ReThinking with Adam Grant
The art and science of trash talk with Rafi Kohan
July 30, 2024
[00:00:00] Rafi Kohan:
I found an example of trash talking in the gulf room in the early 1900s, where one guy said to his opponent, “Why don't you roll down your sleeves so everyone doesn't see your muscles quivering?”
[00:00:12] Adam Grant:
Hey everyone, it's Adam Grant. Welcome back to Rethinking my podcast on the science of what makes us tick with the TED Audio Collective. I'm an organizational psychologist and I'm taking you inside the minds of fascinating people to explore new thoughts and new ways of thinking.
My guest today is Rafi Kohan. He's a journalist and the author of the book Trash Talk, The Only Book About Destroying Your Rivals That Isn't Total Garbage. It's a fascinating and delightful case that although the term is fairly new, the art form goes way back.
[00:00:45] Rafi Kohan:
There's something fundamental about trash talk to human beings, and we've been talking trash basically as long as we've been talking. It goes back to the Bible, it goes back to the Homeric poems. You can find examples, you know, across culture, across geography, and throughout time.
[00:01:01] Adam Grant:
Rafi has been a sports writer, an editor, a freelance journalist, and he directed The Atlantic's Creative Studio, Rethink. He also convinced me to rethink my assumptions about the purpose of trash talk.
Rafi, how do we trash talk on a podcast? Like, do I tell you, you're gonna, you're gonna bomb.
[00:01:23] Rafi Kohan:
Honestly, the most surprising thing about receiving your email was learning that you could read. I will say that I was, uh, um, appreciative of your trash talking efforts over email because a lot of people say that their instinct is when we first encounter one another and we talk is, is to talk some crap to me. But then they don't do it. But you actually did it. You said, “You are to book writing what Shaq is to free throw shooting.” Which by the way, I've written two books. So if I'm 50%, that's not so bad. Right? You know, at least you write, you write one good one.
[00:01:50] Adam Grant:
You found the veiled compliment there. It's a high hit rate for creative work.
[00:01:54] Rafi Kohan:
I was just looking for a way to pos positively frame it. You know, I needed to be able to go home without crying that night.
[00:02:01] Adam Grant:
I have to try to come up with something at least mildly entertaining. So I felt like a lame effort at Trash Talk was the easiest opening volley.
[00:02:09] Rafi Kohan:
Uh, although I wouldn't even call it a lame effort, right? Any sort of trash talk is inherently a provocation of some kind, right? There's some sort of violation. I mean, even if I say, “That's lame.” I could still say, “Well, but that still is upsetting to me because this is a person who I admire and respect, and he is putting down my work.” Even if in a, a lame, hackneyed trash talk kind of way, it's all about how I receive it, right? Putting out the provocation, putting out the incitement is really only half of the trash talk battle. It's all about that response, all about the uptake.
[00:02:44] Adam Grant:
Did you have a traumatic moment of, of being insulted on a basketball court as a kid? What's the origin story of why do you care so much about trash talking? Because I think everybody thinks it's an interesting and an entertaining phenomenon. Few people would think to write a whole book about it.
[00:02:59] Rafi Kohan:
Well, actually, nobody would think to write a whole book about it. 'Cause this is the first ever book about trash talk. And.
[00:03:08] Adam Grant:
That, and that's why it's the only one that's not total garbage.
[00:03:10] Rafi Kohan:
That's exactly right. That's why I felt so confident in my trash talking subtitle is because it's easy to insult everyone when everyone includes no one. I'm not really a trash talker personally. You know, the way that I've used trash talk on the basketball court is actually more to be self-deprecating, and adopt the kind of like underdog posture.
Like if I'm guarding somebody who's way taller than me and I manage to strip the ball from them. I'll say something to the effect of, “Oh man, you can't even get by me. Like, that's embarrassing.” But you know, I, I love trash talk. I'm a child of the nineties, grew up a New York Knicks fan of the Pat Riley and John Starks and Anthony Mason, Knicks, and the idea was that there is something so charismatic, so magnetic, so sort of dangerous about trash talk in some ways, at least as we kind of understand it.
But that sort of speaks to the idea that we actually don't understand it, right? Within the American context specifically, we invented this new term in the 1980s and really sort of popularized it in the 1990s of trash talk to describe this ancient form of, of human behavior that we just never quite named in that way.
And we were somehow rebranding it, recasting it specifically with the influence of Black American oral traditions, like the dozens like toasting and because of our larger cultural and racial context, we kind of stigmatized it as a result, and therefore we're taking trash talk at its word and not really understanding what's happening beneath the surface.
[00:04:41] Adam Grant:
As soon as I started thinking about trash talk as something that that's been part of human interaction from day one, I immediately thought of Shakespeare. Like biting your thumb at someone is trash talk. You're provoking them just like you were describing without even needing a word. You're basically saying they're not up to a fight, you're gonna destroy them.
