Our team includes Laura Kwerel, Adhiti Bandlamudi and our supervising producer Tara Boyle. Read the episode transcript. We'll be back momentarily. This week, in the final installment of our Happiness 2.0 series, psychologist Dacher Keltner describes what happens when we stop to savor the beauty in nature, art, or simply the moral courage of those around us. If you are able, we strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which includes emotion and emphasis that's not on the page. This week, in the second installment of our Happiness 2.0 series, psychologist Todd Kashdan looks at the relationship between distress and happiness, and ho, Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. Sometimes, life can feel like being stuck on a treadmill. But is that true when it comes to the pursuit of happiness? In this favorite episode from 2021, Cornell University psychologist Anthony Burrow explains why purpose isnt something to be found its somethi, It's natural to want to run away from difficult emotions such as grief, anger and fear. But it is a completely crucial part of the human experience. BORODITSKY: Well, you would be at sea at first. Each generation hears things and interprets things slightly differently from the previous one. Additional Resources Book: But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy that's all around us. They are ways of seeing the world. Please do not republish our logo, name or content digitally or distribute to more than 10 people without written permission. Many of us rush through our lives, chasing goals and just trying to get everything done. In the United States, we often praise people with strong convictions, and look down on those who express doubt or hesitation. MCWHORTER: Thank you for having me, Shankar. It's not necessarily may I please have, but may I have, I'll have, but not can I get a. I find it just vulgar for reasons that as you can see I can't even do what I would call defending. And one thing that we've noticed is that around the world, people rely on space to organize time. Copyright 2018 NPR. al (Eds. This takes kids a little while to figure out, and he had all kinds of clever ways to ask these questions. And if you teach them that forks go with women, they start to think that forks are more feminine. This week, we continue our look at the science of influence with psychologist Robert Cialdini, and explore how these techniques can be used for both good and evil. That's what it's all about. That's because change is hard. VEDANTAM: If you have teenagers or work closely with young people, chances are you'll be mystified by their conversations or even annoyed. They often feel angry about it, and you think this anger is actually telling. I'm Shankar Vedantam. out. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? (LAUGHTER) VEDANTAM: In the English-speaking world, she goes by Lera Boroditsky. The categorization that language provides to you becomes real, becomes psychologically real. VEDANTAM: For more HIDDEN BRAIN, you can find us on Facebook and Twitter. And to arrive in a new place where you can't tell a joke and can't express an idea - oh, it's just really painful because you feel like your whole self is hiding inside and no one can see it. Can I get some chicken? BORODITSKY: I spoke really terrible Indonesian at the time, so I was trying to practice. How do certain memes go viral? This is HIDDEN BRAIN. And we looked at every personification and allegory in Artstor and asked, does the language that you speak matter for how you paint death, depending on whether the word death is masculine or feminine in your language? But actually, it's something that's not so hard to learn. Many people have this intuition that, oh, I could never learn that; I could never survive in a community like this. And then if you are going to be that elliptical, why use the casual word get? It seems kind of elliptical, like, would it be possible that I obtained? He's also the author of the book, "Words On The Move: Why English Won't - And Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally).". Athletic Scholarships are Negatively Associated with Intrinsic Motivation for Sports, Even Decades Later: Evidence for Long-Term Undermining, by Kennon M. Sheldon and Arlen C. Moller, Motivation Science, 2020. For example, when we started talking about navigation, that's an example where a 5-year-old in a culture that uses words like north, south, east and west can point southeast without hesitation. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. So the word for the is different for women than for men, and it's also different for forks versus spoons and things like that. A free podcast app for iPhone and Android, Download episodes while on WiFi to listen without using mobile data, Stream podcast episodes without waiting for a download, Queue episodes to create a personal continuous playlist, Web embed players designed to convert visitors to listeners in the RadioPublic apps for iPhone and Android, Capture listener activity with affinity scores, Measure your promotional campaigns and integrate with Google and Facebook analytics, Deliver timely Calls To Action, including email acquistion for your mailing list, Share exactly the right moment in an episode via text, email, and social media, Tip and transfer funds directly to podcastsers, Earn money for qualified plays in the RadioPublic apps with Paid Listens. You can support Hidden Brain indirectly by giving to your local NPR station, or you can provide direct support to Hidden Brain by making a gift on our Patreon page. Of course, you also can't experience anything outside of time. Later things are on the right. Going the Distance on the Pacific Crest Trail: The Vital Role of Identified Motivation, by Kennon M. Sheldon, Motivation Science, 2020. It is a great, free way to engage the podcast community and increase the visibility of your podcasts. BORODITSKY: Yeah. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. Well, if you have a word like that and if it's an intensifier of that kind, you can almost guess that literally is going to come to mean something more like just really. And you can even teach people to have a little bit of fun with the artifice. So for example, for English speakers - people who read from left to right - time tends to flow from left to right. We talk with psychologist Iris Mauss, who explains why happiness can seem more el, When we want something very badly, it can be hard to see warning signs that might be obvious to other people. Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. This is a database with millions of art images. BORODITSKY: Yeah. All episodes of Hidden Brain - Chartable Hidden Brain Episodes Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button Many of us rush through our lives, chasing goals and just trying to get everything done. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. And if people heard the sounds a little differently and produced them a little differently, if there were new meanings of words - very quickly whatever the original meaning was wouldn't be remembered. And it really is an illusion that what language is, is something that sits still. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. So there are some differences that are as big as you can possibly measure. No matter how hard you try to feel happier, you end up back where you started. But it's so hard to feel that partly because our brains are on writing, as I say in the book. If you're a monolingual speaker of one of these languages, you're very likely to say that the word chair is masculine because chairs are, in fact, masculine, right? Rightly Crossing the Rubicon: Evaluating Goal Self-Concordance Prior to Selection Helps People Choose More Intrinsic Goals, by Kennon M. Sheldon, Mike Prentice, and Evgeny Osin, Journal of Research in Personality, 2019. I want everybody to have the fun I'm having. Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. And what's cool about languages, like the languages spoken in Pormpuraaw, is that they don't use words like left and right, and instead, everything is placed in cardinal directions like north, south, east and west. And all of a sudden, I noticed that there was a new window that had popped up in my mind, and it was like a little bird's-eye view of the landscape that I was walking through, and I was a little red dot that was moving across the landscape. "Most of the laughter we produce is purely . UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #3: (Speaking foreign language). You can't smell or taste time. But is that true when it comes to the pursuit of happiness? And they said, well, of course. . Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. VEDANTAM: If you're bilingual or you're learning a new language, you get what Jennifer experienced - the joy of discovering a phrase that helps you perfectly encapsulate a feeling or an experience. He says that buying into false beliefs, in other words, deluding ourselves can . VEDANTAM: If languages are shaped by the way people see the world, but they also shape how people see the world, what does this mean for people who are bilingual? And it irritates people, but there's a different way of seeing literally. So there are these wonderful studies by Alexander Giora where he asked kids learning Finnish, English and Hebrew as their first languages basically, are you a boy or a girl? It's not something that you typically go out trying to do intentionally. VEDANTAM: I want to talk in the second half of our conversation about why the meanings of words change, but I want to start by talking about how they change. So earlier things are on the left. You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around. VEDANTAM: Lera Boroditsky is a cognitive science professor at the University of California, San Diego. Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. It's natural to want to run away from difficult emotions such as grief, anger and fear. MCWHORTER: It's a matter of fashion, pure and simple. I'm Shankar Vedanta. There's a way of speaking right. I saw this bird's-eye view, and I was this little red dot. Language was talk. So some languages don't have number words. This is HIDDEN BRAIN. