Category: psychology
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #6 — People Need To Feel Safe To Participate
The best performance I’ve ever been to (the best music, dance, theatre, speech — any kind of performance) was by Bobby McFerrin. His performances involve music and extensive audience interaction. I saw him in a 1500-seat theatre in a small city in Wisconsin. The theatre was full, and from the start the audience was appreciative…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #5 — People assign meaning to your tone of voice
If you’ve ever eavesdropped on a conversation in a country where you did not speak the language, you might have been surprised to find yourself following along and picking up the feeling of the conversation even though you didn’t understand any of the words or literal meaning. This is an entire field of research, and it’s…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #4 – People "read" your body positions instantly and unconsciously
Not too long ago I spoke at a conference with a line-up of great presenters. One man I had been looking forward to hearing got up to speak. He is well-known in his field, but I had never seen him speak. His talk was very good, but I couldn’t concentrate on it because throughout the…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #2 – Writing By Hand Can Increase Commitment
I remember, many many years ago, when I wrote my Ph.D. thesis in graduate school, my first draft was done by hand (ok, now I’ve admitted that I’m quite old!). Most writing these days is done by typing on a keyboard. I write these blogs directly into my laptop using a keyboard, same thing with the…
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Experiences vs. Possessions: You Are What You've Done, Not What You Own
In the last few years psychology research (e.g. Carter & Gilovich, 2010) has proven what many of us have long suspected: that experiences (vacations, events with friends, etc) make people happier than buying and owning stuff (computers, clothes, etc). But more recent research by the same duo (Carter & Gilovich, 2012) shows that the experience…
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The Science of Happiness, Part 3: What commuting, graduate degrees and being single have in common
WARNING: The following discussion is about the correlation between happiness and many other factors. But it’s just correlation. The factors below are correlated with happiness, but that does not mean they CAUSE happiness. “Correlation does not imply causation”. Now that I’ve posted the warning, I can talk about some of the interesting correlations between happiness…
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7 Tips To Get A Team To Implement Your Recommendations: Tip #4
This is the 4th in a 7-part series on how to get a team to implement your recommendations. Tip #1 was: Hide Your Top 3 Recommendations. Tip #2 was Say “You”, “They”, “Customers”, “Users”, or “Research”. Don’t say “I”. Tip #3 was Give Them A Presentation, Don’t Send Them A Report. Now for Tip #4. The context…
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7 Tips to Get A Team To Implement Your Recommendations: Tip #1
Have you ever found yourself in a meeting trying to convince a team to implement your recommendations? Perhaps you are a web designer who wants the team to move ahead with your design, or you are a user experience professional who has recommended a re-design to make a product more usable. You work hard and…