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The Truth of “Work Hard, Play Hard”

The Truth of “Work Hard, Play Hard”

by | 2022 Jun 22 | Public, Quick Hits

Quick Hits
Daily brief research updates from the cognitive sciences

work play office brain motivation

We all know the phrase “work hard, play hard” and this drew my attention when I stumbled across some research actually looking into this – and whether this is a good thing or bad thing. There is after all a counter argument to this the “burn the candle at both ends” argument whereby doing too much, and too many different things, leads to a rapid deterioration.

Lonnie Anderson and Laura Crimi of Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada decided to investigate the relationship between these motivations and published their results in 2016. They asked 1’400 participants about their age, gender, religious, and cultural background. They then asked about their attraction to religion, parenthood, accomplishment (or fame), and recreation.

What did they find?

The correlations were interesting for a number of reasons. There was a correlation between most of the factors. This suggests that higher motivation in general leads to higher desire and application in all areas. This is something we have seen at leading brains with our data into high performers in the workplace. They seem to have higher motivation in everything.

What they did find in addition, however, was three clear groupings of individuals:

  • Those that were apathetic and had lower motivation in all areas
  • Those that were “community” based – attracted to religion and family
  • Those that were go-getters attracted to achievement, family, and leisure

This is interesting because this in part matches our internal data we have collected at leading brain but suggests that those high on achievement are attracted to multiple different forms of this but also leisure in general not to mention family.

Aarssen and Crimi assigned this to mortality salience i.e. by being highly engaged this distracts form confronting your own mortality. However, I disagree, based my in-depth work and analysis of the brain and motivation, and I see these as natural high activation and motivation patterns which then tends to manifest in different areas in life. We saw in our data that those high on motivation generally had high motivation in everything.

It’s likely to stay relatively stable over life – but that will be for another piece of research. And I see that Aarssen has not published anything else on this vein – maybe that’s something for me then!

But this suggests that work hard and play hard is more of personality trait than good advice. Those who are highly motivated are highly motivated in both work and leisure aspects●

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Andy Habermacher

Andy Habermacher

Andy is author of leading brains Review, Neuroleadership, and multiple other books. He has been intensively involved in writing and research into neuroleadership and is considered one of Europe’s leading experts. He is also a well-known public speaker speaking on the brain and human behaviour.

Andy is also a masters athlete (middle distance running) and competes regularly at international competitions (and holds a few national records in his age category).

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Reference

Lonnie W. Aarssen, Laura Crimi. 
Legacy, Leisure and the ‘Work Hard – Play Hard’ Hypothesis. 
The Open Psychology Journal, 2016; 9 (1): 7
DOI: 10.2174/1874350101609010007

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Coffee Makes Business Teams More Effective

Coffee Makes Business Teams More Effective

by | 2022 Jun 21 | Public, Quick Hits

Quick Hits
Daily brief research updates from the cognitive sciences

Positive team coffee break

I just couldn’t resist reviewing this piece of research, from a few years ago, after I stumbled across this (likely because some background algorithm had recommended it to me based on my other Quick Hit yesterday on caffeine). And no, I do not have any financial interests in the coffee industry.

So how on earth and in what way can coffee make teams in business more effective?

The researchers at Ohio State University conducted two experiments in the guise of a coffee tasting experiment complemented with a discussion with undergraduates. The caffeinated coffee was given before or after a discussion task that had been assigned, or supplemented with decaffeinated coffee.

What happened?

In the first experiment they found that those who had had caffeinated coffee rated themselves and others in their discussion group more positively. This points to higher team cohesion and satisfaction with the team and, at least, subjective better “performance”. This seemed to be due to alertness because their self-ratings on alertness were higher than those who didn’t drink coffee in advance.

Of more interest is that an analysis of the group discussion showed that those who had drunk caffeinated coffee talked more, which may be good or bad, but they also stayed on topic more, which is definitely good.

This therefore suggest that caffeinated coffee

  • Increases team positivity
  • Increases team performance ratings
  • Increase communication
  • And increases time on task

All too good to be true?

Well, it would need to be followed up. Maybe time of day would make a difference, or the same effect could be achieved with other stimulants. However, as the research has shifted over the years to seeing the benefits of coffee, maybe a good cup of coffee would be more than beneficial for your next team meeting.

Investing in a quality coffee machine also●

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Andy Habermacher

Andy Habermacher

Andy is author of leading brains Review, Neuroleadership, and multiple other books. He has been intensively involved in writing and research into neuroleadership and is considered one of Europe’s leading experts. He is also a well-known public speaker speaking on the brain and human behaviour.

Andy is also a masters athlete (middle distance running) and competes regularly at international competitions (and holds a few national records in his age category).

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Reference

Vasu Unnava, Amit Surendra Singh, H. Rao Unnava. 
Coffee with co-workers: role of caffeine on evaluations of the self and others in group settings. 
Journal of Psychopharmacology, 2018; 026988111876066
DOI: 10.1177/0269881118760665

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Caffeine Makes You More Prone to Impulsive Buying

Caffeine Makes You More Prone to Impulsive Buying

by | 2022 Jun 20 | Public, Quick Hits

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Daily brief research updates from the cognitive sciences

A fascinating piece of research just published shows that drinking coffee makes you more impulsive. That means you are likely to buy more, and more items you actually don’t need.