[00:04:59] Rafi Kohan:
So at at the most basic level, trash talk is the presentation of a challenge, right? It suggests to your opponent. That they do not have what it takes to succeed. They cannot win. And this adds stress to a confrontation, right? It literally adds anxiety. It puts more pressure on your opponent's performance.
'Cause the, the the follow up question is, can you handle this? Can you, can you perform in the way that you're supposed to perform the way that you need to in spite of this added pressure and anxiety? Can you focus on the things that you're supposed to focus on? Are you going to become distracted by task irrelevant cues like me insulting your mother.
Can you self-regulate? Right? Can you get yourself where you need to be?
[00:05:40] Adam Grant:
I, I think that a lot of people hear trash talk, and especially if they haven't spent a, a lot of time around, um, competitive team sports, um, they think it's, it's bullying or verbal abuse of some kind. For me, that's a mistaken assumption.
[00:05:54] Rafi Kohan:
So they exist on a continuum. For sure, right? They, it is, it is uncivil behavior and in fact, you know, you can trash talk by verbally abusing someone. So the question is, what are the sort of qualities or features that kind of mediate that, that allow it to become something else?
And for me, I think about a few things. One is that it exists within a magic circle, right? Johann Heisinger talks about playgrounds sort of being these spaces apart from the other space where like new rules apply that are distinct from the rules beyond. So therefore, when you're playing in the NFL, it's okay to tackle a guy and not get arrested for assault, right?
Same if you're in a boxing match, if you're talking trash within a, you know, an acceptable space. You can say things that would cut at a person and you know, that aren't necessarily considered to be or shouldn't be taken as insulting or abusive. The second one would be opting in on some level, opting in, and there certainly can be argument about what qualifies as opting in.
Right? When Charlie Villanueva was playing in the NBA, was he opting in to Kevin Garnett, allegedly calling him a cancer patient because he has alopecia? I don't know, but there's some level of opting in that you're participating in this voluntarily, or as they say, the legal realm, right? You're coming to the nuisance.
And the third, which I think is absolutely imperative, is an opportunity to respond, right? You're inviting a response. It's a level playing field to equal competitors, and therefore there's also accountability at play. So you can say something, but you also have to stand behind it, and I have the opportunity to come back at you for it. While trash talk in invites a response. Bullying is punching down and seeking to silence.
[00:07:35] Adam Grant:
The boundaries on that can be slippery though, right? We're talking 90s basketball. Michael Jordan was not above trash talking players who were far below his ability level.
[00:07:45] Rafi Kohan:
There's so much gray area in all this space. There's no question. And you could argue, and I think you would be right to argue that he probably would've been a better leader if he had other modes of leadership, right? If he didn't just try to navigate these social relationships and seeing who could hang with them by testing them via verbal abuse, which can be a function of trash talk. But they are both players in the NBA. Right? It's not like David Stern or a team owner, right> Telling the 12th guy on the bench that he really stinks.
[00:08:12] Adam Grant:
Yeah, that's a good point. And it reminds me of, of probably the most interesting research I've read on trash talking, which I, I imagine you're intimately from familiar with my colleagues, Jeremy Yip, Maurice Schweitzer and Samir Nurmohamed did this great paper on trash talking, where they found that if you're competing, trash talking can motivate effort, but it demotivates when you're cooperating.
And I think that's exactly the distinction you're highlighting here, that it's probably not a good idea to berate Scottie Pippen if you're Michael Jordan.
[00:08:41] Rafi Kohan:
Yes and no. I love that paper so much. It was like foundational for me in terms of my reporting, just in terms of the way that it defined this basic function of trash talk as raising the psychological stakes of competition, right? It creates meaning like this existential, it makes something matter, and I love that so much.
There is a difference between ingroup and outgroup trash talk, right? And when you're talking trash about an outsider, or you hear it from an, from an outsider that can strengthen the bonds of identity of, of the ingroup. But within a group, there can be real value, pro-social value of trash talk too, but I, but you have to be more careful with it.
As Zora Neale Hurston said of the dozens, “it is a risky pleasure.” If you're talking trash to one another. What are the protective mechanisms on a team? I mean, trust is essential to all of this. Do I trust that you're doing it in a way to make me better, to get me to raise my game, to challenge me? Right. And will there be sort of recovery period afterwards where you'll dap me up afterwards or give me a hug and be like, “Hey man, that was great.” Right?
So that I can reappraise it. The failed mental model as they put it, is that people didn't anticipate that trash talk would in fact raise the motivation levels of the targets of trash talk. You can use that within a team to great effect. I mean, just think about practice, right? You know, getting people to come practice when they might not want to practice.
