Jordan Peterson: The Mind of Highly (Dis-)Agreeable People

Summary

The script discusses the potential evolutionary reasons behind women's heightened sensitivity to negative emotions, such as fear and punishment, attributing it to the greater dangers women face, including physical and sexual threats. It also explores how women's nervous systems may be adapted for mothering, making them more vulnerable and responsive to infants' needs, which can be at odds with the competitive, assertive behaviors required in certain adult environments. The narrative contrasts agreeable and disagreeable personalities, highlighting the challenges faced by highly agreeable individuals in competitive settings and the importance of learning to assert oneself.

Takeaways

• 🧠 The script suggests that women's heightened sensitivity to negative emotions may be due to the historical dangers they face, such as physical and sexual threats.
• 🤰 It discusses the evolutionary perspective that women's vulnerability increases at puberty due to the potential consequences of sex, such as pregnancy, which has historically had severe repercussions.
• 👶 The speaker posits that women's nervous systems are adapted for the mother-infant relationship, requiring high sensitivity and responsiveness to care for infants effectively.
• 🍼 Women's caregiving role, particularly for infants under nine months, is emphasized as demanding and emotionally loaded, shaping their nervous system's wiring for optimal care.
• 🚫 The script implies that the traits developed for caregiving may not be well-suited for competitive environments, such as the business world, where assertiveness and toughness are often valued.
• 🤝 The contrast between agreeable and disagreeable personalities is highlighted, with agreeable individuals being compassionate and polite, while disagreeable individuals are described as tough-minded and competitive.
• 💪 Disagreeable people are characterized by their predatory aggression and dominance behavior, viewing the world as a place to compete and win, rather than being volatile or defensively aggressive.
• 🏢 The speaker shares a story about a highly disagreeable individual who was effective in identifying and removing underperforming employees in corporations, enjoying the process due to their competitive nature.
• 🔍 The importance of conscientiousness in judging performance is underscored, with conscientious people focusing on accomplishments rather than personal circumstances or feelings.
• 👩‍💼 The script suggests that large corporations often exploit the agreeable and conscientious nature of women, benefiting from their hard work and lack of complaint.
• 💭 It is noted that agreeable people may struggle with assertiveness and conflict due to their wiring to avoid disturbance around infants, which can be a disadvantage in environments requiring negotiation and self-advocacy.

Q & A

Why might women be more sensitive to negative emotions according to the speaker?

The speaker suggests that women may be more sensitive to negative emotions due to the historical and evolutionary reasons that make the world more dangerous for women, such as the dangers of physical altercation and sexual vulnerability.

What does the speaker mean by the 'cost of sex for women is higher'?

The speaker refers to the potential consequences of sexual encounters, such as pregnancy, which historically have had more significant impacts on women's lives, affecting their societal roles and personal freedom.

How does the speaker describe the nervous system of women in relation to the mother-infant relationship?

The speaker posits that women's nervous systems are adapted to care for infants, requiring them to be highly responsive, sensitive to threats, and capable of expressing vulnerability, which may not be as advantageous in adult interactions or competitive environments.

What is the difference between 'predatory aggression' and 'defensive aggression' as described by the speaker?

Predatory aggression is described as a proactive, competitive behavior aimed at dominance, whereas defensive aggression is more reactive and protective, often associated with high neuroticism.

Why does the speaker believe that agreeable people are more prone to exploitation in the workplace?

Agreeable people are naturally inclined to avoid conflict, prioritize the needs of others, and be accommodating, which can make them susceptible to exploitation, especially in competitive or hierarchical work environments.

What role does the speaker suggest agreeable people play in large institutions?

The speaker suggests that agreeable people, often disproportionately women, are the backbone of large institutions due to their conscientiousness and agreeableness, which leads them to perform tasks diligently without seeking credit or complaining.

How does the speaker describe the personality of the friend who is highly disagreeable?

The friend is described as blunt, extraordinarily polite, and enjoys firing underperforming employees in corporations, viewing it as a way to clear out those who do not contribute effectively to the organization.

What is the speaker's view on the necessity of assertiveness training for agreeable people?

The speaker believes that assertiveness training, or learning to negotiate on one's own behalf, is crucial for agreeable people to avoid being exploited and to ensure their own needs and desires are recognized and met.

Why does the speaker think it's challenging for agreeable people to identify their own desires?

Agreeable people often prioritize the needs and desires of others, which can make it difficult for them to develop a clear sense of their own wants, especially if they are highly agreeable and accustomed to accommodating others.

What does the speaker imply about the conflict avoidance tendencies of agreeable people?

