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Mini: PIC-NIC · Why We Do What We Do

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to why we do what we do? Welcome
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  Speaker 1: to why we do what we do? Many I'm your
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  Speaker 1: host Abraham and I'm Shane or a psychology podcast. And
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  Speaker 1: we have a regular recording schedule or release schedule at
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  Speaker 1: least and which way record a full length episode every Wednesday,
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  Speaker 1: and we have in the not too distant past recently
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  Speaker 1: started releasing an additional mini episode every Monday. These are
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  Speaker 1: these little fifteen minute deep dive topics that we will
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  Speaker 1: do deep dive. It's a shallow dive. Come on, it's
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  Speaker 1: fifteen minutes. We're doing a little bite sized chunk of
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  Speaker 1: a thing. And then we get out of there so
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  Speaker 1: you can get about your week. And I think there
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  Speaker 1: was more to say about that. Oh, if you're joining
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  Speaker 1: us for the first time, welcome, Happy to have you here.
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  Speaker 1: Consider joining us over on Patreon, leaving us a rating
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  Speaker 1: and review, liking, subscribing, telling a friend. But let's get
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  Speaker 1: into our topic before we waste too much time. Let's
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  Speaker 1: go have a boom boom, Let's have a bigotie buscuit.
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  Speaker 2: I love I love your Yogi bear voice so much.
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  Speaker 2: It's oaking so weird. Talking about picnic analyzes and what
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  Speaker 2: is a picnic analysis, Well, it's a lens that we
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  Speaker 2: apply to behavior to help us understand why people do
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  Speaker 2: confusing and weird things, things that they know are going
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  Speaker 2: to be harmful or hurtful, why they don't do certain things,
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  Speaker 2: And so it gives us an opportunity to kind of
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  Speaker 2: conceptualize the possibilities for why somebody may or may not
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  Speaker 2: do the things we need them to do.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's both the why we do what we do
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  Speaker 1: and why we don't do what we don't do. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: it could be both the weird and I know we
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  Speaker 1: say weird, but it's also you could apply it to
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  Speaker 1: understanding anything as well. But important caviat here, this is
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  Speaker 1: not a formal validated assessment. What this is is kind
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  Speaker 1: of a useful heuristic way to try and understand behaviors
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  Speaker 1: by wrapping some context around them.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, so first, understanding behavior entails understanding and everything we
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  Speaker 2: do can be situated inside of a context for what
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  Speaker 2: provoked the behavior, the behavior itself, and the outcome for
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  Speaker 2: that behavior. So there's always kind of a sequence of
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  Speaker 2: events that happens that precedes the behavior, includes the behavior,
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  Speaker 2: and then the results of the behavior or some result
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  Speaker 2: in the environment around it.
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  Speaker 1: Let's say that I feel a rumbling in my stomach.
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  Speaker 1: I maybe haven't eaten for a little while, And this
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  Speaker 1: is not upset stomach, it is hungry stomach. I see
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  Speaker 1: a sign for a nearby restaurant. That happens before I
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  Speaker 1: go to that restaurant and get food. That is the
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  Speaker 1: behavior that I do. My stomach feels better and not rumbly.
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  Speaker 1: That is the outcome from me having to go get
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  Speaker 1: that food. So that is a quick sort of example
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  Speaker 1: of how I might break down a sequence of events
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  Speaker 1: and understand the before, during, and after of a particular
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  Speaker 1: behavioral choice. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: So understanding this, we can then look at outcomes as
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  Speaker 2: they affect choices in the moment. So is that outcome
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  Speaker 2: positive or negative? Is it in the future or is
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  Speaker 2: it immediate? Is it certain or uncertain? And all of
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  Speaker 2: these factors can influence the choices that we make depending
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  Speaker 2: on circumstances.
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  Speaker 1: So generally speaking, when there are outcomes that are positive, immediate,
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  Speaker 1: and certain or pic or pick, these tend to wield
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  Speaker 1: considerably more power over our choices than outcomes that might
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  Speaker 1: be negative in the distant future and uncertain.
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  Speaker 2: Right, which would be an f you right, nufu, Yeah, nuphu,
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  Speaker 2: which doesn't roll off the tongue quite as well as
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  Speaker 2: pick does.