 What is astounding though, is that the effect sizes in this study was dramatic to say the least.

What did these researchers at the University of South Florida find?

They set up a complimentary coffee stand at a store and then offered shoppers complimentary coffee. But only half received caffeinated coffee with the other half receiving decaffeinated coffee. 300 of these people then shared their receipts with the researchers.

The found that those who had drank the caffeinated coffee spent 50% more on average and 30% more items. This figure is exceptionally high. Also suggesting that these individuals probably had no strict budget restraints.

The analysis also showed that those caffeinated shoppers also bought more non-essential items. However, this was not a controlled lab experiment, so the researchers also conducted a lab-based experiment whereby 200 participants then selected what they wanted to buy from a preselected list of 66 items. Again, after drinking caffeinated coffee or decaffeinated coffee or a non-caffeine drink such as water.

The again found that those who had drunk the caffeinated coffee picked more items that could be considered impulsive purchases i.e. non-essential items.

Why?

The effect sizes are so large I would certainly like to see more follow studies on this. However, the group sizes should be large enough to weed out any fluke irregularities. The researchers noted that caffeine is a stimulant and also actives various energizing and feel-good pathways in the brain notably the dopamine network. This can lead to a higher energetic state but also more impulsiveness and lower self-control.

So mental note: before going shopping, keep off the coffee●

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Andy Habermacher

Andy Habermacher

Andy is author of leading brains Review, Neuroleadership, and multiple other books. He has been intensively involved in writing and research into neuroleadership and is considered one of Europe’s leading experts. He is also a well-known public speaker speaking on the brain and human behaviour.

Andy is also a masters athlete (middle distance running) and competes regularly at international competitions (and holds a few national records in his age category).

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Reference

Dipayan Biswas, Patrick Hartmann, Martin Eisend, Courtney Szocs, Bruna Jochims, Vanessa Apaolaza, Erik Hermann, Cristina M. López, Adilson Borges. 
EXPRESS: Caffeine’s Effects on Consumer Spending. 
Journal of Marketing, 2022; 002224292211092
DOI: 10.1177/00222429221109247

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Healthy Brains Are Hotter Than You Think

Healthy Brains Are Hotter Than You Think

by | 2022 Jun 17 | Public, Quick Hits

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Daily brief research updates from the cognitive sciences

healthy brain

When we get sick we get a fever and we all know what our body temperature should be: around 37°C. Too much above that and we have a fever, and too much below and we risk undercooling.

What is the optimal temperature of the brain? We might assume that it is going to be around body temperature – after all internal temperature is precisely what we measure with thermometers. But the answer is we haven’t really known.

Researchers have measured brain temperature but often in patients undergoing surgery. New techniques have enabled more precise temperature measurements. However, there has been little done to measure the temperature over the course of a day and across demographics.

A group of researchers from Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory for Molecular Biology, in Cambridge has a led a large study to get a better grip on this with surprising results.

The Surprising Results

The surprising results are that average brain temperature was a hot 38.5°C enough to be classed as a fever in other parts. More surprising is that temperature in some regions at some times of day reached much higher temperatures with the highest measured as 40.9° – this would normally be considered a critical and dangerous fever!

These temperatures, however, vary by about 1°C over the day with warmest temperatures in the afternoon and coolest at night (unsurprising).

Variation is Critical

The more surprising insight was, however, in measuring temperatures of those in intensive care units. Here brain temperatures varied very strongly from a downright frigid 32.6°C to a scorching 42.6°C – this may be unsurprising, they were after all in critical conditions. But more surprising was that daily fluctuation of brain temperature in individuals predicted outcomes. Only 4% of those who had brain temperature fluctuations die whereas 27% of those without brain temperature fluctuation did.

Women Have Warmer Brains

That sound like an oversimplified statement and it is. But they did note that, in this study, women had average brain temperatures 0.4% higher. They also note that as one ages brain temperature also increases. This may be part of  a natural ageing process.

 

So, all in, the brain seems to be a special organ with a, on average, higher temperature than other organs in the body – why this is so is open to speculation. This temperature varies between time of day, age, and sex, and daily temperature fluctuation seems to be a healthy indicator.

Thinking about that makes my brain feels like it’s running hot – I hope that’s a good sign●

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Andy Habermacher

Andy Habermacher

Andy is author of leading brains Review, Neuroleadership, and multiple other books. He has been intensively involved in writing and research into neuroleadership and is considered one of Europe’s leading experts. He is also a well-known public speaker speaking on the brain and human behaviour.

Andy is also a masters athlete (middle distance running) and competes regularly at international competitions (and holds a few national records in his age category).

