before) all of a sudden come from? Even Clapton can't really explain it, but he now prays for help every morning and night. Telling his story in their book Willpower, it becomes clear that Roy Baumeister and John Tierney aren't quite sure how to explain it either and since neither is particularly religious it's understandable that they have decided to focus on the social component of religious denominations in order to explain how faith benefits people looking for more self-control in their lives. Put simply, being alone sucks:

Getting Into The Habit...

Does the name Henry Morton Stanley ring a bell? I'm impressed if it does, since Mr. Stanley is not quite as well-known as the man he found in the African jungle in 1871 after months of searching: the great missionary Dr. David Livingstone. But according to the authors of Willpower. Why Self-Control is the Secret to Success, it is hard "to name any explorer in history who endured such sustained misery and terror so deep in the wilderness" as Henry Stanley. How did he do it?

Stanley was actually a journalist (not a scientist or explorer primarily) and definitely didn't get his willpower from his upbringing: Born to an unmarried eighteen-year-old woman who abandoned him to her father, he never knew his own father and ended up in a workhouse by the time he was six years old. But for some reason he saw the benefits of having self-control early on and worked on improving his own continually. So by the time he went on his first expeditions to the interior of Africa, he was well prepared - mentally probably even more so than physically.