Your body language may shape who you are | Amy Cuddy | TED

Summary

Amy Cuddy, psychologue sociale, explore l'impact des gestes non verbaux sur notre comportement et les jugements des autres. Elle explique comment des poses de pouvoir, adoptées même deux minutes, peuvent augmenter les niveaux d'hormones liés à la dominance et réduire ceux associés au stress, améliorant ainsi notre confiance et notre succès dans des situations clés. Cuddy encourage les gens à 'faire l'imposteur' jusqu'à ce qu'ils deviennent ce qu'ils veulent être, en utilisant ces poses pour changer leur perception d'eux-mêmes et celle des autres.

Takeaways

• 🧍‍♀️ Notre posture peut avoir un impact significatif sur notre bien-être et la manière dont nous interagissons avec le monde.
• 🤔 Les chercheurs s'intéressent à la manière dont les gestes non verbaux, comme la posture, influencent les jugements et les interactions sociales.
• 🤝 Une poignée de main, ou l'absence de celle-ci, peut entraîner des discussions et des jugements prolongés sur les personnes.
• 🧐 Les jugements basés sur le langage corporel peuvent prédire des résultats de vie importantes, comme les promotions professionnelles ou les relations amoureuses.
• 🦅 Les expressions de pouvoir et de domination se manifestent par l'expansion de notre corps, prenant de l'espace et se déplaçant avec assurance.
• 🐥 Chez les animaux et chez les humains, les expressions de puissance sont universelles et anciennes, comme le montre la posture de la fierté.
• 🦥 En position de faible pouvoir, nous nous rétrécissons, nous nous enfermons et nous évitons le contact avec les autres.
• 🏫 Dans les salles de classe, les étudiants montrent un spectre complet d'expressions de pouvoir, de l'alpha carré à ceux qui se rétrécissent.
• 🔬 Des expériences ont montré que des postures de pouvoir adoptées brièvement peuvent augmenter la confiance et l'hormone du pouvoir, tandis que les postures de faible pouvoir ont l'effet inverse.
• 💼 L'application de ces postures de pouvoir dans des situations évaluatives, comme les entretiens d'embauche, peut améliorer la perception par les autres et influencer les résultats positifs.
• 🌟 Il est possible de 'faire l' imposteur' jusqu'à devenir celui que l'on fait semblant d'être, ce qui peut conduire à des changements durables dans la perception de soi et des performances.

Q & A

Quel est le conseil gratuit sans technologie donné au début du discours?

Le conseil est de changer sa posture pendant deux minutes pour voir comment cela peut changer la manière dont votre vie se déroule.

Quels sont les effets des gestes non verbaux sur les jugements et les inférences que nous faisons?

Les gestes non verbaux peuvent entraîner des jugements rapides et des inférences qui peuvent prédire des résultats de vie significatifs tels que qui nous embauchons ou promouvons, qui nous invitons à sortir.

Quelle est la recherche de Nalini Ambady sur l'impact des interactions médecin-patient?

Elle a montré que les jugements sur la gentillesse des médecins basés sur des clips de 30 secondes sans son prédisaient si le médecin serait poursuivi en justice.

Quel est le lien entre les expressions faciales et la perception de pouvoir chez les candidats politiques?

Alex Todorov a démontré que les jugements basés sur les visages des candidats politiques en une seconde seulement pouvaient prédire 70% des résultats des élections aux États-Unis.

Comment les gestes non verbaux de puissance et de domination sont-ils exprimés dans le règne animal?

Dans le règne animal, ces gestes consistent à s'agrandir, s'étirer, occuper de l'espace et s'ouvrir, ce qui est vrai pour de nombreuses espèces et non seulement pour les primates.

Quelle est la différence entre les poses de puissance et les poses de faiblesse?

Les poses de puissance consistent à s'étendre et à occuper de l'espace, tandis que les poses de faiblesse consistent à se replier, se raccrocher et se rendre petit.

Quels sont les effets des poses de puissance sur les taux d'hormones du cortisol et de la testostérone?

Les poses de puissance augmentent la testostérone et diminuent le cortisol, ce qui est lié à une attitude plus/assertive et moins stressée, tandis que les poses de faiblesse ont l'effet inverse.

