As I think back about my childhood there are a few dark memories that elicit some shame. The specifics of these rare events are vague in my mind, but I do recall my reaction and the subsequent feelings aroused deep within. Part of my shame stemmed from the certainty that I alone was so inclined to find humor in the misfortune of others. Come to find out, later in life, the Germans have a very specific word for my inappropriate reactions. The word, Schadenfreude, has no English equivalent, but imagine my relief to learn that my strong compulsion to laugh when a playmate injured himself was not some deep seated character flaw. I like to consider myself a sensitive and caring guy; generally, pretty empathetic. That was true, I am told, even when I was a child. But, on occasion, I really struggled with a deep and overpowering reflexive drive to heartily laugh when one particular friend of mine managed to hurt himself. When anybody else got hurt I tended to writhe with a sick feeling in my knees. Not so with this guy. He was older than I and although I loved spending time with him, I also experienced a fair amount of envy in his presence. I admired him for his confidence, competence, and he seemed to possess all the wondrous possessions of my dreams. As I’ve come to learn more about schadenfreude, I now realize that this envy probably played out in the expression of this emotion.
So what is this schadenfreude response and where does it come from? First, what is it? The word itself is derived from schaden, which in German means adversity or harm and freude, which means joy. Literally the term means deriving pleasure from another’s misfortune. Although people rarely acknowledge this feeling, it is very common and probably as old as humankind. It drives the infatuation people have with celebrities and politicians particularly when it comes to their foibles and faux pas. It also drives the success of slap stick comedy and the humor derived from the ubiquitous home videos of men being unexpectedly struck in the private parts. Who has not seen and laughed at least one of these videos? This response transcends all of human kind and it certainly keeps the tabloids and paparazzi in business.
Schadenfreude has of late become an area of scientific inquiry. Little by little we are acquiring more and more information about this phenomena. Studies of empathy using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) mapped out, in real time, active centers of the brain as individuals were exposed to another person’s pain. The fMRI detected activity in the frontoinsular and anterior cingulate cortices. These areas of the brain are associated with pain responses and the subsequent emotions. Empathy is likely a brain-based response whereby the witness re-lives the negative emotions of pain without actually enduring the physical stimuli. A surprising result of this research was that when some subjects (men in particular), witnessed unfortunate things happening to bad people, the left nucleus accumbens (NAcc) tended to light up. The NAcc is a collection of neurons within the striatum, which is thought to be a major reward center in the brain. The striatum play important roles in our experiences of pleasure, laughter, reward, and even addiction and aggression.
We have learned even more from the work of neuroscientist Hidehiko Takahashi and his colleagues at Japan’s National Institute of Radiological Sciences. They asked 19 adult volunteers to read scenarios describing the successes and misfortunes of fictional characters and to report their feelings about these people as they were undergoing an fMRI. They discovered that reports of envy were associated with activity in the anterior cingulate cortex (the same pain center noted above). Envy, it seems, like empathy, is an unpleasant experience, processed in the same way as is physical pain. On the other hand, the feelings of pleasure associated with another’s misfortune were associated with increased activity in the striatum (pleasure center). In contrast to empathy and envy, schadenfreude actually feels good. Another person’s misfortune can trigger the same positive feelings as those associated with eating a great meal, hearing a really funny joke, or watching your team win the big game.
So, it seems, we are hard wired to feel schadenfreude. There must have been some evolutionary advantage conferred to those who experienced this emotion. Or perhaps, it may simply be secondary to some other traits that did offer selective advantages. Emily Anthes (2010) in an article in Scientific American: MIND noted “from an evolutionary standpoint, schadenfreude makes a lot of sense. The world is a competitive place, and an individual benefits, for instance, when a sexual competitor breaks a leg or a hunting rival falls ill.” There is a certain degree of social relativism at work here. Another’s misfortune stands you in better relative position for limited resources and thus survival. That’s the evolutionary psychology angle. Although the survival piece is certainly less relevant today, sexual selection and economic competition still are.
As it turns out, one is more likely to experience schadenfreude when one envies or harbors disdain for the victim of misfortune. And lack of personal familiarity with the victim also seems to be at play. Familiarity is most likely to elicit the empathy response. So, I guess there is no need for me to feel shame for this particular dirty little secret.
Speaking of dirty little secrets, I only felt a modicum of shame about the pleasure I experienced upon learning of the downfalls of Senator Larry Craig and Pastor Ted Haggerd. These self-righteous men publicly and vociferously professed the immorality of homosexuality while privately partaking in same gender sexual activity. I’m guessing that hypocrisy like true evil holds a special schadenfreude spot in our NAcc.
For a humorous spin on this concept listen to the song on this subject from the racy Broadway play called Avenue Q.
Tragedies like the events of January 8th in Tuscan shake the nation. We grieve for the victims and struggle to make sense of it all. The dialogue that has followed the event is not surprising. People want and need to understand why a person would do such a thing. These events are mind boggling and the human brain does not tolerate the ambiguity and senselessness of such acts. We gain solace by filling in the blanks with assumptions about the gunman’s sanity or motives.
We respond by presuming that only a mad man could commit such heinous acts. Or, we conclude that because the principle target was a politician, that his behavior must be ideologically driven. These assumptions provide a framework within which the event is easier to comprehend. The notion of insanity simplifies the situation: mental illness becomes the culprit. The notion of it being a politically motivated act also allows us to point a finger.
In fact, however, we don’t know what brought this young man to make such a terrible choice. The incomplete mosaic of the shooter’s life drawn from disparate snapshots by relative strangers suggests erratic behavior and disjointed thoughts. Was he abusing substances or evidencing symptoms of psychosis? As of right now we just don’t know.
We do know, however, that he and his family lived a reclusive life and that he struggled to exhibit sufficient adaptive skills to successfully navigate the worlds of work and college. I suggest that although it may be easy to conclude that Loughner is deranged, it is important to remember that insanity is not a prerequisite for such atrocious behavior. You may assume that only insane people would commit such crimes – but the reality is that ordinary people are capable of doing equally terrible things if their beliefs and their culture condone it or even honor it.
It is for example quite wrong to assume that the 9/11 terrorists were insane. Their faith in their god and the teachings of their religious book as well as the value put on such beliefs by the narrow sect of their particular extremist culture made them heroes and martyrs, destined for eternal bliss.
There are other situations where the sanity line is a bit murkier. Timothy McVeigh was apparently paranoid and quite capable of rationalizing his behavior by revising or cherry picking historical facts: but he too was highly motivated to act out his own form of justice for crimes that he believed were committed by the Federal Government (e.g., Waco, Ruby Ridge). His perspective about right and wrong was different than most of ours, but that doesn’t necessarily qualify him as insane. We don’t understand or align with his thinking and thus conclude that he must be mentally ill. The brutality of his behavior certainly bolsters such a conclusion. But recall that he was a decorated soldier in the Gulf War. He was a trained killer. The enemy, at some point following his discharge from the Army, shifted from Saddam Hussein to the US Federal Government. His beliefs justified his behavior in his eyes.
