Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - #34 Why Being Popular Isn’t All It’s Cracked Up To Be with Professor Mitch Prinstein

Episode Date: October 31, 2018

“We are biologically programmed to care what others think of us” Who doesn't want to be more popular? Leading psychologist, Professor Mitch Prinstein explains why perhaps we should be careful what we wish for… More than childhood intelligence, family background, or prior psychological issues, research indicates that it’s how popular we were in our early years that predicts how successful and how happy we grow up to be. But it’s not always the conventionally popular people who fare the best, for the simple reason that there is more than one type of popularity: the first based on status and the second based on likeability. Although we are hardwired to crave status, research indicates that this type of popularity hurts us more than we realise. In fact, research shows that people who were popular in high school were more likely to suffer from addictions, problems in relationships and had a higher risk of depression, anxiety and loneliness in later life. We discuss how popularity taps into our basic need to survive and examine the surprising links to our health and lifespan, offering important insights for all of us about how we can cultivate the right kind of popularity. This conversation is more relevant today than ever before. In a world that pushes us to pursue power, and click our way to online status, it has become too easy to be lured towards a type of popularity that can harm us, and our children. This is a truly eye-opening conversation – I hope you enjoy it! My upcoming book 'The Stress Solution' covers these topics in detail. You can pre-order it on Amazon. Show notes available at drchatterjee.com/popularity Follow me on instagram.com/drchatterjee/ Follow me on facebook.com/DrChatterjee/ Follow me on twitter.com/drchatterjeeuk Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

While likability leads to positive outcomes decades later, the people who are the coolest, most popular folks in high school, research shows that when they grow up, they're more likely to suffer from addictions. They have difficulties in their professional and personal relationships, and they're at much higher risk for anxiety, depression and loneliness. Hi, my name is Dr. Rangan Chatterjee, medical doctor, author of The Four Pillar Plan, and television presenter. I believe that all of us have the ability to feel better than we currently do, but getting healthy has become far too complicated. With this podcast, I aim to simplify it. I'm going to be having conversations with some of the most interesting and exciting people both within as well as outside the health space to hopefully inspire you as well as empower you

with simple tips that you can put into practice immediately to transform the way that you feel. I believe that when we are healthier we are happier because when we feel better we live more. Because when we feel better, we live more. Hello and welcome to another episode of my Feel Better, Live More podcast. My name is Rangan Chatterjee and I am your host. Today's guest is the leading psychologist, Professor Mitch Prinstein. Mitch is an expert on popularity and has written a fabulous book called The Popularity Illusion, which I first came across a few months ago when I was locked away researching material for my brand new book, The Stress Solution. I was absolutely fascinated with Mitch's work and I'm looking forward to

sharing it with you today. Who doesn't want to be more popular? Well, perhaps we should be careful what we wish for. More than childhood intelligence, family backgrounds, or prior psychological issues, research indicates that it's how popular we were in our early years that predicts how successful and how happy we grow up to be. But it's not always the conventionally popular people who fare the best. For the simple reason that there is more than one type of popularity. The first is based on status and the second is based on likability. Now, although we are hardwired to crave status,

research indicates that this type of popularity hurts us more than we realize. In fact, research shows that people who were more popular in high school are more likely to suffer from addictions, were more popular in high school are more likely to suffer from addictions, difficulties in professional and personal relationships, have a higher risk of depression, anxiety and loneliness. We discuss how popularity taps into our basic need to survive and examine the surprising links to our health and lifespan. We offer important insights for all of us about how we can cultivate the right kind of popularity. This conversation is more relevant today than ever before. In a world that pushes us to pursue power and click our way to online status, it's become too easy to be lured towards a type of popularity that can harm us and our children. I think you're going to find

today's episode full of fresh insights and I I think you're going to find today's episode full of fresh insights and I really think you're going to enjoy it. Before we start, I'm pleased to report that my partnership with Athletic Greens is continuing. They are the sponsor of today's show. If you have listened to the podcast before, you will know that for me, the right nutrition is an essential ingredient to having a healthy and happy life. And yes, I do prefer people to get their nutrition from eating foods, but I recognize that for some of us, it can be a little bit challenging. Many of us are rushing around. We're trying to meet competing demands. We often get home late.

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getting on with it. I really like what this company stands for and I've got to say that this is one of the most nutrient-dense whole food supplements that I have come across. For listeners of this podcast, if you go to www.athleticgreens.com forward slash live more, you will be able to access a special offer where you get a free travel pack box containing 20 servings of Athletic Greens, which is worth around £70 with your first order. So do go and check it out at athleticgreens.com forward slash live more. Now, on to today's conversation. So I'm absolutely delighted today to be speaking to a gentleman who has written an absolutely

fabulous book called The Popularity Illusion. In fact, it's a book that I have quoted a little bit in my upcoming book, The Stress Solution. And I'm absolutely delighted that we're actually going to have the chance to have a conversation. So without further ado, I'm going to speak to Mitch Prinstein today. And so Mitch, welcome to the Feel Better Live More podcast. Thank you so much. Excited to talk. Yeah, me too. So we've got a bit of a slight time delay at the moment because you are in the United States. Is that right at the moment? That's right. I'm in North Carolina. You're in North Carolina. I'm in the northwest of England, recording this over Skype with you. So

I guess we're going to be getting into technology at some point in this conversation, I would imagine. But I guess this is just illustrating how amazing technology can be that we can, from thousands of miles away, actually have this conversation. That's right. That's right. Technology is good and sometimes not so good. So yeah, we'll talk about that. We'll talk about that. So I guess the first question for me, Yeah, we'll talk about that. We'll talk about that. So I guess the first question for me, really, I'm really struck by this concept that you talk about, which is popularity and likability.