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  Speaker 1: It is not.
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  Speaker 2: So A common example that's used while we talk about
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  Speaker 2: picnic Nazies is the idea of smoking, the behavior smoking.
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  Speaker 2: So for someone who enjoys smoking, the outcome of smoking
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  Speaker 2: is positive. It feels good, it's immedia and even I
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  Speaker 2: always kind of say positive too, and that they get
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  Speaker 2: a break from whatever tasting too, because people get a
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  Speaker 2: lot of smoke breaks. It's immediate. As soon as you
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  Speaker 2: are doing the thing you're smoking, it happens, and then
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  Speaker 2: it's certain it will definitely feel the way you want
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  Speaker 2: it to when you do it. The adverse outcomes of
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  Speaker 2: smoking are negative, such as cancer, and the positively probably
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  Speaker 2: just future and it's uncertain. There are people who smoke
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  Speaker 2: that never get cancer, so it's something that will happen
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  Speaker 2: long term. It doesn't happen to affect them immediately. It
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  Speaker 2: takes a long time for those outcomes to come about.
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  Speaker 2: So it makes sense that we do the thing that
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  Speaker 2: makes us feel good to the moment.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. The positive, immediate and certain effects are clear.
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  Speaker 1: The negative future uncertain effects, eh, who knows about those
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  Speaker 1: not going to control this right now.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 1: Imagine also, you're driving and someone cuts ahead and you
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  Speaker 1: ahead of you in traffic. Maybe you're hearing this and
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  Speaker 1: that happened to you right now, maybe the one who
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  Speaker 1: did the cutting. Again, let's apply our little lens here.
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  Speaker 1: The outcome of this is positive. They get ahead in
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  Speaker 1: line right. That saves them time, It gives them a
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  Speaker 1: little bit of an edge. It's immediate, you're immediately ahead
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  Speaker 1: of other people, and it might help you make a
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  Speaker 1: light that you might have otherwise missed because you cut
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  Speaker 1: in front of people. And it is certain, assuming that
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  Speaker 1: you do pull this off, you will definitely get ahead
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  Speaker 1: of those people. You might not necessarily make the light,
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  Speaker 1: but you will be a little bit further ahead in
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  Speaker 1: the line. The adverse outcomes of this, we're going to
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  Speaker 1: try and paint that light as well, are negative. Let's
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  Speaker 1: say you cause an accident. That would be pretty negative.
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  Speaker 1: They would be immediate because if that happened, they would
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  Speaker 1: happen right away, but they're uncertain. It does not commonly
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  Speaker 1: result in a car crash. Probably someone has done this
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  Speaker 1: before and had a positive, immediate, certain outcome. So there's
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  Speaker 1: a negative immediate, uncertain outcome. Otherwise that's less likely to
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  Speaker 1: then have that effect on their behavior. If it was
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  Speaker 1: certain that there was going to be an accident, probably
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  Speaker 1: they would not have done that thing in most circumstances.
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  Speaker 2: Right, So you just mentioned negative immediate and uncertain or NIU,
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  Speaker 2: Like an example of a negative immediate and certain outcome
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  Speaker 2: would be something like ADS.
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  Speaker 1: All right, let's take another example. Walking while texting. The
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  Speaker 1: positive immediate certain you get there is all these sort
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  Speaker 1: of social interactions that happen with texting. Maybe it's something
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  Speaker 1: that is not even positive, but it's like you need
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  Speaker 1: this conversation to happen for whatever reason, you're like really
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  Speaker 1: want to be engaged. It's immediate because as you're texting,
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  Speaker 1: the thing is happening, and it's certain because you get
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  Speaker 1: too type in to send out that text. Whether or
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  Speaker 1: not you'll get a response is maybe less certain, but
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  Speaker 1: you do get to actually do the thing. You get
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  Speaker 1: to say what you want to say in those moments.
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  Speaker 1: So even though there are some other negative things, there's
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  Speaker 1: negative you might walk out into traffic, you might trip
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  Speaker 1: over something, you might walk into somebody else, you might
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  Speaker 1: get pickpocketed. Those are negative things. They are mostly immediate
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  Speaker 1: because they would probably happen right away. But again, they
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  Speaker 1: are uncertain. There is no guarantee that any of those
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  Speaker 1: things are going to happen. As a matter of fact,
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  Speaker 1: you probably have a long history of the more certain
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  Speaker 1: things of you getting what you want when you want
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  Speaker 1: it right away, So those things are more likely then
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  Speaker 1: to drive that behavior.
