Having deep one-on-one conversations

Mike felt like a real movie star pulling up to the venue. His face lit up and everyone jumped when a real pirate opened the door and yelled, Ahoy, maties! Before the show started, Mike enjoyed the special pre-show event, complete with a juggling pirate, a singing pirate, and a dancing sea lion. He laughed and laughed! We caught his mom staring at him and softly smiling, taking in all his joy. Now it was time for the big show. It was a packed house, and Mike was in the front row. Dinner was served: potato soup, buccaneer biscuits, half o' roasted cackler (chicken), mashed and flogged taters, cob o' buttery (corn), and apple o' me eye pie--a dinner fit for pirates. So the negative reaction that nonconformers so frequently receive helps explain why people often submit to the norms of the group. Interestingly, Schachter also found that an initial nonconformer who subsequently steps in line is warmly received. After all, when someone who deviates from the rest of the group sees the light, it validates the group's norms. Although most participants in Asch's studies publicly adjusted their responses to support the group perception at least once, it was not necessarily the case that all, or even most, were blindly punting away their own individualism to succumb submissively to the group opinion. Asch recognized this as well, noting that in postexperimental interviews, many subjects expressed considerable concern for the solidarity and well-being of the group. Thus, the participants' responses can also be interpreted as a result of valuing positive social relations (Hodges & Geyer, 2006). From this perspective, then, participants' conformity to the group norm despite their own perceptions can be seen as an adaptive means of productively and harmoniously coexisting with others. It is no surprise that people who come from more collectivistic cultures, which strongly value group cohesion, generally are more likely to conform than people who come from individualistic cultures, which strongly value unique self-expression (Bond & Smith, 1996). When we stick out, we can risk ridicule and rejection from others. What Personality and Situational Variables Influence Conformity? The therapeutic idea is made totally transparent. ACTIVITY SCHEDULING

Identifying activities / experiences that were enjoyed in the past - the reinforcers. Afterwards, writing down an activity plan for the coming weeks, in which new and potentially enjoyable things are added to the usual daily routine. Hopelessness and pessimism are typical symptoms of depression. The therapist should therefore have the rhetorical skills to give some hope for better times. In particular, he should be able to respond in a professional way to the common statement It's no use at all! Therapists shouldn't react annoyed when a depressive patient shows only limited excitement about the suggested activities. Quite the opposite: if he or she was totally enthusiastic about all these cool new things that are about to happen, then maybe the diagnosis is incorrect. In the 1970s, Lewinsohn published the Pleasant Events Schedule - a list with 320 activities. Mike took it all in. His face glowed, and he grinned from ear to ear. It was the end of the show, but not the end of the experience for Mike. The team had arranged a special meet-and-greet where some of the pirates met with Mike and gave him a special flag with the characters' autographs. He held and stared at it for at least two minutes. He was in shock. Mike's Front Row experience was truly magical on so many levels since he'd had so many health setbacks in the time before the event. It was a miracle that he even made the trip. Days before the trip, Mike's mom learned that he had only a short time to live. In fact, the doctors said, He may have just a few months. Despite this more positive view of conformity, in many contexts, such as deciding whether a defendant is guilty or whether an aircraft design is safe, it would be rather alarming if individuals went along with the group despite what they know to be true from their physical perceptions. From Asch's studies, it's tempting to agree with Mark Twain, who noted, We are discreet sheep;

But we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that 25% of participants never conformed to the group. These results also provide compelling evidence that some people do resist social pressure. Unfortunately, not a great deal is known about the personality characteristics of those who tend to conform as opposed to those who do not. Early studies found some indications that people who have such traits as a high need to achieve (McClelland et al. People who have a greater awareness of self and high self-esteem (Santee & Maslach, 1982) are also less likely to conform because they are more confident in their own judgments and less in need of other people's approval. Indeed, self-esteem appears to be especially likely to help one resist conformity when those feelings of self-worth are based on who one thinks one really is, as opposed to self-esteem based on achievements that others may value (Arndt, Schimel, et al. For years, psychologists also thought that women conformed more than men, but any such differences are actually quite small. It turns out that people will more readily conform on topics they don't know much about. Since depressive people often find it difficult to identify something enjoyable, this list is intended to bring some ideas to the table. It contains things that you would expect to find in such a collection, like playing with pets, eating good meals or going to the movies. And there's also a little bit of a darker section, with suggestions like taking powerful drugs, shocking people or taking part in military activities. Very different things have the potential to please the human soul. In Germany, this list gets passed on to young behavioral therapists by the older ones for many generations now - like the first set of scissors, handed down to the trainee hairdresser. In Lewinsohn's list, each pleasant event can be evaluated according to how often it has occurred in the last 30 days (not at all / a few times / often), and how much enjoyment it created (none at all / potentially enjoyable / very pleasant). The sheer number of things is an invitation to try out something new. If you want to have a look, you can find many variants of this list all over the internet. There's no need to do it all - being in a fight may easily lead to a non-pleasant result for the non-trained, and having an original idea may be quite hard to accomplish when planned for a specific time on the activity schedule. Since this collection is already over 40 years old, perhaps the time has come for an update. In his final days of life, our board member and event coordinator Carey Smolensky told us that, upon visiting Mike at the hospital, he walked into the room and caught Mike flipping through the photo article from his Front Row experience. Mike's story is a powerful example of how the three forces we've talked about make the moment: mindset, relationships, environment.