And you talk about them being two different things. So what is the difference between popularity and likability? This is what I think is so fascinating about popularity, because almost everybody has some feelings about that topic, or someone remembers what popularity was like. But scientists actually show that when we think of popularity, we're probably thinking of just one type, and that is status or the type that we experience in high school. And that's about how much we're visible, we're well known, we're even famous or influential towards others. But that's not the

type of popularity that we start experiencing when we're really young. In fact, even three-year-olds can be more or less popular based on how likable they are. And likability is really different from our status or our other form of popularity, because it really leads to completely opposite outcomes if you look at the effects on our lives even decades later. Well, I mean, that's incredible. And I think you're absolutely right. When we talk about status or popularity, I think all of us, myself included, as you're talking about that, we're often brought back to the school playgrounds and things that might have happened there where

either we got bullied or we weren't sort of part of a particular group. And, you know, I've got to say that when I talk to a lot of my patients these days about their health, it's amazing how often the lifestyle choices they're making is in some way related to their emotional health and their emotional health can often, you know, go all the way related to their emotional health. And their emotional health can often go all the way back to experiences as a child. And I guess what's interesting to me is that you're saying that even back at the age of three, as humans, as young children, we are already, what do you say, we can detect likability? Is that what you're getting at? That's right.

If you ask three-year-olds to tell you who they like the most and who they like the least, you can determine whether kids are generally very likable, dislikable, neglected, or even controversial, folks that are both liked and disliked by their peers. And unless we talk about this and we intervene to change it, research says that how likable we are at three will be the same likability that we have when we're 13 and 33 and 103. It's remarkably constant and it has a huge effect on our happiness, on our success, on our relationships, and even on our physical health. Wow. I mean, that's incredible to hear, Mitch. So what are some of those

implications? Yeah, I guess if we go into one of these long-term implications, then we can sort of dive back into what it actually means. What are we detecting as children? What are we picking up? And I guess how we might be able to change that as well. Sure. Yeah, likable folks are really remarkable in the way that they interact within a group. And we can talk a little bit about why this has such a big effect on so many outcomes. But research shows us after dozens and dozens of studies that likable children grow up to be adolescents who get better grades, who are happier, who engage in more community service and have more positive relationships. and have more positive relationships. And if you follow those people out until adulthood, in their 30s and 40s and 50s, you find that the ones who were the most likable as children are more likely to get hired and promoted. They're more likely to make more money,

believe it or not, complete more years of school. They have happier marriages, and they actually have fewer physical illnesses illnesses and they live longer lives, all related to their likeability, even after controlling for so many other factors that we would think play an even more important role. But it's likeability that matters. That is so incredible. And I guess I'm trying to think then. So is this something that people are born with? then so is this something that people are born with you know they're either likable or they're not or is this something that you know certain early childhood experiences sort of dictate how we react to those and therefore you know that becomes our personality that becomes whether

we're likable or not I mean you know I guess a lot of people will be listening to this thinking wow well you know I've got children and something has happened, does that mean they're stuck with that for the rest of their lives? So it's a little bit of both. A little bit of our likability can be based on what we're born with. Things like our intelligence or even our physical appearance, or the extent to which we feel sociable, which can be a genetic kind of temperament inherited from our parents. But it's really important for people to know that we can absolutely change our likability. We can change our kids' likability. And it is something that can be adapted. One of the biggest ways is how it is we interact when we are within a group. Because the number one factor that makes us not liked is how aggressive

we are. And sometimes we're acting aggressively because we've learned somewhere in our environment that people are likely to reject us. So research shows that we kind of anticipate being rejected. We see rejection in places where it might not really be. And we even preempt our response or others' behavior by starting to behave as if we expect something bad to happen. And it perpetuates this really negative cycle that we can reverse. But if we don't talk about it, then it really can lead us to just become rejected over and over again, with every new setting or every new group we get into. Yeah, well, almost like a self fulfilling prophecy that, you know, we just

start to, I don't know, just the way that we're feeling almost means that any situation we go into is going to, it's almost going to become what we think it is already, just from the way that we are. I didn't say that eloquently, actually. I've just, this is quite profound what you're saying, actually. And it's got me thinking quite a lot. Well, thanks. You know, there was a really interesting study where they asked people to watch a movie. And while they were watching that movie, it had some scenes where people were rejecting one another. And it also had some cues where people were accepting one another. But they had the participants wear a special kind of glasses where they could track

exactly what they were looking at on screen by tracking kind of the pupils in their eyes. What they found was that people who had experiences of being rejected, about 75% of the time, they were staring at the parts of the image that signaled rejection. People kind of frowning or turning away from one another, crossing their arms and looking sad or averting eye contact. crossing their arms and looking sad or averting eye contact. But when different people who had been accepted in their past watched the exact same movie at the exact same time, their eyes focused 80% of the time on positive cues, on people who were smiling or welcoming others into their social group. And it's amazing if you think about it. People who are rejected might actually be walking through the world seeing only those cues or mostly those cues that makes them think that the world continues to be a rejecting place. It's actually like they're seeing the world through these rejection colored glasses.