That's a terrific use of intra team trash talk. I had an old boss who would say, “Don't hold a grudge. Use a grudge.”
[00:10:08] Adam Grant:
It’s surprising to a lot of people that the very thing I'm doing that I think is gonna gimme an edge over my competitor, uh, is actually potentially gonna backfire. But it also turns out to be more complicated than that, as you know, because in that paper also, you're upping the stakes, as you said, you're creating a sense of rivalry between you and an opponent, and that can motivate them to work harder or play harder, but it also raises the likelihood that they'll cheat because they're willing to do whatever it takes to make sure that you lose.
[00:10:36] Rafi Kohan:
As you said, it can motivate someone, but it also makes them more petty.
It also makes them potentially act less ethically. It can narrow their attentional focus in a way that could be more directed in trying to, you know, retaliate against you. Again, that's the pettiness as opposed to focusing on the, the task at hand. But, so then the question is, what's your goal with this?
If you're an antagonistic trash talker, maybe you want me to become a little bit petty or a little bit less ethical, because then maybe I will foul you in a way that will get me kicked outta the game. Right.
[00:11:10] Adam Grant:
This is Zinedine Zidane.
[00:11:11] Rafi Kohan:
Yes. And Marco Materazzi. Absolutely.
[00:11:14] Adam Grant:
Exactly.
[00:11:15] Rafi Kohan:
Absolutely.
[00:11:15] Adam Grant:
I mean, Zidane gets, he ends up headbutting Materazzi and gets kicked out of what the last game of his career in the World Cup final.
[00:11:22] Rafi Kohan:
The world’s sports' biggest stage and his team loses in penalty kicks. I mean, the consequences couldn't have been more severe.
[00:11:31] Adam Grant:
Well, thi this raises the question of how to respond to trash talk. When I teach emotional intelligence, I, I show the Zidane clip and we raise the question of in class of, “Okay, what do you do in that situation?”
And I think for me, what's clear is that Zidane has an emotional trigger. Which is, he's been raised in a culture of honor. And if you insult a female member of his family, that is not trash talk. That is the worst form of disrespect and he's gonna lose it. And we've seen him do this before in competition.
[00:12:02] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:12:03] Adam Grant:
And what I encourage students to do is to come up with a script to identify their emotional trigger, what value could be violated, uh, by an insult or an unpleasant interaction? And then choose a script that would allow them to better handle that situation. If I were coaching Zidane, I would say, “Okay, look, you should have a script that goes something like this, the next time somebody does that, I wonder why he's saying that? Maybe Materazzi doesn't even know my sister. Maybe he's just trying to get me to get kicked out of the game because he knows he can't beat me.”
What would you recommend?
[00:12:37] Rafi Kohan:
When something happens that's offensive, like even when we know it's happening or could happen, we are sort of ha hardwired to be offended, right?
This is the, the fundamental attribution error as it's known, right? We mistake, you know, the context for the behavior as, or as Fritz Heider put it, “Behavior engulfs the field and we simply have a hard time not taking it personally.” So the response to trash talk is to display mentally tough behavior. Right?
Mental toughness is basically about self-awareness and self-regulation. So as you're saying, having some sort of cue for yourself, some kind of psychological cue when you can identify when you've been distracted, you're getting upset in a way that's not helpful, or your internal state is either rising or falling below your optimal zone of functioning, which describes sort of where our peak performance states are.
And then the ability to self-regulate to get yourself back to where you need to be. In the Army, they teach soldiers to ask themselves a question, which is what's important now? Anger is in the past, you're responding to something that already happened. What can I focus on right now in this moment? And even if the task seems overwhelming, which by the way is one of the things that trash talk can do, is it can overwhelm a person, makes someone feel like the demands of performance are more than they can handle.
So then you shrink it down to size. You say, “I don't have to worry about all that. I just need to focus on this and I can handle this.” And then you move on to the next thing. And acceptance is really key. I am not trying to ignore that Materazzi said this thing. 'Cause when you try to suppress a thought, it gives, it only gives it more oxygen.
You accept that something was said, you and then you, you, you choose how to respond to it. Is this useful for me or can I disregard it? And the way to disregard again, is not to ignore or suppress, but to focus on something else. And I think this is how Zidane would frame this, is that it actually brings up more of a moral question than a performative one, which is how do you square performance imperatives, competitive imperatives versus moral imperatives.
He has said that he responded in the right way. He said he would never apologize to Materazzi. He would rather die. But it does speak to a larger question, which is when people are crossing a line with the things that they say and potentially shifting societal norms in a way, then what is our responsibility to respond in a way that takes us out of performance and brings us more into sort of like a social and moral and ethical realm?