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #5: (Speaking foreign language). VEDANTAM: John McWhorter, thank you so much for joining me on HIDDEN BRAIN today. He's a defender of language on the move, but I wanted to know if there were things that irritated even him. So they've compared gender equality, gender parity norms from the World Health Organization, which ranks countries on how equal access to education, how equal pay is, how equal representation in government is across the genders. And dead languages never change, and some of us might prefer those. Think back to the last time someone convinced you to do something you didn't want to do, or to spend money you didn't want to spend. I'm . Does Legal Education Have Undermining Effects on Law Students? They shape our place in it. Whats going on here? So LOL starts out as meaning hardy-har-har (ph), but then it becomes something more abstract. But what I am thinking is, you should realize that even if you don't like it, there's nothing wrong with it in the long run because, for example, Jonathan Swift didn't like it that people were saying kissed instead of kiss-ed (ph) and rebuked instead of rebuk-ed (ph). Those are quirks of grammar literally in stone. Perspectives on the Situation by Harry T. Reis, and John G. Holmes, in The Oxford Handbook of Personality and Social Psychology, 2012. VEDANTAM: One of the things I found really interesting is that the evolution of words and language is constant. But is that true when it comes to the pursuit of happiness? Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. For more on decision-making, check out our episode on how to make wiser choices. People do need to be taught what the socially acceptable forms are. Parents and peers influence our major life choices. That kind of detail may not appear. And it's just too much of an effort, and you can't be bothered to do it, even though it's such a small thing. Copyright Hidden Brain Media | Privacy Policy. You can find all Hidden Brain episodes on our website. Which pile do you go in, right? It's inherent. What do you do for christmas with your family? And so I was trying to keep track of which way is which. And to our surprise, 78 percent of the time, we could predict the gender of the personification based on the grammatical gender of the noun in the artist's native language. So when I ask you to, say, imagine a man walking down the street, well, in your imagery, you're going to have some details completed and some will be left out. And there are all kinds of interesting, useful, eye-opening ideas that exist in all of the world's languages. That is utterly arbitrary that those little slits in American society look elderly, but for various chance reasons, that's what those slits came to mean, so I started wearing flat-fronted pants. And then he would take a Polaroid of the kid and say, well, this is you. BORODITSKY: And when they were trying to act like Wednesday, they would act like a woman BORODITSKY: Which accords with grammatical gender in Russian. As you're going about your day, you likely interact with family, friends and coworkers. But somehow they've managed, not just by randomly bumping into each other. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. And nobody wishes that we hadn't developed our modern languages today from the ancient versions. We'll also look at how languages evolve, and why we're sometimes resistant to those changes. And I was telling this person about someone I knew back in America. And it sounds a little bit abrupt and grabby like you're going to get something instead of being given. But it turns out humans can stay oriented really, really well, provided that their language and culture requires them to keep track of this information. Cholera and malnourishment await Somalis fleeing . But things can be important not just because they're big. And so for example, if the word chair is masculine in your language, why is that? Just go to the magnifying glass in the top right corner, click on it, and use the search function at the top of the page. VEDANTAM: You make the case that concerns over the misuse of language might actually be one of the last places where people can publicly express prejudice and class differences. So you can think about an un-gendered person in the same way that I might think about a person without a specific age or specific height or specific color shirt. All of these are very subjective things. But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy thats all around us. Copyright Hidden Brain Media | Privacy Policy, Read the latest from the Hidden Brain Newsletter. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Speaking foreign language). Yes! I think it's a really fascinating question for future research. And the answer should be, north, northeast in the far distance; how about you? Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. In the final episode of our "Mind Reading 2.0" series, we bring back one of our favorite conversations, with linguist Deborah Tannen. Lots of languages make a distinction between things that are accidents and things that are intentional actions. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn helps us map out the unexpected ways we can find joy and happiness in our everyday lives. So it's mendokusai. Refusing to Apologize can have Psychological Benefits, by Tyler Okimoto, Michael Wenzel and Kyli Hedrick, European Journal of Social Psychology, 2013. VEDANTAM: It took just one week of living in Japan for Jennifer to pick up an important, VEDANTAM: There isn't a straightforward translation of this phrase in English. Thank you for helping to keep the podcast database up to date. MCWHORTER: Yes, that's exactly true. And if that is true, then the educated person can look down on people who say Billy and me went to the store or who are using literally, quote, unquote, "wrong" and condemn them in the kinds of terms that once were ordinary for condemning black people or women or what have you. I just don't want to do it. And maybe the convenience store or the shop is really not that far away. And so for me, that question was born in that conversation of are there some languages where it's easier to imagine a person without their characteristics of gender filled in? And this is NPR. Perceived Partner Responsiveness as an Organizing Construct in the Study of Intimacy and Closeness, by Harry T. Reis, et. So for example, grammatical gender - because grammatical gender applies to all nouns in your language, that means that language is shaping the way you think about everything that can be named by a noun. The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. So we did an analysis of images in Artstor. native tongue without even thinking about it. And a girl goes in this pile. We convince a colleague to take a different tactic at work. No matter how hard you try to feel happier, you end up back where you started. Updated privacy policy: We have made some changes to our Privacy Policy. That said, if you hear one or two pieces of music that you really love, feel free to email us at [emailprotected] and well do our best to respond to your request. All rights reserved. Whats going on here? This week on Hidden Brain, we revisit a favorite episode exploring what this culture means Jesse always wanted to fall in love. It goes in this pile. Subscribe to the Hidden Brain Podcast on your favorite podcast player so you never miss an episode. Listen on the Reuters app. You may also use the Hidden Brain name in invitations sent to a small group of personal contacts for such purposes as a listening club or discussion forum. And he started by asking Russian-speaking students to personify days of the week. Learn more. Please note that your continued use of the RadioPublic services following the posting of such changes will be deemed an acceptance of this update. Whats going on here? So I think it's something that is quite easy for humans to learn if you just have a reason to want to do it. Imagine you meet somebody, they're 39 and you take their picture. BORODITSKY: So quite literally, to get past hello, you have to know which way you're heading. But time doesn't have to flow with respect to the body. Today in our Happiness 2.0 series, we revisit a favorite episode from 2020. So in English, I might say that Sam (ph) broke the flute. Evaluating Changes in Motivation, Values, and Well-being, Goal Striving, Need Satisfaction, and Longitudinal Well-being: The Self-Concordance Model, Personal Strivings: An Approach to Personality and Subjective Well-being, Read the latest from the Hidden Brain Newsletter. A brief history of relationship research in social psychology, by Harry T. Reis, in Handbook of the History of Social Psychology, 2011. Lera said there's still a lot of research to be done on this. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. Everyone wants to be loved and appreciated. Perceived Responses to Capitalization Attempts are Influenced by Self-Esteem and Relationship Threat, by Shannon M. Smith & Harry Reis, Personal Relationships, 2012. Purpose can also boost our health and longevity. And you suddenly get a craving for potato chips, and you, realize that you have none in the kitchen, and there's nothing else you really want to, eat. And very competent adults of our culture can't do that. If you're just joining us, I'm talking to John McWhorter. VEDANTAM: My guest today is - well, why don't I let her introduce herself? GEACONE-CRUZ: And you're at home in your pajamas, all nice and cuddly and maybe watching Netflix or something. Trusted by 5,200 companies and developers. VEDANTAM: So I find that I'm often directionally and navigationally challenged when I'm driving around, and I often get my east-west mixed up with my left-right for reasons I have never been able to fathom. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #7: (Speaking foreign language). Something new will have started by then, just like if we listen to people in 1971, they sound odd in that they don't say like as much as we do. So we've done a lot of studies looking at how speakers of Spanish and German and Russian actually think about objects that have opposite grammatical genders. Hidden Brain Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. VEDANTAM: If you're bilingual or you're learning a new language, you get what Jennifer, experienced - the joy of discovering a phrase that helps you perfectly encapsulate a. feeling or an experience. BORODITSKY: The way to say my name properly in Russian is (speaking foreign language), so I don't make people say that. Many of us rush through our lives, chasing goals and just trying to get everything done. VEDANTAM: As someone who spends a lot of his time listening to language evolve, John hears a lot of slang. Hidden Brain Hidden Brain, Shankar Vedantam Subscribe Visit website Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our. UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As character) Right. Personal Strivings: An Approach to Personality and Subjective Well-being, by Robert A. Emmons, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1986. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? So what happens is that once literally comes to feel like it means really, people start using it in figurative constructions such as I was literally dying of thirst. Hidden Brain. VEDANTAM: There are phrases in every language that are deeply evocative and often, untranslatable. It's how we think about anything that's abstract, that's beyond our physical senses. BORODITSKY: Thank you so much for having me. And we teach them, for example, to say that bridges and apples and all kinds of other things have the same prefix as women. She shows how our conversational styles can cause We all know casual sex isn't about love. That was somehow a dad's fashion, and that I should start wearing flat-fronted pants. It Takes Two: The Interpersonal Nature of Empathic Accuracy, by Jamil Zaki, Niall Bolger, Kevin Ochsner, Psychological Science, 2008. That's how much cultural heritage is lost. I'm Shankar Vedantam. to describe the world. Transcript The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. But as Bob Cialdini set out to discover the keys to influence and persuasion, he decided to follow the instincts of his childhood. Social Functionalist Frameworks for Judgment and Choice: Intuitive Politicians, Theologians, and Prosecutors, by Philip Tetlock, Psychology Review, 2002. Why researchers should think real-world: A conceptual rationale, by Harry T. Reis, in Handbook of Research Methods for Studying Daily Life, 2012. VEDANTAM: I'm Shankar Vedantam. There was no way of transcribing an approximation of what people said and nobody would have thought of doing it. So one possibility for bilinguals would be that they just have two different minds inside - right? If you're like most people, you probably abandoned those resolutions within a few weeks. Hidden Brain - Transcripts Hidden Brain - Transcripts Subscribe 435 episodes Share Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. What a cynical thing to say, but that doesn't mean that it might not be true. ROB LOWE: (As Chris Traeger) Dr. Harris, you are literally the meanest person I have ever met. In this week's My Unsung Hero, Sarah Feldman thanks someone for their gift more than 20 years ago. Sometimes, life can feel like being stuck on a treadmill. MCWHORTER: Yes, Shankar, that's exactly it. Subscribe to the Hidden Brain Podcast on your favorite podcast player so you never miss an episode. And we're all going to have feelings like that. The only question was in which way. Of course, if you can't keep track of exactly seven, you can't count. What techniques did that person use to persuade you? FDA blocks human trials for Neuralink brain implants. They're supposed to be painting something very personal. So bilinguals are kind of this in-between case where they can't quite turn off their other languages, but they become more prominent, more salient when you are actually speaking the language or surrounded by the language. Look at it. If you can speak more than one language, does this mean that you're also simultaneously and constantly shifting in your mind between different worldviews? VEDANTAM: One of the ultimate messages I took from your work is that, you know, we can choose to have languages that are alive or languages that are dead. (SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "PARKS AND RECREATION"). Or feel like you and your spouse sometimes speak different languages? Interpersonal Chemistry: What Is It, How Does It Emerge, and How Does it Operate? But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy thats all around us. I had this cool experience when I was there. MCWHORTER: Oh, yeah, I'm a human being. Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button. Hidden Brain - You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose Hidden Brain Aug 2, 2021 You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose Play 51 min playlist_add Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the. something, even though it shouldn't be so much of an effort. But if I give that same story to a Hebrew or an Arabic speaker, they would organize it from right to left. So for example, you might not imagine the color shirt that he's wearing or the kinds of shoes that he's wearing. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn helps us map out the unexpected ways w, Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the challenges we all face at various stages of life. And then 10 years later when they're 49, you say, well, that picture of you at 39 is what you really are and whatever's happened to you since then is some sort of disaster or something that shouldn't have happened.