And it changes every single interaction every single day. Think how powerful that is on how much our rejection experiences could be affecting every relationship and interaction we have today. This is why it's so important for people to kind of change that. Yeah, absolutely. You know, it really isn't quite incredible. I've been doing a lot of work on myself over the last year. It's a lot of emotional work trying to figure out why I make the decisions that I make and what's great is that I can now go into different situations and have a completely different mindset to how I would have perceived that situation even four or five years back and it really is quite incredible

how you can you can almost in some ways I'd say you can train yourself but I found it's it's almost untraining those habits that I've it's almost untraining those habits that I've learned, you know, untraining those so I can actually behave in a slightly different way. And I guess that's apparent what you're saying is that if likability is so strongly correlated with things like better grades, you know, people being happier, better marriages, even less physical illnesses, which I think is incredible that it's got that much of an impact, that it impacts our biology in terms of are we going to get sick or not, then it's quite empowering to know we can do something about it. But Mitch, when you say likability, what's the difference between popularity,

which you're saying, I guess we are hardwired to create, but you're sort of saying that actually, we should be striving for likability and not popularity. So what are the key differences there? So likability is when we make other people feel happy, and included and valued. It's when we help to form a group and help people to feel like they're an important member of that group. Now, popularity is completely different. Popularity or gaining a sense of status over others is when we make others feel somehow lower in order to make us feel higher on a pedestal. We do that usually by demeaning others or being aggressive, being dominant or bullying. Think about the United States president, for example. We think about ways that we try and get as much power as possible and get as much focus

on ourselves. So this is in some ways quite the opposite. Now, the reason why we have instincts for this is because if you think about other animal species, this is absolutely an important thing in order to ensure that you get access to resources, right? Food or mating partners, if you're thinking about our closest cousins, like chimpanzees, for instance. And we all have our brains hardwired to start to care about this when we become adolescents. It used to be that we grew out of adolescence, and we went back to becoming a society that cared more about likability. But in the last 30 years or so, we have become a society, particularly westernized cultures, that now cares about popularity, particularly westernized cultures, that now cares about popularity, that dominance and that fame and visibility, way more than we ever have before in the history of our species.

And this is why it's a problem. While likability leads to positive outcomes decades later, the people who are the coolest, most popular folks in high school, research shows that when they grow up, they're more likely to suffer from addictions. They have difficulties in their professional and personal relationships, and they're at much higher risk for anxiety, depression, and loneliness. Wow. I guess it makes you think that is this connected with us being a social species, you know, that we've always, you know, we've relied on our community and our friends and our family and really, you know, I guess the wider community to help us stay safe, to help us get food, to pool resources, all these kinds of things which

have really helped us evolve. And I guess you would argue what it is to be fundamentally human is probably this ability to, you know, exist with other people. So I guess on that sort of evolutionary level, it's not surprising, therefore, that the traits which allow us to get on with people are also going to be the traits that lead to better outcomes. I completely agree. I was so fascinated when I was learning about, even from an anthropology perspective, about our species. We weren't the only human-like species that was walking around 60,000 years ago, but we were the ones that survived. The other species became extinct. This is so surprising because when you look at the research, we were actually not the biggest, we were not the hardiest, we were not the ones that were able to withstand cold temperatures or hunger. So no one would have bet on us to survive. But it turns out there was

just one thing that we had that the other groups didn't have. And that was a slight change to our voice box that allowed us to communicate in sophisticated ways when other groups couldn't really do anything but grunts, let's say. And that small change did exactly what you say. With language, we became a social species. And it didn't take very long before it was clear if you were in the group, you were protected, you got food, you got warnings, you were able to hunt together with others. Even today, we see some evidence of that kind of biological drive to be in a group still affecting us in curious ways, like the ways that yawns are contagious. That comes from back then,

you know, the ways that we were signaling in to being part of the group and doing what the group does and being ready to act in the same way. What I think is really cool is the ways that that group mentality is still affecting us in our brains and also in the expression of our DNA. So at the moment that we experience social rejection, we have things that happen in our bodies that put us at risk for health problems as a result. Yeah, that's incredible. I mean, I don't know if you've seen the same research that I have. Professor George Slavich, I think it's University of California, or UCLA, he, you know, I remember reading some of his research about when you've become, you know, when you're

socially isolated, or you've had a breakable, you've left the group, you know when you're socially isolated or you've had a break or you've left the group you know you're i think that the way that your pro-inflammatory genes are expressed goes up i'm pretty sure you know you basically your body goes in a pro-inflammatory states and you know inflammation or chronic unresolved inflammation is at the root cause of many of modern the modern illnesses that we're now seeing. And it's incredible to think that social isolation and not feeling part of a group might be playing a role here. Yeah, I think that's so cool. I mean, within 40 minutes of being rejected, we can see changes in the DNA in your blood. And what we see are these pro-inflammation changes, because 60,000 years ago, if you were kicked out of the herd, then you might be attacked and you needed to, your blood needed to clot, you needed to be

able to recover from a serious illness. So your inflammation response was really adaptive back then. That was a good thing to happen if you were kicked out of the herd. The other thing that George Slavich's research shows is that our viral immunity goes down at the same time. And the reason why is because if you're kicked out of the herd, who are you going to catch a cold from? So to conserve energy, your body would kind of stop protecting you from viruses. Of course, all this was really helpful 60,000 years ago. But today, if you suddenly lose a friend on Facebook, you're probably not going to be attacked by a woolly mammoth. So we have this kind of pro-inflammation response that increases and this viral immunity that decreases.

And we don't need that anymore. So it leads to a whole way of our body losing its homeostasis that affects our brains, that affects our bodies. And as you say, our species suffers from a variety of illnesses that have a lot to do with inflammation responses now. responses that once were that once served us really well but in the modern living environment when you know we are most of us are relatively safe we're not at threat of you know being being attacked or going hungry or having you know a lion come and you know uh you know cause us damage or anything like that so but the same sort of biological mechanisms are often kicking in. And actually, in this modern environment, they're becoming harmful.

It's really quite something. And it kind of makes sense why we are seeing so many different chronic degenerative diseases. We're coming up with more and more new names and new labels. And I understand why we're doing that, but I think it is helpful sometimes to look at our biological responses through this evolutionary lens to kind of figure out where has this come from? Exactly.

