In this column, we provoke fresh thinking and round up some of the weird, wonderful, quirky, surprising – and shocking – stories out there
Digital nomad’s paradise
Fancy taking your remote coaching practice to a different city, or even becoming a digital coach nomad?
If so, Melbourne, Dubai and Sydney are your best bets, according to a study ranking the best cities to live and work from remotely.
Melbourne scores highly on ‘livability’ factors like safety, healthcare and culture, and leisure activities, and is boosted by its remote working infrastructure and the presence of a specific ‘digital nomad’ visa. Dubai and Sydney come in second and third, respectively, according to on-demand housing platform Nestpick.com’s study looking at legislation, costs and overall livability. In addition to these three cities, only seven others offer a ‘digital nomad’ visa: Zagreb, Prague, Lisbon, Reykjavik, Tallinn, Athens and Mexico City.
On average, Rio de Janeiro has the most affordable home office space (€119 per month), followed by Saint Petersburg (€139), and Istanbul (€169). Las Palmas has the best overall weather conditions while Tallinn the best combined noise, air and light pollution score.
US cities lead the pack for Covid-19 vaccination rates: Boston has the highest percentage at 63.31%, ahead of Honolulu (58.94%) and Seattle (54.89%).
Read the full study here: https://bit.ly/3k3kGYE
Extravert: act as if to reap the benefits
Dialing up extraversion-related behaviours can lead to more positive feelings, even if you or your client is highly introverted.
Extraversion has been associated with benefits including motivation, positive emotions, working harder and having fewer adverse experiences at work (eg, Wilmot et al, 2019) and enhanced creative thinking (Goclowska et al, 2018). Some research has already suggested introverts behaving like extraverts can reap benefits (eg, Margolis & Lyubomirsky, 2020) but for the very introverted, this could be depleting and produce ‘negative’ emotions.
However, a recent study (Kuijpers et al, 2021) finds that even for those who aren’t naturally extraverted, higher-than-normal levels of extraversion-related behaviours are associated with more positive feelings.
References
- M A Goclowska, S M Ritter, A J Elliot and M Baas, ‘Novelty seeking is linked to openness and extraversion, and can lead to greater creative performance’, in Journal of Personality, 31 March 2018 https://bit.ly/3ATdXX6
- E Kuijpers, J Pickett, B Wille and J Hofmans, ‘Do you feel better when you behave more extraverted than you are? The relationship between cumulative counterdispositional extraversion and positive feelings’, in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 30 May, 2021 https://bit.ly/36t4WWL
- S Margolis and S Lyubomirsky, ‘Experimental manipulation of extraverted and introverted behavior and its effects on well-being’, in Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 149(4), 719-731, 2020 https://bit.ly/36sB4d0
- M P Wilmot, C R Wanberg, J D Kammeyer-Mueller and D S Ones, ‘Extraversion advantages at work: A quantitative review and synthesis of the meta-analytic evidence’, in Journal of Applied Psychology, 104(12), 1447-1470, 2019 https://bit.ly/3wtlkRD
Finding your sweet spot
Anyone remember the scene from the film, When Harry Met Sally when Meg Ryan fakes an orgasm, and a fellow diner utters that unforgettably delicious line, “I’ll have what she’s having”?
Ryan’s character was trying to prove to her male friend, played by Billy Crystal, that not all men can tell the difference between a real and a fake orgasm, fooling at least one other diner.
Actually, it’s not so far-fetched. Apparently, when we witness someone in the throes of a particularly acute emotional state, like intense joy or pain, we find it hard to pinpoint exactly what they’re feeling. And while we find it easier to identify emotions as vocalisations such as laughter, cries, screams and moans becoming more intense, this is only up to a point, according to research by Natalie Holz and colleagues from the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, published in Scientific Reports.
Their study suggests there’s an intensity “sweet spot” for accuracy. Participants were best able to judge emotions of moderate or strong intensity rather than low intensity, but when the vocalisations reached peak intensity, accuracy decreased again.
Participants also frequently miscategorised positive expressions as negative, particularly at high intensities.
Read the full study here:
- https://bit.ly/3f45uXU
- Contributions to this slot are welcome.
Email: liz@coaching-at-work.com