Talk Deeply

Read an interesting article in the NY Times today, "Talk Deeply, Be Happy?"

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/17/talk-deeply-be-happy/

It describes an interesting psychology experiment in which the daily conversations of individuals were recorded and analyzed. The researchers coded conversations as being substantive (politics, opinions, feelings), small talk (weather, food, TV), or practical (chores or assignments). They concluded that people who engaged more often in substantive conversations were happier than those who had fewer substantive conversations.

Quiz for methods students: does this show causality? why or why not?

The researchers recognize quite rightly that their study did not establish causality. As the comments following the article note, it could be that people who are happier are more likely to engage in substantive conversations. Or, that people are more likely to engage in those conversations with friends and happier people might have more friends, or those with more friends may be happier.

Second methodological question, How do you convince subjects to have microphones attached to their bodies all day recording all their conversations and who codes all those conversations???

Well, the second part is easy, graduate students code those conversations. The first part is probably a reflection of the moeny offered to subjects willing to have this "invasion" of their privacy. We would want to know how the wearing of microphones might affect behavior, too.

Third, sociological question. The field of sociology is based on the idea that humans are social animals who need and want connection to others. What constitutes connection?

Can you have a connection to someone without having a substantive conversation? Is my small talk with the janitor each day when he comes in to empty my trash a connection? We can certainly think of examples in our own lives in which small talk lead to substance. In general, that is true of any relationship. Rarely do we start with the "BIG QUESTIONS." Even doctors tend to make some small talk first before getting down to business. Most relationships are built on a slowly evolving base of trust, starting with small talk and leading up to the bigger issues.

It will be interesting to hear about the follow-up study, whether encouraging people to engage in more substantive conversations over the course of the day increases their feelings of happiness. You could try it yourself right now!

Childhood

A few days ago I was thinking about aging and the end of life, today a quote from an essay by Erik Kolbell in today's NYTimes got me thinking about childhood. Here is the quote....


"Most children exercise very little power over the decisions that affect their lives. They don’t decide who their parents are, where their family will live, where they will attend school, when they will reach puberty, who will or will not befriend them. They have limited control over their athletic skills, their looks, their wit, or whether, in the great Serengeti that is their schoolyard, they will be predator or prey. They are as much the subject of their story as its author. "


I wanted to put it next to a quote I've been saving for awhile from a middle school teacher, Susan Graham, from her blog, "A Place at the Table." She wrote, describing middle school,

"It is a wonderful/awful time of transition that is both thrilling and bittersweet. As the innocence of childhood slips away, you can't blame young adolescents for longing for one more year of magic. They may hide behind their blasé masks of indifference, but they still want to be surprised. They still want to believe."

Do we think of childhood as a time of innocence, or as a time fraught with danger and unpredictability? Is a having a lack of control part of what makes childhood magical? I wonder if not having those decisions and responsibilities in childhood allows for the innocence and the magic. We certainly sometimes talk about children who had to "grow up too soon." On the other hand, childhood can be a cruel place in big and little ways. For some children the inability to control their surroundings, or their fate, can be frightening and damaging. For others, perhaps, freeing.

Perhaps at the end of life the same factors come into play. We may lose some of our control over where we live and how we live. We could allow that to let the magic back in, giving up those responsibilities may free us to be surprised. To believe.

Aging

I read an interesting commentary the other day about aging. The author's argument was that we can't really understand old age if we aren't old. That isn't exactly what he said, but that is my impression. Brown argues that as we age we look at age differently. I certainly understand that idea. When I was a kid at summer camp I thought the camp counselors, college students, were so old, wise, and responsible. When I became a camp counselor myself I couldn't believe that people were trusting us to care for their kids all week!

Now in my 50s I feel that this isn't a very old age at all. I have a lot of life ahead of me. Brown, in his article, points out that people in their 80s and 90s feel much the same way. They aren't thinking about the end of life on a daily basis, they are just living. In sociology and gerontology we talk about the importance of socialization and learning age appropriate roles from the generations ahead of us. We learn how to be parents partly by observing our parents--their triumphs and mistakes. Similarly, we learn how to be "old" by watching those who are older than us. If we are lucky (in my opinion) we have role models of engaged, active, happy people who can serve as models.

Still, we often bring our preconceived notions to our interactions with older people. Brown talks about meeting an older woman who has just lost her husband. Assuming that she must be grief stricken, he makes a sympathetic comment. He is surprised when she replies that she is in "Heaven," she has a freedom and lightness that she lacked when he was alive. I'm impressed with her ability to be so honest. How many spouses might feel that mixture of release and grief at the death of their partner? Is Brown's assumption one about age or about marriage? I can remember my husband's grandmother's sense of freedom when her husband passed away. She felt she could travel, something he never wanted to do. She had not been limited so much by her age as by her situation.

Here's the link....
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/02/health/02case.html

Skiing

I learned to ski when I was about 10 I guess. My dad was a skier and as each of us reached a certain age (probably the age at which the hand me down boots fit) he would take us out for a trial run. He took me one evening to The Pines, a local ski area in Northern Indiana. I was not a big fan by the end of the lesson. I was cold, the rope tow was painful, and I fell down a lot. Later that year, or perhaps the next, we built a small snow mound in our backyard. I'm not sure why, maybe for sledding. It was maybe 3-4 feet high and we cut some steps into the back. I decided to learn how to ski on that mound. I went out one day and side stepped up the back, turned around and slid down, over and over again. Maybe I was older, maybe I was stronger, maybe it was the lack of a rope tow, but I started to feel more comfortable on skis. Next time we went to The Pines, I was hooked.

