Category: Psychology

Serendipity May Be Source of 50% of Patents

(p. 1) A surprising number of the conveniences of modern life were invented when someone stumbled upon a discovery or capitalized on an accident: the microwave oven, safety glass, smoke detectors, artificial sweeteners, (p. 4) X-ray imaging. Many blockbuster drugs of the 20th century emerged because a lab worker picked up on the “wrong” information.
. . .
(p. 5) So how many big ideas emerge from spills, crashes, failed experiments and blind stabs? One survey of patent holders (the PatVal study of European inventors, published in 2005) found that an incredible 50 percent of patents resulted from what could be described as a serendipitous process. Thousands of survey respondents reported that their idea evolved when they were working on an unrelated project — and often when they weren’t even trying to invent anything. This is why we need to know far more about the habits that transform a mistake into a breakthrough.
. . .
A number of pioneering scholars have already begun this work, but they seem to be doing so in their own silos and without much cross-talk. In a 2005 paper (“Serendipitous Insights Involving Nonhuman Primates”), two experts from the Washington National Primate Research Center in Seattle cataloged the chance encounters that yielded new insights from creatures like the pigtail macaque. Meanwhile, the authors of a paper titled “On the Exploitation of Serendipity in Drug Discovery” puzzled over the reasons the 1950s and ’60s saw a bonanza of breakthroughs in psychiatric medication, and why that run of serendipity ended.

For the full commentary, see:
PAGAN KENNEDY. “How to Cultivate the Art of Serendipity.” The New York Times, SundayReview Section (Sun., JAN. 3, 2016): 1 & 4-5.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date JAN. 2, 2016, and has the title “Cultivating the Art of Serendipity.”)

Pagan’s commentary is based on her book:
Kennedy, Pagan. Inventology: How We Dream up Things That Change the World. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Co., 2016.

“Minds Feel More Crimped, Fear More Pervasive, Possibility More Limited”

Maybe to lead happy or satisfying lives, we need more adventure, or more projects (hard and important ones) to commit ourselves to?

(p. 19) Freedom is still out there. We all have our idea of it, the deferred dream. Your psyche builds layers of protection around your most vulnerable traits, which may be closely linked to that precious essence in which freedom resides. Freedom is inseparable from risk.

. . .
I don’t know if the world is freer than a half-century ago. On paper, it is. The totalitarian Soviet Imperium is gone. The generals who bossed Latin America are gone, generally. Asia has unshackled itself and claims this century as its own. Media has opened out, gone social.
Yet minds feel more crimped, fear more pervasive, possibility more limited, adventure more choreographed, politics more stale, economics more skewed, pressure more crushing, escape more elusive.
. . .
Which brings me to Finnegan’s wonderful book, a kind of hymn to freedom and passion. Freedom is inside you. It’s the thing that cannot be denied. For Finnegan, that’s surfing and writing. “How could you know your limits unless you tested them?” he asks — a question as true before the ferocious energy of the wave as before the infinite possibilities of the written form.

For the full commentary, see:
Cohen, Roger. “Ways to Be Free.” The New York Times (Sat., JAN. 23, 2016): A19.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date JAN. 21, 2016.)

The Finnegan book praised in the passage quoted above, is:
Finnegan, William. Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life. New York: Penguin Press, 2015.

“Good News for the Grumpy”: Happiness Does Not Lengthen Life

(p. A6) A study published on Wednesday [Dec. 9, 2015] in The Lancet, following one million middle-aged women in Britain for 10 years, finds that the widely held view that happiness enhances health and longevity is unfounded.
“Happiness and related measures of well-being do not appear to have any direct effect on mortality,” the researchers concluded.
“Good news for the grumpy” is one way to interpret the findings, said Sir Richard Peto, an author of the study and a professor of medical statistics and epidemiology at the University of Oxford.
He and his fellow researchers decided to look into the subject because, he said, there is a widespread belief that stress and unhappiness cause disease.
Such beliefs can fuel a tendency to blame the sick for bringing ailments on themselves by being negative, and to warn the well to cheer up or else.
“Believing things that aren’t true isn’t a good idea,” Professor Peto said in an interview. “There are enough scare stories about health.”
The new study says earlier research confused cause and effect, suggesting that unhappiness made people ill when it is actually the other way around.
. . .
Professor Peto said particularly important data came from 500,000 women who reported on their baseline surveys that they were in good health, with no history of heart disease, cancer, stroke or emphysema.
A “substantial minority” of these healthy women said they were stressed or unhappy, he said, but over the next decade they were no more likely to die than were the women who were generally happy.

