0:01

Hey everyone,

0:04

thanks for joining us on the science of happiness. This

0:07

week we are re-airing a favorite episode of

0:09

ours that was actually nominated for an award.

0:12

It's about a true cultural champion

0:14

and hero of mine, Temple Grandin.

0:17

Temple transformed the cattle industry and

0:20

born with autism has helped shape

0:22

our thinking about this form of neurodiversity.

0:25

In today's episode, she shares why

0:28

we need friends with shared interests.

0:31

Enjoy. I

0:42

had a lot of good things happen. Did

0:45

lots of fun things when I was in my

0:47

elementary school years. I had a really good childhood.

0:50

Going outside, making things.

0:54

Where I started to get into trouble was in high

0:56

school. High

0:59

school was an absolute disaster of

1:01

bullying and teasing. Absolutely

1:04

terrible. I

1:07

went to a large girls school and

1:10

girls that the teenagers, they were more interested

1:12

in boys than doing things like building things.

1:15

And I ended up getting kicked out because I threw a book at a

1:18

girl who called me. And

1:20

I ended up getting sent to a special boarding

1:22

school for kids with problems. I

1:26

was absolutely not motivated to study. I

1:29

basically just messed around and not done

1:32

any studying. Then

1:34

my science teacher came along. And

1:37

what he did is he gave me

1:39

the motivation to study. Because

1:41

now studying was a pathway to

1:44

a goal of becoming a scientist.

1:48

Not my science teacher, I don't think I would have gotten

1:50

through high school. Welcome

1:54

to the Science of Happiness. I'm Dacher Keltner.

1:57

Our guest today is one of my intellectual

1:59

and cultural heroes. Temple Grandin.

2:01

Born with autism, she was ostracized

2:04

by her peers, socially isolated, and

2:06

experienced a lot of anxiety as

2:08

a child. Now Temple

2:10

is a world-famous scientist, and she

2:12

credits this to her support networks.

2:16

We hear from Temple about the kinds of relationships

2:18

that shaped who she is today, and we

2:21

also talk about what the research has

2:23

to say about health repercussions of not

2:25

having strong social networks. I don't

2:27

think we should see social networks as like an

2:29

optional extra when it comes to health. Like, this is really

2:31

cool. We'll

2:34

hear from psychologist Tegan Cruyas and

2:36

get tips on the types of relationships that

2:38

support us the most. More

2:41

after this break. This

2:57

episode is brought to you by Progressive

2:59

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the over 28 million drivers who trust

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Progressive. Welcome back to the science

3:49

of happiness. I'm Dacher Keltner. This

4:00

week we're talking about support networks and

4:02

the tremendous impact they have on our lives. Our

4:05

guest is the world's leading expert on

4:07

humane animal handling and an advocate for

4:09

people on the autism spectrum. Temple

4:12

Grandin is a professor of animal science at

4:14

Colorado State University. Her most

4:16

recent book is Visual Thinking, The

4:19

Hidden Gifts of People Who Think

4:21

in Pictures, Patterns, and Abstractions. Temple,

4:25

now 75, was diagnosed with autism at

4:27

the age of three, and

4:29

doctors wanted to institutionalize her as they often

4:31

did with kids with autism at that time.

4:34

She credits her success in part to

4:36

the strong social connection she's built, and

4:39

we know from the scientific literature how fundamental

4:41

that is to our well-being. Temple,

4:43

it's an honor to have you on our show. It's

4:46

great to be here. In

4:48

your lectures you have this fascinating statement,

4:50

and I wanted to see if you'd

4:53

be willing just to expand on it. She

4:56

said, if I could snap my fingers and

4:58

be non-autistic, I would not. Autism

5:00

is part of who I am. What

5:03

is happening a lot right now in

5:05

our society is people are claiming neurodiversity

5:07

and variations on what humans are,

5:10

claiming autism as a strength in many ways, as

5:12

it has been for you. How

5:14

has your own autism been a source of

5:16

support for you in your life and work?