You know, it's fascinating to me that there's an effect as well in our brains that seems to occur that's quite surprising to researchers when we experience social rejection, perhaps for these same evolutionary reasons. We see that there's a part of our brain that activates at the moment we experience social rejection. And it's the part that activates when we experience physical pain. Now, it's not the part that makes us feel actual sensations of pain, tingling or burning, but it's the part that tells

our bodies to do something dramatically and immediately to change our behavior. So think about that. If you're experiencing physical pain, there are two things that happen thanks to the changes in your brain. One is you feel pain, but the other is you immediately do something to get away from the pain. Well, that's the part that seems to be activated at the moment of social rejection, which in essence is telling us that the moment we experience rejection, our brain is telling us, change your behavior, do whatever you have to, to get back in the herd, try and be more popular. So we really are programmed in this kind of 60,000-year-old way to care what others think of us and to care about popularity. The problem is that we now live in a world where our brains and our bodies and our inflammation response is telling us to do something that in today's society will harm us. And this is kind of the paradox. We are programmed to care about something deeply that

we know now in today's society, if we pursue it, will actually harm us. Yeah, it's absolutely incredible. You mentioned that in the last 30 years or so, we've changed quite a lot as a society where after adolescence, where, you know, if I understand you correctly, we're saying, you know, if I understand you correctly, you were saying, you know, we saw all of us children trying to figure out how to be more likable. And as we go to adolescence, we sort of try and become more popular and maybe to exert ourselves a little bit, maybe to, you know, I don't know, you know, stand out a little bit in the crowds.

But you were saying after we've sort of experimented with that in adolescence we would go back to being likable again and actually that would be the predominant traits for many of us whereas in the last 30 years you're saying that's not been the case so obviously what happened 30 ish years ago uh to make that case. And then I guess, you know, how old is social media now? 12 years, maybe 13 years, something like that. You know, so I'm interested what happened about 30 years ago. And then I guess we have to get into how has social media affected all of this? You know, when we graduated high school, that used to be the end of our opportunity to get visibility and widespread influence. We would enter into a society where it wasn't just us and our high school peers anymore.

It was the entire community or the entire world. And it was really hard to ascend to kind of a position of status. So we used to kind of put that aside and really be more interested in forming a community with others and connections and working cooperatively. But over time, we started to get to the point where we don't need other people quite as much, especially in urban environments. We really don't need to work as a group. Most of us telecommute from home, or many of us do right now. We don't even have to work with people in the office anymore.

We can all live in our own individual ways. At the same time, we started to introduce through the media different ways where individuals that would never before achieve the level of kind of fame and notoriety, as you would see in the early 1900s or so, suddenly everyone had this chance at fame. Some people say it started with kind of 24-hour news channels and cable and the ways that there was more of a profile of individual people. And we all started to realize, it's been proposed, that, thought maybe we could entertain this still. Well, of course, that gave rise over time to getting to have much more intimate relationships with celebrities and tabloids and wanting to know a lot more about them than we ever did. And that gave birth to reality TV, where literally anyone could become popular. And we all got to choose who was most popular or not just by calling in for the you know, the pop idol shows and things like that. And then social media, which was really a quite brilliant way to help get those

oxytocin and dopamine receptors in our brain, an opportunity to be flooded with really positive, rewarding responses that made us feel social connection and reward simultaneously, simply by pressing a button from your own computer. And that began this kind of obsession with us pursuing status and popularity now, all the time. Adolescents are not the only ones who do this. We all do it. Yeah, we do. Absolutely. And I guess, if we're, well, when we're not careful, I've experienced this myself before, when you spend too much time on social media, it can really be quite damaging to how you feel about yourself, your mental health, just your general well-being. And, you know, there is this real constant pressure. You know, every time you go on, there's a lot of people saying, you've got to be posting regularly. You've got to be doing this. You've

got to be doing that. You know, how do you get your next 10,000 followers or whatever, you know, whatever people are using. And, you know, I've got to say, look, I'm not anti-technology. You know, I do use social media, but I'm a lot more careful with how I use it now than how I used to. And I've got to say, I think it's pretty toxic for a lot of people. And, you know, it's probably not that politically correct to say that, but that's generally how I feel. That's what I see in my consultation room as well. Many of my patients that I see, I feel, and sort of I have explored this with them, that their use of technology or their overuse or misuse of technology is being quite damaging, particularly to their mental health. That's exactly what our research shows.

You know, social media, I agree. I'm actually very pro technology myself personally. And I also use social media. And social media does have some great things that it can provide. If you think about it, social media connects us in ways that it never did before. It gives us the opportunity for instant social support if something negative happens to us. And it provides a platform to share even minor daily hassles that we would usually not call up a friend and talk about. But we can share it just in a fun way on social media and get a lot of support. People that

feel really isolated and alienated in their own environments, perhaps they're a member of an underrepresented minority group, also can get a feeling of community on social media. So these are great, great things. But if you think about how social media was designed, it was designed to focus our attention on the number of our likes or retweets or followers, even followers that we never, ever will meet, people that are meant to just simply be a number to us. And the thing that scares me the most, especially as a parent, is the ways that we're starting to communicate to today's youth that their value in our society is measured by the number

of those likes and the number of those followers. Here in the States, there are literally magazines, popular teen magazines that are explaining to kids that they should post things they don't believe in. They should like things that they don't believe in because getting followers is more important than anything else. because getting followers is more important than anything else. This, to me, is a very dangerous message, because it's essentially telling children, and also adults, that popularity, status forms of popularity, and these really fake connections with others, if you really think about it,

are absolutely important for our well-being. But we all know that that gives us a temporary feeling of maybe pleasure, but it does not lead to social connections. It does not lead us to feel good. And as you say, a lot of folks get quite lonely and depressed based on their time on social media. Are you seeing that there is a rebellion against social media in any way? Are you seeing, in your research obviously

you're talking about this quite a lot are you seeing that there's a certain groups of people who are going actually no we've had enough um of social media because i tell you last week i was on the road here in the uk um i'm filming a new uh bbc one television show at the moment and it was on the road it was in a place called bright Brighton. And I remember we were talking to people on the street about various things. And I spoke to this 20-year-old young lady and her mother. I can't remember what the topic was, but what really struck me is that she has just graduated.

