0:00

This is Hidden Brain. I'm

0:02

Shankar Vedanta. What would

0:04

you have done? It's one of

0:06

the most enduring questions

0:09

in psychology. If you

0:11

were a German soldier in

0:14

the 1940s, would you have

0:16

followed orders? If you were

0:18

a member of a Hutu

0:20

militia group in 1994, would

0:22

you have killed your Tutsi

0:25

neighbors in the unfolding genocide

0:27

in Rwanda? If you

0:29

were a son or daughter

0:31

of a slave-owning family in

0:33

18th century America, would you

0:36

have spoken out against racial

0:38

injustice? What would you

0:40

have done? The question is

0:42

compelling because while we all like

0:44

to think we would have done

0:46

the brave thing, the right thing,

0:48

many of us have the sneaking

0:50

suspicion, we might not. We fear

0:52

that we might have fallen in

0:54

line like everyone else and done

0:57

what we were told to do. Today

1:02

on the show, we explore

1:04

the reasons many of us

1:07

fail to stand up to

1:09

unjust rules and authority. Not

1:11

just the dictators, or people

1:13

perpetrating crimes against humanity, but

1:15

to petty tyrants in the

1:18

workplace, unfair rules in our

1:20

cities, even mean-spirited gossip in

1:22

our circle of friends. Why we

1:24

silence ourselves and how we can

1:26

align our words and actions with

1:29

our values, this week, on hidden

1:31

brain. All of us

1:33

can remember moments when

1:36

we stepped up to do

1:38

the right thing. Maybe we

1:41

helped a fellow student

1:43

who was on the

1:45

receiving end of

1:47

hurtful barbs. Maybe we

1:50

defied orders that we

1:52

knew were wrong. Looking

1:54

back, we remember these

1:57

moments with pride. us

2:00

also remember other moments. Moments

2:02

of silence, of cowardice. We

2:04

don't post about such moments on

2:07

our social media feeds, but we

2:09

do ask ourselves afterwards, why don't

2:11

I say something? Why don't I do

2:13

something? At Cornell University, psychologist

2:15

Sunita Sah studies why

2:17

we stay silent when we

2:19

know we should speak and how to

2:22

rediscover our voices. Sunita Sah,

2:24

welcome to Hidden Brain. It's

2:26

wonderful to be here. Thank you.

2:28

Sunita, I want to take you

2:30

back to your days in

2:32

Pittsburgh. There was a evening

2:34

one day when you felt

2:36

a sudden pain in your

2:38

chest. Can you tell me what

2:40

happened? Yes, I had this

2:43

immense chest pain, and it

2:45

was a pain that I had

2:47

not felt before. And so I

2:49

thought I should do something about this.

2:51

And I ended up going to the

2:53

emergency room in Pittsburgh, which is one

2:56

of my first experiences of the healthcare

2:58

service in the US, having moved from

3:00

the UK. And it was very efficient.

3:02

Within minutes, I was actually through

3:05

triage and a nurse had whisked

3:07

me into an examination room and

3:09

they did a lot of tests,

3:11

including an electrocardiogram to make sure

3:14

there was nothing wrong with my

3:16

heart, which was my primary concern.

3:18

and everything was fine. So I

3:20

was relieved and my pain was

3:22

going down a little bit and

3:25

I told the doctor and I

3:27

thought I was about to get

3:29

released from the emergency room and

3:31

she said well actually just before

3:33

you go I would like you to

3:36

have a CT scan. And so I

3:38

was like oh I wonder why?

3:40

Why is that? And she said

3:43

just to make sure that you

3:45

don't have a pulmonary embolinary embolism.

3:47

Sunita had worked as

3:50

a doctor in the UK

3:52

before moving to the United

3:54

States. She knew the

3:56

symptoms of a pulmonary

3:59

embolism. which is a blockage

4:01

in the lungs that's caused by

4:03

a blood clot. A pulmonary embolism

4:05

causes what we call pleuritic chest

4:08

pain. And this is a sharp

4:10

pain. It catches your breath when

4:13

you inhale and exhale. That was

4:15

not the type of pain that

4:17

I was experiencing. I just did

4:20

not think that I had this

4:22

embolism in my lungs. And so

4:25

I did not think the CT

4:27

scan was necessary and I didn't

4:29

want it because why expose yourself

4:32

to ionizing radiation if you don't

4:34

need it? I mean with a

4:36

CT scan it's about 70 times

4:38

more on average than the radiation

4:41

you get from an x-ray. It's

4:43

still small but why have it

4:45

if you don't need it? And so

4:47

I should have said no to the

4:49

CT scan and yet I didn't.

4:55

Moments later, Sunita found herself

4:58

getting prepped for the scan.

5:00

She turned to the tech

5:02

and asked how much radiation

5:04

the scan entailed. Sunita didn't

5:06

need to ask the question. I knew

5:09

how much radiation was in the

5:11

CT scan. And so I wanted

5:13

her to say, oh, are you

5:15

comfortable with that? I wanted her

5:17

to ask me so I could

5:19

say, actually, no, I'm not. Do

5:21

I really need this? And she

5:23

didn't. She just hesitated and then...

5:25

I carried on, I carried on

5:27

having a CT scan and I

5:29

was like, oh this is not

5:31

working, people are not registering my

5:33

discomfort and so I just lay

5:35

back in the scanner and was

5:38

perplexed why I couldn't say

5:40

no. I'm assuming you didn't

5:42

have a pulmonary embolism.

5:44

No, the images showed everything

5:46

was clear, everything was fine

5:49

and I regretted so much not

5:51

being able to speak up and

5:53

just say. I don't think I

5:55

have a pulmonary embolism. I

5:57

just want to go home.