There are legitimate examples of heinous crimes committed by individuals with clear mental illness issues such as Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, and John Wayne Gacy. Seung-Hui Cho (of Virginia Tech) also comes to mind. Jared Loughner on the surface appears to be more in this category, but it is a presumption at this point. There is no evidence that he was driven by a different set of moral imperatives spurred on by rancorous political hate speech.
Regardless, as many pundits have proclaimed, there is a fear that the vitriol that abounds in our political discourse may inspire and incite the Timothy McVeighs of the world. Frankly, my first assumption was that the attack on Giffords was inspired by the very hate and fear emanating from the likes of Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin. Again, it is imprudent to draw such conclusions, but when someone has a differing political perspective and you target them as enemies of the state, destined to destroy America, then you have touched your toes on the line! And when you incite hate and associate the opposing side with Hitler and Soviet Stalinists, then you have crossed the line. Compound such rhetoric with images of violence and you have become grossly irresponsible.
I implore all US citizens to embrace civility and reject those that employ hatred to further their ideology. We have all too real and tragic examples of the consequences of this behavior. Lets devote our attention to civil dialogue about the issues that challenge our people and our planet. The issues and we the people, deserve better!
Have you ever heard someone make an argument that leaves you shaking your head in disbelief? Does it seem to you like some people are coming from a completely different reality than your own? If so, then this blog is for you. I have spent the last year trying to develop an understanding of the common thought patterns that drive the acrimonious spirit of our social and political dialogue. I am continually amazed by what I hear coming from seemingly informed people. I have assumed that some folks are either deluded, disingenuous, or downright ignorant. There is yet another possibility here, including the reality that different moral schema or belief systems may be driving their thinking. And if this is the case, how do these divergent processes come to be? I have learned a lot through this exploration and feel compelled do provide a recap of the posts I have made. I want to share with you those posts that have gathered the most traction and some that I believe warrant a bit more attention.
Over the past year I have posted 52 articles often dealing with Erroneous Thought Processes, Intuitive Thinking, and Rational Thought. Additionally, I have explored the down stream implications of these processes with regard to politics, morality, religion, parenting, memory, willpower, and general perception. I have attempted to be evidenced-based and objective in this process – striving to avoid the very trappings of confirmation bias and the erroneous processes that I am trying to understand. As it turns out, the brain is very complicated: and although it is the single most amazing system known to human kind, it can and does lead us astray in very surprising and alarming ways.
As for this blog, the top ten posts, based on the shear number of hits, are as follows:
What started out as ramblings from a curious guy in a remote corner of New York State ended up being read by folks from all over the planet. It has been a difficult process at times, consuming huge amounts of time, but it has also been exhilarating and deeply fulfilling.
I have been heavily influenced by several scientists and authors in this exploration. Of particular importance have been Steven Pinker, Daniel Simons, Christopher Chabris, Jonah Lehrer, Bruce Hood, Carl Sagan, and Malcolm Gladwell. Exploring the combined works of these men has been full of twists and turns that in some cases necessitated deep re-evaluation of long held beliefs. Holding myself to important standards – valuing evidence over ideology – has been an important and guiding theme.
Several important concepts have floated to the top as I poked through the diverse literature pertaining to thought processes. Of critical importance has been the realization that what we have, when it comes to our thought processes, is a highly developed yet deeply flawed system that has been shaped by natural selection over millions of years of evolution. Also important has been my increased understanding of the importance of genes, the basic element of selective pressures, as they play out in morality and political/religious beliefs. These issues are covered in the top ten posts listed above.
There are other worthy posts that did not garner as much attention as those listed above. Some of my other favorites included a review of Steven Pinker’s article in the New York Times (also titled Moral Instinct,) a look at Jonathon Haidt’s Moral Foundations Theory in Political Divide, as well as the tricks of Retail Mind Manipulation and the Illusion of Attention. This latter post and my series on Vaccines and Autism (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3) were perhaps the most important of the lot. Having the content of these become general knowledge would make the world a safer place.
The evolution of understanding regarding the power and importance of Intuitive relative to Rational Thinking was humbling at times and Daniel Simons’ and Christopher Chabris’ book, The Invisible Gorilla, certainly provided a mind opening experience. Hey, our intuitive capabilities are incredible (as illustrated by Gladwell in Blink & Lehrer in How We Decide) but the downfalls are amazingly humbling. I’ve covered other topics such as happiness, superstition, placebos, and the debate over human nature.
The human brain, no matter how remarkable, is flawed in two fundamental ways. First, the proclivities toward patternicity (pareidolia), hyperactive agency detection, and superstition, although once adaptive mechanisms, now lead to many errors of thought. Since the age of enlightenment, when human kind developed the scientific method, we have exponentially expanded our knowledge base regarding the workings of the world and the universe. These leaps of knowledge have rendered those error prone proclivities unessential for survival. Regardless, they have remained a dominant cognitive force. Although our intuition and rapid cognitions have sustained us, and in some ways still do, the everyday illusions impede us in important ways.
Secondly, we are prone to a multitude of cognitive biases that diminish and narrow our capacity to truly understand the world. Time after time I have written of the dangers of ideology with regard to its capacity to put blind-folds on adherents. Often the blind- folds are absolutely essential to sustain the ideology. And this is dangerous when truths and facts are denied or innocents are subjugated or brutalized. As I discussed in Spinoza’s Conjecture: “We all look at the world through our personal lenses of experience. Our experiences shape our understanding of the world, and ultimately our understanding of [it], then filters what we take in. The end result is that we may reject or ignore new and important information simply because it does not conform to our previously held beliefs.
Because of our genetically inscribed tendencies toward mysticism and gullibility, we must make extra effort in order to find truth. As Dr. Steven Novella once wrote:
“We must realize that the default mode of human psychology is to grab onto comforting beliefs for purely emotional reasons, and then justify those beliefs to ourselves with post-hoc rationalizations. It takes effort to rise above this tendency, to step back from our beliefs and our emotional connection to conclusions and focus on the process.”
We must therefore be humble with regard to beliefs and be willing to accept that we are vulnerable to error prone influences outside our awareness. Recognition and acceptance of these proclivities are important first steps. Are you ready to move forward? How do you think?
As I read Steven Pinker’s book The Blank Slate: Modern Denial of Human Nature I was, for lack of a better word, flabbergasted, about the extent of acrimony that seemingly persists regarding the nature versus nurture debate. This parley, from my naive perspective, was over long ago. Yet Pinker detailed the extensive history to which some intellectuals, even today, attack the notion of any genetic contribution to traits such as IQ, behavior, political views, religious views, and personality.
For me there is very little question about the impact of genes. It is clear as day in my family. My daughter for example is very much like me. And I see the influence of genes nearly every day in my practice. As a psychologist with a specialty in evaluating and treating difficult to manage children (i.e., Autism Spectrum Disorder, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, and ADHD), I often work with families who have an exceptionally strong willed and self directed child. The children that have these latter traits, without Autistic like symptoms, are often classified as Oppositional Defiant. Along with such independent mindedness, typically comes an explosive temperament and a highly sensitive and precocious level of personal dignity. It is important to note that a vast majority of the time, the child is a proverbial chip off the ole-block: usually, the father was similarly quite difficult to manage as a youngster.