Maybe she was 21, actually. She just graduated from university. And she said, I don't use social media at all. I never really understood the point of it. And all said, I don't use social media at all. I never really understood the point of it. And all I see are friends around me who are quite unhappy and obsessed with it. I thought, wow, I don't think I've ever heard that before. That's a 20 or 21 year old young lady saying that she has purposely made a choice not to be on social media at all, partially because it didn't speak to her, but also because of what

she's seen around her. And I just wonder, is this getting more and more common? And here in the States, the pendulum is just starting to swing a little bit back the other way. Mostly I'm hearing about this when I talk with college students and with high school students about their social media accounts. What they tell me is that they now have two accounts. media accounts. What they tell me is that they now have two accounts. One account uses their real name and they post basically fake images and they post really curated types of posts to try and maintain a public image that will get them really status popularity. In fact, ironically, they refer to that as their real Instagram accounts, even though it's all fake images. And they referred to it as their Insta account. But a lot of adolescents are saying that they recognize that,

and young adults are saying, they recognize that these posts are fake. This is not what people look like when they wake up in the morning. This is not what people feel genuinely. This is their best selves, a presentation that tries to get them followers. And they feel disconnected from others. So they're starting to create what they call a Finsta account, a fake Instagram account. Fake because they put a fake name on it and they only tell their closest friends. But ironically, it's where they post their real pictures and their real feelings. And they discuss true emotional vulnerability that they have on there. So this is what's happening here on our side of the pond. We've got people who are getting

pretty sick of social media, but feeling like they've grown up in a culture where there's no way to have interactions with people unless it's on social media. So they're now creating ways of using social media that make them feel truly connected to others, but they feel that that's their fake presentation. So this is very confusing if you think about how adolescents are thinking about relationships today. Yeah, I mean, that's incredible to hear, Mitch. But I guess that also fits with this whole idea that humans have always evolved, we've always adapted. And, you know, social media was that new. I remember when Facebook first came out

and I got my first account and everyone was on it all the time. It was just the most incredible thing in the world to be able to talk to your friends, share posts, share photos. It really was incredible. But I think, you know, I think as time has gone by,

many of us have started to now deactivate accounts or actually just start to use them less and less or move to a new platform, whether it be Instagram or something else to really try and explore what, you know, what are the benefits or what other platforms may I enjoy using more or less and i think ultimately is that it's such a new technology that we haven't quite as a you know as a as a species i guess you know if we're really sort of expanding it out across the world we haven't quite well many of us i'm sure some people will listen to this and go i'm i'm sort of okay with social media i love using it i get a lot of support there and i don't think either m Mitch or myself are denigrating that in any way. And we're saying that there are multiple benefits there. But I do kind of figure, you know, you're saying the younger generation are coming through and they're going to figure out, hopefully, a better way of using social media where you

get the best without the bad. Or at least, you know know the optimist in me wants to believe that because i have two young kids you know an eight-year-old boy a five-year-old daughter and i worry you know they don't have a phone at the moment um but from what i see from my friends who've got slightly older kids it's not long before all their buddies will be having smartphones and have access to social media. And I've got to say, that worries me. So I wonder, Mitch, have you got any, you know, I don't know, any tips, I guess, not specifically on social media, although I'd love you to cover

that if you could, but also, you know, for parents listening, you know, to this podcast, and, you know, who are concerned about their children growing up in this sort of world where really popularity status is probably gaining, there's more drive to achieve that sort of external popularity rather than what you call likability. What can parents do to sort of help their children? I've got several tips that I hope will be helpful. The first would be that for adults, but also for kids, it's really important to think about, let's start with social media.

You know, what are you posting? Why are you posting it? And really think about that for a second. Are you posting this because you think it will get a lot of likes from others? Is it specifically a way to try and get that boost of dopamine, that kind of experience of feeling like you've got a lot of likes from others? Is it specifically a way to try and get that boost of dopamine, that kind of experience of feeling like you've got a lot of followers or, you know, kind of

positive comments? Or is it because you're genuinely trying to express something that's important to you and you're trying to connect and form relationships with others? And I think we all have at one time or another done both of those things. We've either posted something we genuinely feel passionate about, or we've tried to make a connection or comments on others' posts to make a connection. And sometimes we post something just because it feels good when we got lots of likes on it. So I would just say we need to think about how often we're posting for status and keep that in moderation, because some people do get quite addicted to it.

Sure, we all do it every once in a while, but really check ourselves. Are we doing this for status or are we doing it for likability? The second thing that I think we really need to do as parents, and my kids are around the same age as yours, so I absolutely resonate with what you're saying, is that we have to train our children to think about how to consume what they see on social media. Remember, they're much more savvy at social media than we are in some ways, but we are still the adults that can help them to understand how to process the information they see on social media. So to remind them, when someone posts something dangerous or illegal or inappropriate, something dangerous or illegal or inappropriate, do you really think it's because those kids believe in those behaviors? Or are they just doing that kind of fronting to seem cool and to try and

get a lot of likes? And when people like that, is it because they truly approve of those behaviors? Or is it because they're also just trying to seem cool or they feel somehow pressured to like what their friends post immediately? Help kids consume, how to consume what they see on social media, and they should be talking with parents about that. There's some research that shows that parents do a great job talking with their kids about their social lives offline, but parents don't frequently talk with their kids about what they're seeing online and help them process that information.