5:59

I so regretted that. I want

6:01

to ask you about another story,

6:04

Sunita. You have a friend named

6:06

Rick, who was experiencing some lower

6:08

back pain, and he decided that

6:10

he was going to go in

6:12

to get a massage. What happened?

6:14

Yes. His doctor had actually

6:16

recommended for his lower back

6:18

pain, for him to do

6:20

some stretching, some exercises. and

6:22

that a deep tissue massage

6:24

would probably help. So he

6:26

booked one in New York

6:28

City and he was really

6:30

looking forward to having some

6:32

relief from his pain. And

6:34

he walked in, the place was

6:37

just very serene, it was

6:39

a nice scented room, candles,

6:41

lovely music playing. The massage

6:44

therapist told him to get

6:46

onto the massage table and

6:48

he did it and thought

6:50

this is amazing. Then the

6:53

massage therapist came in and

6:55

he put two warm hands

6:57

onto Rick's back and then

6:59

all of a sudden he dug

7:01

his elbow in really sharp

7:04

into his trapezius muscle which

7:06

is near the top of

7:08

his back and immediately

7:11

Rick wanted to say something

7:14

he wanted to scream out and

7:16

say ah! But he didn't, he

7:18

hesitated and thought, okay, that's just

7:20

the first, that's just the first

7:23

part of the massage. But then

7:25

he continued over and over and

7:27

each time the elbow dug into

7:29

his back, his upper and his

7:32

lower back and all along, he

7:34

was just trying to stifle all

7:36

this pain and screams. He just

7:38

didn't say a word. He wanted

7:41

to, but he could not say

7:43

anything. I understand that Rick not

7:45

only left without saying anything, but

7:47

he added a tip for the

7:49

massage therapist on his way out.

7:51

That's right. He thanked the massage

7:53

therapist and then paid him and

7:55

gave him a tip and then

7:57

had a very painful subway ride.

8:00

back home. So once he got

8:02

home he told his wife about

8:04

this massage and she said

8:06

that's not normal. Why didn't

8:08

you say anything? And he

8:10

was like well I didn't

8:12

want him to think that

8:14

he wasn't doing his job

8:16

properly. I thought this is

8:18

how massages go so I

8:21

just couldn't say anything

8:23

to him. And she said so

8:25

you'd rather have him hurt you

8:27

than you hurt his feelings.

8:29

And he was like,

8:32

exactly. Sunita has

8:34

asked herself how

8:36

she and so

8:38

many other people she

8:40

knows have become so

8:43

compliant. In her case,

8:45

she traced it back

8:47

to her family

8:49

upbringing. When I was young,

8:51

I remember asking my dad,

8:53

what does my name Sinita

8:55

mean? And so mostly I

8:57

lived up to that. I

8:59

was known for being an

9:01

obedient daughter and student. So

9:03

I did what I was

9:05

told, I did my homework

9:07

the way that they wanted me

9:09

to and expected. I even had

9:12

my hair cut the way my

9:14

parents insisted. And these were the

9:16

messages I received, not just from

9:18

my family, but from the community

9:20

and from teachers, is to be

9:22

good, to be polite, to obey,

9:24

not to question authority. And mostly

9:26

I lived up to that. I understand

9:29

your parents who are fairly

9:31

strict with you, and at one

9:33

point your dad would wake you

9:35

up in the middle of the

9:37

night to practice your scales. I

9:39

mean, that's pretty intense. Yes, and

9:42

I think this is maybe a

9:44

dynamic that is familiar to

9:46

first generation children of immigrants.

9:49

So I do remember my

9:51

dad. getting me out of bed

9:53

in the middle of the night because

9:55

I hadn't practiced my flutes. And I

9:57

had to do the scales. Some

10:00

time ago, Sunita noticed she

10:02

was being similarly demanding

10:05

of her own son. So we

10:07

were in London around 2012 for

10:09

the Olympics and I was really

10:11

excited because the Olympic flame was

10:13

going to pass where I used

10:15

to live in London and I

10:17

wanted to take him with me

10:19

to see the flame. And he

10:21

was nearly five years old and

10:23

we were walking along. It was

10:25

a hot day and... He was

10:27

tired because he'd already been out

10:29

in the morning and he didn't

10:32

want to go. So he kept

10:34

holding me back and I told him

10:36

to hurry up, come and then he just

10:38

like, no, I don't want to go. It

10:40

was just in his chin out and I

10:42

know that look very very well now and

10:45

he just refused to go. So I tried

10:47

to pick him up and carry him. He

10:49

was too heavy and he just sat down

10:51

in the middle of the pavement and whatever

10:53

I said I couldn't make him go. So

10:56

I had to give up. on seeing the

10:58

flame and I walked back home with him

11:00

and I looked at him and I said,

11:02

why can't you just be good? And

11:05

those words stayed with me

11:07

afterwards because I remember telling my

11:09

husband about it in the evening

11:11

and he was like, you sound

11:13

like those people, do you remember?

11:15

And I do. I remember when

11:18

my son was born, he was

11:20

a little baby and well meaning

11:22

relatives would always be asking me.

11:24

Oh, is he good? And I

11:26

was confused, like, what do you

11:28

mean? Is he good? He's a

11:30

baby. That's what they meant was,

11:32

does he sleep when you want

11:34

him to? Does he eat when

11:37

he wants him to? Does he do

11:39

what you want him to do? And

11:41

this was a powerful realization

11:43

for me that if we equate

11:45

being good with being compliant,

11:47

doing what other people want,

11:49

then we equate also being

11:51

defiant with being bad. And

11:53

that's what... I was brought

11:55

up like, so that kept

11:57

me awake that night for sure.

