Reframing the Battle of Wills  ## Metadata - Author: [[Hidden Brain]] - Full Title: Reframing the Battle of Wills - Category: #podcasts - URL: https://share.snipd.com/episode/b0d6693b-5fff-4155-a7fe-776e0314886a ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **Apology After A Violent First Day** - Stuart Ablon recounts being spat at and later apologized to by a distraught adolescent named Jason. - The apology revealed regret and hinted that the behavior came from lack of control, not malice. Transcript: Stuart Ablon I was particularly on guard as I passed by the room where Jason was and nervous. And he called out to me. I remember I was trying to walk by pretty swiftly, actually, so I wouldn't have to engage with him for fear of what might happen. And he called my name and I sort of turned around and I looked at him and he looked at me and he said to me, hey, I'm sorry. I'm sorry about what I said. I really didn't mean it. I just lose control like that. And I don't even know what I'm saying. And I just looked at him and I said, okay, it's all right. I accept your apology. ([Time 0:05:41](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ae6df035-c5d4-4abc-bac7-d31e754f30a4)) - **Working Memory Is The Cognitive Shelf** - Working memory and executive functions act as a cognitive 'shelf' that holds multiple pieces of information during conversation and action. - Deficits in these skills explain many everyday struggles like disorganization and conversational shutdowns. Transcript: Shankar Vedantam Sure. Stuart Ablon Working memory, you know, it's not like trying to remember what you had for lunch, you know, a couple of days ago or things like that. Is what neuropsychologists call the cognitive shelf, the shelf we have in our brain where we can put something up on that shelf, we can still see it, we can grab it when we need it. And we are much more reliant on our working memory than we have any idea. You know, I always tell people just having a conversation like we are right now, right? Like as I'm talking, what you're hopefully doing is listening and thinking to yourself, hmm, what do I think about what he's saying? So you're holding one piece of information is what is he saying? Another piece is what am I thinking about what he's saying? Then hopefully you're also saying to yourself, I wonder how I might respond to what he's saying. And if you're really behaving in the most adaptive way, you're even saying to yourself, and I wonder how he'll respond to what I might say based upon what I think about what he's saying. And by the way, I haven't stopped talking at the same time. So you're holding all this information in your head and you have to keep all those files open in your head at one time. Shankar Vedantam I often notice this about myself. You know, I'm trying to get something and I say, okay, I need to get this piece of information. And this piece of information is in this other file over here. So I go to that file, but I realize there's something there that's missing or that I need something else in order to get that information. And now I'm suddenly three steps down the rabbit hole and I have to remember how to climb my way back to the problem I had in the first place. Stuart Ablon And all of that is working memory. It is. And what you're also pointing out here is that working memory is incredibly closely related to other skills that have to do with attention and organization. And this is why when we study working memory, we often sort of lump it together with attentional skills because those, they sort of go together and they all amount to our ability to stay Organized as well, which is, again, a skill. And the fancy term for some of these skills is what we call executive functioning skills, the sort of CEO of your brain, if you will. So ([Time 0:24:27](https://share.snipd.com/snip/549a07b2-5512-47b4-91a8-866693597d83)) - **Avoid The A-C Split Trap** - Avoid the A-C split trap (impose will vs. give up) and adopt Plan B instead. - Be strategic if you choose Plan C temporarily, but don't confuse it with giving up. Transcript: Stuart Ablon Absolutely. And here's the thing. People so often get stuck, whether it's in a home, a school, a workplace, in what I call the A-C split. In a two-parent household, for instance, the A-C split is one parent's the plan A parent, one parent's the plan C parent. But this happens in workplaces as well. And what I like to say is you don't get plan B by the average of A and C. And there is another option, and that's plan B. Plan B is collaborative problem solving. It is working together to solve a problem in mutually satisfactory ways, and it has a clear set of guideposts to it that have been refined over years of practice ([Time 0:40:30](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c919433c-0ff4-4f80-b1be-cf36c6613f5d)) - **Use Plan B: Three-Step Collaborative Method** - Use Plan B: collaborative problem solving with three clear ingredients: empathy, your concerns, and joint solutions. - Follow that sequence exactly and involve the other person in co-creating solutions. Transcript: Stuart Ablon What are these guideposts to it? Basically, there's three steps, or I prefer to call them ingredients, okay? And just to be clear at the outset, you can't use plan B on someone. This is a process that you do with someone, but it has clear guideposts, and feel free to share those guideposts with the person that you are doing this with. There's nothing hidden about this. This is transparent. So the guideposts, these three ingredients are first ingredient, the empathy ingredient. And that is where you try to understand the other person's concern, perspective, point of view, or what's hard about a situation. And only once you've done that, that first ingredient, the empathy ingredient, do you move to the second ingredient, where you get to share your concern, your perspective, your point Of view, or what you're worried about. And only once you have two sets of concerns on the table, do you go to the third ingredient where you invite that person to work together, to collaborate with you to solve the problem. You must have both parties' concerns on the table. ([Time 0:41:11](https://share.snipd.com/snip/15bde389-67e8-43a2-8eac-70ffdd23d4eb)) - **Empathize Like A Detective** - Empathize by asking clarifying questions, making educated guesses, reflecting