Good Life Project - Brain Training: What Really Works? | Cognitive Bias: Anchoring.

Episode Date: October 19, 2017

In today's GLP Update, we're talking about new research on brain training. And, we're kicking off a series on "cognitive bias," a/k/a the silly ways our minds fool us into thinking we're more rational than we really are.Good Life Riff: In the first of our GLP Riffs on cognitive bias, we're exploring a quirky, hidden tendency known as "anchoring" or "focalism. What is that? It's how we subliminally anchor the value of things to a specific number, often a dollar amount. Why does this matter? Because it can lead us to believe something is worth way more or less than it really is, then pay a ton for something we end up regretting.Good Life Science: And, in our Good Life Science segment, we're diving into some fascinating new research on brain training. You've seen the apps, website and programs. Train your brain for better memory, attention, focus, problem-solving. Or, just plain stop it from shrinking as you age. Is it true? Well, a new study out of Johns Hopkins looks at two popular approaches and comes up with some eye-opening conclusions. Hint: one works at least twice as well as the other. And, as always, for those want to go to the source, here's a link to the full study.Rockstar Sponsors: RXBAR Kids is a snack bar made with high-quality, real ingredients designed specifically for kids. It contains 7 grams of protein and has zero added sugar and no gluten, soy or dairy. Find at Target stores OR for 25% off your first order, visit RXBAR.com/goodlife.Are you hiring? Do you know where to post your job to find the best candidates? Unlike other job sites, ZipRecruiter doesn’t depend on candidates finding you; it finds them. And right now, GLP listeners can post jobs on ZipRecruiter for FREE, That’s right. FREE! Just go to ZipRecruiter.com/good.Audible has the best audiobook performances, the largest library, and the most exclusive content. Learn more, start your 30-day trial and get your first Audible book free, go to Audible.com/goodlife.Thrive Market: Get $60 of FREE organic groceries + free shipping and a 30-day trial at thrivemarket.com/goodlife. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey, it's Jonathan Fields with today's Good Life Project update. Today we're going to be diving into two different things. In our riff, we'll be talking about kind of a unique cognitive bias that messes with the way we see the world and make decisions. And we're also going to explore a particular type of brain training, some research on one specific type of brain training in our science update that actually pretty seriously outperforms other forms of brain training. We've seen a lot of brain training out there in the market these days. And we're going to do a bit of myth busting with today's science update. Excited to dive in with you. I'm Jonathan

Fields, and this is Good Life Project. comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you actually going to kick off a series on something called cognitive bias.

So what is this thing? Cognitive bias is a tendency that we have. It's basically it's baked into all human beings. And it's something that very often leads us to make irrational decisions. So we like to think of ourselves as intelligent, thinking, feeling, rational human beings. We think that if somebody presents us with a certain amount of information, we can look at that information and we can figure out what is valid, what's not valid, what makes sense. We can weigh it. We can do our pluses and minuses, our pros and cons. And then based on this, we can drop it into a spreadsheet if we want. We can make intelligent

decisions, rational decisions. And sometimes we can, but it turns out that very often what we think is rational is anything but. And part of the reason is because we have these tendencies, these orientations that control the way that we process information, the way that we take it in, the way that we make decisions with it, and the way we behave once we've made decisions, very often in the context of buying something or giving something away or saying yes or no to something. The thing is, most of us have no idea that these less than conscious biases or tendencies are in operation. We don't see them. We just see ourselves making what we believe to be intelligent decisions in the world.

So I thought it would be interesting to spend the next couple of weeks in our riffs exploring some of the really big, the primary cognitive biases and diving into sort of each one, explaining what they are, sharing an example or two of how they affect us and how they affect our decisions in the world so that maybe we can become a little bit more aware. Maybe we can either at least have fun with and acknowledge the fact that we are being controlled by something we don't necessarily see, even though it exists inside of our brains, and then maybe even zoom the lens out a little bit and give us a chance to make some better decisions by acknowledging these tendencies and cognitive biases and seeing if we can somehow approach our decision-making differently in a way to compensate for them. That said, up first today is a pretty interesting cognitive bias that goes