[00:15:03] Adam Grant:
I love your question. So one of the things that's, that's fascinating to me and that I've been thinking about, there are places where I think competitive drives are extremely high and there is no trash talk. I, I spent a lot of years in the world of springboard diving. I. I have never once seen trash talk and I was trying to figure out why that is, and I had a couple of initial hypotheses.
One is it's already a, a sport where so much rides on tiny things that it almost feels cruel to put that pressure on someone. Another is, there's just a strong norm of civility in diving. Um, you know, everyone's facing fear. Everybody is dealing with pain. We've all had the experience of getting lost in midair and then belly flopping or back smacking in a way that that hurts for hours, if not, you know, days.
And it just, it didn't mean to do that to somebody else. So this is all very specific to diving, but it, it raises a broader question of. What have you learned around why trash talk evolves in some environments and not others, and what are the features of a context that that make it acceptable versus unacceptable?
[00:16:11] Rafi Kohan:
First thing I thought of was Michael Phelps, and obviously he's not a diver, but there's a famous picture of him from before a 2016 race at the Summer Olympics where he is just under a hood. I think he's got headphones on and he is staring daggers at his opponent, or at least everyone assumed that he was staring daggers at his opponent.
What he actually said he was doing was.
[00:16:29] Adam Grant:
Phelps Face.
[00:16:30] Rafi Kohan:
Phelps.
[00:16:30] Adam Grant:
Yeah, I remember that picture.
[00:16:30] Rafi Kohan:
That's right. And he was psyching himself up. He was getting into his own zone of optimal functioning. Right. That in individual sports, especially one where things do ride on such technicalities, I think everybody is in their own head so much already that you might not necessarily be thinking about how to throw off someone else.
There is already so much on the line for yourself. It goes back to the point that norms matter so much, and as you said, there's a perhaps a norm of civility in competitive diving. What I think about is the early days of mixed martial arts. And nowadays, mar mixed martial arts, UFC in particular, is maybe ground zero for the world's most lying, crossing trash talk.
And, but back 30 years ago, 25 years ago even, there was no trash talk in the UFC, none in the MMA because it was built on values like respect and honor from the, the individual martial arts that, you know, were cobbled together to create MMA. But eventually there was someone who crossed the line. And when they pushed beyond this norm, people had an opportunity to either go with it or to push back against it.
And everyone saw that and they're like, “Yeah, man, I'm here for that. Like, I'm definitely down for that kind of energy.”
[00:17:45] Adam Grant:
It becomes a spectator sport and all of a sudden you realize there's entertainment value in trash talking. If you're doing an obscure sport like diving, there's, there's not a lot of incentive to do it.
[00:17:55] Rafi Kohan:
Right. Well, you're, you don't have the pre-fight, press conferences and weigh-ins, and that really speaks to more of a marketing imperative. This idea that trash stock can be used as a tool of business. When you raise the stakes of competition, when you create a rivalry relationship, you're investing people in the outcome of this contest in a way they wouldn't otherwise be invested in it.
I actually spoke to a lot of folks in the amateur wrestling world who bemoaned the fact that there's not more trash talk because they would like to have more attention around their sport, but they say, “Oh, everybody says it's unsportsmanlike. That's not part of, you know what we do here.” So therefore it doesn't happen.
[00:18:32] Adam Grant:
Yeah, it's, um, it's, it's interesting. I, I feel like business is full of these examples. Like, I remember when the, the GM CEO called the, the Mercedes C-Class, very average.
[00:18:41] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:18:43] Adam Grant:
Which is hilarious. But going back to the diving example for a second, I don't wanna say that trash talking is inherently bad, but I always loved the fact that in a sport that was competitive, that people were so kind to each other.
And it's, it's one of the things that made diving so enjoyable is you felt like even the people that I spent a whole year training to beat, I was still cheering for them.
[00:19:05] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:19:05] Adam Grant:
And I still wanted them to dive their best and I wanted to beat them.
[00:19:08] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:19:08] Adam Grant:
On my own merit.
[00:19:09] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:19:09] Adam Grant:
But I wonder if one of the, one of the reasons that that arose is at meets you're training with your competitor. Like you're standing in line at the same board, you're going through the same experience, and I think about so many sports where you practice separately from your competitors.
[00:19:25] Rafi Kohan:
Hmm.
[00:19:25] Adam Grant:
There's a clear boundary there. I wanna build an environment where respect is a core value.
[00:19:31] Rafi Kohan:
Mm-Hmm.
[00:19:32] Adam Grant:
And if people are gonna trash talk and bring in that little bit of incivility, they do it in a way that everybody thinks is fun and.
[00:19:38] Rafi Kohan:
Right.
[00:19:39] Adam Grant:
Within the acceptable bounds of interaction. How do you think about creating that?