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  Speaker 2: Right, and then let's take a look at maybe a
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  Speaker 2: behavior like taking risky photos. Right, So in that moment,
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  Speaker 2: you might take a photos to somebody. It's positive, it's immediate,
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  Speaker 2: and you're going to get a certain reaction, right, like,
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  Speaker 2: you know if it's a good reaction, but it could
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  Speaker 2: be negative, right, Like it could be there could be
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  Speaker 2: a negative outcome where it's like maybe that picture goes
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  Speaker 2: to the wrong person and that is uncertain, right or
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  Speaker 2: in the future. There's a lot of things to kind
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  Speaker 2: of unpack inside of that that it could go any
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  Speaker 2: number of ways. Right, Like, let's say you take your
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  Speaker 2: risky photo in general, and like you lose your phone, right,
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  Speaker 2: that's uncertain. That's a negative outcome and uncertain, and that
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  Speaker 2: may lead to some people seeing the photo. There are
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  Speaker 2: lots of different kind of when you start doing this exercise,
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  Speaker 2: there are different ways to approach this in terms of
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  Speaker 2: like thinking about all the potential outcomes and whether they're good, bad,
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  Speaker 2: or otherwise, whether they will happen or not, and whether
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  Speaker 2: they are going to happen immediately or it's going to
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  Speaker 2: take some time for it to happen, right, And that's
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  Speaker 2: kind of the whole practice here that we're looking at.
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  Speaker 1: I do appreciate that you went a very different direction
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  Speaker 1: on that than I was expecting, which was thinking of
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  Speaker 1: photos as nuts, the photos themselves maybe being euphemisms for like, yeah, nudes.
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  Speaker 1: I was kind of thinking like taking a picture while
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  Speaker 1: leaning over the Grand Canyon, or taking a picture well
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  Speaker 1: standing in front of traffic or something like that. Okay, okay,
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  Speaker 1: people do both of those things, so you can apply
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  Speaker 1: the lens either way. Like either way, it makes sense
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  Speaker 1: to think of it in terms of the positive media
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  Speaker 1: of certain negative.
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  Speaker 2: Speak to what's in strength in our repertoire.
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  Speaker 1: But I appreciate it that he has the route that
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  Speaker 1: you took. But yes, anyway, both of those things great. Anyway.
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  Speaker 1: One thing I did sort of I mention it top
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  Speaker 1: is sort of the positive immediate and certain are more
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  Speaker 1: likely to wield behavior negative is actually extremely powerful and
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  Speaker 1: influencing behavior. But again, the immediate and certain part are
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  Speaker 1: really important factors in determining the extent to which that's
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  Speaker 1: going to motivate behavior. If it's negative, immediate, and certain,
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  Speaker 1: that also is going to prevent that behavior from happening. Now,
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  Speaker 1: let's also say we can use this picnic analysis beyond
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  Speaker 1: just unpacking why someone does what they do to think
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  Speaker 1: about how we can also influence their behavior in the
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  Speaker 1: desired direction. So you imagine you have an employee or
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  Speaker 1: a coworker who's always late. Just as an example. You
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  Speaker 1: could apply this lots of places, but that's a common
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  Speaker 1: one that shows up. A lot of us have jobs,
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  Speaker 1: a lot of us deal with coworkers who are not
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  Speaker 1: particularly punctual. Let's say that's the thing that happens. Think
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  Speaker 1: of what the positive, immediate, and certain thing is that's
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  Speaker 1: currently influencing their tardiness. Also, consider how the aversive outcomes
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  Speaker 1: of tardiness are negative, delayed, or uncertain, like sometimes no
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  Speaker 1: one notices they come in late. Think about how you
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  Speaker 1: could instead shift the outcomes of punctuality such that they
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  Speaker 1: are positive, immediate, and certain. How could you make it
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  Speaker 1: so that showing up to work has more positive, immediate,
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  Speaker 1: and certain, and showing up late to work has more negative,
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  Speaker 1: immediate and certain outcomes, and you will move behavior more
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  Speaker 1: toward the outcome you're trying to get. That exact analysis
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  Speaker 1: can help inform like, first of all, why are they
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  Speaker 1: doing this? Second of all, what could I change to
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  Speaker 1: move it in the direction that it needs to go in? Right?