12:00

Think about the last time you were on

12:02

a plane or train or bus?

12:04

Sitting nearby were two families. Both

12:06

had small infants with them. One

12:08

was calm and compliant. The other

12:11

shrieked and screamed. Did you find

12:13

yourself marveling at the good kid

12:15

and annoyed by the bad kid?

12:17

If you're a teacher, do you

12:20

find yourself drawn to angelic

12:22

children who follow the rules

12:24

and find yourself exasperated by

12:26

kids who constantly test the

12:29

limits? When we

12:31

come back, the psychological drivers that

12:33

prompt us to fall in line

12:35

and how they can lead us

12:37

astray. You're listening to Hidden

12:39

Brain. I'm Shankar Vedanta. Support

12:59

for Hidden Brain comes from LinkedIn. As

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a small business owner, you don't have

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Terms and Conditions apply. This

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is hidden brain. I'm Shankar Vedante.

14:01

All of us need to follow rules.

14:04

When you live in a country where

14:06

people drive on the right, you cannot

14:08

suddenly decide to drive on the left.

14:10

Well, you can, but you'll quickly get

14:12

in a crash. We expect schools and

14:15

stores to be open when they say

14:17

they will be open, and we expect

14:19

courts and cops to come to our

14:21

aid when someone breaks the law and

14:24

harms us. But while

14:26

rules do many good things in

14:28

our lives, they can also turn

14:30

us into unthinking automatons. At

14:32

Cornell University, Sunita Sa

14:35

studies the psychology of

14:37

compliance and defiance. Sunita, in

14:39

April 2004, an assistant manager

14:41

at a Kentucky McDonald's, gets

14:44

a call from a police

14:46

officer. Set the scene for me, Sunita.

14:48

Who was this manager and what

14:50

was the call about? So

14:53

the manager, her name was

14:55

Donna Summers, she's an assistant

14:58

manager in her early 50s,

15:00

and she's worked here for

15:02

a while. At 5 p.m.

15:04

the phone rings in the

15:07

small back office, and online

15:09

is just a deep male

15:11

voice, someone who identifies himself

15:13

as Officer Scott. And he

15:15

says he's investigating a theft.

15:18

So a customer has had her

15:20

purse stolen and he describes

15:22

the person that they think

15:24

has stolen the purse. That

15:26

person is a young girl,

15:28

about 90 pounds, with dark

15:31

brown hair. So immediately

15:33

Donna Simmers says that's

15:35

Louise. But she's surprised

15:37

because Louise is quite irresponsible.

15:39

She's a high school senior. and

15:42

she's never been known for being

15:44

dishonest in any way. She's hardworking,

15:46

she's bound for college, she's looking

15:49

after her sick mother, and yet

15:51

that is who they identify as

15:53

responsible for this theft. The officer

15:55

cites various laws and criminal

15:58

statutes that Louise alleges. broke.

16:00

He tells Donna he has

16:02

her supervisor, a woman named

16:04

Lisa Siddens, on the other

16:06

line. So Officer Scott tells

16:08

her that they are also

16:10

investigating Louise for dealing drugs

16:12

and it's very serious. The

16:14

officers are on their way

16:16

and they need to detain

16:18

the suspect as soon as

16:20

possible. They don't want the

16:23

suspect to get away and

16:25

they don't want her to

16:27

get rid of any evidence.

16:29

So they request... Donna Summers

16:31

restrained they suspect Louise in

16:33

the back office and followed

16:35

their instructions. Donna Summers brings

16:37

Louise to the back office.

16:39

Officer Scott is still on

16:41

the phone. A note that

16:43

this next part of the

16:45

story involves physical and sexual

16:47

assault. So Officer

16:49

Scott is on the cordless

16:51

telephone giving orders and he orders

16:54

Donna Summers to conduct a

16:56

strip search first of all. So

16:58

Summers does. She asks Louise

17:00

to remove every item of clothing.

17:02

She shakes each item and

17:04

places it in a plastic bag.

17:07

And even though Louise starts crying

17:09

and summer's comfort for her

17:11

and she thinks that the strip

17:14

search is over the top.

17:16

She thinks that she must obey

17:18

authority, she must obey the

17:20

police officer. It's called in the

17:22

backroom. By this point, Louise

17:25

is wearing only a McDonald's apron.

17:27

When Donna Summers tells the

17:29

police officer she needs to attend

17:31

to the evening rush at

17:33

the restaurant, he asks her to

17:36

bring in someone else to watch

17:38

the teenager. So she asks

17:40

Jason Bradley, who's a 27-year-old cook,

17:43

to take over. So Jason

17:45

comes, he takes over the phone

17:47

and Officer Scott demands that

17:49

Louise drops her apron so she

17:51

can see whether she's hiding

17:53

any evidence. Jason refuses to be

17:56

a part of the strip

17:58

search. He hands... the phone back

18:00

to Donna Summers and returns to

18:03

the kitchen. So at this

18:05

point Donna Summers says that she

18:07

can't spare any more staff

18:09

because it's getting really busy in

18:11

the McDonald's and Officer Scott

18:13

asks whether she is married and

18:16

she said she's engaged and

18:18

he asks her do you trust

18:20

him and she says yes

18:22

and he tells her to call

18:25

call him call your fiancee. Donna

18:29

Summers asks her fiancé to come

18:31

to her workplace. Walter Nix coaches

18:34

youth baseball. He's a regular church

18:36

goer. But once in the back

18:38

room, alone with a frightened teenager,

18:41

he obediently follows the instructions of

18:43

the voice on the phone. So

18:46

over the next two hours, Officer

18:48

Scott asks him to do an

18:51

array of different physical and sexual

18:53

abuse to Louise, and he agrees,

18:55

and he conducts this abuse. So

19:02

at the end of this period

19:04

Walter Knicks finally leaves and Donna

19:07

Summers comes back He goes to

19:09

his car. Walter Knicks goes to

19:11

his car, but he recognizes that

19:14

he has done something that he

19:16

shouldn't have done. What happens there?