Quelle a été l'expérience menée par les chercheurs pour tester l'impact des poses de puissance sur la confiance en soi?

Les participants ont adopté des poses de puissance ou de faiblesse pendant deux minutes, puis ont été interrogés sur leur sentiment de puissance et ont passé un test de tolérance au risque.

Quels sont les résultats de l'expérience qui a utilisé des entretiens d'embauche simulés pour évaluer l'impact des poses de puissance?

Les participants qui ont adopté des poses de puissance ont été plus souvent choisis pour un emploi et ont été évalués positivement, principalement en raison de leur présence et non du contenu de leur discours.

Quel conseil Amy Cuddy donne-t-elle pour améliorer la perception que les autres ont de nous?

Elle suggère de faire des poses de puissance avant des situations évaluatives stressantes pour configurer son cerveau de manière à être plus affirmatif, confiant et à l'aise.

Outlines

00:00

🧍‍♀️ Posture et langage corporel

Amy Cuddy commence par une astuce de vie sans technologie qui consiste à changer sa posture pendant deux minutes. Elle invite le public à observer leur posture actuelle et souligne l'importance de notre langage corporel, que nous observons chez les autres et qui influence nos jugements sur eux. Elle mentionne des études montrant que les jugements basés sur le langage corporel peuvent prédire des résultats significatifs dans la vie, comme qui sera embauché ou promu. Cuddy explique que les expressions corporelles de pouvoir et de domination sont universelles et anciennes, et elle mentionne des recherches sur la posture et les hormones liées au pouvoir.

05:02

🦅 Langage corporel et dynamique de pouvoir

Cuddy observe que les étudiants en MBA manifestent des expressions corporelles de pouvoir et de faiblesse, et cela semble lié au genre, les femmes étant plus enclines à adopter des postures de faiblesse. Elle note également que cela affecte la participation et les notes des étudiants. Cuddy et son collaborateur Dana Carney cherchent à savoir si l'imitation de postures de pouvoir peut améliorer la participation et les sentiments de puissance. Ils étudient l'impact des postures sur les hormones liées au pouvoir et au stress, et posent la question de savoir si le corps peut changer l'esprit.

10:04

🧍‍♂️ Poser pour la puissance

Les chercheurs ont mené une expérience où des participants adoptent des postures de puissance ou de faiblesse pendant deux minutes, puis sont interrogés sur leurs sentiments de puissance et leur tolerance au risque. Les résultats montrent que les postures de puissance augmentent la confiance et l'optimisme, et provoquent des changements hormonaux significatifs, avec une augmentation de la testostérone et une diminution du cortisol. Cuddy explique que ces changements hormonaux configurent le cerveau pour être assertif et confiant ou stressé et fermé.

15:07

💼 Poses de puissance et entretiens d'embauche

Cuddy et ses collègues ont étudié l'impact des poses de puissance sur les entretiens d'embauche stressants. Les participants effectuent des poses avant un entretien simulé, et les juges, sans donner de réactions non verbales, évaluent les candidats. Les résultats montrent que les personnes qui ont adopté des postures de puissance sont plus susceptibles d'être embauchées et sont évaluées positivement. Cuddy partage son expérience personnelle d'imposteur et comment elle a utilisé la stratégie de 'faire l'effet' pour surmonter ses sentiments d'inadéquation.

20:10

🌟 Faites l'effet jusqu'à devenir

Amy Cuddy conclut en disant que les petits changements, comme les poses de puissance, peuvent conduire à de grands changements. Elle encourage le public à pratiquer les poses de puissance avant des situations stressantes et à partager la science derrière cette pratique avec ceux qui en ont le plus besoin. Elle insiste sur l'importance de ne pas se contenter de 'faire l'effet' jusqu'à réussir, mais de le faire jusqu'à devenir la personne que l'on veut être, en internalisant le changement.

Keywords

💡Posture

La posture est la manière dont un individu se tient, généralement en position debout ou assise. Dans le script, la posture est présentée comme un hack de vie qui peut influencer la perception de soi et les interactions sociales. Par exemple, l'oratrice mentionne que changer sa posture pendant deux minutes peut avoir un impact significatif sur la façon dont on se sent et comment on est perçu par les autres.