[00:19:43] Rafi Kohan:
I think that's an important for any kind of trash talk environment in general is to create these kinds of like protective mechanisms that allow for some kind of psychological safety, right? That we can go at one another without feeling like we're actually being threatened by someone. I think about it as a safe space to do unsafe things, and I think, you know, depending on what you're doing or you know the or or where you're doing it, that space might change.
But I think you need to feel supported, right? You need to feel like someone's actually has your best interest in mind, right? The path to mental toughness requires vulnerability, and to be vulnerable, we need to feel safe in some ways, we need to feel supported. We need to feel that context. And I will say that about the diving stuff, you know, the way you describe it, I mean, is it truly free of all trash talk because you are, you're seeing one another.
Like, is anybody not sort of like winking to their opponent when they're about to take a dive or saying, “Hey, can you, can you, can you do this?”
[00:20:42] Adam Grant:
Never seen it.
[00:20:43] Rafi Kohan:
Wow. That's amazing. It really is.
[00:20:45] Adam Grant:
Never, I think it would be dishonorable, honestly.
[00:20:47] Rafi Kohan:
Mm-hmm.
[00:20:48] Adam Grant:
Which is the way you described the early UFC days.
[00:20:51] Rafi Kohan:
Right.
[00:20:51] Adam Grant:
I have a hunch. Same thing is true in gymnastics and figure skating like these, these very precarious sports. But maybe I'm wrong.
[00:20:58] Rafi Kohan:
For no. People who are listen couldn't, wouldn't be able to see it. But I shook my head vigorously at figure skating and that's just because there's a story about Katarina Witt. Former champion figure skater, they would have these free skate times where everybody would be on the ice and they would have three minutes, whatever to go through their routines.
And what Katarina Whit would do, while other people were rehearsing their routines, is she would improvise a dance to their routines. And people would be so intimidated by her doing this that it would psych them out for the competition. So is that trash talk? I mean, it's a kind of psychological gamesmanship for sure.
I don't know if it's trash talk, but I, I think, I think it's, it's a sister of it.
[00:21:38] Adam Grant:
This raises another question, which is about gender and trash talk, but trash talk seems to be pretty vibrant in women's sports as well. I think about the Angel Reese, um, Caitlin Clark, Hailey Van Lith situation. What have you learned about gender differences in the prevalence of trash talk and also in the way it's used?
[00:21:55] Rafi Kohan:
This behavior is probably more socialized than it is you know, innate, right? In terms of the way we express aggression, right? The way that we feel comfortable expression, aggression based on how it will be received or perceived sort of more widely. And you could see this in the reaction to Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark, the kind of attention it got.
There's also some, a racial component there, of course, but that we made a bigger deal out of that. Then we would've made a big deal out of Anthony Edwards going at Kevin Durant just in the playoff series that just happened, which was an.
[00:22:26] Adam Grant:
Yeah.
[00:22:26] Rafi Kohan:
Incredible trash talk. But again, at the most basic level, talking trash to someone is an invitation to compete. It raises the stakes. It's the presentation of a challenge and asking, “Can you handle this? Can you raise your game?” It's a way to almost get the best out of your opponent, right? A rival will push you further than you can go on your own.
[00:22:51] Adam Grant:
Let me transition here to a lightning round. We're looking for a sentence at most ideally, and you can skip one if you can't handle it.
[00:23:02] Rafi Kohan:
Okay.
[00:23:02] Adam Grant:
And I'm pretty sure you can't. You mentioned trash talk in the Bible. What is your favorite line of trash talk there?
[00:23:10] Rafi Kohan:
David to Goliath. “I will strike you down and cut off your head.”
[00:23:14] Adam Grant:
That one I think came to fruition.
[00:23:16] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah, it worked out. He baited them pretty good.
[00:23:19] Adam Grant:
What is your favorite modern trash chalk line?
[00:23:23] Rafi Kohan:
So, I don't know if this qualifies as modern because it's from the 1970s, but it's modern by, uh, biblical standards. Shep Messing was a former goalkeeper for the, uh, US Men's Olympic team, and he had a strategy after halftime of games when he was competing in, uh, the NASL, which is a different league.
He would go up to someone on the other team and he would say to them something to the effect of, “I hope you didn't hear. There's a fire in your neighborhood.” Something to take their mind off the competition. And of course there's no smartphones, no way to, to check it. And as he put it to me, he wanted to make them worried, not angry.
[00:23:59] Adam Grant:
Do you have a favorite piece of trash talk from a movie or a TV show?
[00:24:03] Rafi Kohan:
He Got Game with Denzel Washington and Ray Allen when they're playing one-on-one toward the end. And he says, “I've got nothing to do with your game.” And the point is, you're responsible for how you respond.
[00:24:15] Adam Grant:
Stepping a little beyond trash talk.
What is the worst advice you've ever gotten?
