How To Keep The Love Alive

On Wednesday, March 10, I had the pleasure of making love with Scientific American's editor in chief, Mariette DiChristina—in front of a large audience, no less.

Hey, calm down. We didn’t make love with each other. We did something even better. We showed about a hundred smart, skeptical New Yorkers that we could, fairly easily and on demand, increase the love that people feel toward each other—people who are already in love, people who are just friends, and even total strangers.

The venue was the classy 92YTribeca, the fairly new home of art and intellect in lower Manhattan, and the excuse was Scientific American Mind's January/February cover story about how science can help you fall in love. Our presentation began, consistent with the occasion, with a prolonged hug that prompted laughter and applause.

When, eventually, the embrace ended, I asked four volunteers to come up on stage, and I paired them off into couples that had never met before. I then asked them, on a scale of 1 to 10 (where 1 was low and 10 was high), a) how much they liked each other, b) how much they loved each other, c) how close they felt to each other, and d) how attracted they were to each other.

Next, I asked the individuals in each couple simply to look deeply into each other’s eyes for two minutes in an exercise I call “Soul Gazing.” After the giggling stopped, they got down to business and started looking quite serious.

Then I asked for those numbers again: liking, loving, closeness and attraction. To the delight and astonishment of the audience, the numbers went up for all four people—14 percent overall.

But why should just four people have all the fun? I now asked everyone in the audience to turn toward the person in the seat next to him or her and gaze —after which I asked people to raise their hands if they felt closer to the person they had just faced. Nearly every hand went up.

Research and Love

Can emotional intimacy truly be increased on demand? Mariette now explored the issue by reviewing some of the scientific studies that have been conducted on this topic in recent years, which show, among other things, that:

* Emotional bonds are strengthened when people engage in physically arousing activities together (get thee to the gym)

* People tend to bond when they’re in frightening situations together (bungee jumping anyone?)

* Feelings of love indeed grow when total strangers simply gaze into each other’s eyes for two minutes (but please read on before you start staring at strangers on New York subways)

* People feel closer when they do new things together (been to the new Museum of Sex on 5th Avenue yet?)

More than 80 scientific studies demonstrate such phenomena. Mariette, switching to journalist mode, then asked me questions about the research, such as, “Isn’t staring at someone threatening? Why would people fall in love simply by gazing at each other? And why do any of these procedures work at all?”

Having studied such matters now for seven years, in part by interviewing people who are in arranged marriages in which love has grown over time, I answered as follows:

Emotional bonds often get stronger when people feel vulnerable, and this works for two reasons. First, when you see someone who is in a weak and vulnerable state, you often feel like comforting or protecting that person; those tendencies make you feel close to someone, and they often bring you physically closer, too. Second, when you are feeling vulnerable yourself, you might interpret your emotional state as a loving one—especially if someone nearby happens to reach out to comfort you. If two people feel vulnerable simultaneously, these two tendencies can interlock and increase synergistically.

Most of the experiences that lead to increases in emotional intimacy produce this kind of dynamic. Strong sexual attraction, scary situations, vigorous exercise and novel situations all make people feel vulnerable to some extent. And, yes, even gazing can have this effect. The difference between mutual gazing and staring is the consent; people are giving each other permission to invade their privacy in way that is normally quite threatening. It’s like saying, “Okay, you can see me naked. No problem.” Do you feel vulnerable? You bet.

Love Games

Enough talk. We spent the next half hour demonstrating three other techniques that quickly increased emotional bonds: “The Love Aura,” “Let Me Inside,” and the “I-Love-You Game.” In the last, two strangers took turns saying “I love you” to each other in different ways. In our culture, that phrase is one of the hardest things there is to say to someone; saying it makes people feel especially vulnerable. Our volunteers were nervous and giggly at first, but then became increasingly earnest and emphatic—intense, in fact. Their intimacy numbers nearly doubled in just over two minutes, and they embraced each other warmly the moment exercise ended. It was breathtaking to watch.

Was this just a series of parlor tricks? Not at all. I’ve become increasingly convinced over the years that the way we seek and form relationships in Western countries is deeply flawed—and that we can do better. Our relationships typically begin with a burst of physical attraction that we interpret, often incorrectly, as love. Over time, both the passion and the loving feelings subside. Worse still, we leave the entire process to chance—to the Fates, as it were. In some cultures in Africa and Asia, however, love is on a very different trajectory. Many couples are able to make love grow stronger over time, taking responsibility for their feelings and taking control over the process of loving. “First comes marriage, then comes love,” people say in India.

