Do 'wise people' even exist? Do we have 'wise characters' or is our behaviour more influenced by 'wise situations'? And if so, what kinds of situations best support wise behaviour? Eranda Jayawickreme joins Igor and Charles to discuss the classic battle royale of the person-situation debate, whole trait theory and the ever-controversial Stanford Prison experiment. Igor outlines the actor-observer bias and suggests that westerners should be more sympathetic to grumpy waitstaff, Eranda considers the motivations behind blaming bad apples vs bad barrels and the implications for the justice system, and Charles learns that overestimating the robustness of his own virtue can lead to all manner of perilous situations. Welcome to Episode 5.

Special Guest: Eranda Jayawickreme.

Links:

• Eranda Jayawickreme - Growth Initiative Lab - Wake Forest University
• Aristotle & Virtue Theory: Crash Course Philosophy No.38
• Stanford Prison Experiment
• The Lifespan of a Lie - Medium
• The Big Five Personality Traits: VeryWell Mind
• Situational Salience and Cultural Differences in the Correspondence Bias and Actor-Observer Bias
• The person–situation debate in historical and current perspective: Epstein, S., & O'Brien, E. J. (1985)
• Character: The Prospects for a Personality-Based Perspective on Morality: William Fleeson*, R. Michael Furr, Eranda Jayawickreme, Peter Meindl and Erik G. Helzer (2014)
• Situation‐Based Contingencies Underlying Trait‐Content Manifestation in Behavior: Fleeson (2007)
• Whole Trait Theory: Fleeson, Jayawickreme (2015)
• In favor of the synthetic resolution to the person–situation debate: WilliamFleeson, Noftle (2009)
• On the interface of cognition and personality: Beyond the person–situation debate: Mischel, W. (1979)
• Persons, Situations, and Virtue Ethics: John M. Doris (1998)
• No Character or Personality: Gilbert Harman (2015)
• Virtue Ethics and Social Psychology: Julia Annas
• A cognitive-affective system theory of personality: Reconceptualizing situations, dispositions, dynamics, and invariance in personality structure: Mischel, Walter,Shoda, Yuichi (1995)
• Wisdom in Context: Igor Grossmann (2017)
• Moving Personality Beyond the Person-Situation Debate The Challenge and the Opportunity of Within-Person Variability: William Fleeson (2004)
• Prof. Dr. Wilhelm Hofmann

Are emotions simply bugs in the system that prevent us from taking wise decisions? Or do they play an essential role in guiding us towards the wisest path? In short, should we be like hyper-rational cool-headed Mr Spock, or more like the emotionally sensitive Master Yoda? How much can we even observe and guide our emotions as they unfold anyway? And are emotionally intelligent geniuses necessarily more moral than the rest of us? Stéphane Côté joins Igor and Charles to discuss the science of emotional intelligence, machiavellian deviants, emotional super-readers, deep-acting vs surface-acting emotional management, and why you can't hide your motivations from airport customs agents. Igor uncovers the mechanics of the jingle-jangle fallacy, Stéphane warns of the 'danger zones' highly empathic people enter when discussing the attractiveness of friends with their partners, and Charles finally understands why you shouldn’t sit opposite someone you don’t like in a team meeting. Welcome to Episode 4.

Special Guest: Stéphane Côté.

Links:

• Stéphane Côté
• When Emotions Make Better Decisions - Antonio Damasio - YouTube
• The Happiness Curve: Why Life Gets Better After 50 (9781250078803): Jonathan Rauch: Books
• Seeking wisdom in graying matter - Dilip Jeste
• Neurobiology of Wisdom: A Literature Overview | Genetics and Genomics | JAMA Psychiatry | JAMA Network
• Lisa Feldman Barrett: You aren't at the mercy of your emotions -- your brain creates them | TED Talk
• James Gross on emotion regulation - YouTube
• The Jekyll and Hyde of emotional intelligence: emotion-regulation knowledge facilitates both prosocial and interpersonally deviant behavior. - PubMed - NCBI
• Emotional Intelligence - Daniel Goleman
• Empathic Accuracy and Observed Demand Behavior in Couples — Ickes W., Simpson J. (1997). Managing empathic accuracy in close relationships, in Empathic Accuracy, ed Ickes W., editor. (New York, NY: Guilford; ), 218–250.
• Emotional Intelligence Quiz | Greater Good Magazine
• Jingle-Jangle Fallacies for Non-Cognitive Factors
• Emotional Intelligence in Organizations | Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior
• The Emotionally Intelligent Decision Maker: Emotion-Understanding Ability Reduces the Effect of Incidental Anxiety on Risk Taking - Jeremy A. Yip, Stéphane Côté, 2013
• Chapter 1 Emotional intelligence and wise emotion regulation in the workplace | Individual and Organizational Perspectives on Emotion Management and Display
• Paul Bloom - Against Empathy | Boston Review