💡Nonverbal communication

La communication non verbale fait référence aux signes, gestes, expressions faciales et autres comportements qui transmettent des informations sans utiliser de mots. Dans le script, l'accent est mis sur l'importance de la communication non verbale dans la formation de jugements rapides et la prédiction des résultats dans diverses situations sociales, comme lors d'un entretien d'embauche.

💡Power dynamics

Les dynamiques de pouvoir se réfèrent à la distribution et à l'exercice de l'autorité ou de l'influence dans les relations entre les personnes. L'oratrice discute des expressions non verbales de pouvoir et de domination, telles que l'agrandissement de soi et l'occupation d'espace, qui sont universelles et anciennes, et comment elles peuvent affecter la confiance et la perception de la compétence.

💡Hormones

Les hormones sont des substances chimiques produites par l'organisme qui ont un effet sur le comportement et la santé. Le script mentionne deux hormones clés : la testostérone, associée à la dominance, et le cortisol, lié au stress. L'oratrice explique comment les niveaux de ces hormones peuvent changer en fonction des postures adoptées et influencer nos sentiments de puissance ou de faiblesse.

💡Stress

Le stress est une réaction psychophysique à une situation perçue comme menaçante ou difficile. Dans le contexte du script, le stress est lié à la réduction de la testostérone et à l'augmentation du cortisol, ce qui peut entraîner une réduction de la confiance en soi et une augmentation de l'anxiété, surtout dans des situations évaluatives ou sociales.

💡Impostor syndrome

Le syndrome de l'imposteur est un sentiment d'insécurité où une personne craint d'être découverte comme étant frauduleuse ou incompétente, malgré des preuves du contraire. L'oratrice partage son expérience personnelle de ce sentiment après un accident de voiture, où elle se sentait comme si elle n'avait pas le droit d'être dans son environnement académique.

💡Risk tolerance

La tolérance au risque est la mesure de la disposition d'une personne à prendre des risques. Dans le script, l'oratrice mentionne que les personnes qui adoptent des postures de pouvoir ont une tolérance au risque plus élevée, ce qui se manifeste par une propension accrue à parier dans des jeux d'argent.

💡Assertiveness

L'assertivité est la capacité à exprimer ses besoins, opinions et sentiments de manière ouverte et respectueuse. Le script souligne que les personnes avec des niveaux élevés de testostérone et des niveaux bas de cortisol sont plus assertives et confiantes, ce qui est lié à une posture de pouvoir.

💡Job interview

Un entretien d'embauche est une rencontre où un candidat est évalué pour un poste de travail. Dans le script, l'entretien d'embauche est utilisé comme exemple de situation évaluative où l'adoption de postures de pouvoir peut avoir un impact significatif sur la perception du candidat par les employeurs.

💡Presence

La présence fait référence à la manière dont une personne occupe l'espace et est perçue par les autres, souvent en termes d'autorité et de confiance. L'oratrice explique que la présence est une composante clé de la performance dans des situations évaluatives et peut être améliorée par l'adoption de postures de pouvoir.