One with a nurture bias might suggest that my daughter and those oppositional children I see are simply products of their environment. But here is what is interesting. Often in the families I serve, there are other well behaved, well adjusted, and polite children. To suggest that the environment uniquely and exclusively shaped the behavior and affect of the troubled child would suggest that there was a substantial level of differential parenting going on in the home. This scenario is far too common to be a product of differentiated parenting style. And thorough behavioral analysis almost always rules out this variable. Socially, the parents are blamed for their bad kid, not because of their gene contribution, but because their alleged poor parenting practices. Well, most often, poor parenting is not the cause of the problem! And my daughter’s similarity to me unfolded despite my attempts to foster in her, her own unique identity and insufficient environmental influence.
The argument really is moot. Genes do matter! The evidence is substantial and it transcends the anecdotes I just shared. Only those with an ideological position inconvenienced by this reality argue otherwise. I actually prefer the idea that genes don’t matter. It would give me greater capacity to affect change in homes given my behavior analytic skills. It would also give me more hope that my daughter will not develop the same geeky interests that I have. Too late! She is a geology major. Like me, she loves rocks. It would also give me hope that she wont develop the same G/I ailments that have incapacitated me, my mother, and my grandfather. Again too late. Sadly, the other day she had to buy some Tums.
People are uncomfortable with the idea that issues such as personality and IQ, for example, would have any genetic determinism. It seems too limiting, too materialistic, and too deterministic. People, I think, are more comfortable with the idea that they can affect change – that they can arrange outcomes, that the power is in our hands. But the real power, it seems, is spread out – residing both in our hands and in our genes. Environmental determinism, in fact, is more consistent with my political and social views, but no matter how inconvenient, I am compelled by evidence to soften my stance regarding this romantic notion. How I wish that DNA did not enter the picture with regard to such issues. Or do I? Had it not, we wouldn’t be here to write/read such musings. You’ve heard of the whole evolution by means of natural selection thing, haven’t you?
As it turns out, we are products of our genes and our environment. No duh! Debate over! Right? Nope! I had assumed that it was commonly accepted that genes matter. I had no idea that acknowledging this reality was in a sense sacrilegious to some. Although Pinker made clear the debate, I suspected that perhaps this was an esoteric intellectual war of words limited to philosophical types with high brow notions about macro economic models and so on. But, I became more aware of the lingering embers of environmental determinism as a result of a firestorm that erupted last week regarding an essay written by an environmental advocacy group spread about on Twitter and a subsequent article posted in the Huffington Post. These articles essentially minimized genetic determinism in major health issues due to the failure of the Human Genome Project to isolate specific genes responsible for specific illnesses. Out with the genes – in with the environment the proponents celebrated. Environmental determinists pounced on the absence of evidence as if it were evidence of absence (Carmichael, 2010). As it turns out, genes are really complex and diseases are influenced, it seems, by gene cohorts rather than any one specific gene. I am less familiar with the research regarding genetic influence on disease but the tone of the banter reminded me of the debate about human nature detailed by Pinker.
I have discussed in several recent posts the impact of genes on important issues such as personality, adaptive functioning, and even political perspectives. The psychologist Eric Turkheimer pulled together the unusually robust evidence from extensive studies of twins (fraternal and identical) reared together and apart as well as studies of adopted children relative to biological children and concluded that there are three important laws that help explain the development of personality characteristics and intelligence. The three laws are as follows:
All Human traits are heritable;
The effect of being raised in the same family is smaller than the effect of the genes; and
A substantial portion of the variation in complex human behavioral traits is not accounted for by the effects of genes or families.
These laws are best summarized based on current research from behavioral genetics as follows:
Heredity accounts for about 50% of the variance in the adaptive functioning outcomes of children.
The home environment, as it is influenced by parents, accounts for 0 to 10%, and
The child’s peer group accounts for the remainder (40-50%) (Pinker, 2002).
Corresponding laws regarding the variants affecting diseases are perhaps unclear at this time. But denial of genetic influence is much like the denial of the heliocentric theory of the solar system or the arguments put forth by Creationists and anti vaccine advocates. They are guided by ideological notions that hang by a thin thread. Something near and dear to the hearts of the proponents of exclusive environmental determinism is threatened by evidence. The only recourse is denial. Its an old and tired song and dance. Genes matter – but not exclusively. Environment matters – but not exclusively. Get used to it.
The human brain is a curious organ. We are continually learning new and very exciting things about this incredibly complicated masterpiece of evolution. But, every now and then, we learn something that shakes to the core our understanding of accepted concepts. This has been the case recently with our understanding of placebos.
Placebos as I’m sure you know, are fake substances, treatments, or procedures that, in and of themselves, have no active ingredient or direct effect. Regardless of the inert nature of placebos, they can and do elicit some powerful responses. This has long been attributed to a person’s beliefs and expectations about the legitimacy of effect. One Japanese study, for example, showed that people who believed they were being exposed to real poison ivy (but were actually exposed to a placebo), developed a painful response that mimicked the actual reaction to legitimate poison ivy (Blakeslee, 1998). In this study, only the subjects’ belief was responsible for the skin rashes. The mind’s powerful capacity, in this case, produced very real and painful responses regardless of the presence of any true irritant.
This is the placebo effect. Again, attribution lies in the person’s beliefs and expectations rather than in the substance, drug, treatment, or procedure. It is important to note that although the beliefs and expectations emanate from one’s mind, the bodily responses can be very real. Scientists use placebos in trials to evaluate treatment efficacy because of this innate gullibility.
The gold standard for evaluation of treatment efficacy (in drug trials) involves double-blinded, randomized, and placebo controlled procedures because, people seem to get better simply from getting attention and/or treatment regardless of form (within limits). This is only true where psychological factors overlay the manifestation of symptoms (Crislip, 2006). Placebos do little to reduce serious medical issues like MS, stroke, or cancer; but people with particularly subjective experiences of pain, affective disorders, and psychologically mediated disorders can and do report improvements when unknowingly taking placebos. Formerly, it was presumed that the patient had to believe that the sugar pill was indeed an actual drug. This presumption is what has been recently questioned. What if the patient knows it is a placebo, will that reduce the treatment efficacy? Recent evidence suggests not!
We must consider a few important things about placebos. The American Medical Association says that “the use of a placebo without the patient’s knowledge may undermine trust, compromise the patient-physician relationship, and result in medical harm to the patient.” Regardless, Kaptchuk et al (2010) noted “a recent national survey of internists and rheumatologists in the US found that while only small numbers of US physicians surreptitiously use inert placebo pills and injections, approximately 50% prescribe medications that they consider to have no specific effect on patients’ conditions and are used solely as placebos (sometimes called “impure placebos”). “Prescribing placebos necessarily involves deception and this brings the practice into question. But deception may no longer be necessary!
Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, Massachusetts just published a startling study (Placebos without deception: A randomized controlled trial in irritable bowel syndrome) in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS ONE (Kaptchuk, 2010). And as the title suggests, placebos were knowingly used to evaluate their effectiveness in treating irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Participants were recruited from advertisements for “a novel mind-body management study of IBS” in newspapers and fliers and from referrals from health care professionals. The authors note that the symptoms of IBS constitute one of the top 10 reasons people seek primary-care treatment.
Eighty, primarily female (70%) subjects with a mean age of 47 years (±18 yrs.), diagnosed with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), were randomly assigned to one of two groups for a three week trial. One group was an open-label placebo group where the treatment provided was acknowledged to be placebo pills “made of an inert substance, like sugar pills, that have been shown in clinical studies to produce significant improvement in IBS symptoms through mind-body self-healing processes.” The second group received no-treatment but they did receive the same quality of interaction with health-care providers that the open placebo participants received. Several standardized measures of IBS symptom severity were used.
The subjects knew they were taking inert pills – but the suggestion was made, by the physician, that the pills have resulted in significant improvements in previous clinical trials (which was true and due to placebo effect). As it turns out, the open-label placebo produced significantly higher mean global improvement scores at both the 11-day trial midpoint and at the end of the three week treatment.
Of the participants in the open- or honest-placebo group, 59% experienced adequate relief versus 35% of those in the no treatment group. The authors concluded that “Placebos administered without deception may be an effective treatment for IBS. Further research is warranted in IBS, and perhaps other conditions, to elucidate whether physicians can benefit patients using placebos consistent with informed consent.” The difference between the groups is substantial. Although 35% of the subjects in the no treatment group experienced adequate symptom resolution without any treatment, they were the recipients of some physician attention. Such attention alone is associated with improved outcomes. Further, the 24 point difference is unlikely to be explained by differences in the natural history of the disease (the natural ebb and flow of symptom presentation) or regression toward the mean (the natural tendency for repeated measures to move more closely to the average value) (Crislip, 2006). Because subjects were randomly assigned to the groups, these latter effects are likely to cancel each other out.
So, as it turns out, taking an honest-placebo may substantially reduce IBS symptoms in over half of sufferers. How does this happen? I suggest that because an authority figure suggested that the pill had resulted in significant symptom reduction in previous trials there remains a high probability of the expectancy effect. I question whether it should be considered an “Honest-Placebo.”
So we have the attention provided by the physician, the expectancy affect, and the added ritual of taking the pills. The authors suggest that this latter factor may play an important role in the effect. Regardless, the sugar pill appears to have done something. Perhaps this helps explain why billions of dollars are spent annually on vitamins, “natural remedies,” and homeopathy despite lack of biological plausibility or evidence of treatment efficacy. We are, it seems, inherently gullible people. Placebos work, because the mind is a powerful thing – simply thinking you’re being treated, can make you feel better. Also on the plus side – no long list of scary side effects – although, we could get them, I suppose, if doctors were to imply the possibility.
I have learned some things of late that have congealed in such a way, so as to leave me in a bit of an existential crisis. One of my most precious beliefs, specifically, the importance of parenting style, as it pertains to child intelligence and personality outcomes, has been relegated to the proverbial dust heap alongside the id, the wandering uterus, and the Oedipus complex.
Why would the salience of parenting style even come into question? It seems ridiculous to pose such a question. Of course parenting style matters! It is widely believed that parents can and do shape and mold their youngsters in a meaningful way that plays out in the formation of an adult. But, and this is a big but, the reality is that the impact of what you do as a parent has a much narrower impact than you might think.
I discussed this last week in my post Ten Best Parenting Tips: But Does it Really Matter? where I shared the Parent’s Ten (Epstein, 2010) and laid out a question of the quality of the research used to delineate these ten great tips. In that post I noted that:
“We are lead to believe, based on the results of [the Epstein study], that we, as parents, can shape our children, and thus by engaging in The Parent’s Ten, produce happier, healthier, and wiser children. But can we really? Is there an illusion of cause here? Are these simply correlations? The findings of behavioral genetics would suggest that this is an illusion – that these variables vary in predictable ways based on the influence of a third variable – genes.”
Genes are the sticking point. Epstein did not control for the effect of shared genes in this study. It is likely that children who have well functioning parents will be likewise well functioning, not because of the parenting style employed by their parents, but because of their shared genes. Well functioning and happy adults breed happy and well functioning children. Ultimately, parenting style, seems to have little impact on such outcomes.
The current research from behavioral genetics provides a preponderance of evidence leading to the same conclusion: that the home environment, as it is influenced by parents, accounts for 0 to 10% of the variance in the personality and intelligence outcomes of children! Heredity (genes) accounts for about 50%. A long standing question about the remainder has ultimately pointed in the direction of the child’s peer group whereby they account for 40-50% of the variance on personality and intelligence outcomes (Pinker, 2002). As it turns out, peers are the nurture influence in the nature and nurture interplay.
This latter notion runs counter to nearly everything we have been taught regarding human development over the last 100 years (Gladwell, 1998). Freud first put parents at the core of the child’s personality and neurosis development, and there they have remained. Mothers in particular have fielded more than their share of blame with regard to the pathology of their offspring. Cold maternal parenting style, after all, had been blamed for autism. And perfection seeking mothers have been blamed for the development of anorexia in their teenage daughters. We know that these relationships are unfounded. Regardless, the thinking persists, and bad outcomes are attributed to bad parenting whereas good outcomes are the fruit of sound parenting. The problem with this type of thinking is that the research has not born it out.
The Minnesota studies of twins and the Colorado Adoption Project have made it clear (Harris, 1998): parents contribute their genes and that seems to be it. When it comes to personality variables such as openness to experience, conscientiousness, extroversion-introversion, antagonism-agreeableness, and neuroticism, parents affect this only through heritability. Factors like IQ, language proficiency, religiosity, nicotine dependence, hours of television watching, and political conservatism/liberalism are all hugely influenced by genes (Pinker, 2002).
How do we know this? Adopted children resemble their biological parents not their adoptive parents (Gladwell, 1998). Also, as Steven Pinker (2002) points out, “Identical twins reared apart are highly similar; identical twins reared together are more similar than fraternal twins reared together; biological siblings are far more similar than adoptive siblings. All this translates into substantial heritability values…”
And consider smoking. Who can forget the TV ad portraying a child watching and pondering the emulation of his father’s smoking behavior. The slogan was something akin to “like father like son.” They had it right, but the smoking behavior in front of the child was not the culprit. Children of smokers are two times more likely to smoke as children of non-smokers. What we see is that nicotine addiction is heavily influenced by genes. Adoptive children of smokers do not have elevated rates of smoking, and this greatly diminishes the role that modeling plays in the equation.
