Is It Too Late For Change?
“People don’t change.” I remember hearing this from one of my professors in medical school. His comment went hand in hand with everything I thought I knew about human nature: personalities are set in stone and character doesn’t change.
Numerous studies suggest otherwise. Of note, when psychologists talk about personality traits, they are referring to the Big Five which include the following:
1. Openness to Experience
2. Conscientiousness
3. Extroversion
4. Agreeableness
5. Neuroticism
The combination of these five are believed to be the core characteristics that capture an individual’s personality. While research suggests that these traits are largely inherited and tend to be stable over time, it certainly doesn’t mean they are unchangeable.
Life experiences and situations have been shown to significantly impact specific traits:
Strong relationships increase conscientiousness, agreeableness and extroversion and decrease neuroticism.
Divorce increases extroversion and openness in women.
Greater job satisfaction decreases neuroticism and increases extroversion.
Remarriage decreases neuroticism in men.
Personality can be re-shaped in other ways too:
Scientists have successfully designed programs to increase openness, which tends to predict better health and a longer life….One experiment found that a training program increased openness among older adults. A different study found that openness grew with the enhanced bodily awareness that comes from dancing and possibly other forms of physical activity.
Above all, regardless of our basic personality traits, we can freely choose how we express them and how we behave. As described in the Science of Us:
You can indeed train yourself to become more conscientious, more agreeable, more (or less) of whatever it is that you currently are not…
It turns out that you can teach old dogs new tricks.
I wish you all the best,
Dr. Samantha Boardman
Are You Asking the Right Questions?
Genuine curiosity and an unwillingness to accept the status quo is a distinguishing characteristic of truly successful people. For them, information and simply knowing facts is not enough. They constantly ask questions to help them better understand the information they have and how they can act on it. They always want to know more—from their boss, from their spouse, from their teachers and they don’t stop learning when school ends.
Asking the right questions is a key strategy that enables people to keep an open mind and to enhance their lives in meaningful ways at work and at home. Most importantly, questions enable us see connections and explore possibilities that may not be obvious. All too often, people avoid asking questions because they fear the unknown, they don’t want to be seen as troublemakers or they are afraid of disrupting their routines.
Research shows the benefits of formulating the right questions:
When students know how to ask their own questions, they take greater ownership of their learning, deepen comprehension, and make new connections and discoveries on their own. However, this skill is rarely, if ever, deliberately taught to students from kindergarten through high school. Typically, questions are seen as the province of teachers, who spend years figuring out how to craft questions and fine-tune them to stimulate students’ curiosity or engage them more effectively. We have found that teaching students to ask their own questions can accomplish these same goals while teaching a critical lifelong skill.
Asking good questions is important in school and beyond. As Forbes contributor, Jason Selk writes, there are three questions CEOs should ask themselves every day:
1. What three things did I do well today?
2. What is my number one most needed improvement for tomorrow?
3. What is one thing I can do differently to help make the needed improvement?
The above questions apply to work, relationships, parenting, and beyond. Questions are a key component of self-evaluation and help keep a focus on the future—not on what has been or could have been.
As Jim Collins, author of the best seller Good to Great, described Peter Drucker (aka “the man who invented management”) as someone “who had a remarkable ability to not just to give the right answers but more important, to ask the right questions—questions that would shift our entire frame of reference.”
That’s what the best questions do. They make us re-think what we think we know.
I wish you all the best,
Dr. Samantha Boardman
Mending a Broken Heart: A How-To
Remember that scene in Clueless, where Cher kind of makes fun of Tai for wanting to burn the few things she associates with her late relationship with Elton? Turns out, Tai was right. Burn, baby, burn. That’s the best way to mend your broken heart. Well, not the burning so much as the ritual of it all.
For those in a committed and loving relationship, Valentine’s Day may be something to look forward to, but for the broken-hearted, it’s a painful reminder of lost love. Each image of heart-shaped chocolate boxes, bouquets of red roses and sappy card commercial — even the usual catch-all heart emoji — can make the lonely feel even more lonely.
If you are having a hard time in the wake of a difficult breakup, behavioral science sheds some light on how to move on. In a series of experiments, researchers Michael Norton and Francesca Gino reveal that people who engage in rituals recover more quickly and report feeling better than those who don’t.
We typically think of rituals as communal or religious but, as Norton and Gino’s research shows, a ritual doesn’t need to be to be effective. They were surprised to discover that, when asked to write about a ritual performed in the wake of a loss, most participants turned to “everyday” practices that were self-generated, personal and private.
One wrote:
I returned alone to the location of the breakup each month on the anniversary of the breakup to help cope with my loss and think things over.
Another wrote:
I looked for all the pictures we took together during the time we dated. I then destroyed them into small pieces (even the ones I really liked!), and then burnt them in the park where we first kissed.
Afterward, the participants felt better.
Norton and Gino theorize that engaging in a ritual after a loss restores a sense of control. Feeling in control mitigates sadness and increases well-being, physical health, and resilience.
In addition to helping mend a broken heart, Norton and Gino’s research suggests that performing a ritual—even one made up by others—may be helpful in dealing with everyday setbacks. In one experiment, they induced a sense of loss among participants by having them lose a lottery. Those in the “ritual group” were told about the benefits of rituals and then asked to engage in the following mini ritual:
1) Draw their feelings on a piece of paper for two minutes.
2) Sprinkle a pinch of salt on it.
3) Rip the paper into pieces.
This group described feeling much better and less disappointed than those who didn’t engage in the ritual.
The results of the study indicate that, in order for a ritual to be most effective, it needs to be deliberate, intentional and performed. Just knowing that a ritual is helpful is not enough. Action must be taken though the specific actions do not seem to matter.
Create a go-to ritual to help you deal with the daily hassles and disappointments. While you cannot control all of life’s curve balls, you have far more power than you realize over whether or not they take you down.
I wish you all the best,
Dr. Samantha Boardman
How Can I Make Myself Stand Out In A Job Interview?
Conventional wisdom holds that in order to stand out, it is important to highlight your achievements.
Findings from a study conducted by researchers at Harvard and Stanford University suggest taking a different strategy. If someone is writing a letter of recommendation on your behalf, request that they underscore your potential. The study found that people are more impressed when they hear about what a candidate is capable of doing in the future rather than dwelling on what they have done in the past. In the study, a painting by an artist who was described as having the potential to win a major art prize was preferred over the work of an artist who had already won a major art prize. A rookie basketball player who demonstrated great potential was preferred over an accomplished more seasoned player who had been in the NBA for five years. Advertisements for a comedian who “could become the next big thing” versus “has become the next big thing” generated far more interest as measured by click rate. Applicants to a Ph.D. program with letters of recommendation emphasizing potential over achievement were considered more appealing.
These findings have broad implications for how we market ourselves and, perhaps more importantly, for how we think about ourselves. Do we dwell on the past and on what we have done or do we focus on the future and imagine what is possible?
I wish you all the best,
Dr. Samantha Boardman