back, and reassuring the person. - Adopt a curious stance and suspend judgments to truly understand the other's concerns. Transcript: Stuart Ablon And what I found is fascinating that when it goes well, when we're doing a good job empathizing, we're doing four things and four things only. These four things are, like any good detective would, asking a lot of questions, clarifying questions. If you're not getting information, educated guessing. That's the second thing. If you get any information, either in response to your question or in response to an educated guess, you reflect back in your own words what you've heard from the person. We call that reflective listening. And that shows you're listening. And the fourth thing is reassurance. And what reassurance is is your way of saying this is not some tricky form of plan A. So it's you saying things like, don't worry, you're not in trouble. Or I'm just trying to understand. Or one of my personal favorites. I know there must be an important reason that. Fill in the blank. Okay? Because what I always remind myself is I may not love the person's behavior, but I'm sure they've got a good reason, a good concern, a good perspective. That's what you're on the hunt for. And the last thing I would say about this is your stance should be one of curiosity. ([Time 0:44:51](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3a93e289-f34b-4524-bb86-b344b12c473e)) - **Share Your Concerns Without 'But'** - After empathizing, state your perspective by summarizing what you heard and using 'and' instead of 'but'. - This keeps the conversation collaborative and reduces defensiveness. Transcript: Shankar Vedantam But I can see how this might backfire, Stuart. I listen to you very carefully. I'm patient. I'm genuinely curious. I try and understand where you're coming from. And once I've understood it, I say, all right, that's all well and good, but here's what I think. Could that be a problem? Stuart Ablon It could be a problem. And the first thing I'm going to suggest is a little tweak in wording, not that there's magic words out there, but the word but almost sort of implies, okay, I heard you, but guess what? My perspective is different or more important than yours. I always encourage people to say, once you've heard the other person out, first of all, summarize what you've heard from them so that you really are showing you've heard it. And then use the word and instead. And just say, and, here's my point of view, or here's my concern or my perspective. ([Time 0:46:35](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c6733aa0-0c16-4e5f-9fe8-6394a0b81f98)) - **Let Them Take First Crack At Solutions** - Invite the other person to propose the first solutions to give them ownership and autonomy. - Let them practice problem-solving so skills grow through doing, not just watching. Transcript: Stuart Ablon Once you've clarified the problem to solve, which is once you've identified the respective concerns, there's a lot of reasons you want to invite the other person to take first crack At solutions. First of all, when you invite that person to come up with an idea, you are giving them ownership, autonomy. They're co-author of a solution, as opposed to you sort of, even if you're trying to do it in the best of collaborative spirits, if you're the one suggesting the first solution, it might Feel imposed upon them. And if they're co-authored, they're going to be much more invested in that. But beyond that, this is an opportunity to actually get a chance to see how that person does, what their skills are like coming up with a solution that is theoretically mutually satisfactory, Realistic and doable. I work with lots of people who they'll come up with a solution, but it's not mutually satisfactory or it's not realistic or it's not doable. And so they need practice. Well, guess how you're going to practice and develop that skill? Not by watching somebody else solve problems. ([Time 0:48:21](https://share.snipd.com/snip/fdfdddf2-9ad0-41fa-8986-38097b1e9b55)) - **Tinfoil Solution In A Psychiatric Hospital** - A nurse used Plan B with a paranoid patient who refused group therapy and learned his delusion about others 'hearing thoughts.' - They co-created a solution (tinfoil under a beanie) that allowed him to attend groups and reduced assaults. Transcript: Stuart Ablon And by the way, one important distinction here is there's a difference between what I like to call emergency collaborative problem solving and proactive collaborative problem solving. The best time to solve a problem is not right in the middle of it. So it's not when you're trying to force this guy to go to the treatment mall. So she sits down with him and says, hey, so I've noticed you haven't been going to groups. And she knew he was very volatile. So she front loaded with reassurance. Don't worry. I'm not going to try to force you to go to group. That's not what this conversation is about. Basically saying, this is not plan A. I just want to understand. I bet you have a really good reason why you're not going. Can you tell me? And of course, he thinks this is still plan A. What does he do? He says, you're not going to make me go. You just try. You're not going to make me. She goes right to reflective listening. I'm not going to. You're absolutely right. I'm not going to. OK. And I'm sure you have a good reason why you're not going. More reassurance. And I'm just curious. I bet there's a good reason. I just wonder if you could help me understand. And he said, I'm not going and sit in some little room with a bunch of people. She goes right to reflective listening. Anytime you hear something as a good detective, go to reflective listening and then look for more. So she says, so you don't want to go sit in a room with a bunch of people, a small room? How come? Because I'm not going to do it. You're not going to make me. You're absolutely right. I'm not going to make you. I just want to understand. And it sounds like there's something about being in a small room with people. Yeah, because they can hear my every thought. Oh, they can hear your every thought. And this, by the way, is a good example of, you don't have to agree with what the person is saying to understand it. Just go to reflective listening. They can hear your every thought. How come? Because of the brain waves that are coming out of my brain. And