And the third tip that I'll say just really briefly is that it's really important for parents to remind kids that their offline experiences are not merely fodder for their online profiles. And by that, I mean, if you see teenagers today, when they are spending time actually face to face, a lot of what they're doing is taking pictures of themselves to put online to that. And then they spend time with their heads buried in their phones talking about whether they're on their offline photo just created more online activity. This is a problem. Our research shows that kids who spend more time on social media are actually losing out on social skills that they need to be developing during that adolescent period. And the more that they spend online, the more deficient they are in those face-to-face or voice-to-voice social skills that they need to succeed as adults. So sometimes it's good when you're hanging out with a bunch of friends offline, put the phones down, stop taking selfies, stop looking at who's liking your selfies, and just have some good old fashioned conversations. Not to sound too old fashioned myself here, but there's something very important in developmental psychology about having real social conversations and connections. Yeah, Mitch, thank you so much for bringing that up. So I think it's a very, very important point. And, you know, I think we've got to be aware that some people will say, you know, you guys just sound like an older generation now who are not embracing

the change that's happening in the world. And I don't think either one of us is trying to say that we're not embracing it. we both admitted we love technology and we both enjoy using social media and and many other things about you know that technology brings us but i do agree you know i do think it's it's very very clear that electronic communication um is not the same as meaningful human um you know you know what it's not the same as meaningful human, you know, it's not the same as actually a human connection. You know, it's just, you know, it's very transactional what we do online. And of course, you can have meaningful transaction online, but we shouldn't substitute it for, you know, real face-to-face time with those people that are close to to us and there's so many things about your

your words and you know both in the book and both in this but also in this podcast is it reminds me a lot of what I've been delving into the last few months which is you know stress what does stress mean and where our stress is coming to us in the modern world as opposed to where they were coming to us in the past which which i think really is the nub of the matter you know our stress response is brilliant it turns us into the best version of ourselves when needed to um but unfortunately you know in 21st century living a lot of us are having our stress response fired up and stimulated you know throughout the day seven days a week where you know, in 21st century living, a lot of us are having our stress response fired up and stimulated, you know, throughout the day, seven days a week, where, you know, rather than now and again,

and I think that's where the problem lies. This whole thing about likability, I think, is just really great to think about, because I guess what you're saying is that, you know, engaging with other people, doing stuff for others, doing something in service of others, becoming less me-focused is actually not only a nice thing to do, but it is actually critical to do for our health, I guess is what you're saying. Absolutely. same. Absolutely. Research shows that women suffering from breast cancer who participate in support groups where they interact with others actually live longer and have better outcomes on their recovery from cancer. There's something quite magical and important about the ways that we get social support from others and the ways we interact and forming true connections that changes our stress responses, whether it comes to cortisol or inflammation or different

kinds of cardiovascular response systems. These are all highly sensitive to our social experiences. And let me just say, to reinforce a point that you're making, that you can absolutely do that on social media as well. This is something that can be used in a very good way. For instance, use the private messaging or direct message feature. You know, it's there to make true connections and say something where you're able to use the benefits of social media, have conversations with people from very far away, but write a private response. The other thing is sometimes writing a comment rather than and or just clicking the like button. Because if you think about it, when someone posts something vulnerable or stressful, and they're looking for support,

when people click the like button, they see a number of likes, and it says 75 people liked your post. But that's not the same way. And we know in a relationship perspective, has actually seen a comment from a person that they know and have a relationship with that just says, I'm here for you if you need, or, you know, sorry to hear you're going through that. And the effects of that of seeing some anonymous number of people that liked your comment, and I know you can click on it and see who those people were, but it does not have the power of even just seeing one person with their name attached who just wrote a quick sentence. So you can do this.

You can address stress and provide a very helpful stress response through social media. But that's not the way adolescents are trained to use it and a lot of the ways that adults use it, sometimes we just click the like button and we go on, you know. So I think you can do all this on social media, but it's about using it to perpetuate connections. Yeah, Mitch, I think that's a brilliant tip. And actually, that will have benefits, not only for the person who posted something vulnerable there, you know, it's nice for them to get some support and a little comment there saying, hey, I'm here for you.

But actually the benefits are also there for you. If you're the one posting that comment, doing something for other people, doing something to make someone else feel good and take the onus off you and onto them, that actually has powerful health benefits for that individual as well. You know, it works both ways because ultimately we are, we're social beings and, you know, being in

a tribe or being in a supportive community, the benefits would work both ways, right? Absolutely. You know, I was writing a part of the book talking about how to use social media and at the same time that my birthday came about and sure enough, you know, my birthday was visible to people, I guess, on Facebook. And I got, you know, lots of people writing happy birthday and, and Facebook. Now it's interesting when you log back on a couple of days later, it just says to you, you know, 200 people wished you a happy birthday or something like that. It doesn't even show you their names. You have to really click a few times to look at it. And I thought, you know,