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  Speaker 1: And so being on time results in something that is positive, immediate,
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  Speaker 1: and certain. Being negative results in something that is negative,
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  Speaker 1: immediate and certain. And I I mean ideally we don't
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  Speaker 1: need to go the versive route with things, But like
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  Speaker 1: just think about, like how could you use that analysis
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  Speaker 1: like prioritize the positive if you need to include the negative.
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  Speaker 1: But those are like ways that you can conceptualize why
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  Speaker 1: they're doing it and how you could try and move
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  Speaker 1: it in a more appropriate direction.
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  Speaker 2: Right now, this is not the end all be all
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  Speaker 2: for analyzing human behavior. As a matter of fact, it's
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  Speaker 2: not a really great way to analyze the actual behavior
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  Speaker 2: of a person and what they're getting out of it,
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  Speaker 2: right correct, Yes, But what it is good for it's
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  Speaker 2: useful for a framework for thinking through circumstances that might
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  Speaker 2: be impacting people's behavior. It allows you to think a
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  Speaker 2: little bit deeper than just going, oh, this person is
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  Speaker 2: just the worst and they're always late, or this person's
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  Speaker 2: spoking and they just don't care. It's making you actually
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  Speaker 2: think about, like, well, why would somebody even consider something
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  Speaker 2: like that? And let's look at like the possible or
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  Speaker 2: the probabilities that go along with those things, right exactly,
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  Speaker 2: So it allows you think through the circumstances that might
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  Speaker 2: be impacting people's behavior on a day to day basis.
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  Speaker 2: And it doesn't have to be all three of those things.
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  Speaker 2: It doesn't have to be negative and immediate and uncertain
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  Speaker 2: and future.
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  Speaker 1: Right.
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  Speaker 2: It can be negative, immediate and certain, and that will
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  Speaker 2: usually motivate behavior away from a particular outcome, whereas positive,
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  Speaker 2: immediate and certain will move it towards that outcome.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and just as you said, this is a way
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  Speaker 1: of thinking about it. It's not the only way, probably
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  Speaker 1: not even the best way, but it is a useful
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  Speaker 1: heuristic sort of lens to just start thinking about it,
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  Speaker 1: like why is that thing going on? What are the
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  Speaker 1: positive immediate certains or the negative future uncertains and just
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  Speaker 1: start unpacking that. That will probably help demystify some of
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  Speaker 1: the things that are going on. And again just thinking
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  Speaker 1: it through. But why though, Because picnic This is a
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  Speaker 1: fun way to It's a fun acronym to apply to this. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: we picnic because it's a useful heuristic. It gives us
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  Speaker 1: a great starting place for understanding behavior and choices. It
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  Speaker 1: is not to be confused with actual analysis, real data,
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  Speaker 1: real experimental control. That's where you get actual analysis. This
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  Speaker 1: is just a framework, a guideline, like a thing that
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  Speaker 1: helps with the knee jerk reaction that we might otherwise apply. Right, exactly,
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  Speaker 1: exactly perfect. Anything you'd like to add or anything that
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  Speaker 1: I like that I forgot before we wrap this up?
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  Speaker 2: Not today.
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  Speaker 1: I think that nails it perfect. As I mentioned, we
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  Speaker 1: release full length episodes on Wednesdays, these short minis on Mondays.
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  Speaker 1: Join us again for our full length episode. Join us
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  Speaker 1: again for a mini episode. Support us on Patreon, leave
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  Speaker 1: a rating review. All the things that I think I
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  Speaker 1: said at the top, but I think that is everything
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  Speaker 1: I have. So have a great rest of your week.
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  Speaker 1: This is Abraham and it's a Shane. We're out.
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  Speaker 2: Bye.
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  Speaker 1: You've been listening to Why we do what we do.
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  Speaker 2: You can learn more about this and other episodes by
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  Speaker 2: going to WWDWWD podcast dot com, Thanks for listening, and
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  Speaker 2: we hope you have an awesome day.