For the full story, see:
DENISE GRADY. “Happiness Doesn’t Bring Good Health, Study Finds.” The New York Times (Thurs., DEC. 10, 2015): A6.
(Note: bracketed date added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date DEC. 9, 2015, and has the title “Happiness Doesn’t Bring Good Health, Study Finds.”)

The research summarized in the passages quoted above, appeared in:

Liu, Bette, Sarah Floud, Kirstin Pirie, Jane Green, Richard Peto, and Valerie Beral. “Does Happiness Itself Directly Affect Mortality? The Prospective UK Million Women Study.” The Lancet (Dec. 9, 2015) DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(15)01087-9.

Open Offices Are “an Absurd Attack on Concentration”

(p. A11) Mr. Newport acknowledges the good intentions behind open offices: They are meant to encourage serendipity and teamwork. But he argues that burdening workers with perpetual distractions constitutes “an absurd attack on concentration” that creates “an environment that thwarts attempts to think seriously.” Sure, there’s collaboration–not least the unspoken camaraderie among coworkers who have shared in the cringe-inducing experience of hearing a colleague castigate her spouse over the phone.
Mr. Newport, a computer science professor at Georgetown, is the unusual academic who will sully himself with matters as practical as: How can a talented employee rack up the rarefied and acute skills–writing, coding, scouring the latest mergers and acquisitions–that make someone indispensable? His answer? Expanding your capacity for “deep work,” ruthlessly weeding out distractions and regularly carving out stretches of time to sharpen abilities. Mr. Newport explains why honing an ability to concentrate can yield enormous professional payouts. Then he lays out rules for becoming one such rare bird.
Most corporate workers, Mr. Newport argues, don’t have clear feedback about how to spend their time. As a result, employees use “busyness as a proxy for productivity,” which Mr. Newport describes aptly as “doing lots of stuff in a visible manner”–blasting out emails, for instance, or holding meetings on superficial progress on some project.
. . .
The book’s best example is the Pulitzer Prize winning Lyndon Johnson biographer Robert A. Caro, known for working on a meticulous schedule in his Manhattan office dressed in a coat and tie “so that he never forgets when he sits down with his research that he is going to work,” as one profile of Mr. Caro put it.

For the full review, see:
KATE BACHELDER. “BOOKSHELF; Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?; Yes, open offices cultivate camaraderie–among coworkers who all cringe as a colleague shouts at her soon-to-be ex-husband over the phone.” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., Jan. 20, 2016): A11.
(Note: ellipsis added, italics in original.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Jan. 19, 2016.)

The book under review, is:
Newport, Cal. Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World. New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2016.

Koch Employees Motivated by the Fulfillment of Meaningful Work

(p. A11) . . . , Mr. Koch defines “principled entrepreneurship” as the effort to maximize profit by “creating superior value,” as well as by “acting lawfully and with integrity.” What is good for business, he says, is good for society–another aspect of good profit.
The culture of a company is formed, Mr. Koch observes, when employees internalize such principles and practices. Although employees should be urged, he says, to be agents of change, to think critically and, when necessary, to challenge the decisions of their bosses, they will find that their most significant motivation is a sense of accomplishment and fulfillment. “We cannot ignite a passion for creating the greatest value,” Mr. Koch writes, “if there is no meaning in our work.”

