Tag: “Science”

The other day I was watching an old episode of The Big Bang Theory in which Sheldon (a character), who is stuck in his investigation on dark matter, looks for ways of getting stressed on purpose and asks his friends to annoy him. With all of this, he is trying to induce what’s known as productive anxiety, a state of optimal stress for productivity.

The need for cognitive closure is a psychological term that describes the human desire to obtain a straight answer to any questions leaving no space for confusion or ambiguity.

If you are running a 5k race trying to achieve your best time, surely in the halfway point you’ll be struck by doubt about whether you will get it or not. In full effort, with your heart beating so hard and the muscle fatigue accumulating in your legs, you will have a strong urge to slow down.

Many companies design open work spaces so that all employees are in constant communication, since they believe that higher collaboration will allow them to be more productive. Group brainstorming dynamics are used again and again as a mechanism to get more and better ideas about any subject. In our society, and especially in the business world, while cooperative group work is very much appreciated, individual work is undervalued.

The anchoring effect is one of the most solid tested phenomena in the world of experimental psychology. Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky carried out a good number of experiments, which conclusions you can find in the book Thinking, Fast and Slow.