The psychologist Eric Turkheimer pulled together the unusually robust evidence from extensive studies of twins (fraternal and identical) reared together and apart as well as studies of adopted children relative to biological children and concluded that there are three important laws that help explain the development of personality characteristics and intelligence. Steven Pinker suggests that these laws constitute the most important discovery in the history of psychology (2002). The three laws are as follows:
All Human traits are heritable;
The effect of being raised in the same family is smaller than the effect of the genes; and
A substantial portion of the variation in complex human behavioral traits is not accounted for by the effects of genes or families.
So does this mean that what we do as parents doesn’t really matter? And does it mean that my role as a child psychologist helping parents manage very difficult children is a waste of time? This is my crisis.
Well … it does matter! How a parent treats and manages a child will affect how the child behaves and how the child feels about the parent. These are important issues. If poor parenting results in difficult feelings for the parent, “these feelings can last a lifetime – but they don’t necessarily cross over into the life the child leads outside the home” (Harris quoted in Gladwell, 1998). Here is the important point “whatever our parents do to us is overshadowed, in the long run, by what our peers do to us” (Harris quoted in Gladwell, 1998). The home environment is very important for all involved – and parenting style can greatly impact that environment. So parenting style does matter – if only for the establishment of sanity in the home. It seems to me that treating a child well is an ethical obligation. But if that’s not enough encouragement for treating another human being well, perhaps you should do so in hopes that when you are old and frail, your children may treat you well (Harris paraphrased in Gladwell, 1998).
Pinker (2002) adds an important provision:
“Differences among homes don’t matter within the samples of homes netted by these studies, which tend to be more middle-class than the population as a whole. But differences between those samples and other kinds of homes could matter. The studies exclude cases of criminal neglect, physical and sexual abuse, and abandonment in a bleak orphanage, so they do not show that extreme cases fail to leave scars. Nor can they say anything about the differences between cultures… In general, if a sample comes from a restricted range of homes, it may underestimate effects of homes across a wider range.“
We do know that parenting style can have adverse consequences when a child is subjected to neglect or abuse. This is hugely important! It’s not that parenting style doesn’t matter. It matters greatly! Parents can establish a happy encouraging environment, provide for the development of essential skills and knowledge; BUT, again, over the long term, it seems that these contributions do not shape the personality or intelligence of their children. Their gene’s are responsible for those outcomes. What seems to be more important, when it comes to shaping the genetic contribution, is where a parent raises their child. It’s the peer group that finishes the job. Now that is scary! And I thought my crisis was over.
References:
Epstein, R. (2010). What Makes a Good Parent?Scientific American MIND. November/December 2010. (pgs 46-51).
Gladwell, M. (1998). Do Parents Matter? Judith Rich Harris and Child Development. Annals of Behavior. The New Yorker.
What makes a good parent? Really? What can we do to ensure that our children grow up happy, healthy and wise? There is a lot of advice out there – some of which, on the surface seems quite sage. But history is replete with really bad advice – some based in moral authority and some in the ill formed wisdom of so called experts. New advice is commonplace and how often have you been confused by the contradictory nature of yesterday’s and today’s tips? There are enough schools of thought out there to confirm and satisfy almost any advocate of any “reasonably sane” parenting approach and even some not so prudent approaches. There is a pretty good reason for this variability and I’ll get to that in a minute, but first, lets look at a recent article from Scientific American MIND that provides a summary of a scientific analysis resulting in a list of the top ten most effective child rearing practices.
In What Makes a Good Parent? the author, Robert Epstein, shares the results of a study on parenting skills that he carried out at UC San Diego, with a student (Shannon Fox). The results were presented at the annual convention of the American Psychological Association this past summer. Epstein and Fox looked at parenting techniques advised by experts, strategies commonly employed by parents, and strategies that seemingly had efficacy in the real world. They collected their data online from nearly 2000 parents who volunteered to take a test of parenting skills at Epstein’s website: http://MyParentingSkills.com. The test was devised by Epstein based on the literature, whereby ten parenting techniques that had robust evidence with regard to good outcomes were selected and measured. Epstein had the 10 skills assessed by 11 parenting experts to further evaluate their validity. The participants answered 100 questions pertaining to their agreement (on a 5 point agree to disagree scale) with the ten parenting variables (e.g., “I generally encourage my child to make his or her own choices,” “I try to involve my child in healthful outdoor activities,” “No matter how busy I am, I try to spend quality time with my child.”). In addition to these questions the test asked questions pertaining to important variables such as income and educational levels of the parents, marital status, parenting experience, age, as well as questions regarding the happiness, health and functioning capacity of their child/ren.
The results, coined by the author as The Parent’s Ten, make perfect sense to me as a parent of three reasonably well adjusted, happy and successful college students. They also gel with my exposure to the literature and my experiences guiding parents within my professional capacity as a child psychologist over the last 16 years. Here is an excerpt from the article:
“Here are 10 competencies that predict good parenting outcomes, listed roughly in order from most to least important. The skills – all derived from published studies – were ranked based on how well they predict a strong parent-child bond and children’s happiness, health and success.
Love and affection. You support and accept the child, are physically affectionate, and spend quality one-on-one time together.
Stress management. You take steps to reduce stress for yourself and your child, practice relaxations techniques and promote positive interpretations of events.
Relationship skills. You maintain a healthy relationship with your spouse, significant other or co-parent and model effective relationship skills with other people.
Autonomy and independence. You treat your child with respect and encourage him or her to become self-sufficient and self-reliant.
Education and learning. You promote and model learning and provide educational opportunities for your child.
Life skills. You provide for your child, have a steady income and plan for the future.
Behavior Management. You make extensive use of positive reinforcement and punish only after other methods of managing behavior have failed.
Health. You model a healthy lifestyle and good habits, such as regular exercise and proper nutrition, for your child.
Religion. You support spiritual or religious development and participate in spiritual or religious activities.
Safety. You take precautions to protect your child and maintain awareness of the child’s activities and friends.“
Although you may not find these results all that surprising, Epstein suggests that they are because if you look closely at the list you’ll see that the vast majority of the skills are parental personality and/or life skill issues. As this study suggests, a child’s well-being, it seems, is most closely associated with how a parent treats oneself (e.g., manages stress and maintains a healthy diet and exercise regimen), how one gets along with the co-parent (e.g., maintains and models important healthy relationships), as well as the efficacy of one’s life skills (e.g., sustains income and plans for the future), and how deeply one values education.
These “skills” constitute a full 50% of the list and when weighted, based on the degree of association, likely account for a huge and disproportionate amount of the influence on child happiness, health, and adaptive functioning outcomes. And several of the other “skills” (e.g., affection, respect for the dignity of children, degree of parental control imposed, and even level of spirituality) really are behaviors that are known to vary associated with one other crucial, yet unmentioned variable.
You see, the presumption here is that children are brought into the world as malleable blank slates that we can mold through the type of parenting we employ. The reality is that parents who employ these skills likely do so as a function of their intelligence and personality, which are heavily influenced by their genes. The truth of the matter is likely that children whose parents care for themselves, have good social skills, and plan for the future will have happier, healthier, and wiser children, but not because of the parenting skills employed during their upbringing, but because of their shared genes. Epstein did not control for the effect of shared genes in this study. And neither have most of the researchers looking at the relationship between parenting behavior and children outcomes (Pinker, 2002). The current research from behavioral genetics suggests that the home environment, as it is influenced by parents, accounts for 0 to 10% of the variance in the wellness outcomes of children! Heredity accounts for about 50% and the child’s peer group accounts for the remainder (40-50%) (Pinker, 2002).
