SYSK TRENDING - How the Negativity Effect Rules Us
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Why do we remember the single negative comment more than many compliments?
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Suppose 10 people tell you how great you look today, and one person says, You look tired. Which comment are you going to remember tonight? Probably the bad one. There's actually a reason for that. It's called the negativity effect, our tendency to give bad experiences, bad news, and criticism more weight than equally positive things. And it can influence everything. From your relationships and career to what you buy, what you worry about, and how you see the world. That's why today's SYSK trending topic is how the negativity effect rules us. So why does your brain seem so determined to focus on what's wrong? John Tierney is a science journalist, and in my conversation with him, he explains why bad is so powerful and how understanding.
Understanding that can help you keep negativity from running your life. And we'll be back with that insight right after this. A big thank you to today's sponsor, Vinted. I think most of us have what I call someday clothes. I'll wear that someday. That'll fit better someday. Someday I'll have a place to wear that. Meanwhile, it's been hanging in the closet for three years. Vinted offers another possibility. Sell it. Every day people can sell clothes they're no longer wearing and make some extra money. And they've made the process pretty painless. Take what you don't wear, list it on Vinted. Listing is quick and simple. And when an item sells, Vinted creates the prepaid shipping label for you. And importantly, there are no seller fees on vintage.
So when you sell something, you keep everything you earn. I like this whole idea because instead of clothes just taking up space, somebody else gets to wear. them and you get some money out of the deal. Your closet looks better too. I mean everybody wins, even the closet. So maybe it's time to stop waiting for someday. Download the Vinted app for free and start listing with no seller fees so you keep everything you earn. You've probably heard of something called negativity bias or the negativity effect, which is basically that we tend to pay attention to and are more motivated by negative things than by positive things. That it hurts more to lose $10 than it feels good to get $10. And it seems to be human nature, but there's so much more to it than that.
Understanding how the negativity effect works and how you can use it in a positive way is really interesting. John Tierney is a writer who, along with social psychologist Roy Baumeister, has researched and written a book called The Power of Bad, How the Negativity Effect Rules Us, and How We Can Rule It. Hi, John, welcome.
Hi Mike, thanks for inviting me.
So since you're the expert and you wrote the book on it, explain the power of bad.
Well the power of bat is the negativity effect, which is the universal tendency of bad events and bad emotions to affect us more strongly than good ones. You know, when you hear a mix of compliments and criticism, you obsess over the criticism instead of enjoying the praise. You know, when you walk into a room and you see a bunch of faces, you focus on the hostile one and you miss all the smiles. And you know, and this negativity effect it just skews the way we see the world, it skews our our decisions and our relationship. It
is isn't it true? I mean, uh so our podcast has l hundreds and hundreds of reviews on Apple Podcasts and all that, and most of them are glowing. Most of them are great. People love this podcast, but guess which ones I know I take particular notice of
And the ones you can't forget. There it's just the same thing's happened. That's what you know, the power of bad when the reviews came out, you know, they've been generally very good, but it's the one sentence here or the one, you know, cranky guy who posts a review who you think never really actually read the book.
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