Highlights

提供免费的无技术生活技巧，只需改变你的体态两分钟。

我们对身体语言非常着迷，尤其是对别人的身体语言。

社会科学家花费大量时间研究身体语言对我们判断的影响。

研究表明，观察30秒无声的医生与病人互动片段，可以预测医生是否会被起诉。

普林斯顿大学的研究表明，对政治候选人面部表情的判断，在一秒钟内预测了70%的美国参议院和州长竞选结果。

我们不仅通过非语言信号判断他人，也通过它们影响我们自己。

权力和支配的非语言表现在动物界是关于扩张的。

人类在感到强大时也会扩张自己的身体，无论是长期还是暂时的。

感到无力时，我们会做完全相反的动作，我们会封闭自己。

在MBA课堂上，学生展示了权力非语言的全范围。

研究表明，女性比男性更倾向于表现出无力的非语言信号。

权力的非语言信号与学生的参与度和表现有关。

研究者想要知道，是否可以通过假装拥有权力的姿势来增加参与度。

我们的非语言信号不仅影响他人对我们的看法，也影响我们对自己的感受。

研究表明，我们的身体可以改变我们的心理状态，包括我们的思想、感觉和生理反应。

实验发现，仅仅两分钟的高权力姿势可以显著提高人的睾丸素水平和降低皮质醇水平。

权力姿势可以在实际生活中应用，如在压力情境下的面试中。

实验结果表明，采用高权力姿势的人在模拟面试中得到了更高的评价。

作者通过个人经历强调了'假装直到你成功'的力量。

作者鼓励人们不仅尝试权力姿势，还要分享这个科学发现，特别是那些资源有限的人。

微小的改变可以带来巨大的变化，两分钟的权力姿势可以在压力情境中帮助你更好地表现自己。

Transcripts

Translator: Joseph Geni Reviewer: Morton Bast

So I want to start by offering you a free no-tech life hack,

and all it requires of you is this:

that you change your posture for two minutes.

But before I give it away, I want to ask you to right now

do a little audit of your body and what you're doing with your body.

So how many of you are sort of making yourselves smaller?

Maybe you're hunching, crossing your legs, maybe wrapping your ankles.

Sometimes we hold onto our arms like this.

Sometimes we spread out. (Laughter)

I see you.

So I want you to pay attention to what you're doing right now.

We're going to come back to that in a few minutes,

and I'm hoping that if you learn to tweak this a little bit,

it could significantly change the way your life unfolds.

So, we're really fascinated with body language,

and we're particularly interested in other people's body language.

You know, we're interested in, like, you know — (Laughter) —

an awkward interaction, or a smile,

or a contemptuous glance, or maybe a very awkward wink,

or maybe even something like a handshake.

Narrator: Here they are arriving at Number 10.

This lucky policeman gets to shake hands with the President of the United States.

Here comes the Prime Minister -- No. (Laughter) (Applause)

(Laughter) (Applause)

Amy Cuddy: So a handshake, or the lack of a handshake,

can have us talking for weeks and weeks and weeks.

Even the BBC and The New York Times.

So obviously when we think about nonverbal behavior,

or body language -- but we call it nonverbals as social scientists --

it's language, so we think about communication.

When we think about communication, we think about interactions.

So what is your body language communicating to me?

What's mine communicating to you?

And there's a lot of reason to believe that this is a valid way to look at this.

So social scientists have spent a lot of time

looking at the effects of our body language,

or other people's body language, on judgments.

And we make sweeping judgments and inferences from body language.

And those judgments can predict really meaningful life outcomes

like who we hire or promote, who we ask out on a date.

For example, Nalini Ambady, a researcher at Tufts University,

shows that when people watch 30-second soundless clips

of real physician-patient interactions,

their judgments of the physician's niceness

predict whether or not that physician will be sued.

So it doesn't have to do so much

with whether or not that physician was incompetent,

but do we like that person and how they interacted?

Even more dramatic, Alex Todorov at Princeton

has shown us that judgments of political candidates' faces

in just one second predict 70 percent

of U.S. Senate and gubernatorial race outcomes,

and even, let's go digital,

emoticons used well in online negotiations

can lead you to claim more value from that negotiation.

If you use them poorly, bad idea. Right?

So when we think of nonverbals, we think of how we judge others,

how they judge us and what the outcomes are.

We tend to forget, though, the other audience

that's influenced by our nonverbals, and that's ourselves.

We are also influenced by our nonverbals,

our thoughts and our feelings and our physiology.

So what nonverbals am I talking about?

I'm a social psychologist. I study prejudice,

and I teach at a competitive business school,

so it was inevitable that I would become interested in power dynamics.

I became especially interested in nonverbal expressions

of power and dominance.

And what are nonverbal expressions of power and dominance?

Well, this is what they are.

So in the animal kingdom, they are about expanding.

So you make yourself big, you stretch out,

you take up space, you're basically opening up.

It's about opening up.

And this is true across the animal kingdom.

It's not just limited to primates.

And humans do the same thing. (Laughter)

So they do this both when they have power sort of chronically,

and also when they're feeling powerful in the moment.

And this one is especially interesting because it really shows us

how universal and old these expressions of power are.

This expression, which is known as pride,

Jessica Tracy has studied.

She shows that people who are born with sight

and people who are congenitally blind do this

when they win at a physical competition.

So when they cross the finish line and they've won,

it doesn't matter if they've never seen anyone do it.

They do this.

So the arms up in the V, the chin is slightly lifted.