this is an actively delusional person with paranoid schizophrenia who has a delusion that actually the FBI has planted information in his head and that other people can hear the Information and things like that. And this nurse does the best job of empathizing because what she says is, oh, wow. So you're saying when people are close to you, they can hear your every thought. And so you will want to go down into the therapy, the treatment mall and sit in a small room where everybody could hear everything you're thinking. And the guy's like, yeah, would you want everybody hearing what you're thinking? And she says, absolutely not. So she doesn't have to agree, but now she's understanding where he's coming from. And he's beginning to regulate because she's understanding him. That's ingredient one. She moves on to ingredient two after summarizing. So it sounds like you're not wanting to go down to the treatment mall because you don't want everybody to hear your every thought, which I can totally understand. I wouldn't want everybody hearing my every thought either. And not, but she says, and I guess I just worried that then you don't get to participate in and benefit from any of the treatment. He thinks she's about to go plan A. So what does he do? He said, you're not going to make me go. She goes right back with a little reassurance. You're absolutely right. I'm not going to force you to go. That would be dumb. Why would I want to force you to go somewhere where you say everybody can hear your every thought? That sounds terrible. I don't want to make you do that. I'm just worried that you're not able to benefit from the treatment. Two sets of concerns on the table, ready to go to the third ingredient. So I wonder if there's a way that you could benefit from the treatment groups and not have to worry about anybody hearing your every thought, because that sounds terrible. And then just what we said, ask him to take first crack at a solution. Do you have any ideas what we could do? She waits a little bit, and he says, I got an idea. What's your idea? I could put tinfoil on my head. And she does just what we teach people to do, which is to respond to any idea by saying, that's an idea. Let's think about it together. So you put tinfoil on your head. That would like help with the brainwaves. Yeah. That would block them. So nobody could hear what I was saying. Uh-huh. So you would then go to the group? Well, if it worked, yeah, I would go. Huh. Well, and do you think we could do that? And he's like, I've seen the tinfoil you have in the kitchen. And would it cause any problems? I don't think so. And she says, well, I'm a little worried about the other folks might think it's a little odd or, you know, make fun of you or something like that. And he laughs and he says, no, no, no, no, no. I'm not going to just have the tinfoil on my head. We can put it like on my head, but then I'll put my beanie on. So only you and I will know that it's under there. And you know, there you have it. What do you have? You have a solution where who wins there? Everybody. Who loses? Nobody. Problem solved. Relationship built. Challenging behavior decreased. And this guy who hasn't gone to treatment in literally years starts going to treatment. Not magic. Hard work. ([Time 0:58:40](https://share.snipd.com/snip/da27aba0-805f-4496-af98-aa4975782f56)) - **Helpers Also Gain Skills** - Teaching adults collaborative problem solving improves their own empathy, flexibility, and problem-solving skills. - The approach benefits both the helper and the person being helped by building shared capacities. Transcript: Shankar Vedantam Talk about the benefits for the people who are doing the intervening, the parent, the manager, the friend, not just for the person who's receiving the intervention. Stuart Ablon So this is one of my favorite findings from our research group. You know, our program where we do this work is based in the Department of Psychiatry at Mass General Hospital, which is a big research institution. We study everything. It was exciting to see that kids develop skills when adults use this process and practice with them. But perhaps the most exciting thing is, as you're alluding to here, guess who else starts to develop those very same skills when they utilize this process with kids or adults for that Matter. So in other words, when parents learn how to do this, they start to become better problem solvers. ([Time 1:05:47](https://share.snipd.com/snip/e8e8e907-7e53-4ef3-89ec-44c1a152f8c9)) - **Limits Of Rewards And Punishments** - Rewards and punishments can motivate but do not build underlying neurocognitive skills. - Heavy reliance on external reinforcers can erode intrinsic motivation and fails to teach problem-solving. Transcript: Stuart Ablon You know, it didn't emerge out of nowhere. When you look at like school discipline and things like that, or correctional systems, where did that come from? And where it came from is from operant psychology. And what's interesting about this is there's been a ton of research on what we call contingency management approaches or token economy systems, which are like really organized ways Of using rewards and consequences to try to shape behavior. And what all that research has shown is it's not like rewards and consequences are bad and you should never use them, but they're good at some things and not good at other things. They're good at reminding people what's expected of them, what's right and what's wrong. And they're good at motivating people to do those things. What are they not good at? They're not good at building neurocognitive skills. It's not their fault. They just were never intended to be used that way. They're not good at building a helping relationship between one person and another. And ultimately, they're not good at helping people stay calm in the midst of frustration, as we talked about. There's very clear research, thousands of studies that have shown beyond the shadow of a doubt that when you use a tangible external reinforcer reward to try to get somebody to do something, There's a strong negative correlation with the development of intrinsic driver motivation. In other words, the more we try to motivate somebody with something externally, we eat away at that person's internal drive. ([Time 1:12:49](https://share.snipd.com/snip/d839569f-9954-49af-83b8-378dd3fc693b))