The speaker implies that agreeable people's tendency to avoid conflict may be rooted in an evolutionary need to maintain peace around infants, but this can be a disadvantage in adult environments where直面conflict may be necessary for problem-solving.

How does the speaker connect the agreeableness trait with the ability to handle conflict?

The speaker suggests that agreeable people's aversion to conflict may be beneficial in nurturing environments but detrimental in situations requiring assertiveness and direct communication, such as in business negotiations or performance management.

Outlines

00:00

🚷 Women's Sensitivity and Vulnerability

The speaker posits that women's heightened sensitivity to negative emotions may stem from the historical and evolutionary dangers they face, such as physical and sexual threats. Women's vulnerability is emphasized by the higher stakes of sexual encounters due to potential pregnancy and societal repercussions. The speaker also suggests that women's nervous systems are adapted to care for infants, which requires a high level of responsiveness and sensitivity, potentially at the cost of being less effective in competitive, adult environments like business. The narrative contrasts agreeable and disagreeable personalities, with the former being compassionate and the latter being competitive and assertive without concern for the feelings of others.

05:01

🤝 The Dynamics of Agreeableness and Conscientiousness in the Workplace

This paragraph delves into the characteristics of individuals who are high in agreeableness and conscientiousness, often found in large corporations and institutions. These individuals, disproportionately women, are described as hardworking, reliable, and selfless, often taking on the unseen labor that keeps organizations running. The speaker discusses the exploitation of such traits and the need for agreeable people to be wary of being taken advantage of. The paragraph also touches on the conflict between the need for inclusiveness and high performance in hierarchical structures, and the speaker's personal experience with underperforming graduate students and the negative impact on high-performing ones. The importance of assertiveness training for agreeable individuals is highlighted, emphasizing the need to express one's thoughts and desires honestly, even if they may cause conflict.

10:02

🛑 The Challenge of Assertiveness for Agreeable Individuals

The final paragraph focuses on the challenges agreeable individuals face in asserting themselves, particularly in career development. It discusses the difficulty agreeable people have in identifying and pursuing their own desires due to their tendency to prioritize the needs and wants of others. The speaker advises agreeable people to express their true thoughts and to engage in conflicts when necessary, as avoiding them can be detrimental in the long term. The paragraph concludes by emphasizing the importance of self-awareness and the ability to negotiate on one's behalf for agreeable individuals to succeed in their personal and professional lives.

Keywords

💡Sensitivity to negative emotion

This refers to the heightened responsiveness to adverse or distressing feelings. In the video, it is suggested that women may be more sensitive to negative emotions due to the perception of a more dangerous world, which aligns with the theme of gender differences in emotional responses.

💡Physical altercation

Physical altercation denotes a violent confrontation or fight. The script implies that women might be more sensitive to fear due to the potential danger of physical altercations, highlighting the gendered nature of perceived threats.

💡Sexual vulnerability

Sexual vulnerability is the susceptibility to sexual danger or exploitation. The video discusses how women become more vulnerable at puberty due to the higher biological and societal costs associated with unwanted sexual encounters, such as pregnancy.

💡Evolutionary history

Evolutionary history refers to the development and changes in species over time through genetic inheritance and natural selection. The script uses this concept to explain the long-standing biological and social reasons for the differences in sensitivity between men and women.

💡Mother-infant dyad

The mother-infant dyad describes the unique and intimate relationship between a mother and her infant. The video argues that women's nervous systems are adapted to this dyad, emphasizing the role of women in early childcare and its impact on their emotional wiring.

💡Vulnerability

Vulnerability, in this context, refers to the state of being exposed to the possibility of being harmed or threatened. The script discusses how women's heightened sensitivity to vulnerability is linked to their role in caring for infants and the necessity to express and respond to this vulnerability.

💡Conscientiousness

Conscientiousness is a personality trait characterized by being responsible, disciplined, and hardworking. The video mentions that conscientious people focus on accomplishments rather than feelings, contrasting with the agreeableness trait.

💡Agreeableness

Agreeableness is a personality trait that involves being compassionate, cooperative, and considerate of others. The script explores how high agreeableness can lead to being exploited in certain environments, such as large corporations.

💡Disagreeable people

Disagreeable people, as described in the video, are those who are tough-minded, blunt, and competitive. They are not necessarily aggressive but are more likely to engage in dominance behavior and prioritize their own interests over others.

💡Assertiveness training

Assertiveness training is a process aimed at helping individuals to express their thoughts, feelings, and beliefs in a direct, honest, and appropriate way. The video suggests that agreeable people may benefit from such training to avoid being exploited and to negotiate on their own behalf.

💡Predatory aggression

Predatory aggression is a form of assertive and proactive behavior aimed at achieving dominance or success. The script uses this term to describe the competitive nature of highly disagreeable individuals who view the world as a place to compete and win.