by anchoring. Some people call it the anchor, focusing illusion, focalism, but we'll just call it anchoring. Because I think once I sort of describe it, you'll get what it's about as well, and you'll understand why it's important. And you are very likely going to have seen this at work in your own life in a lot of different ways. So probably easiest to set it up with a simple example. Let's say you're looking for a new pair of jeans. You walk into some department store or wherever it is that you look to buy jeans, and there's a wide selection. And you're not a jeans person. I'm hinting at me when I say that. So I need help. I need help making those decisions, right? So I walk up and I find a salesperson

and I say, hey, listen, I need a pair of jeans. Can you help me out? And the salesperson, if they're actually well-trained and they're a really good salesperson, is going to say something like, listen, we've got a wide variety. We've got 25 different brands and types of jeans that you can choose from. Some are designed for different body types. Some are designed with different materials. Some are designed for different looks and feels and stretchability and this and that. Can you give me a sense for what preferences you have? And also, you know, we have a wide range of prices. So why don't I just show you a couple of different pairs? And so I can get a feel for what you like and what you don't like. And then we can

get you exactly what you want. And you're thinking to yourself, yeah, that sounds pretty cool. Actually, that would be super helpful to me because I really don't know where I'm, where I'm starting, what I'm looking for, what I'm interested in. So show me some stuff and I'll tell you, you know, thumbs up or thumbs down and what I like, what I don't like. I'll try it on. We'll see what fits and what doesn't fit. And then you can also tell me what, you know, thumbs up or thumbs down. And what I like, what I don't like, I'll try it on. We'll see what fits and what doesn't fit. And then you can also tell me what, you know, the different things cost because I really don't know. So off you go.

And in the trusting hands of your super duper salesperson, you start to try on or you're shown different pairs of jeans. Now, let's say there's a range of prices on the jeans you're looking for, and they range from $50 all the way up to $500. I know, blows me away, but jeans sometimes are really expensive these days. I'm still on the lower end of my purchasing preferences there. I'm more on the utilitarian end, but hey, whatever floats your boat. So here's my question for you. If you are the salesperson and you know that you have a range of jeans that you could show

me and the price range goes from $50 to $500, where are you going to start? Are you going to start somewhere in the middle so that, you know, you kind of have an average price and we can go up from there or we can go down from there? Are you going to start on the bottom of the price range? So show me $50 because, um, Hey, we can, you know, if we can do it for $50, then, you know, let's do that. Or are you going to show me the $500 pair of jeans? So that's my question. Now, let's throw in one other thing here. You, as a salesperson, work on commission, meaning the more I pay for my jeans, as long as I have the money to pay it,

and you feel good about it, the more money you make, because you're going to make a percentage of whatever I spend. So what do you do? Well, here's what most salespeople do who work on commission. They don't start with the $50 one and work up from there. And they also don't start with the one in the middle, sort of saying, well, this is an average price. We can go down from here or up from here. What they do is they start with the $500 pair of jeans. And even if you're kind of like, they might say to me, hey, listen, I know this is kind of above what you were looking to spend, but I just want to show them to you for a second, let you try them on for just a moment so that you can understand sort of like the full

range of the offerings available. And this is $500. This is sort of like what you get for $500. Why would somebody start with the $500 instead of $250 or $50. Here is the reason why, because it takes advantage of the anchoring bias. This is a cognitive bias where we determine the value of things, we make decisions in relation to a piece of information that we're given first. That becomes an anchor. And then we judge the value of everything else around it based on its relationship to that anchor. So when I'm looking for a pair of jeans, if the first pair I'm shown is $500, right?

Even if I think that's outrageous, when I'm then shown like two or three pairs later, a pair of jeans that are $250 that look and feel like 90% equivalent to the $500 pair of jeans, I'm thinking to myself, wow, that's actually really good value, right? It's like half the price of the other pair. And I get 90% of the yumminess and the benefit and the look. And if I had walked into a store in the beginning and thought about what I wanted to spend on jeans to start with, I'm probably not thinking anywhere close to that.

