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Of course everyone agrees with me. I’m always right. Right?
We like to think that others agree with us. It’s called “social projection,” and it helps us validate our beliefs and ourselves. Psychologists have found that we tend to think people who are similar to us in one explicit way — say, religion or lifestyle — will act and believe as we do, and vote as we do. Meanwhile, we exaggerate differences between ourselves and those who are explicitly unlike us.
But what about people whose affiliation is unknown — who can’t easily be placed in either the “in-group” or the “out-group”? A new study finds that we think the silent are also our side. -Science Daily
Writing Prompt: Write a scene between two characters who have just met. Include their internal monologue
about the assumptions they are making about the other person.
Journaling Prompt: Write about how you feel when you find out that someone who you thought agreed with you actually disagrees.
Art Prompt: Mind Reading
Photo Credit: DerrickT on Flickr
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Children are becoming more sophisticated about image at younger and younger ages.
…even very young children have a great deal of knowledge about the clothing retail sector and they know exactly which shops will sell the kind of clothing they want.
[Researchers] also found a strong association between family culture and the value children placed on brands and logos, citing two cases, ‘Robert’ and ‘Hayley’ (not their real names).
Robert came from a family where brands and designer fashions were valued, and he ‘name-dropped’ constantly about the brands of his clothes. Hayley, on the other hand, came from a family with little disposable income, where brands and logos were of so little importance that she had difficulty in understanding what the terms meant.
Parents, however, do not have it all their own way. Dr Pilcher commented: “There are a variety of fashion influences on children and you can’t ignore the pressures from their peer groups, especially friends of the same sex, and their ideas of what is cool.”
A further influence on young children is the celebrity culture, which they may wish to copy or they may reject. The skimpy clothing of singers Beyoncé and Kylie were not always admired by girls, who thought it was rude to show so much bare skin…
Children who do not participate in that culture, however, can be isolated from their peers in a form of social exclusion. This, Dr Pilcher says, is something to be borne in mind by teachers when considering school uniform policies and by parents doing battle with their children on the shop floor. -Science Daily
Writing Prompt: Write a scene about a young child shopping for clothes.
Journaling Prompt: Write about a shopping trip for clothing from your own childhood. If you have children, compare it to a shopping trip with them.
Art Prompt: Children’s fashion
Photo Credit: Jason Hargrove on Flickr
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When I was a kid, I had a dream. It was squashed by a well-meaning adult who only wanted to save me the pain of failure. What might have happened if I had been allowed to continue dreaming?
“As children we all have this dream of flying off on balloons but we are told it’s not possible. But it really is possible and it makes me wonder how many other things do we tell our kids aren’t possible that really are.” -Jonathan Trapp
Writing Prompt: Write about a child who is allowed to dream the impossible dream.
Journaling Prompt: What was your impossible dream when you were a child? Who told you it was impossible? How did that feel? What might have happened if you had been allowed to continue dreaming that dream?
Art Prompt: Impossible dream
Nonfiction / Speech Writing Prompt: Tell your audience all about the impossible dream of your youth. Could you do it today?
Photo Credit: h.koppdelaney on Flickr
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It gets ugly when a parent starts living through their kid. Here’s a scene from real life.
“Later, we sat in the sand as the other kids my age played a game of beach volleyball. My father must have seen an opening of some kind, because to my great embarrassment he stood up between matches and asked if I could join in. I tried to refuse, but there was no way to do so without seeming like even more of a loser. I was a decent athlete—I’d played lacrosse and hockey in Baltimore—but did not understand the most basic mechanics involved in keeping a ball up in the air with my forearms.
“While the other kids set and dug and belly flopped for shots, I stood in the corner of the court, praying that the ball would miraculously avoid my jurisdiction. Finally someone spiked the ball right at me, and I did something tragic. I caught it. I glanced at my father, still clutching the thing to my stomach. His eyes were squinched up, fixed somewhere near my feet, as if he couldn’t stand to look me in the face. It took me a second to realize he was staring at my legs.
“At the time, my father’s shame was overshadowed by the disgrace I felt in front of my teammates. Now, though, when I’m watering the plants or jogging around the reservoir near my house, I’ll think of my father’s face that day and feel the punch of that ball in my stomach. I’ll fantasize about all the things I might have done, like clock him in the teeth. Perhaps—at least I tell myself this, I insist on it, because the memory still hurts me deeply—he was really making the face at himself.” -Eric Puchner, Schemes of My Father
Writing Prompt: Write about a parent living vicariously through their child.
Journaling Prompt: Write about a time when your parent lived vicariously through you OR when you lived vicariously through your child OR when you observed a parent living vicariously through their child.
Art Prompt: Vicarious
Photo Credit: Ed Yourdon on Flickr
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The pros and cons of narcissism is fascinating as we watch our culture gets more and more narcissistic. I’ve included just a snippet of the information. If you are writing characters, you’ll want to read the entire article and follow the links in it for more information.
For years, psychologists have observed that people routinely overestimate their abilities, said study leader Dominic Johnson, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.
Some experts have suggested that overconfidence can be a good thing, perhaps by boosting ambition, resolve, and other traits, creating self-fulfilling prophecies.