Epstein asks what parental characteristics are associated with good outcomes and finds that women produce only slightly better outcomes then men. Likewise they found that married individuals produce slightly happier children then divorced parents. Gay individuals actually report slightly happier children then do straight individuals. And no differences were noted associated with race or ethnicity, but more educated individuals had the best outcomes. He notes that “Some people just seem to have a knack for parenting, which cannot be easily described in terms of specific skills.” He’s got that right! That knack, although unacknowledged by Epstein, is largely a function of one’s genes. Temperament is a personality trait that we know is hugely influenced by genes and Epstein notes that “Keeping calm is probably step one in good parenting.”
So we have another conundrum. We are lead to believe, based on the results of this study, that we, as parents, can shape our children, and thus by engaging in The Parent’s Ten, produce happier, healthier, and wiser children. But can we really? Is there an illusion of cause here? Are these simply correlations? The findings of behavioral genetics would suggest that this is an illusion – that these variables vary in predictable ways based on the influence of a third variable – genes.
Next week I’ll delve into this notion of whether how one parents really matters. This exploration comes with significant discomfort for me as I am a behavioral child psychologist with 11 years of training and 16 years of practice steeped in the belief that I can help parents make a difference in the lives of their children. I have long accepted the notion that the nature-nurture debate is not an either-or issue. I see in my life and practice that outcomes are clearly the result of the influences of both nature and nurture. Regardless, I have held the notion that it is parenting to a large extent, that accounts for a large portion of the nurturing influence. Now I have to look carefully at the evidence, be willing to shed the ideological notion that we are blank slates, and accept the reality of the situation, no matter how hard and contrary they are to my beliefs. This necessitates true intellectual honesty and deep scientific scrutiny.
References:
Epstein, R. (2010). What Makes a Good Parent? Scientific American MIND. November/December 2010. (pgs 46-51).
Are you Happy? What makes you happy? These questions, although seemingly rudimentary, are more difficult to answer than you might think. As it turns out, happiness, as a condition, eludes clear understanding.
Throughout history, mankind has grappled with a definition of this emotion. Perhaps the most meaningful framing of happiness is rooted in the Aristotelian concept of eudaimonia. Eudaimonia suggests that fulfillment comes not from experiencing the feeling of joy, but from living a virtue-based and meaningful life. Central to this notion is an emphasis on being a good person. Others have put forth perhaps equally telling notions. Nietzsche wrote that “the secret of reaping the greatest fruitfulness and greatest enjoyment from life is to live dangerously.” Bertrand Russel noted that “To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.” These latter two concepts acknowledge something important about the reality of happiness that Ayn Rand denied when she wrote that happiness is “a state of non-contradictory joy, joy without penalty or guilt.” (Salerno, 2010).
We all know (I hope) the feeling of happiness. We might surmise that, if given the power to manipulate our circumstances, we would be able to effectively engineer our world in a way that would guarantee this desirable state. But, as it turns out, as Nietzsche and Russel suggest, happiness is paradoxical.
We think we know what we want, but the acquisition of one’s desires often fails to live up to expectations and sometimes it brings regret, remorse, guilt, or dissonance. Those situations or items we covet in hopes that they will bring us happiness, come with detractors. Many women for example, desire children. Yet many mothers struggle with the need for fulfillment beyond domestic responsibilities (Salerno, 2010). And these two pursuits often collide in stressful ways. We are it seems, hard wired to pursue some goals that are, by their very nature, contradictory when happiness is concerned.
Life’s most prized aspirations, namely children and wealth, actually do not tend to bolster happiness. When looking at the research on the impact of children on maternal levels of happiness, the conclusions suggest that child rearing has a neutral to negative affect on quality of life. Positive associations are hard to come by. And although it appears that there is a slight positive relationship between wealth and happiness, there are numerous caveats to this correlation. Lottery winners for example, after the initial excitement of the win end up being no happier or even less contended than they were before the draw. And people in the United States, the richest nation in the world, report overall lower levels of happiness than folks from poorer countries. (Salerno, 2010).
In reality, our daily lives are comprised of unending battles between opposing objectives. On the one hand, we are drawn to selfish, indulgent, freedom while at the same time we are constrained by altruism, frugality, and commitment (Salerno, 2010). We can’t have it both ways and this conundrum often leaves us conflicted. After all, if we all were to pursue or own selfish interests we would have a highly dysfunctional, disjointed, and even dangerous society. The drive for social cohesion and the necessary restraint have deep evolutionary and strongly compelling roots. And then there is the drive to build social status through material acquisition or conspicuous consumption. This pursuit is really a zero sum game. Whatever you accumulate, there are many others that have bigger and better houses, cars, and jewels. It is all quite complicated and we are a curious lot. We want happiness, yet often what we aspire to, diminishes our happiness. I am reminded of the proverb: “Be careful of what you wish for. You just might get it.” What we want and what really brings happiness are often opposing forces or at least likely to stir conflict. This seems to be especially true with regard to deeper, genetically driven, intuitive drives (e.g., procreation and status building).
A similar paradox plays out in society where it is need, or misery, that catalyzes advancement. To paraphrase Plato: Necessity is the mother of invention. We prosper through innovation, creativity, and achievement: all of which, to some degree, stem from discontent (Salerno, 2010). Sociologists Allan Horowitz and Jerome Wakefield suggest in their book, The Loss of Sadness, that sadness has a clear evolutionary purpose – essentially to propel adaptation. Daniel Gilbert (2006), a happiness guru from Harvard University once wrote that “We have a word for animals that never feel distress, anxiety, fear, and pain. That word is dinner.” It seems that contentedness fosters passivity and stagnation. For example, college students who score very high on measures of happiness rarely have correspondingly high GPAs. And the perkiest adults among us tend to make less money than their more even-keeled colleagues. (Salerno, 2010). I refer to yet another paradox in “Adversity: Had Enough?” where I shared research that contends that happiness is strongest in those that have experienced two to four adverse life events. Moderate amounts of adversity seem to bolster one’s capacity to tolerate and cope with future stressors and elevate one’s general level of contentedness (Seery, 2010). One might assume, that smooth sailing brings happiness, but as it turns out, this is not quite true. And a newly released study from Harvard University suggests that lower levels of happiness are associated with mind-wandering (Killingsworth, 2010). I discussed this in Multitasking: The Illusion of Efficacy, where I suggested that the mantra of FOCUS & FINISH will result in more efficiency (Nass, 2010), but as it turns out, it may also bring one a better mood.
Okay, so what brings people true happiness? There are general circumstances that appear to be associated with higher overall levels of happiness. For example married people tend to be happier than singles, church goers happier than atheists, and people with friends tend to be happier than the insular (Salerno, 2010). Recent findings suggest that people in their 50s are happier than those in their 20s (Stone, 2010).