And if the anchor price to start with had been $50, if the first pair of jeans I was shown was $50, then that becomes my value anchor. And I judge the value of everything and the price point of everything past that based on the $50 starting anchor. So then if I start at $50 and say, wow, I can get a pair of jeans at $50. And then I'm showing a pair that's $250. I'm thinking to myself, five times higher than the price. That is insane. Rather than if I'm started at $500 and I'm showing the $250 pair, I'm thinking to myself, wow, that's like half the price. That's a huge discount. And I'm getting most of the value of the really sort of super premium brand. So the $250, when I start with $500, the $250 appears to me to be so much more reasonable because I'm anchoring it to $500. If my salesperson starts me at 50,

well then the $250 price point seems so much more outrageous because I'm comparing it to $50. So one, it feels so much more valuable because I'm thinking it's half the price. The other, it feels outrageous because I'm thinking it's five times the price. And it's the exact same price. So this is the weird way that our brains work. It's this funky cognitive bias. And the thing is, we actually don't see that. We don't acknowledge that this is a script that is running unconsciously in the way that we make decisions and value things in the world. So maybe pay attention to this. Next time you go out and you are looking to make a decision about something, think to yourself, where am I starting from? If I have complete control over the process,

what is the anchor that I wanna choose for myself to start from? And if you need the help of somebody else in making a decision, maybe tell them upfront, hey, listen, show me the greatest value that you have, like the best price or the high, whatever it may be. And then let's work our way up from there.

And you may find yourself making very different judgments about what you're willing to invest in, what you're willing to choose, what you're willing to say yes and no to, and end up actually getting a lot more value in the things that you decide yes to without actually having to give up nearly as much. Something to think about as we move into our lives and our days. That is the first in our series on cognitive bias. I will be back next week focusing on yet another bias that secretly controls you, your thoughts, your beliefs, and your life. What that is, I'm not going to share until next week. So you will have to tune

back in. And I'm excited to dive into our science update now because we have some really cool research on brain training, what works and what does not. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10.

Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS are later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were gonna be fun. On January

24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him. We need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight Risk. And we're back with today's Good Life Science update. What are we talking about today?

We're talking about some really interesting research out of Johns Hopkins, and this is on brain training. What is brain training anyway? You've probably seen over the last few years, because it's gotten increasingly popular, various apps, various programs, various sort of online interventions, things that you can do to, quote, exercise your brain, to boost your cognitive power, aka your thinking processing power, your memory, your working memory, and to focus your attention. And there's been a prevalence of all of these different tools and apps and technologies, I think in no small part, because we're starting to realize that the brain actually is capable of changing even later in life. And we've seen a lot of sort of news and stories that show that without intervention, the research tells us that as we age, especially once

we hit sort of the middle years of our lives, the size of our brain begins to shrink. We literally lose brain volume, brain mass, and neural connections. And along with that often comes a decline in cognitive function. That includes thinking, problem solving, creativity, memory, attention, focus, and things like that. So once we realize that the brain sort of organically without any intervention just slowly loses size and function as we age, and we also see the research over the last 10, 15 years that says that your brain is actually neuroplastic, meaning we don't start with something and then only have one direction go, meaning down and small, it's actually possible to, quote, exercise the brain in different ways that not only preserve

the capacity of the brain, but potentially add new brain cells and build new connections between the neurons, the cells in your brain in an attempt to potentially not only just maintain cognitive function, but even potentially improve it. So once we sort of stood in that place, a lot of people have been asking the question, well, what exactly do we do? What are the things that we can do

in order to actually maintain or increase our brain juice, our brain power? Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. our brain juice, our brain power. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch,

getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone Xs are later required. Charge time and glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary. And people have experimented with a lot of different things and the research is all over the place. Some of the things that are becoming pretty clear

and make a really big difference are exercise and lifestyle. It can have a huge difference. Exercise in part because it releases a chemical in the brain called BDNF, brain-derived neurotropic factor, that has been described as, quote, miracle grow for the brain. But in this particular study, the researchers at Johns Hopkins were actually looking at these sort of brain training exercises that have been floating around in various shapes, sizes, and forms in technology apps and things like that. Some of them included in some of the biggest commercial programs out there

