Mindset/Mental

Question 1

What is your brain at work’s SCARF model?

Answer 1

status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, and fairness and core/primal interconnected domains of social experience that determine whether interactions are positive or negative

Question 2

what is your brain at work’s ARIA model?

Answer 2

awareness, reflection, insight, action: use to find insights to solve an “impasse”

Question 3

what are key aspects of awareness in your brain at work’s ARIA model?

Answer 3

focus lightly on impasse/minimize prefrontal cortex … issue is “on stage but takes up little space”

“describe problem in as few words as possible”

Question 4

what are key aspects of reflection in your brain at work’s ARIA model?

Answer 4

pay attention to thinking processes/metacognition instead of specific ideas

Question 5

what are key aspects of insight in your brain at work’s ARIA model?

Answer 5

creates energy and motivation, alpha waves go quiet just before and gamma rays spike at moment of insight

Question 6

what are key aspects of action in your brain at work’s ARIA model?

Answer 6

harness energy and motivation, commit to specific actions

Question 7

what are key aspects of status in your brain at work’s SCARF model?

Answer 7

general

• is relative, diverse frameworks exist
• affects longevity/health, self-control, mental clarity/information processing

threat response

• more intense and common than rewards
• triggers flight response/avoidance

reward response
- triggered by high status achieved AND when perception of status increased

Question 8

what are key aspects of certainty and autonomy in your brain at work’s SCARF model?

Answer 8

• perception of control is vital for emotional and physical health
• can be managed via reappraisal

Question 9

what are key aspects of relatedness in your brain at work’s SCARF model?

Answer 9

• brain is highly social, relationships vital to physical and mental health
• connection mediated by mirror neurons
• strangers are naturally considered foes and trigger threat response

Question 10

what are key aspects of fairness in your brain at work’s SCARF model?

Answer 10

threat response, unfairness:

• triggers disgust
• dampens creativity
• heightens physical activity/energy (can be channeled to overcome mental obstacles like fear)

reward response:

• positive feeling of safe connection and trust
• giving activates greater award than receiving

Question 11

what is the role of mirror neurons?

Answer 11

to understand/feel others through experiencing their states ourselves

Question 12

how are mirror neurons triggered

Answer 12

via social cues that communicate intent, particularly facial expressions and body language

Question 13

what brain regions are associated with emotional threat response

Answer 13

limbic system (esp amygdala)

Question 14

what brain regions are associated with intention, cognition, high level thought processes

Answer 14

prefrontal cortex

Question 15

what are social connections important?

Answer 15

quality and quality of them are only life experiences that increase happiness over a long time

(positive psychology, your brain at work)

Question 16

what are thing that improve speed and effectiveness of learning?

Answer 16

• verbalizing
• writing down
• teaching others
• spaced repetition

(your brain at work)

Question 17

what are common negatives related to perception that interacting with “foes”

Answer 17

• less pleasant feelings
• distracted attention
• misread intent

(your brain at work)

Question 18

how to make a “foe” into a “friend”

Answer 18

• connect on human level (touching, small talk, personal vulnerability)

(your brain at work)

Question 19

what is the primary prerequisite for effective collaboration?

Answer 19

environment of good relationships (relatedness), which takes considerable effort

(your brain at work)

Question 20

what is the role of expectations in human performance?

Answer 20

• incoming data interpreted to meet expectations and ignored when it doesn’t fit
• neurochemistry/dopamine affected asymmetrically

(your brain at work)

Question 21

what are dopamine effects of meeting expectations?

Answer 21

small dopamine reward

Question 22

what are dopamine effects of exceeding expectations?

Answer 22

large dopamine reward

Question 23

what are dopamine effects of falling short of expectations?

Answer 23

• sharp drop in dopamine/motivation
• strong threat response
• often leads to negative spiral

(your brain at work)

Question 24

what are the important details of reappraisal technique (your brain at work)?