For the full review, see:
JOSEPH MACIARIELLO. “BOOKSHELF; The Company He Keeps; Respect means treating people on their merits–not according to the rigid categories of identity politics. Merit will always create value.” The Wall Street Journal (Fri., Oct. 23, 2015): A11.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Oct. 22, 2015.)

The book under review, is:
Koch, Charles G. Good Profit: How Creating Value for Others Built One of the World’s Most Successful Companies. New York: Crown Business, 2015.

Behavioral Economists Ignore Biases and Irrationalities of Governments

(p. A4) . . . it is quite a leap between acknowledging markets sometimes fail and arguing they are inherently flawed. Policy makers who work from the second assumption risk overreaching, by seeing market failure where there is none and ignoring their own behavioral biases, in either case leaving people worse off, not better. Public trust in free markets hasn’t wavered notably in the U.S. or Britain from precrisis levels and even in the pope’s native Argentina, attitudes aren’t much more negative than in 2009.
. . .
. . . , consumers don’t seem irrational when they evaluate fuel economy; one study found changes in gasoline prices are closely reflected in the relative prices of less fuel-efficient used cars.
Besides, as Mr. Viscusi and Mr. Gayer note, the government has behavioral biases of its own. Courts and regulators assign more value to the potential harm of a new drug than its potential benefits. Politicians take actions out of proportion to the risks, for example by closing schools during the Ebola scare or imposing onerous airline-security checks to prevent terrorist hijackings.

For the full commentary, see:
GREG IP. “Market Critics Shouldn’t Overreach.” The Wall Street Journal (Thurs., Sept. 24, 2015): A2.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Sept. 23, 2015, and has the title “Critics of Free Market Shouldn’t Overreach.” Where there are minor differences between the print and online versions of the article, the sentences quoted above follow the online version.)

The Vicusi and Gayer paper mentioned above, is:
Viscusi, W. Kip, and Ted Gayer. “Behavioral Public Choice: The Behavioral Paradox of Government Policy.” Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 38, no. 3 (Summer 2015): 973-1007.

Was “the Naturally Aloof” Washington, an Introvert?

(p. C6) In “The Washingtons,” an ambitious, well-researched and highly readable dual biography, Flora Fraser has worked hard, despite the limited documentation that is available, to portray George and Martha, and their extended family, as fully rounded, flesh-and-blood people, freeing them from the heavy brocade of hagiography.
. . .
Her social graces, . . . , served the naturally aloof George well during his eight increasingly trying years as president. Martha had a way of keeping conversation flowing around her, Ms. Fraser says, while George’s “silences could unnerve the most confident.” An official dinner with the Washingtons could be an ordeal, since George was a terrible conversationalist and was known to sit silently tapping his spoon against the table, obviously impatient for the evening to end.

For the full review, see:
FERGUS M. BORDEWICH. “Domestic Tranquility; Martha kept conversation flowing at dinner; George’s silences ‘could unnerve the most confident.'” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., Nov. 14, 2015): C6.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Nov. 13, 2015.)

The book under review, is:
Fraser, Flora. The Washingtons: George and Martha, “Join’d by Friendship, Crown’d by Love”. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2015.

Do Entrepreneurial Results Excuse Entrepreneurial Arrogance?

(p. A1) Robert Whaley is a professor of finance at Vanderbilt University’s Owen Graduate School of Management and the developer of the two major so-called fear indices — the VIX and VXN on the Chicago Board Options Exchange — that are used to make bets on market volatility.

READING Right now it’s “Becoming Steve Jobs,” by Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli. It has a somewhat different take than Walter Isaacson’s “Steve Jobs.” I felt Isaacson’s version was a little negative. But what the books have in common is that Jobs was sheer genius. So what if he was arrogant? Consider what he’s done. We wouldn’t have iPhones and iPads if it wasn’t for his vision. I absolutely think that excuses his behavior. If everyone just wanted for people to look back and say you were kind, how would we move forward?