19:18

Sunita He rings his friend and

19:20

he immediately says I've done something

19:23

terrible So it's only when he

19:25

leaves that he recognizes that this

19:27

was wrong and after he's left

19:30

Officer Scott continues, he asks Donna

19:32

Summers, who else is there? Is

19:34

there another man that can monitor

19:37

Louise? So at that point Donna

19:39

Summers goes back into the restaurant

19:41

to look for someone and the

19:44

only person that she thinks of

19:46

is Thomas Sims who's actually a

19:48

58-year-old maintenance man who is there

19:51

just on his day off. He's

19:53

having dessert and coffee. So she

19:55

asks him to come with her

19:58

to their back. And then she

20:00

hands the phone to him and

20:02

Officer Scott asks the same thing

20:05

again. He asks Thomas Sims to

20:07

tell Louise to drop her apron

20:09

so that Thomas can see whether

20:12

she's concealing any evidence. And Thomas

20:14

now immediately feels alarmed and he

20:16

says, looks directly at Louise and

20:18

he says, you keep that apron

20:21

wrapped around you. And he hands

20:23

the phone. straight away back to

20:25

Donna Summers and he says something's

20:28

not right about this. This is

20:30

wrong. So at this point now

20:32

the whole ordeal has been almost

20:35

three hours long. Donna Summers was

20:37

told by Officer Scott that the

20:39

police were going to be on

20:42

their way and presumably the police

20:44

should have gotten there within three

20:46

hours. Yes that's right but it

20:49

took Thomas Sims to come in

20:51

and... puncture this compliant atmosphere and

20:53

say this is wrong for Thomas

20:56

Summers to really take a step

20:58

back and think about this. And

21:00

when Thomas Sims said these words,

21:03

she decided like, what's going on?

21:05

And she picked up her cell

21:07

phone to call her manager, Lisa

21:10

Siddens, who Officer Scott said was

21:12

on the other line. And Lisa

21:14

says, what are you talking about?

21:16

And only then does she realize

21:19

that this is a hoax. She

21:21

puts the other phone to her

21:23

ear and the line is dead.

21:26

Talk a moment about the fact

21:28

that as Donna Summers picks up

21:30

this call, the officer is citing

21:33

various police codes and statutes. She

21:35

decides to take that first step

21:37

of calling Louise to the back

21:40

room and from that point on,

21:42

each action is only one small

21:44

step beyond the previous action. Talk

21:47

about this process of gradual escalation,

21:49

Sunita. You're like the frog in

21:51

the proverbial hot water. You're not

21:54

aware that you're being boiled. That's

21:56

right. If you start complying, you

21:58

do a little bit more and

22:01

a little bit more, and then

22:03

at what point do you start

22:05

saying no? It's harder to say

22:08

no to end the compliance now

22:10

if you didn't do so early

22:12

on. What is the line that

22:14

you draw that this has gone

22:17

too far now? I

22:26

want to discuss another aspect

22:28

of compliance. Shortly after you finished

22:30

medical school in the United Kingdom,

22:33

you were invited to a

22:35

free financial consultation. What was

22:37

your life like at the time?

22:39

What were the state of

22:41

your finances? And who was

22:43

offering this financial consultation? I was

22:45

working as a junior doctor.

22:47

in the UK and I

22:49

received an invite to meet with

22:52

a financial advisor for free at

22:54

work. So I agreed to

22:56

meet with this financial advisor

22:58

and I remember that meeting very

23:01

well. So it was in

23:03

the office, it was in

23:05

the hospital's posh meeting room, a

23:07

room that I didn't even

23:09

know existed and I walked

23:11

in and there was this blue

23:14

blush. carpet. In contrast to the

23:16

stone, cold tiles of the

23:18

floor, this was a nice

23:20

change. Sunita sank into the couch.

23:22

The financial advisor, whose name

23:24

was Dan, came in. He

23:26

was very tall, big smile, handsome,

23:29

very sharp suit, and he

23:31

shook my hand and he

23:33

spoke to me for a very

23:35

long time, about an hour, about

23:38

my... Mostly about my finances,

23:40

which was surprising because I

23:42

had a very limited disposable income

23:44

at the time, working as

23:46

a junior doctor. He built

23:48

up this fantastic rapport with me

23:50

and at the end of

23:52

an hour he said that

23:54

I should invest in a couple

23:57

of funds and that he would

23:59

write a report for me

24:01

about my finances and all

24:03

this would be for free. So

24:06

I was impressed. It sounds

24:08

great. And since I was tired

24:10

I did blurt how what's in

24:12

it for you? Well he responded

24:14

with there's no such thing

24:16

as a free lunch and I

24:19

remember being surprised then because

24:21

I was working as a

24:23

junior doctor and we got

24:25

free lunches all the time

24:27

from the pharmaceutical reps.

24:29

My eyes got wider and he carried on

24:32

and he said, no, there's no such

24:34

thing as a free lunch. I'm going

24:36

to receive a commission if you invest

24:38

in the funds that I'm recommending today.