[00:24:18] Rafi Kohan:
The worst advice I ever got is write what you know. And I know that might seem like good advice and you know, perhaps it is for some people, but for me it felt very limiting. Whereas I, what I really enjoy is talking to lots of people and learning lots of things and writing what other people know because I certainly didn't know any of this stuff a couple years ago.
[00:24:39] Adam Grant:
I wholeheartedly agree with that. Write what you want to learn.
[00:24:43] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:24:43] Adam Grant:
Or write what you love.
[00:24:44] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:24:45] Adam Grant:
What is something you've rethought lately?
[00:24:48] Rafi Kohan:
Stress, and specifically the role of stress in performance and thinking about stress and our stress responses as actually a resource, something that's helping us be at our best as opposed to something that represents a threat or that could take away from our performance.
[00:25:06] Adam Grant:
Give us a hot take. It could be an unpopular opinion, a rant or a hill you are very eager to die on.
[00:25:13] Rafi Kohan:
Uh, breakfast is overrated.
[00:25:16] Adam Grant:
I knew you were gonna suck at hot takes.
[00:25:18] Rafi Kohan:
As I was talking, I was, I I, it occurred, I started to think about French toast, which is one of my favorite foods, and I realized maybe I was, uh, going a little overboard.
[00:25:27] Adam Grant:
What's a question you have for me?
[00:25:29] Rafi Kohan:
I would love to know if there have been times in your life when you think you would've benefited from a little more trash talk.
[00:25:36] Adam Grant:
There have, and that's how you ace the lightning round.
[00:25:40] Rafi Kohan:
Oh, I killed it.
[00:25:41] Adam Grant:
Well done.
[00:25:42] Rafi Kohan:
Am I allowed to ask a follow up?
[00:25:44] Adam Grant:
Yeah.
[00:25:45] Rafi Kohan:
What were those times?
[00:25:46] Adam Grant:
I think one of the times when I would've really benefited from trash talk was, uh, actually when I was near panic mode after a rehearsal for my first TED Talk. I, I gathered about 40 people who I felt had very high standards and it was a mix of people. Some had given TED Talks, some were great speakers, great writers, people who had sort of been very constructive critics and tough coaches on my work in the past.
And I pulled them all together and I gave a practice talk and it bombed. Bombed. And almost everybody in the group either had helpful suggestions for improvement or words of encouragement, and I think I would've been more motivated by somebody saying, “You know what? I actually think you have no business giving a TED Talk, and let me tell you all the reasons why.”
[00:26:43] Rafi Kohan:
Wow. Using the disrespect as a form of motivation.
[00:26:47] Adam Grant:
Yeah. It, it would've immediately activated the, the underdog effect that Samir Nurmohamed talks about and studies so well. I know. I would've said to that room, “Well, you don't know what I'm capable of.”
[00:26:58] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:26:59] Adam Grant:
“And I'm gonna show you.”
[00:27:00] Rafi Kohan:
And it would've pulled you out from the internal to the external, most likely.
Instead of ruminating about what went wrong, becoming more anxious, you become focused on the challenge that was presented externally.
[00:27:11] Adam Grant:
That's a really good point. I think it, it would've, it would've activated a, a future focus instead of past.
[00:27:17] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:27:17] Adam Grant:
And I think what was interesting was all the encouragement just left me wondering, “Do people just feel bad because it was so bad?” And, I, I think it really left me wondering, “Can I trust them? Can I do this?”
And I would've been better off with them, as you say, giving me the challenge.
[00:27:17] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:27:17] Adam Grant:
Because I love a good challenge, so yes, I could have benefited from more trash shock. And if any of that group of 40 some are listening, you all failed me.
[00:27:47] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:27:47] Adam Grant:
You suck. You're massive disappointments and I can't believe we're still friends.
[00:27:52] Rafi Kohan:
I was gonna say the same thing.
[00:27:55] Adam Grant:
So it's been over a century since Yerkes Dodson told us there's an optimal level of stress, and we all know what it means to have too much stress, but you could also have too little.
[00:28:06] Rafi Kohan:
Yes.
[00:28:06] Adam Grant:
Uh, where you're not focused, you're not motivated, you don't care. And I think the research on performance pressure that followed has very much tracked that curve, um, with creativity, for example, we know that there's a curve of linear relationship between time pressure and, and the novelty and, and quality of ideas that people generate.
Um, you have too much pressure and you end up having to just sort of just rush ahead with whatever's easy, but you have too little pressure and sometimes you don't feel like you have to start.
[00:28:35] Rafi Kohan:
Right.
[00:28:36] Adam Grant:
Or you have to give your full attention, or you have to kick into high gear to make sure that you can finish.
It's really hard to figure out what the optimal level of stress or pressure is. You spend a lot of time thinking about this.