What do we do when we feel powerless?

We do exactly the opposite.

We close up. We wrap ourselves up.

We make ourselves small.

We don't want to bump into the person next to us.

So again, both animals and humans do the same thing.

And this is what happens when you put together high and low power.

So what we tend to do when it comes to power

is that we complement the other's nonverbals.

So if someone is being really powerful with us,

we tend to make ourselves smaller. We don't mirror them.

We do the opposite of them.

So I'm watching this behavior in the classroom,

and what do I notice?

I notice that MBA students really exhibit the full range of power nonverbals.

So you have people who are like caricatures of alphas,

really coming into the room, they get right into the middle of the room

before class even starts, like they really want to occupy space.

When they sit down, they're sort of spread out.

They raise their hands like this.

You have other people who are virtually collapsing

when they come in. As soon they come in, you see it.

You see it on their faces and their bodies,

and they sit in their chair and they make themselves tiny,

and they go like this when they raise their hand.

I notice a couple of things about this.

One, you're not going to be surprised.

It seems to be related to gender.

So women are much more likely to do this kind of thing than men.

Women feel chronically less powerful than men,

so this is not surprising.

But the other thing I noticed

is that it also seemed to be related to the extent

to which the students were participating, and how well they were participating.

And this is really important in the MBA classroom,

because participation counts for half the grade.

So business schools have been struggling with this gender grade gap.

You get these equally qualified women and men coming in

and then you get these differences in grades,

and it seems to be partly attributable to participation.

So I started to wonder, you know, okay,

so you have these people coming in like this, and they're participating.

Is it possible that we could get people to fake it

and would it lead them to participate more?

So my main collaborator Dana Carney, who's at Berkeley,

and I really wanted to know, can you fake it till you make it?

Like, can you do this just for a little while

and actually experience a behavioral outcome

that makes you seem more powerful?

So we know that our nonverbals govern how other people

think and feel about us. There's a lot of evidence.

But our question really was,

do our nonverbals govern how we think and feel about ourselves?

There's some evidence that they do.

So, for example, we smile when we feel happy,

but also, when we're forced to smile

by holding a pen in our teeth like this, it makes us feel happy.

So it goes both ways.

When it comes to power, it also goes both ways.

So when you feel powerful,

you're more likely to do this,

but it's also possible that when you pretend to be powerful,

you are more likely to actually feel powerful.

So the second question really was, you know,

so we know that our minds change our bodies,

but is it also true that our bodies change our minds?

And when I say minds, in the case of the powerful,

what am I talking about?

So I'm talking about thoughts and feelings

and the sort of physiological things that make up our thoughts and feelings,

and in my case, that's hormones. I look at hormones.

So what do the minds of the powerful versus the powerless look like?

So powerful people tend to be, not surprisingly,

more assertive and more confident, more optimistic.

They actually feel they're going to win even at games of chance.

They also tend to be able to think more abstractly.

So there are a lot of differences. They take more risks.

There are a lot of differences between powerful and powerless people.

Physiologically, there also are differences

on two key hormones: testosterone, which is the dominance hormone,

and cortisol, which is the stress hormone.

So what we find is that high-power alpha males in primate hierarchies

have high testosterone and low cortisol,

and powerful and effective leaders

also have high testosterone and low cortisol.

So what does that mean? When you think about power,

people tended to think only about testosterone,

because that was about dominance.

But really, power is also about how you react to stress.

So do you want the high-power leader that's dominant,

high on testosterone, but really stress reactive?

Probably not, right?

You want the person who's powerful and assertive and dominant,

but not very stress reactive, the person who's laid back.

So we know that in primate hierarchies,

if an alpha needs to take over,

if an individual needs to take over an alpha role sort of suddenly,

within a few days, that individual's testosterone has gone up

significantly and his cortisol has dropped significantly.

So we have this evidence, both that the body can shape

the mind, at least at the facial level,

and also that role changes can shape the mind.

So what happens, okay, you take a role change,

what happens if you do that at a really minimal level,

like this tiny manipulation, this tiny intervention?

"For two minutes," you say, "I want you to stand like this,

and it's going to make you feel more powerful."

So this is what we did.