But positive self-delusion can also lead to faulty assessments, unrealistic expectations, and hazardous decisions, according to the study—making it a mystery why overconfidence remains a key human trait despite thousands of years of natural selection, which typically weeds out harmful traits over generations.
Now, new computer simulations show that a false sense of optimism, whether when deciding to go to war or investing in a new stock, can often improve your chances of winning. -Christine Dell’Amore, National Geographic News
Writing Prompt: What is your character overconfident about? How does that benefit her? How does that cause her to make risky decisions?
Journaling Prompt: Write about a time when you were overconfident and how that affected your decision-making.
Art Prompt: Overconfidence
Photo Credit: Mustafa Khayat on Flickr
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Have you ever wondered what people are getting out of playing video games? I always thought it was pure escapism, but it seems that it is much more than that.
“A game can be more fun when you get the chance to act and be like your ideal self,” explained Dr. Przybylski. “The attraction to playing videogames and what makes them fun is that it gives people the chance to think about a role they would ideally like to take and then get a chance to play that role.”
The research found that giving players the chance to adopt a new identity during the game and acting through that new identity — be it a different gender, hero, villain — made them feel better about themselves and less negative.
Looking at the players’ emotion after play as well their motivation to play, the study found the enjoyment element of the videogames seemed to be greater when there was the least overlap between someone’s actual self and their ideal self.
“When somebody wants to feel they are more outgoing and then plays with this personality it makes them feel better in themselves when they play,” explained Dr. Przybylski. -Science Daily
Writing Prompt: What video game would each of your characters want to play in order to experience being their ideal self? Write about what they are feeling as they play the game.
Journaling Prompt: What is your favorite game? How do you feel when you are playing it? What do you get out of the experience of playing it?
Art Prompt: Video game
Photo Credit: Sebastian Fritzon on Flickr
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I have been accused of being anal retentive, an over-achiever, and a compulsive perfectionist, like those are bad things. -Lisa Yee, Millicent Min, Girl Genius
Writing Prompt: List your character’s weaknesses and strengths. How are her weaknesses actually strengths that will help her in your story? How are her strengths actually weaknesses that will create difficulties for her?
Journaling Prompt: How do people misjudge your strengths as weaknesses?
Art Prompt: Perfectionist
NonFiction / Speech Writing Prompt: Write about your personal qualities that have a negative connotation generally but that you believe are positive attributes.
Photo Credit: babukadja on Flickr
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Everyone has flaws. Most of us have mental flaws: thoughts that niggle at us and hold us back from acting on our dreams. Any good hero must face their flaws and overcome them in order to engage the reader in their journey. Villains, too, have mental flaws. Here is a secret about one way to write these flaws:
An assumed constraint is a belief, based on past experience, that limits current and future experiences… Indicators that an assumed constraint may be holding you hostage are negative internal dialogue, excuses, and blaming statements. -Ken Blanchard, Leading at a Higher Level, Revised and Expanded Edition: Blanchard on Leadership and Creating High Performing Organizations
Writing Prompt: Make a list of your protagonist’s assumed constraints. How are each of these shown by his actions and dialogue? How are they driving your story?
Journaling Prompt: Write about one of your assumed constraints and how you would like to challenge it.
Art Prompt: Excuses
Photo Credit: Helga Weber on Flickr
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People are very complicated, rather than all bad or all good. Even a “good” character may base their behavior on whether they think others will see the consequences of their actions.
…people tend to make decisions on the basis of their self-image. If they believe themselves to be “fair” or “generous,” for example, they avoid actions that are clearly egoistic in nature, so as to avoid contradicting their own self-image. However, if… they are able to ignore the consequences for other people, they find it easier to maintain a positive self-image, even if they their behaviour is selfish. “If the consequences are clearly visible, many participants decide to act fairly,” reports Astrid Matthey: “However, if it is possible to ignore the consequences, it is clearly more difficult to opt for a ‘generous’ decision, and many change their behaviour and select the egoistic alternative.” -Science Daily
Writing Prompt: Explore how your characters justify their actions and why.
Journaling Prompt: How do other people observing you affect your decisions?
Art Prompt: Self-image
Photo Credit: One Laptop per Child on Flickr
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Last week we saw one of today’s most charismatic leaders, Steve Jobs, resigning from the company he built with his riveting way of communicating his vision. But was that charisma, or was it a determined professional who spent hours, unseen, rehearsing his presentations. Almost certainly it was the latter.
The research results suggest that charisma is sometimes an illusion. While managers can establish a reputation as a transformational, charismatic leader in a number of valid ways, managers can also gain the mystique of charisma by veiling how they accomplish what they do, like a stage magician. Prof. Morris, who leads Columbia Business School’s Program on Social Intelligence, elaborated on a point elucidated by this area of research, “Winning in business and political endeavors comes not only from performing well, but also from managing the interpretations that others make of your performance.” – Science Daily
Writing Prompt: Just like Steve Jobs, your writing charisma is based on the back story that only you will see. This is a prompt that encourages you to flesh out your characters and the world in which they live in ways that will never appear in your story.
Journaling Prompt: Write about how you use rehearsal (or don’t) to improve your charisma.
Art Prompt: Charisma
Photo Credit: jimbowen0306 on Flickr
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