24:41

So in other words, he has told

24:43

you that he has something of a

24:45

conflict of interest in the advice that

24:47

he is giving you. What was your

24:50

reaction at this point? So yeah, I mean

24:52

that disclosure of the conflict of

24:54

interest changed the dynamics of the

24:56

situation for me. So I did

24:58

feel less trust in the advice

25:01

that he was giving me to

25:03

invest in these funds, but at

25:05

the same time, I didn't want Dan

25:08

to know that I no longer trusted

25:10

him. I didn't want him

25:12

to know that his disclosure

25:14

had corrupted the good report

25:16

that we'd built up and

25:18

this relationship that we now

25:20

had over the last hour.

25:23

And so I started to feel

25:26

more uncomfortable. I actually felt more

25:28

pressure to sign and say that

25:30

I will take the funds advice,

25:32

I will invest in the funds

25:34

that he is recommending. Because if

25:37

I don't take his advice now,

25:39

I'm essentially depriving him of his

25:41

commission. So both I felt that

25:43

pressure to be helpful, but I

25:46

also felt a lot of pressure

25:48

not to signal distress. So

25:54

you've come up with a term

25:56

that I love called

25:58

insinuation anxiety. What is

26:01

insinuation anxiety, Sinita? So

26:03

insinuation anxiety is a

26:05

distinct type of anxiety

26:07

that arises when people

26:09

worry that they're noncompliance

26:11

with another person's wishes

26:13

may be interpreted as a signal

26:16

of distrust. Insinuating that

26:18

the person is not whom

26:20

they appear to be or should be.

26:22

So we don't want to

26:24

insinuate. that for example our

26:26

advisors, our co-workers, or even

26:29

our friends and our family

26:31

are not trustworthy, that they're

26:33

incompetent, or they're biased, or

26:35

even corrupt. And this anxiety

26:37

increases the pressure to comply

26:40

with another person. You conducted

26:42

a very interesting experiment on

26:44

a ferry in Long Island.

26:46

Tell me about that experiment

26:48

and what you found. We

26:50

had a middle-aged white man go

26:52

up to passengers, just over 250

26:55

passengers, to ask them to fill

26:57

out a very short survey. So

27:00

it was an innocuous survey, just

27:02

asking them, was a ferry running

27:04

on time, how clean is the

27:07

ferry, how many people are you

27:09

travelling with? And for filling out

27:11

this survey, they would get $5 in

27:13

cash. So people agreed to fill

27:15

out this survey, and once they

27:18

had finished the survey, The

27:20

man asked them, well, you know,

27:22

I can give you the five

27:24

dollars as promised, or I can enter

27:27

you into this lottery, which

27:29

pays out somewhere between zero

27:31

and ten dollars, but the

27:34

average payment is usually less

27:36

than five. Hmm. What did people

27:38

do? Pretty much everyone went

27:41

for the cash. Only eight

27:43

percent chose the lottery. And

27:45

that makes sense because you're

27:47

getting a sure $5 versus

27:49

getting something that's likely to

27:51

be less than $5. Exactly. Yeah. So

27:53

it really shows that the preference, but

27:56

nearly everyone, was the $5 cash, you

27:58

know, the certain $5 bill. But when

28:00

the man gave advice, I think you

28:02

should go for the lottery, that went

28:04

up to 20%. But even more surprising,

28:07

there was one condition where the

28:09

man had to reveal his ulterior

28:11

motive for recommending the lottery, that

28:14

he would receive a bonus, a

28:16

commission, if you took the lottery.

28:18

And so in that way, he was disclosing

28:21

his conflict of interest,

28:23

much like Dan, my

28:25

financial advisor had disclosed

28:27

to me. Right. What happened then? In

28:30

that condition, compliance

28:32

with the lottery advice went up

28:34

to 42%. It more than doubled

28:36

the advice alone. I mean, it's

28:38

really puzzling, Sonita, because of

28:40

course, as you've shown, when you

28:43

haven't given anyone advice, their preference

28:45

is just to take the $5.

28:47

When you give people advice to

28:49

take the lottery, it goes up

28:51

to 20%. But when you tell

28:53

people, take the lottery... and I am

28:55

going to profit if you take the

28:58

lottery, you would imagine that number should

29:00

go down because now people should be

29:02

suspicious of me and my motives, but

29:04

the number goes up. It doubles.

29:07

That's right. And people are suspicious.

29:09

They trust the advice less and

29:11

some even said that they like

29:13

the man less because of that.

29:15

But they still went along with

29:17

it and the reason is insinuation

29:19

anxiety. They didn't want the man

29:21

to know that they trusted his

29:24

advice less. Tell me

29:26

about the gender patterns you

29:28

noticed in running this experiment,

29:30

Sinita. So in this particular experiment

29:32

with insinuation anxiety and

29:35

the man-giving advice, this

29:37

insinuation anxiety on

29:39

compliance occurred only in the

29:41

women participants. We didn't see

29:43

it in the men, and

29:45

we were surprised because other

29:48

experiments that we had run

29:50

in different contexts showed no

29:52

gender difference, but in this

29:54

one there was a clear...

29:56

gender difference. Women felt insinuation

29:58

anxiety much more than mended

30:00

and that increased their

30:03

compliance. So Sunita you have

30:05

looked at different fields, aviation

30:07

and medicine, to see how

30:10

often people speak up when

30:12

they see a mistake. What

30:14

have you found? I found

30:16

some really shocking statistics. So

30:18

one survey found that nine

30:21

out of ten health care

30:23

workers, most of them nurses,

30:25

don't feel comfortable speaking

30:27

up when they see a

30:29

colleague making an error or

30:31

taking a shortcut. And crew

30:33

members in commercial airlines, nearly

30:35

50% of them, don't want

30:38

to speak up when they

30:40

see their superior making a

30:42

mistake. These can be life and

30:44

death decisions and insinuation

30:46

anxiety can account for

30:48

some of the reasons

30:50

why they don't feel

30:53

comfortable speaking up. I

30:57

want to talk about another aspect of

31:00

compliance. Sometimes, you know, we're just swept

31:02

along by the current, by what everyone

31:04

around us is doing. You tell the

31:06

story of a young marine named Matthew,

31:09

who was deployed to Iraq when he

31:11

was 19 years old. He's serving near

31:13

Fallujah, and things are not good when

31:15

he gets there. So things were not

31:17

great at all. He was in the

31:20

middle of a war zone. His friends

31:22

were getting blown up by various different

31:24

explosive devices. In fact, his best friend

31:26

was killed. So at one

31:28

point, he's in a unit that's

31:31

basically investigating a neighborhood, and

31:33

they hear an explosive device go

31:35

off, it's near a mosque.