We decided to bring people into the lab and run a little experiment,

and these people adopted, for two minutes,

either high-power poses or low-power poses,

and I'm just going to show you five of the poses,

although they took on only two.

So here's one.

A couple more.

This one has been dubbed the "Wonder Woman" by the media.

Here are a couple more.

So you can be standing or you can be sitting.

And here are the low-power poses.

So you're folding up, you're making yourself small.

This one is very low-power.

When you're touching your neck, you're really protecting yourself.

So this is what happens.

They come in, they spit into a vial,

for two minutes, we say, "You need to do this or this."

They don't look at pictures of the poses.

We don't want to prime them with a concept of power.

We want them to be feeling power.

So two minutes they do this.

We then ask them, "How powerful do you feel?" on a series of items,

and then we give them an opportunity to gamble,

and then we take another saliva sample.

That's it. That's the whole experiment.

So this is what we find.

Risk tolerance, which is the gambling,

we find that when you are in the high-power pose condition,

86 percent of you will gamble.

When you're in the low-power pose condition,

only 60 percent, and that's a whopping significant difference.

Here's what we find on testosterone.

From their baseline when they come in,

high-power people experience about a 20-percent increase,

and low-power people experience about a 10-percent decrease.

So again, two minutes, and you get these changes.

Here's what you get on cortisol.

High-power people experience about a 25-percent decrease,

and the low-power people experience about a 15-percent increase.

So two minutes lead to these hormonal changes

that configure your brain

to basically be either assertive, confident and comfortable,

or really stress-reactive, and feeling sort of shut down.

And we've all had the feeling, right?

So it seems that our nonverbals do govern how we think and feel about ourselves,

so it's not just others, but it's also ourselves.

Also, our bodies change our minds.

But the next question, of course,

is, can power posing for a few minutes

really change your life in meaningful ways?

This is in the lab, it's this little task, it's just a couple of minutes.

Where can you actually apply this?

Which we cared about, of course.

And so we think where you want to use this is evaluative situations,

like social threat situations.

Where are you being evaluated, either by your friends?

For teenagers, it's at the lunchroom table.

For some people it's speaking at a school board meeting.

It might be giving a pitch or giving a talk like this

or doing a job interview.

We decided that the one that most people could relate to

because most people had been through, was the job interview.

So we published these findings,

and the media are all over it,

and they say, Okay, so this is what you do

when you go in for the job interview, right?

(Laughter)

You know, so we were of course horrified, and said,

Oh my God, no, that's not what we meant at all.

For numerous reasons, no, don't do that.

Again, this is not about you talking to other people.

It's you talking to yourself.

What do you do before you go into a job interview? You do this.

You're sitting down. You're looking at your iPhone --

or your Android, not trying to leave anyone out.

You're looking at your notes,

you're hunching up, making yourself small,

when really what you should be doing maybe is this,

like, in the bathroom, right? Do that. Find two minutes.

So that's what we want to test. Okay?

So we bring people into a lab,

and they do either high- or low-power poses again,

they go through a very stressful job interview.

It's five minutes long. They are being recorded.

They're being judged also,

and the judges are trained to give no nonverbal feedback,

so they look like this.

Imagine this is the person interviewing you.

So for five minutes, nothing, and this is worse than being heckled.

People hate this.

It's what Marianne LaFrance calls "standing in social quicksand."

So this really spikes your cortisol.

So this is the job interview we put them through,

because we really wanted to see what happened.

We then have these coders look at these tapes, four of them.

They're blind to the hypothesis. They're blind to the conditions.

They have no idea who's been posing in what pose,

and they end up looking at these sets of tapes,

and they say, "We want to hire these people,"

all the high-power posers.

"We don't want to hire these people.

We also evaluate these people much more positively overall."

But what's driving it?

It's not about the content of the speech.

It's about the presence that they're bringing to the speech.

Because we rate them on all these variables

related to competence, like, how well-structured is the speech?

How good is it? What are their qualifications?

No effect on those things. This is what's affected.

These kinds of things.

People are bringing their true selves, basically.

They're bringing themselves.

They bring their ideas, but as themselves,

with no, you know, residue over them.

So this is what's driving the effect, or mediating the effect.

So when I tell people about this,

that our bodies change our minds and our minds can change our behavior,

and our behavior can change our outcomes, they say to me,

"It feels fake." Right?