For the full interview, see:
KATE MURPHY. “Download: Robert Whaley.” The New York Times, SundayReview Section (Sun., SEPT. 6, 2015): 2.
(Note: the bold above is in the original. The first paragraph quoted above was written by the interviewer Kate Murphy. The paragraph following the word “Reading” is the response by the interviewee Robert Whaley.)
(Note: the online version of the interview has the date SEPT. 5, 2015.)

The Steve Jobs books mentioned by Whaley, are:
Isaacson, Walter. Steve Jobs. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011.
Schlender, Brent, and Rick Tetzeli. Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader. New York: Crown Business, 2015.

Quiet Author Founds Start-Up to Help Introverts

(p. 10) Last month, 50 executives from General Electric gathered on the fourth floor of a SoHo office building for a “fireside chat” with Susan Cain, the author of the 2012 book “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking,” which has sold two million copies worldwide.
. . .
A talk about “Quiet” she gave at a 2012 TED conference has been viewed more than 11.6 million times online. And she has delivered more than 100 speeches since then, sometimes commanding five figures for an appearance. (She also does pro bono work, she stressed.)
. . .
“Writing a book is rewarding,” Mr. Godin said he told her. “But it doesn’t change most people’s lives.”
And so Ms. Cain, who has been coached in public speaking, is now promoting Quiet Revolution, a for-profit company she has started that is focused on the work, education and lifestyle of introverts, which she defines roughly as people who get their psychic energy from quiet reflection and solitude (not to be confused with people who are shy and become anxious in unfamiliar social situations). Extroverts, by contrast, thrive in crowds and have long been prized in society for their ability to command attention. Many people share attributes of both, she said.
Ms. Cain and Paul Scibetta, a former senior executive at J. P. Morgan Chase whom she met when they both worked at the law firm Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in the 1990s, have set up a Quiet Leadership Institute, working with executives at organizations like NASA, Procter & Gamble and General Electric to help them better understand the strengths of their introverted employees.
. . .
Mike Erwin, a former professor of leadership and psychology at West Point who served in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, invited Ms. Cain to speak to cadets in 2012 after he finished reading “Quiet.” He didn’t understand students who were reticent to talk in class or who wanted to explore every risk before jumping into a task. “I’m an extrovert,” he said. “And, as I look back at my career, I wrote off a lot of people who didn’t speak up or want to be in charge.”
In May, he was appointed chief executive of the Quiet Leadership Institute, where he is helping project managers at NASA learn how to lead teams populated with introverts (a common personality type in science). At Procter & Gamble, Mr. Erwin said, executives in research and development are exploring, among other things, how to help introverts become more confident leaders.

For the full story, see:
LAURA M. HOLSON. “Instigating a ‘Quiet Revolution’ of Introverts.” The New York Times, SundayStyles Section (Sun., JULY 26, 2015): 10.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date JULY 25, 2015, and has the title “Susan Cain Instigates a ‘Quiet Revolution’ of Introverts.”)

The Cain book mentioned above, is:
Cain, Susan. Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. New York: Crown, 2012.

Sense of Purpose, Not Greed, Is Reason Multimillionaires Keep Working

(p. 10) I’ve often wondered why the so-called Masters of the Universe, those C.E.O.s with multimillion-dollar monthly paychecks, keep working. Why, once they have earned enough money to live comfortably forever, do they still drag themselves to the office? The easy answer, the one I had always settled on, was greed.
But as I watched the hours slowly drip by in my cubicle, an alternative reason came into view. Without a sense of purpose beyond the rent money, malaise sets in almost immediately. We all need a reason to get up in the morning, preferably one to which we can attach some meaning. It is why people flock to the scene of a natural disaster to rescue and rebuild, why people devote themselves to a cause, no matter how doomed it may be. In the end, it’s the process as much as the reward that nourishes us.

For the full commentary, see:
TED GELTNER. “ON WORK; Bored to Tears by a Do-Nothing Dream Job.” The New York Times, SundayBusiness Section (Sun., NOV. 22, 2015): 10.
(Note: the online version of the commentary was updated on NOV. 21, 2015.)