I should practice what I preach a little bit here. Can I try this? Can I make social media something that is about, you know, relationships and communities? I said, I don't want to have to click to find out who these people were. I want to actually communicate with them. So it took me, it took me a few days, but I went ahead and I clicked on enough buttons till I saw every single one of those people. And I just wrote back a quick one sentence line like, thanks so much. How's it going? Or how's that new job? Or something like that. And let me tell you, social media was fantastic in that way. I mean, I started up 200 conversations with people, sometimes in private message or sometimes in comments. And that actually led to reigniting some true relationships and to really having connections. And, you know,

in this day and age, it's hard to imagine even real phone calls where we got on the phone and talked again. You know, no one does that anymore, but we really did that. And in that way, using social media, just quick little responses saying, thanks, how are you doing? It was fantastic. And in that way, using social media, just quick little responses saying, thanks, how are you doing? It was fantastic. And it led to an amazing year of terrific conversations and reigniting relationships that we all used to do before social media. But if you think about it, it's funny that social media just makes that harder and harder. It just presents a number of people who wished you a happy birthday rather than telling you who they were and offering you the opportunity

to have relationships. So it doesn't take a lot to use social media in a likable way, but the world is pushing us away from that. We just have to make a little effort to reclaim it. And that's a great little story, Mitch, actually, because it is easy to get down on social media. But that also, there's so many lovely, beautiful benefits from it. And I guess, you know, without social media, if you had had a birthday, I guess, you know, I could be underestimating your reach and your popularity. But you know, I guess it would be unlikely you would have got 200 birthday cards or phone calls. Of course, right. You would have had the opportunity to open up 200 conversations, whereas social media has afforded you that, which I guess is a really, really good thing.

I'm also reflecting a lot on what you said maybe five, ten minutes ago about, I think you mentioned it in the context of teenagers and adolescents, but I think this applies across the whole population now, including adults, no matter what their age is, is that often your offline experience is there in order to create your online contents and your online gain more followers and get more traction on your posts and all this kind of stuff, which frankly, I'm sort of rebelling against a little bit in my own life. And I think that comes from being, when I'm at home in the Northwest of England and I'm around my wife and my children, I find I tend to post a lot less on social media. I'm often in London for various engagements. And when I'm there by myself, I find I'm posting quite a bit. engagements and when I'm there by myself I find I'm posting quite a bit and then when I get home I don't really post that much because you know I've said this

on my social media feeds before but I don't really want to um I don't want to model the behavior in front of my children that everything we do has to have a snapshot that gets shared with everyone online um and I guess part of me also doesn't want to share every little aspect of my personal life online. And that's contrary to the advice you get given, because people will be told constantly, oh, you know, you've got to share everything. People want everything you want to, you know, everything you're doing, they want to know about it. And I get that and maybe people do. but I kind of feel that um you know I don't know how I'd feel I do a bit of work on on televisions um so you know sometimes I'm I think I'm getting a little bit more cautious

about my own privacy in my personal life I try and keep it you know personal um I do like sharing bits and bobs. I guess where my sort of slight clash is coming from, you can probably hear that on my turn, is I struggle with it just like everyone else. I really struggle because I think it's great when people share things from their personal life that people can identify with and connect with. But I think it's very hard because you can post 24-7, right? There's just no, there's no natural boundary to when that would stop. I think that's one of the problems for me. I think the key fact is moderation. You know, we really need to, we are biologically programmed to become addicted to those responses on social media truly. The area of the brain that lights up when we experience, when we see these likes,

and people have done studies to look at the activation in our brain when we're on Instagram, and the part of our brains that light up is the same part that's relevant to addictive behaviors. So it can be something we do a lot of. The message, I think, is one of moderation. I have a graduate student who actually just recently graduated. Her name is Dr. Jackie Nisi, and she and I did some research where she was identifying behaviors that she called public displays of friendship on social media, ways that people post simply to say, look at how close I am with these other friends and look at these great activities we're doing. say, look at how close I am with these other friends and look at these great activities we're doing. Some people do that with their romantic relationships as well and say, I just want to post to the world how much I love my partner, which if you think about it is very sweet, but it's also a little bit unnecessary because the person that's most important to communicate

that to is your partner, not to other people to like how much you love your partner. And we all do that every once in a while. She also looked at digital status seeking, people who seem to post things simply to get a lot of likes. The bottom line is that when you look at people who engage in those behaviors excessively, other people do not like them. It's very clear from our research that people who engage in high levels of, let's say, public displays of their friendships or romantic relationships relationships or a lot of digital status seeking, they're very much disliked. And they also report that they're quite lonely in their actual offline lives. So I think it's important for us to kind of look at that and not necessarily reinforce it or for ourselves to only do that in moderation. Yeah, absolutely. I think

was it in your, it might have been in your book or one of your articles online, Mitch, that you were talking about celebrities and how a lot of them are actually very, very lonely. And I wonder if you could just expand on that a little bit, because I guess that sort of probably really speaks to this whole popularity versus likability piece. Absolutely. I mean, in many ways, that is the illusion of popularity is that we are programmed to think that it will bring us a lot of happiness and value. But if you look at those people who have the highest levels of status popularity in our society, they actually report quite a lot of loneliness and are at the highest risk for depression in our society. Having that level of status requires you to maintain that level of status

and creates this kind of image that you have to constantly cultivate and really support. And what celebrities talk about is the way in which it leads them to start distrusting other people who they don't know are either connecting with them to try and form a real relationship or perhaps just to somehow feed off of their own status and celebrity. And as a result, celebrities will uniformly say that they feel that their world gets smaller and smaller as they trust fewer and fewer people. And what they desperately crave so much is just the real genuine connection of feeling happy and valued and included that comes from being just likable. So ironically, while everyone else is working to try and get status popularity, those who have it just want to be likable and an ordinary person that has real relationships.