that people are using to try to preserve or increase their cognitive function, their memory, their attention. And instead of using any one of those commercial things, what the researchers did was they chose two sort of commonly integrated modalities of brain training. And what they found was that one of them actually was really substantially better at improving cognitive function, especially memory or working memory, which is your ability to hold things in your memory for sort of shorter periods of time while you're moving through your day and attention. And the way that they did this was actually by

creating three different groups as generally researchers always do. They had one group engaged in something called dual and back training. They had the other group engaged in a completely different type of training called complex span training. And then of course you have a control group that kind of, you know, like either does nothing or does something, which is not designed to really make any difference. What they found was that the folks who were in the dual and back exercise showed a 30% improvement in one of the most critical sort of cognitive capabilities, working memory and attention in a remarkably short period of time. Now, that said, dual NBAC training is something that I have sort of explored lightly in the past. And it actually is integrated in certain ways into certain commercial programs. If you literally just search dual and back, that's the letter N, by the way, and the word back, B-A-C-K, you'll find tons of research on this. And you'll very likely also find a whole bunch

of apps and even websites where you can kind of do it yourself and experience it. The nature of the training is that you're shown a cycle of prompts. Very often it's a blend of visual and audio at the same time and asked to remember them. So you may see a letter and then a shape or something like that and they appear together and your goal is to remember that and then a shape or something like that. And they appear together and your goal is to remember that. And then you're shown another one and another one through one cycle. And then you come to the next cycle and you're asked to remember those things one cycle back. And you keep doing this and then you'll add to the things that you have to remember. And then you see how many you can remember two cycles back and then three

cycles back and so on and so on. It's a little bit grueling. Some people would actually find this really kind of fun and like a great challenge, but it definitely is taxing. So 30 minutes of this is definitely, you're probably going to want a little bit of a break because it's pretty intense. But what it shows is that the brain is capable of actually expanding its capability in a pretty big way in a pretty short amount of time. And in fact, the participants in the study were given a battery of cognitive tests and also got EEGs or electroencephalograms before to measure brain activity. And in fact, they were given the EEGs or electroencephalograms before to measure brain activity. And in fact, they were given the EEGs again after.

And what that showed was that there was substantially more activity in the parts of the brain that would control these things after the interventions. And in fact, there was also substantial activity in a part of the brain known as the prefrontal cortex, which is where a lot of executive control and problem solving, in addition to working memory takes place. So it's kind of interesting, because there have been all these, you know, commercial brain exercise things that have been out there for a lot of different years. And this is one of the first days, the first day that I've seen, that actually compares and contrasts to very specific modalities and does a detailed analysis and EEG in association with that and shows really substantial gains in both function and in scanning in the way that

the brain is functioning and operating. And I'm looking forward to seeing more work like this, so we can really get a beat on what helps us sustain and expand our brain capacity as we move into the second half of our lives, because that helps us live better lives. As always, I hope you've enjoyed this and learned a bit about the way that our brains function, both in our earlier conversation about cognitive bias. We started with anchoring today, and we are going to explore some really interesting, funky things as we sort of dance through the playground of cognitive weirdness biases and tendencies

in the next couple of weeks. And of course, kind of building on that, the way that we train our brain. I'm Jonathan Fields. See you next week. This is Good Life Project. Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. If the stories and ideas in any way moved you, I would so appreciate if you would take just a few extra seconds for two quick things. One,

if it's touched you in some way, if there's some idea or moment in the story or in the conversation that you really feel like you would share with somebody else, that it would make a difference in somebody else's life. Take a moment and whatever app you're using, just share this episode with somebody who you think it'll make a difference for. Email it if that's the easiest thing, whatever is easiest for you. And then, of course, if you're compelled, subscribe so that you can stay a part of this continuing experience. My greatest hope with this podcast is not just to produce moments and share stories and ideas that impact one person listening, but to let it create a conversation, to let it serve as a catalyst for the elevation of all of us together collectively, because that's how we rise. When stories and ideas become conversations that lead to action, that's when real change happens. And I would love to invite you to participate

on that level. Thank you so much, as always, for your intention, for your attention, for your heart. And I wish you only the best. I'm Jonathan Fields. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him. We need him. Y'all need a pilot.

Flight Risk. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone Xs are later required.

Charge time and actual results will vary.