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Reference

Nina M Rzechorzek, Michael J Thrippleton, Francesca M Chappell, et al.
A daily temperature rhythm in the human brain predicts survival after brain injury.
Brain, 2022
DOI: 10.1093/brain/awab466

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Unpredictable Parents Disrupt Brain Circuitry in Children

Unpredictable Parents Disrupt Brain Circuitry in Children

by | 2022 Jun 16 | Public, Quick Hits

Quick Hits
Daily brief research updates from the cognitive sciences

baby brain

Intuitively we all know that good parenting is essential to kids’ healthy development. We all agree on that. But as soon as we try to define what good parenting is we then enter into controversial territory with diverging opinions, multiple lines of differing research, and some of the world’s best-selling books. In the USA the legendary Dr Spock’s “The Common Sense Book of Child and Childcare” still ranks as one of the best-selling books of all time.

However, research has slowly built up a solid base of what it needs to bring up children.  The “all you need is love” philosophy proving to be extremely robust. Research into various animal models shows that offspring who receive more care developed better but also research into the brain shows that the brain responds by building more connections, and having healthier, or better formed, brain cell populations and networks.

I have written about the dramatic impacts on upbringing, which are particularly obvious when conditions are dire. So, the research is painting a clearer picture here. But this latest piece of research out gives us a clue to something else that seems to be critical – and many may already have worked out and intuited.

What is this?

It is about predictability or consistency of parenting. And in particular the focus on this study was on how this impacts brain circuits.

What did they find?

The researchers at the University of California Irvine compared brains of offspring in mice that were put into maternal care situations which had the same level of care but in one group the maternal behaviour was less predictable.
They found that this impacted the maturing brain at critical nodes impacting connectivity in key regulatory and emotional circuit nodes. This suggests that unpredictable parenting is associated with deficits in emotional control and behaviours. That’s really important to know.

 

This shows that care itself is not enough. Love and care is very good, but predictably seems to be something that is essential for healthy brain development. Something that is present in our SCOAP model with the “O” standing for Orientation which includes having a clear understanding of the world around us and this is clearly strongly formed in the developing brain by predictability of parents.

But I wouldn’t put this down to just parenting – predictability and consistency in behaviour is just as important in business as it is parenting. But if you brain hasn’t developed healthily in the first place, then it may be too late●

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Andy Habermacher

Andy Habermacher

Andy is author of leading brains Review, Neuroleadership, and multiple other books. He has been intensively involved in writing and research into neuroleadership and is considered one of Europe’s leading experts. He is also a well-known public speaker speaking on the brain and human behaviour.

Andy is also a masters athlete (middle distance running) and competes regularly at international competitions (and holds a few national records in his age category).

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Reference

Matthew T. Birnie, Tallie Z. Baram. 
Principles of emotional brain circuit maturation. 
Science, 2022; 376 (6597): 1055
DOI: 10.1126/science.abn4016

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A New Study on Inter-Brain Synchronisation

A New Study on Inter-Brain Synchronisation

by | 2022 Jun 15 | Public, Quick Hits

Quick Hits
Daily brief research updates from the cognitive sciences

heads brains thinking

In case you didn’t know it brain synchronisation (or inter-brain synchronisation) is a thing. And a pretty cool thing. This happens when two, or more, people do similar things together and their brains sync up meaning that the firing patterns become very similar to each other.

This means that that feeling of being on the same wavelength is a feeling for the very good reason that you actually are on the same wavelength. I have written in more detail about this effect, which is important, because it also predicts many things. For example, when solving business types of tasks, brain synchronisation predicts how effectively a team will operate together. And also, how well they solve problems together. Similarly in audiences at concerts brain synchronisation predicts how well they enjoy it.

We could assume that this is related to how similar we are – with similar experiences and attitudes we are most likely to have brain synchronisation, but this piece of research shows that babies and adults playing together also show strong brain synchronisation.

Researchers at Princeton University set up the first experiment of this kind. It must be noted that measuring inter-brain synchrony is hard at the best of times due to its complexities i.e. measuring multiple brains and matching timing precisely. They managed by recruiting 42 children and using a technology called functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) which measure blood flow similar to those pretty scans we often see.

However, 18 were too fidgety to give good readings and 3 flat out refused to wear the cap for measurement. That left 18 recordings.

Of interest is that in this study the same adult played with each child. Each child engaged in two scenarios: one playing with the adult, and another interacting with a parent while the other adult spoke to another person.

While the adult and child were playing brain synchronisation ramped up showing that similar processes were happening in their brains despite the large differences in age.

So, there you have it: parents when you play with your children you are getting on the same wavelength, and I am sure that is good for you.

For you business folk this is not just a random study, because inter-brain synchronisation is important for high performance in teams in business.

Here’s to syncing up!

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Andy Habermacher

Andy Habermacher

Andy is author of leading brains Review, Neuroleadership, and multiple other books. He has been intensively involved in writing and research into neuroleadership and is considered one of Europe’s leading experts. He is also a well-known public speaker speaking on the brain and human behaviour.

Andy is also a masters athlete (middle distance running) and competes regularly at international competitions (and holds a few national records in his age category).

twitter / LinkedIn

Reference

Elise A. Piazza, Liat Hasenfratz, Uri Hasson, Casey Lew-Williams. 
Infant and Adult Brains Are Coupled to the Dynamics of Natural Communication. 
Psychological Science, 2019; 095679761987869
DOI: 10.1177/0956797619878698

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