Sometimes it really helps to have a loved one there to support you, and sometimes it doesn’t

Friday, August 6th, 2021

Researchers at the University of Trier, Top Dog: The Science of Winning and Losing explains, had young adults give a speech about why they were the best candidate for a job — either with or without their boyfriend or girlfriend there:

The scholars had entirely expected that having a supportive partner there would diminish the stress of giving a speech. And that did happen for the men; having their girlfriend or wife there calmed them considerably.

But to the researchers’ surprise, it was the exact opposite for the women.

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[S]ometimes when you’re performing or competing, it really helps to have a loved one there to support you. And sometimes it doesn’t.

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The workplace has its version of this same conundrum: sometimes, employees’ effort level goes up if a boss frequently monitors them. But it’s also true that being monitored can stress out employees and become a distraction, causing them to lose concentration and be less productive.

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In 1965, Robert Zajonc, then at the University of Michigan, resuscitated the question. He noticed a dividing line in all the research, a consistency that explained when being watched helped or hurt performance. He theorized that the key variable was whether people were in a learning phase or had already mastered the skill. If they were learning the skill, the presence of spectators hampered performance. If they had mastered it, the presence of spectators improved performance.

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The idea that novices and experts respond to an audience divergently is consistent with other work that shows that novices get the most out of positive feedback, but experts benefit from criticism — they need that discerning scrutiny in order to improve.

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Jack Aiello of Rutgers University has shown that simple tasks improve under supervision. But the more complicated the job, the worse people perform when being monitored.

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The short answer is that Aiello and his team have found that intermittent supervision works even better than continuous supervision.

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