5:19

Well, I'm an extreme visual thinker. That

5:22

helped me in my work with

5:24

animals, because animals live in a

5:26

sensory-based world, and it

5:29

helped me in my design of work,

5:31

because visual thinkers like me, there's actually

5:33

scientific names for them, where object

5:35

visualizers see the

5:37

world in photo-realistic pictures. An

5:41

animal lives in a sensory-based world,

5:43

not a word-based world. So you've

5:45

got to go, what is it seeing? What is it

5:48

hearing? What is it feeling? What is it smelling? With

5:51

the cattle, the first thing I

5:53

looked at is what cattle were seeing when

5:55

they went to a shoot to get their

5:58

vaccinations. I didn't know what to do. time

6:00

that other people thought verbally. I didn't

6:02

know that at the time that I

6:04

started this. So it's obvious to me

6:06

to look at things like shadows, coats

6:08

on fences, vehicles parked alongside a facility.

6:10

These are things that would make the

6:12

animal stop and refuse to go through

6:14

the chute. That was

6:16

the very first thing that I did and I

6:19

found if you remove the distractions, like move

6:21

the vehicle with a shiny reflection away from

6:23

the handling facility, then the cattle would go

6:25

through it. And

6:29

no one had thought to look at this

6:32

before. Nice.

6:36

That's really cool. You talk

6:38

about, you know, being a child and feeling

6:41

ostracized and being ostracized and

6:43

experiences of anxiety. And I'm

6:46

really curious where you

6:48

found support as a

6:50

child. I had a lot of

6:52

good things happen. I got into early speech therapy really

6:55

early by two and a half. My

6:57

mother was always encouraging my ability in art.

6:59

Mother was very creative. We were

7:01

always doing art projects together, you

7:04

know, carving pumpkins, making Halloween costumes.

7:06

She was very much into encouraging all of

7:09

those kinds of activities. Cool. You've

7:12

had this remarkable intellectual,

7:14

scholarly academic career. You got a

7:16

PhD in animal science. You

7:18

did research on pig behavior,

7:20

cattle behavior and the like. And yet

7:22

you struggled early in school, in

7:25

high school. How would you think about

7:27

your support system in

7:30

high school and your academic journey? I

7:35

ended up getting sent to special boarding school

7:37

for kids with problems. And

7:39

the first thing I did is they put me

7:42

to work running the horse barn, cleaning nine stalls

7:44

every day, feeding the horses. Didn't do any studying.

7:46

The boy I learned how to work. Yeah.

7:50

And also riding horses gave

7:52

me friends through shaded interests.

7:56

I Also had friends with model rockets

7:59

and electronics. And

8:02

I was absolutely not move it to study. Yeah.

8:05

Then my science teacher came along. Were.

8:08

Great. I would have been practically a

8:10

senior year in high. School Okay, I

8:12

had basically just messed around and

8:15

not.any studying. I had no motivation

8:17

to study. And

8:19

what he did his. He gave me

8:21

the motivation to study. Biggest. Now

8:23

studying was a pathway to a

8:26

goal of becoming a scientist. So.

8:29

Now was a real reason for studying. Law.

8:37

Really supported me during hard times

8:39

was Mr. Carter left my science

8:41

teacher at an out of the

8:43

way. It,

8:46

as well as at the special school

8:48

I spent summers out at my aunt's

8:50

ranged Arizona a half and she was

8:52

another. Very important mentor.

8:56

I cannot emphasize enough how important mentors

8:58

are without a on it. Without my

9:00

science teacher, I don't think I would

9:02

have gotten through high school. Yeah.

9:06

I hear you. A

9:11

lot of people when the. Has had

9:13

his career like you have as just different

9:15

contributions to the world and you know really

9:17

making a difference. They get the steep since

9:19

you know it or stage in life of

9:21

like there have been people who really supported

9:23

they're always there for them. How

9:26

would you answer their question of who's always been there

9:28

for you. Well.

9:30

Let's talk about people. Got my career

9:32

started. Yeah the one of them is

9:35

Jim old contractor starting a small steel

9:37

and concrete business. He was of our

9:39

a marine Corps tap than he'd seen.

9:41

Saw my drawings the seek me Out.

9:45

So Be has set up a business that I

9:47

go idea how to do that. Every

9:49

ten years he was an extremely

9:52

important mentor and we designed. I

9:54

designed a lot of jobs form

9:56

and we don't jobs together mainly

9:58

in Arizona. Throughout the set. There

10:01

was still Anne out at the ranch. I

10:03

was still talking to her. You know,

10:06

they were people that helped me. And,

10:08

you know, I know today, COVID locked

10:11

down some stuff that I've

10:13

often thought, I'm an older person. And

10:16

I thought about what if COVID had happened when

10:18

I was in my 20s and

10:20

shut down all my stuff.