Why do we avoid thinking about our own death? How does contemplating our own mortality change our day-to-day behaviour? Why do drivers, when reminded of the fact that they will die, actually drive even faster? Whilst society typically hides death from us, might certain death reflection scenarios actually lead to the development of wisdom? Laura Blackie has considered these and many related questions, and joins Igor and Charles to discuss Terror Management Theory, Death Reflection, and the potential upsides of contemplating our own demise. Igor dismisses a death clock which tells him he won't live as long as Charles, Laura outlines the possible prosocial benefits of imagining a painful and horrible death, and Charles admits to spending too much time thinking about whether his funeral will be well attended. Welcome to Episode 3.

Special Guest: Laura Blackie.

Links:

• Laura Blackie - The University of Nottingham
• The Death Clock: Calculate your life expectancy today
• The Influence of a Sense of Time on Human Development | Science
• Terror Management Theory - Greenberg & Arndt
• Specific and Individuated Death Reflection Fosters Identity Integration
• Greed, death, and values: from terror management to transcendence management theory. - PubMed - NCBI
• Self-affirmation and mortality salience: affirming values reduces worldview defense and death-thought accessibility. - PubMed - NCBI

Does wisdom really come with age? Or is this an outdated myth from a bygone era? How might wisdom develop in a brain that's ageing? Or perhaps by 'age', are we really talking about 'experience'? If so, do all experiences lead to wisdom, or only bad ones? If old people can be foolish, can young people ever be wise? And how on earth do you even gather reliable evidence across generations? Igor brings sad news of declining brain function to anyone over 25 and cautions against seeking out traumatic experiences as a strategy for developing wisdom, whilst Charles is forced to rethink his whole position on Jude Law. Welcome to Episode 2.

Links:

• The Science of Older and Wiser - The New York Times - Vivian Clayton
• Older and Wiser? Integrating Results on the Relationship between Age and Wisdom-related Performance: International Journal of Behavioral Development: Vol 23, No 3
• Erikson, in His Own Old Age, Expands His View of Life
• The Fascination of Wisdom: Its Nature, Ontogeny, and Function - Paul B. Baltes, Jacqui Smith, 2008
• Wisdom in Context - Igor Grossmann, 2017
• Perceived Control Over Aging-Related Declines: Adaptive Beliefs and Behaviors - Margie E. Lachman, 2006
• THE MYTH OF THE AGED SAGE: Does older really mean wiser? « evidence-based wisdom
• Older & Wiser « evidence-based wisdom - Infographic

What's the difference between someone who's smart and someone who's wise? If you can you be intelligent without being wise, can you be wise without also being intelligent? If wisdom's so essential for taking good decisions, what's driving our exclusive obsession with intelligence? And which is really more helpful in our daily lives? Igor describes some surprising fighter-plane-based scenarios when wisdom is as useless as intelligence and Charles explains how open-ended questioning in the classroom comes with its own unique set of risks. Welcome to Episode 1 of the On Wisdom podcast.

Links:

• Wisdom and Intelligence: The Nature and Function of Knowledge in the Later Years - Vivian Clayton, 1983
• Herbert Simon | The Economist
• Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel - Wikipedia
• J. Intell. | Free Full-Text | The Strengths of Wisdom Provide Unique Contributions to Improved Leadership, Sustainability, Inequality, Gross National Happiness, and Civic Discourse in the Face of Contemporary World Problems
• A model of educational leadership: Wisdom, intelligence, and creativity, synthesized: International Journal of Leadership in Education: Vol 8, No 4
• A route to well-being: intelligence versus wise reasoning. - PubMed - NCBI
• g factor (psychometrics) - Wikipedia