31:37

Describe to me the events that

31:40

happened next, Sunita. Yes, so

31:42

when this grenade went off, sort

31:44

of too close for comfort, immediately

31:46

they hear orders to dismount

31:48

and to engage. So some

31:51

of his squad they run

31:53

towards the mosque Matthew along

31:55

with others stay back to

31:58

provide cover and when His

32:00

men came back, they had

32:02

four young men as prisoners

32:04

that were dusty, bloody, blindfolded,

32:06

and in handcuffs. So Matthew was

32:09

given one of the prisoners to

32:11

basically look after. And his prisoner

32:13

was yelling at the top of

32:16

his voice in Arabic, and he

32:18

couldn't understand him, and neither could

32:20

his superior. So his superior tells

32:23

him to shut him up. And

32:25

Matthew asks, what do you mean?

32:27

What do you want me to

32:30

do? And his superior says, it's

32:32

not complicated, hit him in the

32:35

mouth. And so Matthew looks at

32:37

the prisoner and he sees blood

32:39

streaming from his nose into his

32:41

beard. And he doesn't want to

32:43

hit this man. He really doesn't,

32:45

but it's a direct order. His

32:47

best friend is dead. He doesn't

32:49

want to be seen as a

32:52

coward. So he raises his hand

32:54

and he hits him in the

32:56

mouth. And then his

32:58

superior says, he's still talking. Hit

33:00

him again. Hit him in the

33:03

stomach. And I remember Matthew looking

33:05

at me while he's telling the

33:07

story and he said, so I raised

33:09

my hand and that's what I

33:11

did. You

33:18

know, some time ago, Sunita, we

33:20

spoke with political scientists Timor Quran.

33:22

He works at Duke University. And

33:24

many years ago, he came up

33:26

with this term called preference falsification,

33:28

where he describes what happens in

33:30

many societies, where you have, you

33:32

know, a current of some kind

33:34

is running through a society. Maybe

33:36

it's, you know, someone has come

33:38

to power and this person is

33:40

very powerful, or a regime has

33:42

changed, or, you know, some of

33:44

the work that he did was

33:46

looking at, you know, you know,

33:48

the communists and integration with West

33:50

Germany. And he finds that in many

33:52

of these societies, what happens is that

33:54

as people sense that the tides have

33:56

turned, that the current has changed, they

33:58

have a very strong... impulse to basically

34:01

fall in line with whatever the

34:03

prevailing current is. And the idea

34:05

of preference falsification is I have

34:07

preferences but I'm going to in

34:09

some ways suppress my preferences. I'm

34:11

going to falsify my preferences because

34:13

my preferences are out of line

34:15

with what the majority seems to

34:17

want. In the classic example, you

34:19

know, he describes the story of

34:22

a reporter going to, you know,

34:24

East Germany shortly after reunification with

34:26

West Germany and the reporter is

34:28

trying to find... you know, former

34:30

communists to speak with, to ask how

34:32

they are fairing under reunification. And when he

34:34

gets there, all the communists tell him, you

34:36

know, I never really was a communist in

34:39

the first place. I was just pretending to

34:41

go along with the old regime and I

34:43

always was for capitalism, I always was

34:45

for the West. One of the points

34:47

that Timor Quran makes is that it's

34:49

really, really difficult for individuals to break

34:51

out of this when this happens happens

34:54

to them. It's one thing to, or

34:56

to notice it, or even to smile

34:58

about it. feel swept up by the

35:00

tides around you. That's really fascinating

35:02

to hear and it aligns with

35:04

some of my research as well

35:06

if you don't admit to yourself

35:09

or to someone else that you

35:11

feel something is wrong in this

35:13

particular situation. If you don't say

35:16

that you're uncomfortable with it it's

35:18

easy to convince yourself that you

35:20

felt a different way at some

35:22

point. I mean cognitive dissonance is

35:25

very strong as we can

35:27

see. A great deal of

35:29

our rule following is not

35:31

conscious and deliberate. It's implicit

35:34

and automatic. Most of

35:36

the time, we are so

35:38

compliant, we don't even realize

35:40

we are being compliant. When

35:43

we come back, how to

35:45

regain a sense of agency?

35:47

You're listening to hidden brain,

35:50

I'm Shankar Vedanta. This

36:03

is Hidden Brain. I'm Shankar Vedante.

36:06

Every country in the world has

36:08

its national monuments to recognize and

36:10

remember its heroes. These heroes are

36:12

invariably people who stepped up to

36:15

do dangerous, difficult, and courageous things

36:17

in moments of crisis. They are

36:19

the stars of our history books,

36:21

are beacons of inspiration. is the

36:23

author of Defy, the power of

36:26

no, in a world that demands

36:28

yes. She says one common lesson

36:30

from the heroes in our history

36:32

books is that they listen to

36:35

their inner voices in times of

36:37

crisis. Think back to that horrific

36:39

case of impersonation at the McDonald's.