10:24

And I was a young person. I think I might have

10:26

reacted to it worse than reacting to

10:28

it as an older adult. All

10:30

I could think about as an older adult is,

10:32

can't wait to get the vaccine and then I'm

10:35

free. Yeah. And that's true of

10:37

the empirical data is that the younger people have really been

10:39

hit hard. So I hear you saying,

10:41

you know, when I think about the message for our

10:43

listeners out there, many of them younger

10:45

than you and I, and making

10:47

their way is like, find those

10:49

mentors. Finding mentors. Where

10:52

do you think you found the strength? I

10:54

mean, you were bullied in high school and

10:56

ostracized and so forth. Where did the

10:58

strength for that fierceness come from? Well,

11:01

in high school, you know, I was

11:03

bullied. There were still refuges away from

11:05

bullied. There were horses, Mavo

11:07

Rocket Club, which my science teacher ran,

11:10

and electronics lab. These were

11:12

places that were bully free. And

11:15

we also had skiing. That wasn't as important,

11:18

but bullies weren't out there most

11:20

of the time. Yeah. Did

11:22

you feel a sense of home in the Rocket

11:24

Club and the electronics lab? Yes, because the people

11:26

– we had a shared interest. We could talk about how

11:28

to build rockets. And I made a

11:30

rocket that looked like our principal. The other kids thought

11:32

that was really funny. So

11:36

Mr. Patey Rocket,

11:38

a big believer in the friends who shared interest. Because

11:41

the thing that's given me a decent life and a

11:43

fulfilling life is having an interesting career. I

11:46

mean, I had a great time talking with

11:48

a construction person that was probably on the

11:50

autism spectrum. And some of the

11:52

most fun times we ever had was just talking about

11:54

how to build things, how to solve a

11:57

problem. Find

11:59

stuff you can do. really can get interested in and

12:02

then you're gonna find friends through those activities.

12:05

I think that's a really important

12:07

thing to do because the one thing at that boarding

12:09

school they wouldn't let me do is sit around and

12:11

become a recluse in my room. That was not allowed.

12:14

I was absolutely not allowed and I had to

12:17

get out and I had to do things even

12:19

though I wasn't studying and still had to attend

12:21

the classes and not disrupt them but

12:23

we need to get out and do some stuff. Find

12:25

something you like to do with other

12:27

people. Shared interests. That's a

12:30

shared interest. I think this

12:32

is really important. Profound. Well

12:36

Temple Grandin, I want to thank you for your work

12:38

and your visionary voice and I want to thank you

12:41

for being on our show. I've long

12:43

been inspired by how you've

12:45

changed our thinking in the world and it's an honor to

12:48

be with you. So thank you. Well

12:50

thank you very much. Up

12:57

next. If you belong to

12:59

no social groups and you're a smoker, it's

13:01

a toss-up whether you should stop smoking or

13:03

start joining in terms of the benefit to

13:05

your health. We hear about the effects of

13:07

loneliness and how even thinking

13:09

about our social connections can

13:11

strengthen our well-being. I'm

13:18

Dakar Keltner. Welcome back to the Science of

13:20

Happiness. Strong relationships with

13:22

friends, family and mentors are some

13:24

of the most important factors to

13:27

our health and longevity. The

13:29

more we're part of a community, the healthier and

13:31

happier we tend to be. But right

13:33

now we're living through an epidemic of loneliness

13:35

in the United States and around the world

13:38

with some more at risk than others like

13:40

young adults. The other broad

13:42

umbrella group of people who are at

13:44

risk of loneliness are people who are

13:47

generally speaking excluded from society for some

13:49

reason. So you know LGBTQ, if

13:51

they have a disability, if they're in a

13:53

minority cultural group, these tend to be markers of

13:55

people who are more likely to be at risk

13:57

of loneliness. clinical

14:00

psychologist at the National Australian University,

14:03

and returning guest on the science of happiness. She

14:06

studies social connection, how to feel more of

14:08

it, and how loneliness and chronic

14:10

isolation are literally toxic. If you belong to

14:12

no social group and you're a smoker, it's

14:14

a toss-up whether you should stop smoking or

14:16

start joining in terms of the benefit to

14:19

your health. That sounds really provocative, but honestly,

14:21

if you look at the data, it's spot

14:23

on. Feeling socially disconnected can

14:25

be worse for our health than being

14:27

overweight, not exercising, or experiencing air pollution.

