Researchers at the Japanese National Institute for Physiological Sciences have discovered that paying people compliments has the same effect on their brains as paying them money.
"We found that these seemingly different kinds of rewards - a good reputation versus money - are biologically coded by the same neural structure," said Dr. Norihiro Sadato. "This provides the biological basis of our everyday experience that personal reputation is felt as rewards."
The experiments featured one group of people playing cards for cash, while others made videos and filled out questionnaires about themselves and were told they were being evaluated positively by strangers.
Using Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging technology, the researchers found the brain’s reward centre showed increased levels of activity when people were praised or won money. A study led by Caroline Zink of the National Institute of Mental Health, published in the same journal, Neuron, found that the same region was stimulated when people processed information about social status. Together, the reports may offer some explanation of complex social behaviour such as altruism and social standing.
The British government and the CBI have said the findings were very interesting, and are looking at ways of replacing the national minimum wage with a sliding scale of compliments, ranging from “You the daddy” for cleaning toilets, via “Like the tattoo” for classroom assistants, to “Nice arse” for stacking shelves in Sainsbury’s.
Suggestions that massive severance bonuses for executives whose mismanagement wiped billions off their companies’ share value might be replaced by “Awesome, man – way to go!” were rejected out of hand by government ministers and business leaders alike.
No comments:
Post a Comment