The Cat Hairs of Psychological Danger
Renée Eaton
Future Primary/Junior Educator | Believer in Purposeful Learning | Creating Equitable, Engaging Classrooms for All Students | Empowering Students through Creativity, Play, and Community
Despite their nightmarish movie and television reputations, rats are actually friendly and social animals.
They laugh when you tickle them and show empathy to both their fellow rats and humans.
But why am I talking about rats, you may wonder?
Because we can learn a lot about both psychological safety and danger from them.
Rats enjoy playing with one another. And just like humans, they use that play to experiment, learn, and practice. When they play, their seeking system is activated which allows them to explore and test themselves.
But they only do this when they feel safe.
Jaak Pankseep, a neuroscientist and author of Affective Science found that he could activate rats' fear systems by placing a small amount of cat hair in their environment.
This immediately reduced their play from 50 times in five minutes to zero.
In his experiments, it took three days for the rats to feel safe enough to start playing again after the hair was removed, and even after 5 days, they hadn't returned to their original play numbers.
Their seeking system was drastically reduced when their fear system sensed danger.
Like Pankseep's rats, we don't play, explore, learn, experiment, or grow when we're afraid either.
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Our cat hair just looks a little different. It comes in the form of criticism, rejection, and punishment. It's a lack of belonging, an uncertain future, and insecurity.
Anything that makes us feel anxious and fearful at work will reduce our enthusiasm, curiosity, and motivation.
Be vigilant in identifying and removing the "cat hairs" in your workplace. And then work with your team to find what activates their seeking system (like meaning, appreciation, significance, and belonging) and put more of those things into the environment.
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1 年Fantastic analogy. Who knew rats and psychological safety / culture could go hand in hand ??