Wow. Yeah, it's a good reminder for everyone really about how important it is to be likable. We're very close to wrapping this up, Mitch. I just really wanted to cover this. In your book, you talk about this beautiful study. I don't know if it was an official science study or just something you were commenting on, but this whole idea that I think there was some songs there on a dashboard and people were asked to choose their favorite songs and actually how they were already ranked had a huge, was a huge determining factor in terms of how much we thought we liked those songs. I wonder if you could tell me a little bit about that. Yeah, the experimenters looked at some songs

and put them up on a dashboard, as you say, much like iTunes, and had people choose to listen to them and rate them and then download them for free. And they use that information to decide which songs were actually the ones people most preferred. But then what they did was a manipulation. They posted on this platform the opposite ratings. So they took the song that people liked the least, and they made it appear as if it was, in fact, the highly ranked song that people downloaded the most. And they took the song that people loved, and they made it look like people hated it. And then they opened up their kind of iTunes-like platform again, and they let people

listen and download the songs for free. And just seeing that there was a song that was made to appear as if it was popular, suddenly led tons of people, thousands and thousands of people to say, yeah, that was also my favorite song. And that's the one I want to download. And the song that people actually genuinely preferred, but they made to appear unpopular. In fact, other people said, yeah, I agree. I don't like that song either. So it was a fascinating demonstration of what we've seen in so many advertising and marketing and other kinds of platforms, which is that whether we realize it or not, we are all remarkably susceptible to popularity and what we think has status, people and things. And we gravitate towards it at a level that is well beyond our conscious awareness,

but it's extremely powerful. Yeah, it really is. And I think that's just a beautiful example of how powerful it is. And I guess the lesson really is, you know, we're hardwired to be this way. That's who we are as humans. It served us for thousands of years to be this way. And we're not suddenly going to change to not being this way in this space of, you know, 30 years. And I guess social media has the ability to really hijack that. So we just got to be very careful. And as you say, use it in moderation. That's why I'm a huge fan of some dedicated tech free time every day. I think it's very, very important for our wellbeing. Mitch, I'm just, just let all the listeners here know that anything that Mitch and I have spoken about, uh, you're going to be able to see on the show notes page, drchastity.com forward slash popularity. I'll link to a lot of the articles that Mitch

spoke about as well. So for anyone who wants to continue their learning experience after the podcast is over, I'd really encourage you to go to the show notes page, drchastity.com forward slash popularity. Um, and Mitch, I've got to you to go to the show notes page, drchastity.com forward slash popularity. And Mitch, I've got to say, thank you for writing such a brilliant book, The Popularity Illusion. I love the byline, why status is toxic, but likability wins all.

I think it's a really good read. There's a really beautiful way you've ended it with a letter to a teen. So I won't go through that now. People who get the book can actually read that. I think that's brilliant. I think you've really highlighted a very important topic, but one that we're not talking about enough. So I really want to thank you for that, Mitch. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. This was a really fun conversation. Yeah, me too. Really enjoyed it.

appreciate it. This was a really fun conversation. Yeah, me too. Really enjoyed it. Sorry, I was a bit slow sometimes with the way I was responding. I do have quite a bad virus at the moment and I'm struggling to think clearly. So that's why I've been a bit slow and not very eloquent with some of my summaries of what you've said today. But I'm delighted to have had this chat as well. Mitchell, I always like to leave the listener with something inspiring. So something that they can actually take away and start making changes in their own life. So I think for anyone who's resonated with any aspects of the conversation today,

I wonder if you have a few sort of top tips, maybe on how that they can become more likable. I would say that if you are one of 95% of the world who was not the most popular kid in your school when growing up, I would say welcome to the majority. That is how most people feel. And the level of popularity you had in high school is not something that you should continue to feel bad about or you should feel is somehow causing you difficulties in the long term. In fact, being not so high in status popularity, but being likable is far more important in the long run. And every one of us can change our likability at any point in the day.

It starts with even the simplest things as walking into a room and instead of focusing on all of those cues that might remind us how much we might have had troubles when we were growing up. Instead, think about all of the signals that let us start a brand new day. Look for those people who are smiling and welcoming you and engage in behaviors yourself, your own smiling, your own posture, your own way in which you're talking, that will help start a brand new pattern in your lives that will help other people see you as someone that's happy and that includes others and that values others. And every single day, we have millions of opportunities through our social interactions to become more likable and start a whole new

chain process that could affect our happiness and success for the rest of our lives. Wow. Well, thanks for that, Mitch. Really, really helpful advice, I'm sure, for many of us, myself included. So thank you very much, Mitch, for sparing some time today. Good luck with the rest of your research. Hopefully we can continue this conversation

at some point in the future when you've got more things to add. But yeah, thanks for joining me and I'll talk to you soon. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. That concludes today's episode of the Feel Better Live More podcast. I hope the conversation has inspired you to think about your own life and how you can implement some of Mitch's tips to improve your own well-being. You can check out more of Mitch's work on the show notes page on my website,

which for this episode is drchastity.com forward slash popularity. You could read more articles and blogs by Mitch, read some of his published papers, as well as click on a link to purchase his book, The Popularity Illusion. Just a quick reminder that I do talk about Mitch's research in this area, as well as all things stress-related in my brand new book, The Stress Solution, which is available for pre-order now in paperback, as well as the

audiobook version, which I will be narrating. As always, please do let Mitch and I know what you thought of the episode. Mitch is mostly on Twitter with the handle at Mitch Prinstein. And if you think the information shared today would be of interest to some of your friends and family, please do consider sharing the podcast with them either by leaving a review on your podcast app or by taking a screenshot on your phone right now and sharing it on all your social media channels. I know that this podcast is attracting new listeners every single week. For those of you who have just started listening, my first book, The Four Pillar Plan, is available to buy all over the world.

So do consider picking up a copy. Just be aware that if you are listening to this in America or Canada, copy, just be aware that if you are listening to this in America or Canada, it has been released over there with a different title, which is how to make disease disappear. That's it for today. I hope you have a fabulous week. Make sure you have pressed subscribe and I'll be back next week with my latest conversation. Remember, you are the architects of your own health. Making lifestyle change is always worth it. Because when you feel better, you live more. I'll see you next time. Thank you.