Mike brought the right mindset--he was a raving fan of pirates. We had the right people--his family along with our event hosts to make sure every detail was handled. We had the right environment--our team making sure that every detail was thought through, from playing Mike's favorite music in the limo to having his favorite snacks. With our recipients, we even know how comfortable they are with pictures and video and adjust our approach to capture the experience while giving them privacy. Our team are experts at knowing how to spark and sustain great conversation through questions to create a fun, relaxed atmosphere. Moment makers consider every aspect of the environment to influence the experience of everyone involved. If you've thrown parties or even helped organize a wedding, you know and appreciate what I'm talking about. Mike's environment was setting everything up for success--the stretch limo, oceanfront hotel room, first plane ride, his favorite food, carefully selected gifts, and amazing seats to the show of his dreams. Thus, whereas women are more likely to conform on stereotypically masculine topics such as sports or cars, men are more likely to conform on stereotypically feminine topics such as fashion or family planning (Eagly & Carli, 1981). In addition to self-awareness, self-esteem, and gender, aspects of a situation also can influence the likelihood of conformity. In further variants of his paradigm, Asch discovered a number of factors that influence the rate of conformity. For example, larger groups of unanimous opinions elicit more conformity, but only up to a point. Asch (1956) repeated his line-judgment conformity experiment but manipulated the number of confederates who announced the incorrect answer. The Effect of Group Size on Conformity Conformity is more likely as group size increases from one to three people, but then the influence starts to level off. A line graph represents effect of group size on conformity, with vertical axis labeled as Percentage of participants conforming to the unanimous wrong answer ranging from 0 to 45 in increments of 5 while the horizontal axis is labeled as Number of confederates giving unanimous wrong answer, marked from left to right as Control, 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 16. The curve starts from control at 0, further the approximate value of line is as follows 4. Participants were more likely to conform when three confederates gave unanimous wrong answers than when two confederates gave unanimous wrong answers. Because, without binge-watching shows on Netflix, getting many likes on a tweet or leveling a new char in WoW this isn't fully representing modern reality anymore. Let's have a critical look at this psychotherapeutic technique.

Can it really be that easy? Just doing nice things and getting better? Unfortunately, there's a critical issue with this purely behavior-focused approach: pleasant activities are not necessarily experienced as being pleasant. Not because people chose the wrong things to do. But because humans can be true experts in talking down their own success, focusing on the negative things while ignoring the positive, etc Even a top mark in the final exam loses its quality as a super event, if one devaluates it as just having been lucky, instead of seeing it as a proof of the own skills. For behaviorism, this topic has always been a big problem. Because here we are dealing with something inside the ominous Black Box. In 2020, you will still meet behavioral activation in many psychotherapeutic offices or clinics. By intentionally designing every detail of Mike's day, we created a new focus, and therefore new feelings and ultimately a front row moment nobody will ever forget. LIVING LIFE IN THE FRONT ROW EVERY DAY In 2005, the TD Threshold's mission was to create an incredible front row experience for the recipients; We continually look for new and imaginative ways to cultivate an environment where our recipients, their family members, donors, supporters, or anyone connected to our community can practice the art of moment making. We ask ourselves, How can we design and create an empowering environment for each and every person to thrive? We've answered that question by creating. The Front Row Factor Podcast: I once heard someone say, Turn your car into a university on wheels. Doing this became one of the most important decisions of my life. Over 20 years, I've listened to about 7,300 hours of audio programs, articles, and podcasts. Interestingly, however, further increases in majority size above three did not lead to significantly more conformity. It appears, then, that at least in the Asch paradigm, a unanimous majority of three is maximally influential.