Wellness 2.0: Rising to the Occasion
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This is Hidden Brain. I'm Shankar Vedant. There's an old saying attributed to Benjamin Franklin. Nothing is certain in life except for death and taxes. But death and taxes are not the only guarantees. If we live long enough, all of us will experience great setbacks, crises that seem insurmountable, challenges that seem far bigger than we are. When we see others go through natural disasters or terrible illnesses, or the emotional upheavals that come from child custody battles or losing a livelihood, we think, how terrible for them. I'm so glad this didn't happen to me. But what we fail to see in these moments is that all of us are going to experience our own versions of these emergencies and tragedies.
Having to deal with crises is an occupational hazard of being alive. What do we do in such moments? How do our minds respond when faced with catastrophe? And can we better prepare ourselves for their inevitable arrival? Today on the show and in a companion piece on Hidden Brain Plus, we examine the psychology of battling a crisis. It's part of our series Wellness 2.0. What happens in our minds when we face danger and what we can learn from those who prove steadfast in such moments? Techniques and strategies for responding better when life throws us crises, curveballs, and catastrophes. This week on Hidden Brain. We are all called upon from time to time to do hard and sometimes seemingly impossible things. Do we rise to the occasion or do we fall short?
At Columbia University, psychologist Adam Galinsky has studied the science of decision-making and leadership, what it takes to rise to the occasion and what happens in our minds when we don't. Adam Galinsky, welcome to Hidden Brain. Thank you so much. Adam, in January 2012, an Italian cruise ship carrying over 3,000 passengers and 1,000 crew members was on a seven-day voyage in the Mediterranean when it began to veer close to shore. It was unclear why this was happening, but eventually the ship, which was named the Costa Concordia, hit a reef. How deep was the reef and what happened to the ship, Adam?
It was almost 30 feet below the surface, so the captain, Francesco Schettino, couldn't see it, but it just tore a gigantic hole in the bottom of the ship, basically rendering the ship inoperable.
I'm assuming that water must have flooded the generators and engines. The ship must have come to a standstill almost right away.
Absolutely. It had a complete loss of power. There was a blackout that was involved. And basically, at that moment in time, this was essentially a shipwreck.
So that's terrifying, Adam. But I'm guessing that when something like this happens, it's the job of the captain to take immediate action and begin rescuing passengers. Did that happen?
That's not what happened at all. In fact, he did not alert the authorities immediately. In fact, he spent a considerable amount of time trying to go into crisis management mode, figure out how he was going to protect his own reputation and come up with a story that wouldn't place the responsibility on himself. He tried to come up with a story to say that rather than the sudden blackout, which was caused obviously by the accident and the water rushing in, was actually the result of the accident rather than vice versa. And his primary concern was, how am I going to protect myself? And he didn't spend any energy thinking about how he was going to protect the passengers.
So when rescue efforts finally started almost an hour or maybe more than an hour after the ship first hit the reef, did Captain Francesco Schettino supervise and help passengers get off the ship?
He did not. At the time that the Coast Guard was communicating with Chatino about the rescue, he was already himself in a lifeboat. And he claimed that he did not intend to be in a lifeboat, that he fell and stumbled accidentally into the lifeboat. So while everyone else was on board and panicking, Captain Chatino was safely in a lifeboat off of the ship.
So let me just try and catch up with what's happening here. The ship has hit this reef. There's a gigantic hole in the ship. Water is flooding in. The passengers are fearing for their life. And the captain, instead of staying on board and helping the passengers, has himself gotten off the ship onto a lifeboat, but claims he did so accidentally.
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