14:29

This is a really significant health risk

14:31

factor that we probably need to take

14:33

more seriously. In one of

14:36

Tegan's experiments, she simply reminded people

14:38

of their social identities and connections

14:40

before they experienced a setback. So

14:42

in this case, we gave all our participants in

14:44

the study the same setback. Everyone had

14:47

to answer five questions that were actually

14:49

impossible to solve. And we gave

14:51

them five minutes to work on this, and none of them got

14:53

any of the questions right because they were, in fact, impossible to

14:55

solve. And what we found

14:57

was that the people who had been

14:59

reminded of their social identities prior to

15:01

doing this task, they were less likely

15:03

to attribute their failure to personal,

15:06

internal reasons. So they

15:08

didn't say, oh, I'm bad at these tests, or

15:10

I'm just too anxious, or I'm not good at

15:12

these things. They said things like, the

15:14

test was too hard, I didn't have enough time, it's

15:17

these having this fault, and they

15:19

felt less depressed. So their mood was

15:21

better, despite that experience of setback. We

15:24

had given them that psychological resource of

15:26

that sense of being part of a

15:29

collective. And that seemed to me

15:31

now less likely to fall into those unhelpful thinking patterns

15:33

in the face of a setback. In

15:39

another study, she found that the

15:42

more groups someone was in, like a

15:44

bowling league, an exercise class, or a

15:46

book club, the less likely they

15:48

were to be depressed the next year. Among

15:50

those people with a history of depression who

15:52

had started engaging in social and recreational type

15:55

activities, we saw a much lower risk of

15:57

depression relapse. And that's exciting because relapse is

15:59

a... huge problem in depression. Other

16:02

studies suggest that it's not being part

16:04

of just any collective that matters, it's

16:06

about being part of a group you

16:09

genuinely identify with. So it's not just

16:11

that I am a fan of a

16:13

particular team, right? It's that is part

16:15

of my identity, it's who I am,

16:17

and I care deeply about that team's

16:19

success. I feel happy when they win,

16:21

I feel sad when they lose, and

16:23

I want to spend time with other

16:25

people who are part of that community.

16:28

It can be my family, it can be my group

16:30

of friends, it might be my neighbourhood, it can be

16:32

my profession. You don't actually

16:34

need to be that sort of,

16:37

you know, formal joining organisation. I

16:39

think it's more about thinking about, you know, who are

16:41

my people, and how can I

16:43

connect with them better? That seems to do

16:45

more heavy lifting when it comes to health

16:48

than just having strong friendships. These

16:51

groups, they don't just exist out there in the

16:53

world, right? They get under our skin, and

16:55

they influence our sense of self, and speaks

16:57

to the fact that I don't think we should see

16:59

social groups as like an optional extra when it comes

17:01

to health, like this is really cool business. On

17:16

our next episode of the Science of

17:18

Happiness, we explore a lab-tested practice that

17:21

dates back thousands of years, and originated

17:23

in China, Qigong. In

17:26

the simplest terms I could put it is I

17:28

could feel the qi or energy really

17:31

moving throughout my body. It was more of

17:33

like a peaceful feeling, like I

17:35

stopped worrying so much about the world, or

17:37

what my errands were, or you

17:40

know, the things that were just really been stressing

17:42

me out. That's what it felt

17:44

like to me mentally, I mean like, but when

17:46

I think about it, the mentally side and the

17:48

physically side honestly feel so hand in hand. Thanks

17:59

for joining me. Joining us on the Science of Happiness,

18:01

I'm Derek O'Connor. Our Executive Producer

18:03

of Audio is Shuka Kolontari. Haley

18:06

Gray is our Producer, Sound Design from

18:08

Jenny Cataldo of Accompany Studios. And

18:11

a special thanks to our Research Assistants

18:13

and my former Science of Happiness students, Dasha

18:16

Zerboni and Celina Bilal. Have

18:19

a great day. Support

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