Give Entrepreneurs “the Solitude They Need to Think Creatively”

(p. R1) . . . , numerous entrepreneurs and CEOs are either self-admitted introverts or have so many introvert qualities that they are widely thought to be introverts. These include Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, Larry Page, co-founder of Google, Mark Zuckerberg, co-founder of Facebook, Marissa Mayer, current president and CEO of Yahoo, and Warren Buffett, chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway.

As entrepreneurs, introverts succeed because they “create and lead companies from a very focused place,” says Susan Cain, author of “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking” and founder of Quiet Revolution, a website for introverts.
. . .
Many people believe that introverts, by definition, are shy and extroverts are outgoing. This is incorrect. Introverts, whom experts say comprise about a third of the population, get their energy and process information internally. Some may be shy and some may be outgoing, but they all prefer to spend time alone or in small groups, and often feel drained by a lot of social interaction or large groups.
. . .
Introverts not only have the stamina to spend long periods alone–they love it. “Good entrepreneurs are able to give themselves the solitude they need to think creatively and originally–to create something where there once was nothing,” says Ms. Cain. “And this is just how introverts are wired.”
. . .
While extroverts are networking, promoting or celebrating success, introverts have their “butt on the seat,” says Laurie Helgoe, author of “Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life is Your Hidden Strength” and assistant professor in the department of psychology and human services at Davis & Elkins College in Elkins, W.Va. “An introvert on his (p. R2) or her own is going to enjoy digging in and doing research–and be able to sustain him- or herself in that lonely place of forging your own way.”
They don’t need external affirmation
Another important characteristic of introverts is that they tend to rely on their own inner compass–not external signals–to know that they’re making the right move or doing a good job. That can give them an edge in several ways.
For instance, they generally don’t look for people to tell them whether an idea is worth pursuing. They tend to think it through before speaking about it to anybody, and rely on their own judgment about whether it’s worth pursuing.
With extroverts, the need for social stimulation, for getting the idea in front of other people, can make them leap before they’ve thought something out, Ms. Buelow says. “It’s very important for them to get outside feedback and motivation.” Feedback is great, of course. But at a certain point a leader needs to decide on a plan and execute it.
Following their own compass also helps introverts stay focused on a venture. Extroverts can get sidetracked by seeking external validation, such as awards or media attention for a project, which can divert them from their main goals. While introverts welcome external validation, they won’t let it define them or distract them. “It’s about keeping the long-haul perspective,” Ms. Buelow says.
What’s more, because introverts aren’t looking for outside events to validate their plans–or themselves–they don’t take setbacks as personally as extroverts. Somebody who relies on external affirmation tends to take setbacks personally and may get dispirited if the company hits a rough patch.
. . .
. . . , in a 2009 study looking at how introverts and extroverts approached an “effortful task,” Maya Tamir, director of the Emotion and Self-Regulation Laboratory at Boston College and Hebrew University in Jerusalem, found that extroverts sought a happy state while completing the task, while introverts preferred to maintain a neutral emotional state.
“The introverts’ happy space is a quieter space with less interruptions,” says Ms. Buelow. “They won’t have that overstimulation.”

For the full commentary, see:
ELIZABETH BERNSTEIN. “The Case for the Introverted Entrepreneur; Conventional wisdom says you need to be an extrovert to start a successful business. That’s wrong for all sorts of reasons.” The Wall Street Journal (Mon., August 24, 2015): R1-R2.
(Note: ellipses added; bold in original.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the title “Why Introverts Make Great Entrepreneurs; Conventional wisdom says you need to be an extrovert to start a successful business. That’s wrong for all sorts of reasons.”)

The Cain book mentioned in the commentary quoted above is:
Cain, Susan. Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. New York: Crown, 2012.

The Helgoe book mentioned in the commentary quoted above is:
Helgoe, Laurie. Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength. Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks, Inc., 2013.

The Maya Tamir article mentioned above, is:
Tamir, Maya. “Differential Preferences for Happiness: Extraversion and Trait-Consistent Emotion Regulation.” Journal of Personality 77, no. 2 (April 2009): 447-70.