To me happiness has to do with how you frame it and mostly about your expectations. It is helpful to think of life as a transient series of states dappled with moments of joy. It is unrealistic to expect a chronic state of bliss. We are much too inclined to misery to ever accomplish this. And this brings me to perhaps my greatest offering:
Misery exists in the gap
between expectations and reality.
Think about it. I am suggesting that a flexible and open minded focus on the world and the realities of its constraints will help you avoid misery. The most miserable people I know have the most rigid expectations about life, about others behavior, about rules, about fairness, and about shoulds. We have a concept in psychology called the tyranny of the shoulds (coined by Karen Horney) whereby one’s expectations that things should go a certain way, result in subsequent neuroses. This is often true it seems because generally our expectations are unrealistic. The more rigid and prolific one is with regard to expectations, the more likely they are to be slapped down by reality. These folks are consistently victimized by life.
Happiness I contend is a multidimensional construct. In part, it is an absence of misery. But that doesn’t tell us what it is. Perhaps Charles Shultz had it right when he said “Happiness is a warm puppy.” In reality we have to accept that it is paradoxical and that pursuit of it is a personal responsibility. This latter fact is a stressor for many (Salerno, 2010). I myself get joy from shared moments of close interpersonal intimacy, from adventure, from persevering on challenging tasks, from increased understanding of the world around me, and from the contributions I make toward the betterment of other people’s lives. I am happy because I make a difference, because I choose to include adventure in my life, and because I am very fortunate to live in this time and place where I am relatively well off (although not wealthy) and loved.
Ophir, E., Nass, C., & Wagner, A. D. (2009). Cognitive Control in Media Multitaskers.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. v. 106, no. 37. http://www.pnas.org/content/106/37/15583
Seery, M. D., Holman, E. A., & Silver, R. C. (2010, October 11). Whatever Does Not Kill Us: Cumulative Lifetime Adversity, Vulnerability, and Resilience.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1037/a0021344
Are you as perplexed as I regarding the acrimony in American Politics? The rift is peppered with claims of amorality and threats of calamity. It’s almost as if the opposing parties come from entirely different realities. Perhaps they do. I have gained some insight into the liberal-conservative divide thanks to Jonathon Haidt’s work, particularly his Moral Foundations Theory.
Haidt contends that the political divide itself boils down to five universal and transcendent morals held to varying degrees by individuals across all cultures and civilizations. He demonstrated how these moral values group in predictable ways. In particular, he has identified two dichotomous groupings that had been previously discussed respectively by John Stuart Mill and Emile Durkheim.
Haidt describes the first cluster as the Individualizing Foundation, where the emphasis of one’s moral imperative is on the rights and welfare of all individuals. Features of this foundation include “widespread human concern about caring, nurturing, and protecting vulnerable individuals from harm” (Haidt, 2009). The second cluster of values is referred to as the Binding Foundation, which weighs more heavily moral issues that increase social cohesiveness and social order. Rather than focusing on individual equality and personal rights, the emphasis of the Binding Foundation is on loyalty, obedience, duty, self-restraint, respect of authority, piety, self-sacrifice for the group, vigilance for traitors or free-loaders, and orderly cultural boundaries.
Haidt noted that liberals value above all the Individualizing Foundation and hold a relative devaluation of the Binding Foundation. Conservatives, on the other hand, tend to hold the Binding Foundation as being of equal relative importance as the Individualizing Foundations. This conceptualization helped me understand why less affluent conservatives support the Republican agenda regardless of the negative economic impact that such support bestows upon them. They vote based on values that resonate with them. It also helps explain how people at each extreme can take a stand that they contend is morally superior while their adversaries are viewed as being unprincipled and amoral. The reality is that each perspective stems from a position of deeply held principles.
I recently finished reading Steven Pinker’s book entitled The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature. Rather than looking at this political divide in terms of morality, Pinker frames it in terms of divergent views of human nature. Underlying this political divide is a deeper and more rancorous debate about what defines human nature. This issue is as old as civilization itself and was, for example, evident in the divergent lifestyles of the conflicted Greek City States of Athens and Sparta. Pinker contends that the political divide really comes down to how individuals attribute the motives and behaviors of people in general. It is a very basic question of how one views the human race and what drives human behavior.
Pinker takes a stand against the commonly held notion that human nature is a blank slate shaped exclusively through environmental circumstances influenced by economic, political, and social forces. The notion of a blank slate concedes social determinism, which is a position that is favored by liberals. Evolutionary biology and cognitive neuroscience bring to the table substantial evidence that suggests that there are indeed genetic or biological determinants of behavior. Accepting this reality comes with the dreadful reality that such notions guided the eugenics movement that resulted in the holocaust (and other horrible crimes of humanity).
As it turns out, political attitudes, for example, are largely, although not entirely, determined by heredity. Pinker quotes a study of political attitudes among identical twins reared apart where the correlation coefficient was .62. This suggests that genetics accounts for 38% of the determination of political attitude. Such a notion is sacrilege to those on the left. It is deeply disturbing for me, as one who leans heavily to the left on political issues, to learn that my inclinations to accept the findings of these increasingly powerful sciences at some level, distances me from other liberal thinkers. How can this be?
You see, liberals emanate from the sociological tradition that holds the position that society “is a cohesive organic entity and its individuals are mere parts. People are thought to be social by their very nature and to function as constituents of a larger superorganism” (Pinker, 2002 p. 284). On the other hand, conservatives tend to hold the belief that “society is an arrangement negotiated by rational, self-interested individuals. Society emerges when people agree to sacrifice some of their autonomy in exchange for security from the depredations of others wielding their own autonomy” (Pinker, 2002 p. 285).
The modern theory of evolution aligns best with the latter economic contract paradigm, where natural selection results in complex individual adaptations benefiting individuals rather than the species or community. This theory holds that “all societies – animal and human – seethe with conflicts of interest and are held together by shifting mixtures of dominance and cooperation” and that “reciprocal altruism, in particular, is just the traditional concept of the social contract restated in biological terms” (Pinker, 2002 p. 285). To make this dichotomy more clear it might help to think of the sociological tradition as being consistent with Marxist thinking while the social contract is more consistent with Milton Friedman’s free-market conservatism.
At the core of these paradigms are very different conceptualizations of human nature. Thomas Sowell has captured this dichotomy in his book A Conflict of Visions where he delineates those visions as being either constrained or unconstrained. Pinker adapted these labels to be more descriptive and thus refers to them respectively as Tragic (a term Sowell later adopted) and Utopian. These visions refer to the “perfectibility of man” whereas the Tragic Vision holds that “humans are inherently limited in knowledge, wisdom, and virtue” and that as a result “all social arrangements must acknowledge those limits.” This pessimistic view of human nature, is steeped in biological determinism and the acknowledgment of self interested motives. The liberal or Utopian View contends that “psychological limitations are artifacts that come from our social arrangements.” It is believed that economic deprivation elicits social depravity and that social engineering can eradicate the ills of society.