[00:28:47] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:28:47] Adam Grant:
What can you teach us?
[00:28:48] Rafi Kohan:
There is such a thing as an individual zone of optimal functioning, which is in, in an individualized and personally appropriate level of anxiety that, that we each require to be at our best.
And individual zones can be informed by things, as you said, not just by who the person is, but also by the specific task at hand and almost any other factor, any other con, you know, condition you can put on performance. But what's interesting is that what they've also found in subsequent pressure profiling that they've done.
Is that people with narcissism are also really stress hardy because they don't mind being in the spotlight, right? They want to take it on.
[00:29:27] Adam Grant:
Narcissists also have a lot of practice dealing with narcissistic injury.
[00:29:31] Rafi Kohan:
Yes.
[00:29:31] Adam Grant:
Anything is a potential ego thread.
[00:29:33] Rafi Kohan:
Yes.
[00:29:33] Adam Grant:
And so they, they get to build up that stress response over time, potentially.
[00:29:36] Rafi Kohan:
Yes. But, and the key was that you had to train toward the type of behavior that you were looking for to a narcissist. You might, say something like, “Wouldn't it be so great if you could just not swing at the first 10 balls that come your way?” You know, like not taking unnecessary risk, right?
Learning where the right times to take risks are, whereas the punishment sensitive person, they train to the point where it's not actually taking a risk. I've listened to many of your podcasts, but one of the ones with, with Lisa Feldman Barrett, you, you were talking specifically about how sort of trying to reappraise stress in that mo in that performance moment and feeling the nerves and anxiety and even telling yourself, “I can handle this. I'm excited, I'm determined.”
It doesn't necessarily help that much when you're really feeling more than you want to feel, it still helps, right? But what you really need to do is have inoculated yourself to that stress ahead of time. That's the key, right? Having sort of the mastery of that skill execution and having practiced those skills under duress and specifically in the conditions in which you're going to be performing.
And so when you do those things, then when you get to that moment of performance, you can self-regulate to that optimal state.
[00:30:44] Adam Grant:
This is where I think about Alia Crum's research, where teaching people the stress is enhancing as opposed to stress is debilitating mindset actually allows them to use it more effectively because instead of fighting against the arousal that they're feeling or the anxiety, they're able to say, “This is providing me with additional motivation.”
[00:31:01] Rafi Kohan:
Yes, challenge versus threat is a spectrum. It's not like a dichotomy, but you can slide yourself closer to that end of the spectrum toward challenge from threat.
[00:31:11] Adam Grant:
I think the reappraisal of what is the meaning of this stressor is a lot easier
[00:31:16] Rafi Kohan:
Yes.
[00:31:16] Adam Grant:
Than saying, let me get rid of the emotion or the, the intense arousal altogether.
[00:31:21] Rafi Kohan:
Absolutely. The story we tell ourselves about the things that we're experiencing and the meaning we make from it is so critical. And by the way, trash talk speaks so much to this human desire to make meaning, I think. Both in terms of, again, the sort of the creation of rivalry relationships and sort of endowing contests with meaning, but it also exploits our sort of brain's inherent impulse to try to make sense of things, to try to make sense of what we're taking in.
[00:31:45] Adam Grant:
I was doing an event with somebody who I think of as both a friend and a colleague, and I remember our previous conversation just missing a little tension the last time we had been on stage. Like we agreed too much and I wanted a few more sparks to fly and without even thinking it through. When we were getting together backstage, the, the other person made a comment to the effect of, “You know, I, I'm really looking forward to this. It's gonna be a lot of fun.”
I said, “I don't know. We'll see how it goes. Are you up to making it fun? Do you think you're going to say something, you know, challenging and provocative?” And I, I watched like the person's facial expression just deflated.
[00:32:28] Rafi Kohan:
Mm.
[00:32:28] Adam Grant:
And if I had just said, “Hey, by the way, I wanna make sure we mix it up this time.”
[00:32:33] Rafi Kohan:
Mm.
[00:32:34] Adam Grant:
“So, you know what? What do you think about maybe making fun of each other a little bit? Doing a little friendly teasing, some banter.”
[00:32:41] Rafi Kohan:
Right.
[00:32:41] Adam Grant:
It would've been received completely differently. Talk to me about that.
[00:32:45] Rafi Kohan:
He or she wasn't primed for that.
[00:32:48] Adam Grant:
Exactly. It was very jarring.
[00:32:50] Rafi Kohan:
Right.
[00:32:51] Adam Grant:
I, I didn't see it until you were, you were talking about building norms and establishing norms of like, previewing this behavior is really critical.
[00:32:59] Rafi Kohan:
Mm-Hmm.
[00:32:59] Adam Grant:
If you're not in a context where we both opted in.