36:41

Some employees rebelled against Officer Scott's

36:43

instructions and others complied, but every

36:46

one of them felt a defining

36:48

inner emotion. They felt tension, something

36:50

that I call resistance against resistance,

36:52

the resistance to resist, which is

36:55

that they felt this tension between

36:57

what they thought was the right

36:59

thing to do and the tension

37:01

to go along with what others

37:03

expected of them. So obviously most

37:06

of us don't like being tense,

37:08

we don't like being stressed, but

37:10

you say that this tension actually

37:12

can play a very salutary role

37:15

in our lives. How so? Well

37:17

if we think about that tension

37:19

it can actually be a warning

37:21

sign to us that something is

37:23

wrong and that we should pay

37:26

attention to that. It could be

37:28

the first signal that you should

37:30

defy before you even consciously know

37:32

that you want to defy. And

37:35

I recognize that tension in them

37:37

because that's the kind of tension

37:39

I have felt when I want

37:41

to defy, but feel strong pressure

37:43

to comply with what somebody else

37:46

is telling me. And it can

37:48

show up in different ways for

37:50

different people, but we often experience

37:52

that kind of tension. when we

37:55

want to go against something. So

37:57

instead of ignoring it or sweeping

37:59

it away or thinking it's not

38:01

worth our doubt, we should really

38:04

think about what that tension means

38:06

and whether this really means this

38:08

is the time to act, this

38:10

is the time to speak up.

38:12

I want to go back to

38:15

the story you told me about

38:17

how when you had just finished

38:19

medical school in the UK and

38:21

you were weighing how to manage

38:24

your relatively meager savings, you met

38:26

this charming financial advisor named Dan

38:28

who told you that he stood

38:30

to benefit if you chose his

38:32

recommended investments. Did you go ahead

38:35

and take Dan's advice, Sunita? Well

38:37

I felt immense pressure to just

38:39

sign in front of him, but...

38:41

As soon as things started getting

38:44

really awkward, my pager actually started

38:46

beeping. So I had to tell

38:48

him there's an emergency, a medical

38:50

emergency, I have to go. And

38:52

he was fine, he looked a

38:55

bit deflated to begin with, but

38:57

then he was, that's okay. I

38:59

will send you everything and you

39:01

can sign the paperwork later on.

39:04

And that allowed me to exit

39:06

the situation, which I now call

39:08

the power of the pause because...

39:10

It allowed me to not have

39:12

to send a signal of distress

39:15

back to him. When I got

39:17

the papers a week later and

39:19

I didn't have to sign on

39:21

the dotted line in front of

39:24

them, I could much more easily

39:26

assess my very low income and

39:28

so I threw the papers away.

39:30

In some ways this points to

39:32

one of the most important pieces

39:35

of advice you have when people

39:37

are dealing with whether to consent

39:39

to something or to defy something

39:41

and that is to buy themselves

39:44

time. Exactly. Ask for some

39:46

time to think about it. Step

39:48

away from the situation. Physically if

39:50

you can, would be great. Psychologically if

39:52

you can't. So I feel like

39:54

this happens all the time in so

39:57

many different situations. You know, you're

39:59

buying a car. and the salesperson

40:01

basically tries to pressure you into making

40:03

a decision quickly, or you're sitting

40:05

in a dentist chair and the

40:07

dentist says, you know, we need to

40:09

do this and that, or here

40:11

is the procedure we need to do.

40:14

There's a great amount of pressure

40:16

for us to act quickly, and

40:18

of course when we have to act

40:20

quickly, it becomes much more likely

40:22

that we will act in compliant ways.

40:24

That's right. Especially if something is

40:26

seen as an emergency, it becomes

40:28

very difficult to say no. A lot

40:31

of times we can take. more

40:33

time to think about a decision.

40:35

We don't need to make decisions in

40:37

the heat of the moment. So

40:39

we can step away. We can take

40:41

the power of the pause. And

40:43

one thing that I've learned about

40:45

defiance that is really helpful is that

40:48

if you can take the power

40:50

of the pause, it is great.

40:52

But surprise often disables defiance. So preparing

40:54

for situations like that in advance

40:56

is particularly helpful before the moment of

40:58

crisis. One of the other ideas

41:00

that you talk about that can

41:02

be helpful is to name our own

41:05

emotions and to potentially talk to

41:07

ourselves in the third person. Talk

41:09

about this idea. What do you have

41:11

in mind and why would it

41:13

work? So if you can't get physical

41:16

distance, which is ideally the best

41:18

thing, one of the things I

41:20

could have done in front of Dan

41:22

was to get psychological distance, and

41:24

researchers such as Ethan Cross examined what

41:26

happens when we talked about ourselves

41:28

in the third person. So you

41:30

could close your eyes and you could

41:33

say, Sinita, what is it you

41:35

really want to do here? And

41:37

that gives us some distance to really

41:39

think about what we want rather

41:41

than what the other person wants for

41:43

us. I understand that there has

41:45

been research that finds that in

41:47

fact patients are less likely to follow

41:50

advice that is marred by conflicts

41:52

of interest when they hear about

41:54

this advice through a third party and

41:56

they have some time to think

41:58

about what to do. do? That's

42:00

right. So some of my

42:02

research has examined what if

42:04

the disclosure is not coming

42:06

directly from the doctor but

42:08

it comes from a receptionist

42:10

in a letter. I've even

42:12

looked at giving out letters

42:14

in advance informing patients of

42:16

conflicts of interest in general

42:19

when people can deliberate on

42:21

the conflict of interest disclosure

42:23

and it's simple and it's

42:25

timely and it's given in

42:27

advance. we do feel less trust

42:29

in the advice. If you have

42:31

an opportunity to change your mind

42:33

in some of my experiments, that

42:35

shows that's one of the most

42:37

powerful things. So even though there's

42:39

high compliance in front of the

42:42

advisor, it drops a lot once the

42:44

advisor is not in the room and

42:46

you can make the decision in private

42:48

or you can change your mind. And

42:50

some of those results were very

42:53

striking. and shows us what

42:55

we display publicly is not

42:57

really our private preference. You cite

42:59

an idea from the political

43:01

scientist James March about three

43:03

questions that people can ask

43:05

of themselves when they feel

43:08

like they're being pressured into

43:10

doing something. What are these questions?