Answer 24

general

• useful for managing perception of control (certainty & autonomy in SCARF)
• metabolically expensive
• coaches/mentors/therapists useful for seeing other perspectives

Question 25

what are the 4 specific reappraisal strategies suggested by "your brain at work"

Answer 25

- reinterpretation - normalizing - reordering values - repositioning

Question 26

details of "reinterpretation" reappraisal strategy in "your brain at work"

Answer 26

change emotional salience of a past event

Question 27

details of "normalizing" reappraisal strategy in "your brain at work"

Answer 27

recognize an experience is to be expected (similar to labeling)

Question 28

details of "reordering" reappraisal strategy in "your brain at work"

Answer 28

- align wants with reality | - look for and value situational positives

Question 29

details of "repositioning" reappraisal strategy in "your brain at work"

Answer 29

change perspective through which events are interpreted

Question 30

describe the toward vs away principle of emotional neurobiology

Answer 30

away: anxiety/fear - brain tries to minimize danger - felt more strongly - brain focuses and gains false confidence - over-arousal saps resources from prefrontal cortex and creates false/accidental mental connections, and builds of allostatic load which increases permanent sense of threat (your brain at work)

Question 31

how can you regulate emotions before they get triggered?

Answer 31

- situation selection - situation modification - attention deployment (james gross, your brain at work)

Question 32

how can you (positively) regulate emotions before they get triggered?

Answer 32

labeling using words (matthew lieberman): inhibits emotional activity by triggering prefrontal cortex (your brain at work)

Question 33

what's an important danger of matthew lieberman's strategy of regulating emotions by labeling them and how best to counteract it?

Answer 33

- brings emotions back to surface - to reduce arousal, use fewest words indirect metaphors if possible (your brain at work)

Question 34

how does mindfulness affect neurobiology?

Answer 34

strengthens/prioritizes direct experience brain regions vs default network neural circuits (which are mutually exclusive) (your brain at work)

Question 35

what does he "default network" do (medial prefrontal cortex and memory regions like hippocampus)?

Answer 35

planning, daydreaming, ruminating, develops "narratives" for self and others (your brain at work)

Question 36

what do the direct experience brain regions do (insula, anterior cingulate cortex)?

Answer 36

realtime sensory input, switching attention | your brain at work

Question 37

what is best way to get past a mental roadblock/impasse and encourage insight?

Answer 37

- ARIA model - take a break/quiet or switch to unrelated/fun/light activity (quiet prefrontal cortex) - ask someone with less information & fresh eyes (mark beeman, your brain at work)

Question 38

what is the shape of the relationship between stress and (cognitive) performance?

Answer 38

inverted u (yerkes/dodson), peak at moderate level of (eu)stress (your brain at work)

Question 39

what is the mechanism connecting stress and (cognitive) performance?

Answer 39

arousal/adrenaline (called norepinephrine in brain) - creates sense of urgency and promotes mental visualization - too much triggers fear/panic/loss of emotional control interest (dopamine): novelty and positive expectations can "activate" eustress (your brain at work)

Question 40

what are effective tactics for increasing eustress?

Answer 40

- novelty (to increase interest) - positive expectations/mental visualization (your brain at work)

Question 41

what are effective tactics for decreasing stress?

Answer 41

- slow down down mental processes (write things down) - activate other brain areas (pay close attention to sensory input, physically move) (your brain at work)

Question 42

what are the primary characteristics of attention disraction?

Answer 42

- most often triggered by default mode network/thinking about ourselves - exhausts resources of prefrontal cortex (lowers iq, equivalent of losing sleep) (your brain at work)

Question 43

what are the primary characteristics of focus via distraction inhibition?

Answer 43

- cognitively costly - difficulty compounds - easiest when done early in behavior patter before momentum/inertia develops (your brain at work)

Question 44

what is brain at work's protocol for focus?

Answer 44

- remove external distractions | - clear mind of internal distractions before difficult tasks

Question 45

when is multitasking effective?

Answer 45

when executing embedded routines | your brain at work

Question 46

why is focus preferable to multitasking on "conscious" tasks?

Answer 46

accuracy and performance differences because - brain can only consciously focus on one task at a time - switching between tasks uses energy (your brain at work)

Question 47

why is mental simplicity better?

Answer 47

- brain has limited ability to hold information - brain requires more space/energy to hold new concepts - memory degrades quickly when more than 1 idea is held in mind at a time (your brain at work)

Question 48

what are tactics for optimizing use of mental resources?

Answer 48

- prioritize prioritizing (by avoiding other energy consuming mental activities) - focus on most important ideas, not the easiest (which brain defaults to) - schedule most demanding/attention rich tasks for when mind is fresh and alert - use time blocks and batching for different modes of thinking - offload storage of information outside of the brain (focus brain energy on information interaction) (your brain at work)