I now believe I understand a good deal about how this process works, and I believe that it can be packaged to suit Western tastes and needs without importing foreign cultures or the practice of arranged marriage. That was the message Mariette and I left with an appreciative—and dare I even say loving?—audience.

As I left the stage, a woman approached me and said that the gazing exercise, which she had done with man who was a total stranger to her, had made her cry. “There was a whole world in those eyes,” she said.

Yes, of course. We only have to learn how to see.

By Robert Epstein

Source: http://www.scientificamerican.com/
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=science-of-love

The Trouble With Bright Girls

Successful women know only too well that in any male-dominated profession, we often find ourselves at a distinct disadvantage.   We are routinely underestimated, underutilized, and even underpaid.  Studies show that women need to perform at extraordinarily high levels, just to appear moderately competent compared to our male coworkers.

But in my experience, smart and talented women rarely realize that one of the toughest hurdles they'll have to overcome to be successful lies within.  We judge our own abilities not only more harshly, but fundamentally differently, than men do. Understanding why we do it is the first step to righting a terrible wrong.  And to do that, we need to take a step back in time.

Chances are good that if you are a successful professional today, you were a pretty bright fifth grade girl.  My graduate advisor, psychologist Carol Dweck (author of Mindset) conducted a series of studies in the 1980s, looking at how bright girls and boys in the fifth grade handled new, difficult and confusing material.

She found that bright girls, when given something to learn that was particularly foreign or complex, were quick to give up - and the higher the girls' IQ, the more likely they were to throw in the towel.  In fact, the straight-A girls showed the most helpless responses.  Bright boys, on the other hand, saw the difficult material as a challenge, and found it energizing.  They were more likely to redouble their efforts, rather than giving up.

Why does this happen? What makes smart girls more vulnerable, and less confident, when they should be the most confident kids in the room? At the 5th grade level, girls routinely outperform boys in every subject, including math and science. So there were no differences between these boys and girls in ability, nor in past history of success. The only difference was how bright boys and girls interpreted difficulty - what it meant to them when material seemed hard to learn. Bright girls were much quicker to doubt their ability, to lose confidence, and to become less effective learners as a result.

Researchers have uncovered the reason for this difference in how difficulty is interpreted, and it is simply this:  more often than not, bright girls believe that their abilities are innate and unchangeable, while bright boys believe that they can develop ability through effort and practice. 

How do girls and boys develop these different views?  Most likely, it has to do with the kinds of feedback we get from parents and teachers as young children.  Girls, who develop self-control earlier and are better able to follow instructions, are often praised for their "goodness."  When we do well in school, we are told that we are "so smart," "so clever, " or " such a good student."  This kind of praise implies that traits like smartness, cleverness, and goodness are qualities you either have or you don't.

Boys, on the other hand, are a handful.  Just trying to get boys to sit still and pay attention is a real challenge for any parent or teacher.  As a result, boys are given a lot more feedback that emphasizes effort (e.g., "If you would just pay attention you could learn this," "If you would just try a little harder you could get it right.")  The net result: when learning something new is truly difficult, girls take it as sign that they aren't "good" and "smart", and boys take it as a sign to pay attention and try harder.

We continue to carry these beliefs, often unconsciously, around with us throughout our lives.  And because bright girls are particularly likely to see their abilities as innate and unchangeable, they grow up to be women who are far too hard on themselves - women who will prematurely conclude that they don't have what it takes to succeed in a particular arena, and give up way too soon. 

Even if every external disadvantage to a woman's rising to the top of an organization is removed - every inequality of opportunity, every chauvinistic stereotype, all the challenges we face balancing work and family - we would still have to deal with the fact that through our mistaken beliefs about our abilities, we may be our own worst enemy.

How often have you found yourself avoiding challenges and playing it safe, sticking to goals you knew would be easy for you to reach?  Are there things you decided long ago that you could never be good at?  Skills you believed you would never possess?  If the list is a long one, you were probably one of the Bright Girls  - and your belief that you are "stuck" being exactly as you are has done more to determine the course of your life than you probably ever imagined.  Which would be fine, if your abilities were innate and unchangeable.  Only they're not.

No matter the ability - whether it's intelligence, creativity, self-control, charm, or athleticism - studies show them to be profoundly malleable.  When it comes to mastering any skill, your experience, effort, and persistence matter a lot.    So if you were a Bright Girl, it's time to toss out your (mistaken) belief about how ability works, embrace the fact that you can always improve, and reclaim the confidence to tackle any challenge that you lost so long ago.

By Heidi Grant Halvorson, Ph.D

Source: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-science-success/201101/the-trouble-bright-girls

http://www.psychologytoday.com/