Sowell and Pinker suggest that these very visions of human nature shape the belief mechanisms or morals that result in divergent social policies. For example, people who hold the Tragic Vision are more likely to support a strong military because of an inherent human selfishness and the inclination to compete for resources. They are more likely to value religion, tough criminal sentences, strong policing, and judicial restraint because people need to be constrained in order to maintain an orderly and cohesive society. Likewise, because of this pessimistic view of human nature, people inclined to hold such a view are likely to be censorious, meritocratic, pragmatic, and pro business.
People holding the Utopian View are likely to be idealistic, egalitarian, pacifistic, secularist, and more likely to tolerate homosexuality, to be in favor of the rehabilitation of criminals, judicial activism, generous social welfare programs, and affirmative action. They are also more likely to be environmentalists. Pinker’s contention is that all these values, more or less, are heritable and that as a result, people are likely to hold them as self defining. Subsequently, these beliefs are typically not amenable or susceptible to change because they are often held without a rationally based understanding of them. Such deeply held (intuitive) and heritable attitudes quickly spark emotional responses when challenged and people do not move away from such notions even when reason compels them to do so.
So it seems, at the core of the contentious political divide there are discrepant realities pertaining to the very essence of what it is to be a human being. And that essence is evolving regardless of the ideologies that shape the political climate. Perhaps we can escape the gridlock by acknowledging the disconnect between ideology and reality and embrace a truer essence of humanity. That reality, it seems, is a blend of the Tragic and Utopian Visions where human behavior is guided by both social and biological determinants. Reality, as it turns out, is often queerer than one can suppose.
Breaking the chains of ideology necessarily involves abandoning and overpowering intuition, which is itself, a formidable task. But social morays have evolved over time as we have gained deeper insight into humankind. Lets hope for continued evolution!
I have long suspected that a certain amount of adversity in life ultimately leads to greater degrees of happiness. This is contrary to the commonly held notion that suggests that traumatic stress is inherently harmful. It can be argued, as Friedrich Nietzsche once said, “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” I’m in sync with Nietzsche here: hard times build resilience and help one appreciate the better times with deeper enthusiasm. A recent Scientific American Podcast indicated that I might just be right. In Adversity Is Linked to Life Satisfaction, Christie Nicholson reviews the results of a multiyear study by Mark Seery, Alison Holman, and Roxane Cohen Silver that was just published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Using a national survey panel consisting of 2,398 subjects who were assessed on multiple occasions over a four year period, the authors tested for “…relationships between lifetime adversity and a variety of longitudinal measures of mental health and well-being: global distress, functional impairment, posttraumatic stress symptoms, and life satisfaction.” In their analysis of the data they found that:
“people with a history of some lifetime adversity reported better mental health and well-being outcomes than not only people with a high history of adversity but also than people with no history of adversity.”
For the purposes of this study adversity included: “own illness or injury, loved one’s illness or injury, violence (e.g., physical assault, forced sexual relations), bereavement (e.g., parent’s death), social/environmental stress (e.g., serious financial difficulties, lived in dangerous housing); relationship stress (e.g., parents’ divorce); and disaster (e.g., major fire, flood, earthquake, or other community disaster).” It is important to note that adverse events were measured using a frequency count rather than any qualitative analysis of degree of adversity.
The implications one might draw from these findings is that without at least some adversity, individuals do not learn through experience how to manage stress; therefore, “the toughness and mastery they might otherwise generate remains undeveloped.” Overwhelming levels of adversity, are more likely to exceed one’s capacity to manage stress, and thereby impede toughness and mastery. The authors are careful to note that these data are correlative and as such do not establish causation, but they contend that moderate exposure to lifetime adversity may contribute to the development of resilience.
So, it seems, as Nicholson notes:
“… there’s a sweet spot, where a certain amount of struggle is good and produces a toughness and sense of control over one’s life, but anything above or below that amount is correlated with the inverse: Distress, anxiety, and feelings of being overwhelmed.”
You might ask “Where is this Goldilocks Zone?” At what quantity does adversity benefit one’s life perspective and where does it cross a line? Seery et al., acknowledged that it is impossible to pin point the exact parameters of such a sweet spot, but that the data suggests that around two to four adverse events may sufficiently enhance one’s capacity to sustain happiness and tolerate stress. However, and this is important to note, They do not recommend engineering disasters for those who have been “fortunate” enough to escape adversity.
This research reminded me of a story by an unknown author that my mother sent me a few years back. I’m guessing that it has made the rounds on the internet. Regardless, and despite the melodrama, it seems relevant here. What is cogent here is the notion of just enough.
I Wish You Enough
At an airport I overheard a father and daughter in their last moments together. They had announced her plane’s departure and standing near the door, he said to his daughter,
“I love you, I wish you enough.”
She said, “Daddy, our life together has been more than enough. Your love is all I ever needed. I wish you enough, too, Daddy.”
They kissed good-bye and she left.
He walked over toward the window where I was seated. Standing there I could see he wanted and needed to cry. I tried not to intrude on his privacy, but he welcomed me in by asking, “Did you ever say good-bye to someone knowing it would be forever?”
“Yes, I have,” I replied. Saying that brought back memories I had of expressing my love and appreciation for all my Dad had done for me. Recognizing that his days were limited, I took the time to tell him face to face how much he meant to me.
So I knew what this man was experiencing.
“Forgive me for asking, but why is this a forever good-bye?” I asked.
“I am old and she lives much too far away. I have challenges ahead and
the reality is, her next trip back will be for my funeral, ” he said.
“When you were saying good-bye I heard you say, ‘I wish you enough.’
May I ask what that means?” He began to smile. “That’s a wish that has been handed down from other generations. My parents used to say it to everyone.”
He paused for a moment and looking up as if trying to remember it in detail, he smiled even more. “When we said ‘I wish you enough,’ we were wanting the other person to have a life filled with enough good things to sustain them,” he continued and then turning toward me he shared the following as if he were reciting it from memory.
“I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright.
I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun more.
I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive.
I wish you enough pain so that the smallest joys in life appear much bigger.
I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.
I wish enough “Hello’s” to get you through the final “Good-bye.”
I don’t suppose that it is a reach to suggest that exposure to small inconveniences such as rain or pain will likewise help you be more appreciative of sunshine and comfort. After all, we as humans tend to quickly habituate to smooth roads. Without a few potholes, we tend to take unbroken roads for granted. But, the adversity study is suggesting more than this. Its about developing resilience or reparative mechanisms that help us cope with future stressors. This is referred to as adversarial growth, of which, I wish you enough.
References:
Nicholson, C. (2010). Adversity Is Linked to Life Satisfaction. Scientific American Podcast. http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=adversity-is-linked-to-life-satista-10-10-16
Seery, M. D., Holman, E. A., & Silver, R. C. (2010, October 11). Whatever Does Not Kill Us:
Cumulative Lifetime Adversity, Vulnerability, and Resilience. Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1037/a0021344