Over the years I skied only sporadically. We went to the Pines only a few times a year, if that. Instead we would venture to Lower Michigan for a day trip to one of the ski areas, usually Swiss Valley. My dad, oldest sister and younger brother were the usual crowd. I became more and more adept. Once a year we would take a weekend trip further up in Michigan, or a few times, to the UP. I was never an expert skier at that age, just good enough to manage most of the hills in the Midwest.

When I got married I stopped skiing. My husband tried it once, but that was enough for him. We lived in areas where convenient skiing did not exist. So, I went about 20 years without putting skis on. I started once again when my sons showed some interest. We live near a small ski area, sort of like The Pines I grew up with. Over the last several years I've gradually regained my confidence as a skier, although I haven't ventured off the small hills of Central NY.

I find skiing to be so relaxing. There is a natural rhythm and mindlessness that accompanies a trip down the hill. You are focused only on the area right ahead of you, on your body, and on the sound of snowboarders creeping up behind you. On a quiet day, when the slopes are pretty empty, you can just let your mind go blank. I've worried a few times that I would fall asleep on the chairlift ride back to the top. The gentle swaying of the chair, the fresh air, the warmth of a parka all make for a drowsy skier. I like riding up alone, and on quiet days that is easy to do. Once at the top, I favor the wide cross-hill turns and slow descent. I'm in no hurry. I savor the feel of the wind on my cheeks and the rhythmic turn and turn as I make my way down. If I could spend my whole life skiing, I'm convinced, I could solve all of my problems.

Touch

I read an interesting article in the New York Times yesterday about the power of touch. I would have thought that this topic would have been well researched, but apparently not. One of the experiments cited noted that children who were touched by their teacher were more likely to volunteer an answer in class than students who were not touched. What power we have!

How do we decide who to touch, when to touch, and how to touch? In my interactions with students I rarely touch, but I do sometimes feel an almost irresistible urge to reach out and touch a student. Usually it is an attempt to comfort or reassure them. In times of distress it seems we need physical connection more. Of course, as a teacher you must think about the boundaries between you and the students. Touches can be misinterpreted or unwanted. Is it better to err on the side of not touching? Probably.

I am certainly not what would be considered a big toucher. I don't greet friends, or family, with hugs. I'm not the cheek kissing type, either. I might on occasion hug a student, one with whom I have worked closely, perhaps at graduation or the completion of a major goal. So, if you are in my classes, don't worry, I won't be stalking you for a hug. But, if you feel you need one, just ask.

Numbers

I was listening to an old broadcast of Radio Lab last night on my walk. It was a crisp, starry winter night. Perfect for walking. The broadcast was about "numbers" and started with an interesting discussion of how our number sense develops. I may be a little fuzzy on the details, but three basic experiments were described.

First, there was a study with 2-3 month old babies. They hook them up to some brain electrodes and plop them in front of a computer screen. The kids see a screen with some object, say 8 ducks. The screen flashes again, same image. The researchers note that at first there is a lot of brain activity, "cool, ducks on a screen" but, gradually the activity slows as the image repeats. Then a screen with 8 trucks appears, prompting a brain wave response in the temporal lobe..."cool, something new to look at!" The babies recognize that something has changed. If they repeat the experiment, but this time switch not the object, but the number, for instance go from 8 ducks to 16 ducks, the babies show an increase of brain activity, but this time in a different place (parietal lobe, perhaps?). Babies recognize a different kind of difference now.

Second experiment. Find a 2 year old. Give her a bunch of pennies. Sit down and say, "can you give me 1 penny?" The kid will pick up one penny and hand it over. Ask, "can you give me 2 pennies?" and the kid will just pick up a bunch of pennies and hand them over. They know that 2 is more than 1, but have no clue how much more. The idea of 2 doesn't develop until about 1/2 way through the year. Then the idea of 3 takes a little longer, then 4. I think they said it wasn't until 3.5 years old that kids can count out objects. They can count before then, that is, recite the numbers in order, but they have no meaning. Making that connection is a big leap.

In that discussion the idea was introduced that our "natural" way of thinking about numbers was closer to a logarithmic understanding than a scalar (?) way of thinking. Leading to the 3rd experiment. In this case an aboriginal group was found that had very little concept of numbers. They might count up to 4 or 5, but after that numbers had no real meaning. If given a number line with 1 on one end and 9 on the other, and asked to say what number comes in the middle, they are apt to choose not 5 (the Western answer) but 3! Since 3 is 3x 1 and 9 is 3x 3 then, 3 is in the middle...they are thinking in logarithms!

Attention

There was an interesting article in the Chronicle of Higher Education last week http://chronicle.com/article/Scholars-Turn-Their-Attention/63746/

The focus was on attention spans, multitasking, and teaching. There were many interesting ideas, but two really caught MY attention. The first was the discussion of the studies showing that for the most part we can remember 7 units of information. I had heard and read this before, although I had never seen the source of that fact. It got me to thinking about teaching and how to present information in a way that will be remembered. We can remember 7 digit phone numbers, but we can remembe longer strings of information if we "chunk" the information--break the information into pieces that we recall as a whole. If we remember 7 chunks of 7 digits we can remember a string of 49 digits!! I wonder if I should organize my lectures and notes into chunks better, into pieces of information that will be more easily remembered.

The other point was about student multitasking. Should an instructor ban phones, laptops, newspapers, etc? Or tolerate them? Some of my colleagues have very strict rules about reading newspapers, etc, in class. I tend not to care, as long as the person isn't making noise or distracting those around her. If students don't need the information I'm presenting, that is a decision they make, not me.