Smartphones and Dopamine

No, this is not about social media and how it's addicting us to our phones.

You want a tool to let you know how good (or bad) a listener you are?

There are some naturally-occurring chemicals that affect our moods.  You all know about tryptophan, which is supposedly why you all fall asleep after Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner.  (The only problem being that turkey isn't really that excessively high in tryptophan, and the reason you fall asleep is because you've eaten so much dinner, regardless of what that dinner is.)  There is also the fact that phenyalanine, which we produce when we are in love, is present in chocolate.  Therefore, many theorize that those who are disappointed in love sooth themselves by eating chocolate.  (This is a case of taking perfectly good data, and drawing the wrong conclusions.  The reality is that those who insist on falling in love have insufficient chocolate in their diet.)

Dopamine is a chemical that we produce, ourselves, in many situations.  Dopamine is associated with reward.  When we produce dopamine, we reward ourselves.  It is pleasant.  It makes us happy and rewarded.  So strong is this association that anything which produces dopamine can become addictive.

Talking about ourselves exercises the part of the brain that produces dopamine.

Why should we have a mechanism that rewards us for talking about ourselves?  Probably because letting other people know about ourselves is necessary for communication.  But, of course, when taken to extreme, it can become a problem.  We get rewarded for talking about ourselves.  We like how we feel when talking about ourselves.  Talking about ourselves can become additive.  We can easily get to the point where we only talk to other people because it gives us a chance to talk about ourselves.

(And that thing the police do, using silence to get people to talk?  Well, suspects being interviewed in a police station are probably a bit stressed.  In a bid to reduce their stress, they'll probably want to do something that produces dopamine, so that they can reduce their stress and discomfort.  Talking about themselves will do that.)

You're probably part of the ninety percent who think they are better-than-average listeners.  You may even feel that you are a pretty good counsellor, even if informally, even if you only try to be good at listening to your friends, or people at church.  Trust me, it's likely that you are not.  OK, Rob, I hear you say, you've said we're not good listeners.  *We* say we are.  So far it's "he said/we said."  Prove it.

OK, I have a challenge for you.  Most of you have smartphones.  Most of those smartphones will take video.  Set them up to record a few conversations.  It may be just you having coffee with a friend.  It may be you counselling a friend.  (If so, let them know what you are doing, and get their agreement.)  Then watch the video.  Watch it all the way through.  Listen to it carefully.  Count all the times you talk about yourself.  (You should really *measure* the amount of time you are talking about yourself, but we'll start with just counting.)  Even if the story you are telling is making a point important to your friend, if it's about you, it counts.

(And remember, if this is a counselling situation, simply letting the counsellee talk about themselves means that *they* get the dopamine reward.  They get to feel good.  Isn't that the point of the exercise?)

If you're being honest, you'll probably be surprised by the result.  You may even be shocked.  I'm not going for shock, here, but you can't start to fix a problem until you realize it exists.  Once you realize that you *do* need to improve, you can start to use this tool (and move on to the measuring part) to practice and improve your listening skills.