43:12

These are three questions that

43:14

James March came up with with

43:17

regards to decision making in general

43:19

in any situation. And the three

43:22

questions are who am I. What

43:24

type of situation is this?

43:26

And what does a person like

43:28

me do in a situation like

43:31

this? And

43:33

I apply these three questions to situations

43:35

that might require defiance. That even

43:37

though we might ask these questions

43:39

all the time when we're making

43:42

a decision and we often ask

43:44

them implicitly, it's really good to

43:46

make them explicit and think of

43:48

them as some type of compass

43:50

so they go around in a

43:52

circle. Who am I? What type

43:54

of situation is this so we

43:57

can assess the situation for safety

43:59

and impact? And what does a

44:01

person like me do in a

44:03

situation like this? What is my

44:05

responsibility? And then how we act

44:07

feeds back again into who you

44:09

are. So talk about why asking

44:12

these three questions is compelling. And

44:14

I noticed that one of the

44:16

questions is not what should I

44:18

do in the situation, but what

44:20

would a person like me do

44:22

in a situation like this? I

44:25

find that very powerful because

44:27

a lot of us have

44:29

values but we don't make

44:31

them explicit. So we have

44:33

values that we might say

44:36

is integrity, equality, compassion, but

44:38

just... Saying those values and

44:40

not living by them day

44:42

to day is often what

44:44

happens, like there's a large

44:46

gap between who we think

44:48

we are and what we

44:50

actually do. And that starts

44:53

at a really young age.

44:55

There was a survey of

44:57

over 20,000 high school students

44:59

that showed that nearly two-thirds

45:01

of them said that they

45:03

had cheated on a test.

45:05

Nearly one-third... said that they

45:07

had stolen something from a

45:09

store in the last year.

45:12

And more than 80% had

45:14

said that they had lied

45:16

to a parent about something

45:18

significant. That breaks my heart

45:20

because I have a high

45:22

school student. I'm sure your

45:24

high schooler is one of

45:26

the twenty percent seneta. But

45:29

these figures are likely to

45:31

be conservative. Of course. One

45:33

in four of them said

45:35

that they had lied about

45:37

a question on the survey.

45:39

And yet, you know, we

45:41

say that we're happy with

45:43

our ethics and integrity. So

45:45

even though we rate integrity

45:48

very high, we often don't

45:50

live by the values that

45:52

we rate. And so asking

45:54

ourselves, what does a person

45:56

like me do in a

45:58

city? like that, we can

46:00

get to our aspirational cells.

46:02

If you think you are

46:05

this type of person, what

46:07

would I actually do in

46:09

this situation? How is it

46:11

that I would like to

46:13

act? And this is the

46:15

type of person I am.

46:17

I am the type of

46:19

person that would say something.

46:22

We might feel psychologically scared.

46:24

We might even feel physically

46:26

scared. These fears can be

46:28

paralyzing. In our companion episode

46:30

of the story on Hidden

46:32

Brain Plus, we explore how

46:34

we might deal with those

46:36

fears. It turns out, one

46:38

of the greatest anti-dotes to

46:41

fear is not courage, but

46:43

love. If you're a subscriber,

46:45

that episode should be available

46:47

right now in your podcast

46:49

feed. It's titled, Defeating Fear.

46:51

If you're not yet a

46:53

subscriber, I invite you to

46:55

check out a subscription with

46:58

a free seven-day trial. Go

47:00

to Support. hiddenbrain.org. If you're

47:02

using an Apple device, go

47:04

to Apple.co/Hiddenbrain. Your support doesn't

47:06

just unlock great content. It

47:08

unlocks a way for us

47:10

to keep bringing you great

47:12

content. If you're a long-time

47:14

fan of the show, it's

47:17

your way of showing us

47:19

that you would like us

47:21

to keep doing this into

47:23

the future. Again, those links

47:25

are Apple.co/Hidden Brain or Support.

47:27

Hidden brain.org. Sunita Sa is

47:29

a psychologist at Cornell University.

47:31

She is the author of

47:34

the book, Defy, the power

47:36

of No, in a world

47:38

that demands yes. Sunita, thank

47:40

you so much for joining

47:42

me today on Hidden Brain.

47:44

Thank you so much. Hidden

47:57

Brain is produced by Hidden Brain Media. Our

47:59

audio production team includes

48:01

Annie Murphy -Paul, Kristen Wong,

48:03

Laura Corell, Ryan Katz, Autumn

48:05

Barnes, Andrew Chadwick, and

48:07

Nick Woodbury. Tara Boyle is

48:09

our executive producer. I'm

48:11

Hidden Brain's executive editor. If

48:15

you have follow -up questions

48:17

for Sunita Sa, and you'd

48:19

be willing to share those

48:21

questions with a Hidden Brain

48:23

audience, please record a voice

48:25

memo on your phone and

48:27

email it to us at

48:29

ideas at hiddenbrain .org. Use the

48:31

subject line Defiance. That email

48:33

address again is ideas at

48:35

hiddenbrain .org. I'm Shankar Vedantan.

48:37

See you soon.