[00:33:02] Rafi Kohan:
Yes. Familiarity is important mediator for stress, actually. Right. So it's like when you, when you experience something that's novel, you'll have a much larger stress response. I think it speaks to something that's interesting about the idea of competition versus cooperation, and that is, cooperation is inherent to competition. If you don't have cooperation, you can't have competition.
So it's more just saying, let's have a different kind of cooperation here. Right?
[00:33:27] Adam Grant:
That's right. Let's, let's agree on, on the rules that we can duke it out under a little bit and.
[00:33:33] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah, let's agree to disagree.
[00:33:34] Adam Grant:
Yeah, exactly. And to disagree passionately.
[00:33:37] Rafi Kohan:
The creation of good faith is really what it is so that we can, uh, like again on the most basic level, and it's what you were doing, agree to disagree, like, but first we need to have some good faith about what we're doing here.
[00:33:49] Adam Grant:
It's creating good faith and it's reinforcing goodwill.
[00:33:51] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah, absolutely.
[00:33:53] Adam Grant:
To bring us full circle, I think the thing that I love most about the book’s subtitle that you created is you have sent a signal to the whole world, anybody who interacts with you now knows that you're coming to play ball.
[00:34:07] Rafi Kohan:
It's so nice to give people that kind of permission in some ways, right? Because one, you're saying my guard is down. You can lower your guard too, but also it creates a more, a more instant sense of immediacy with people too, right?
You can skip the small talk and get right to the trash talk. Right? One of the things you know you can say about trash talk is that it's intimacy masquerading as hostility, especially when it takes place within relationships.
[00:34:33] Adam Grant:
Intimacy masquerading as hostility. I will only make fun of you if I like you and think.
[00:34:39] Rafi Kohan:
Absolutely.
[00:34:40] Adam Grant:
It's appropriate in our relationship.
[00:34:42] Rafi Kohan:
Absolutely. It is a sign of a healthy environment or, or it can be.
[00:34:48] Adam Grant:
Wow. Well, that, that is something to rethink. I have so many people that I wanna diss right now.
[00:34:55] Rafi Kohan:
I have so many people that I want, I want to hear you diss.
[00:35:00] Adam Grant:
And in the meantime, because, uh, our Sixers just, uh, just fell to your Knicks, um, you're definitely going down next.
Thank you, Rafi.
[00:35:07] Rafi Kohan:
Thank you so much, Adam.
[00:35:08] Adam Grant:
Loved it.
[00:35:09] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah, me too, man.
[00:35:09] Adam Grant:
Looking forward to our paths crossing again.
[00:35:11] Rafi Kohan:
Likewise.
[00:35:17] Adam Grant:
I never thought about trash talk as intimacy masquerading as hostility, and I realized that's what I've always loved about friendly rivalries is that you can make fun of each other and you're doing it in good fun, and it's just, it's a mark of how much you care about each other. I think that's what a great roast is all about.
It's a sign of a healthy relationship that you can insult each other lovingly without taking offense.
Rethinking is hosted by me, Adam Grant. This show is part of the TED Audio Collective, and this episode was produced and mixed by Cosmic Standard. Our producers are Hannah Kingsley-Ma and Aja Simpson. Our editor is Alejandra Salazar. Our fact checker is Paul Durbin. Original music by Hansdale Hsu and Allison Leyton-Brown.
Our team includes Eliza Smith. Jacob Winik, Samiah Adams, Roxanne Hai Lash, Banban Cheng, Julia Dickerson and Whitney Pennington Rodgers.
I mean, at least I don't have like giant headphones on.
[00:36:25] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah. Which is dwarf the size of my head. Yeah.
[00:36:29] Adam Grant:
Yeah. Although, you know, I also don't have the luxury of wearing headphones because when you don't have hair.
[00:36:35] Rafi Kohan:
Mm.
[00:36:35] Adam Grant:
They're really uncomfortable.
[00:36:36] Rafi Kohan:
Uh, pre it presses into the scalp.
[00:36:39] Adam Grant:
Exactly. They're not designed to just like, rest on top of your head.
[00:36:42] Rafi Kohan:
Mm. That seems, that seems like a market inefficiency that somebody should, uh, should address.
[00:36:48] Adam Grant:
Yeah, except where I don't think there's enough demand. All, all the bald podcasters, although there are a lot of us.
[00:36:55] Rafi Kohan:
Or they would, or they're, or they're in, uh, too great of denial to admit it.
[00:36:59] Adam Grant:
I think the last time I did that, I ended up with a giant dent on my head after a a two hour conversation.
[00:37:04] Rafi Kohan:
Right on.
[00:37:05] Adam Grant:
Delightful. My denial was erased.
[00:37:08] Rafi Kohan:
Yeah.
[00:37:08] Adam Grant:
Live.