So I said, fake it till you make it.

It's not me.

I don't want to get there and then still feel like a fraud.

I don't want to feel like an impostor.

I don't want to get there only to feel like I'm not supposed to be here.

And that really resonated with me,

because I want to tell you a little story about being an impostor

and feeling like I'm not supposed to be here.

When I was 19, I was in a really bad car accident.

I was thrown out of a car, rolled several times.

I was thrown from the car.

And I woke up in a head injury rehab ward,

and I had been withdrawn from college,

and I learned that my IQ had dropped by two standard deviations,

which was very traumatic.

I knew my IQ because I had identified with being smart,

and I had been called gifted as a child.

So I'm taken out of college, I keep trying to go back.

They say, "You're not going to finish college.

Just, you know, there are other things for you to do,

but that's not going to work out for you."

So I really struggled with this, and I have to say,

having your identity taken from you, your core identity,

and for me it was being smart,

having that taken from you,

there's nothing that leaves you feeling more powerless than that.

So I felt entirely powerless.

I worked and worked, and I got lucky,

and worked, and got lucky, and worked.

Eventually I graduated from college.

It took me four years longer than my peers,

and I convinced someone, my angel advisor, Susan Fiske,

to take me on, and so I ended up at Princeton,

and I was like, I am not supposed to be here.

I am an impostor.

And the night before my first-year talk,

and the first-year talk at Princeton is a 20-minute talk to 20 people.

That's it.

I was so afraid of being found out the next day

that I called her and said, "I'm quitting."

She was like, "You are not quitting,

because I took a gamble on you, and you're staying.

You're going to stay, and this is what you're going to do.

You are going to fake it.

You're going to do every talk that you ever get asked to do.

You're just going to do it and do it and do it,

even if you're terrified and just paralyzed

and having an out-of-body experience,

until you have this moment where you say, 'Oh my gosh, I'm doing it.

Like, I have become this. I am actually doing this.'"

So that's what I did.

Five years in grad school,

a few years, you know, I'm at Northwestern,

I moved to Harvard, I'm at Harvard,

I'm not really thinking about it anymore, but for a long time I had been thinking,

"Not supposed to be here."

So at the end of my first year at Harvard,

a student who had not talked in class the entire semester,

who I had said, "Look, you've gotta participate or else you're going to fail,"

came into my office. I really didn't know her at all.

She came in totally defeated, and she said,

"I'm not supposed to be here."

And that was the moment for me.

Because two things happened.

One was that I realized,

oh my gosh, I don't feel like that anymore.

I don't feel that anymore, but she does, and I get that feeling.

And the second was, she is supposed to be here!

Like, she can fake it, she can become it.

So I was like, "Yes, you are! You are supposed to be here!

And tomorrow you're going to fake it,

you're going to make yourself powerful, and, you know --

(Applause)

And you're going to go into the classroom,

and you are going to give the best comment ever."

You know? And she gave the best comment ever,

and people turned around and were like,

oh my God, I didn't even notice her sitting there. (Laughter)

She comes back to me months later,

and I realized that she had not just faked it till she made it,

she had actually faked it till she became it.

So she had changed.

And so I want to say to you, don't fake it till you make it.

Fake it till you become it.

Do it enough until you actually become it and internalize.

The last thing I'm going to leave you with is this.

Tiny tweaks can lead to big changes.

So, this is two minutes.

Two minutes, two minutes, two minutes.

Before you go into the next stressful evaluative situation,

for two minutes, try doing this, in the elevator,

in a bathroom stall, at your desk behind closed doors.

That's what you want to do.

Configure your brain to cope the best in that situation.

Get your testosterone up. Get your cortisol down.

Don't leave that situation feeling like, oh, I didn't show them who I am.

Leave that situation feeling like,

I really feel like I got to say who I am and show who I am.

So I want to ask you first, you know, both to try power posing,

and also I want to ask you to share the science, because this is simple.

I don't have ego involved in this. (Laughter)

Give it away. Share it with people,

because the people who can use it the most

are the ones with no resources and no technology

and no status and no power.

Give it to them because they can do it in private.

They need their bodies, privacy and two minutes,

and it can significantly change the outcomes of their life.

Thank you.

(Applause)