Highlights

Women's higher sensitivity to negative emotions may be due to the world being more dangerous for them, especially regarding physical and sexual dangers.

The cost of sex for women has historically been higher due to the potential consequences of pregnancy.

Women's nervous systems may be adapted to the mother-infant relationship, making them more attuned to vulnerability and care.

Caring for infants under nine months requires a high level of responsiveness and sensitivity to environmental threats.

Disagreeable individuals are characterized by toughness, bluntness, competitiveness, and a lack of willingness to do things they don't want to do.

Disagreeable people may exhibit predatory aggression and dominance behavior in competitive environments.

A case study of a highly disagreeable person who was effective at identifying and firing underperforming employees in corporations.

The importance of conscientiousness in judging performance rather than focusing on feelings.

The potential for agreeable and conscientious people, often women, to be exploited in large institutions.

The need for agreeable people to learn assertiveness to avoid exploitation and to negotiate on their own behalf.

The challenge for agreeable people to express their true thoughts and feelings, especially if they are harsh or conflict-inducing.

The tendency of agreeable people to avoid conflict, which can be beneficial in certain situations but detrimental in others.

The importance of agreeable individuals identifying and expressing their own desires and needs, rather than always prioritizing others.

The role of psychotherapy in helping agreeable people develop strategies to navigate conflict and assert their needs.

Transcripts

so let's assume that the reason that

women are higher in sensitivity to

negative emotion is because the world is

actually more dangerous to women right

because that would be the most logical

reason why there would be a sex

difference in a sex difference in it

something like fear or sensitivity to

punishment well first there's the danger

of physical altercation second there's

the sexual danger

so women become sexually vulnerable at

puberty and why do I say vulnerable

well it's straightforward it's because

the cost of sex for women is way higher

than it is for men or it certainly has

been throughout our evolutionary history

because if a man has an unwanted sexual

encounter well then he walks away and

maybe he's persecuted by the state or

prosecuted by the state for it but if a

woman has an unwanted unwarranted or

incautious sexual encounter and she ends

up pregnant then well in traditional

societies that's you're just done and

even in modern societies that are rich

like ours you're it's it's a I don't

have to go into that it's big trouble no

matter what you do about it it's big

trouble

so being being more nervous about that

makes perfect sense but then here's the

last thing and I think that woman's

nervous systems are not adapted to women

I think woman's nervous systems are

adapted to the mother-infant dyad and

because you are not the same creature

when you have an infant not at all

you're way more vulnerable and it's

partly because you have to express their

vulnerability of the infant and you also

have to care for it right so you think

about an infant especially under nine

months so let's say how are you going to

be wired up if you're going to optimally

care for an infant under nine months and

I'm saying under nine months because

women generally do the bulk of childcare

for infants who were under nine months

old and part of the reason for that

there's a whole host of reasons but part

of the reasons for that obviously is

that they breastfeed but imagine what

you need to be wired up biologically in

order to care for an infant first of all

they're very demanding right because

they're completely helpless and they're

demanding 24 hours a day and it's quite

it's quite it's quite an emotional load

and an infant under nine months is never

wrong right what you do to an

nine months is when they're in distress

you always respond you never tell the

infant get your act together and stop

whining right which you can do say to an

into a child that's 18 months old you

can start having that sort of

conversation but under nine months it's

like nothing is the infant's fault it's

surrounded in an extraordinarily

threatening world and you have to be

responsive to what it needs regardless

of what you want and you have to be very

sensitive to the threats that emerge in

the environment and so I think the price

that women pay for that ability to have

an intimate relationship with infants in

the very earliest stages of development

is that their nervous systems are

actually wired so that they can perform

that role optimally and the disadvantage

to that is that having a temperament

like that doesn't work that well when

you're dealing with adult man especially

when you're dealing with them and in a

business environment because it's not

the same thing not at all it's a

competitive environment so okay so

agreeable people are compassionate and

polite what are disagreeable people like

they're tough minded they're blunt

they're competitive and they won't do a

damn thing they don't want to do so it

isn't exactly that they're aggressive

although they will push you the hell out

of their way if you're in the way

they're not they're not like volatile

like you are if you're high in in

neuroticism it isn't defensive

aggression it's more like predatory

aggression its dominance behavior and so

for someone who's high who's high highly

disagreeable they look at the world as a

place in which they can compete and win

and I'll tell you a story I have a

friend I gave him my personality test

the big five aspect scale that Colin

DeYoung developed huh in my lab and I

knew he is a disagreeable guy and by

interacting with I mean he's even rude

to people sort of spontaneously on the

street I actually like him quite a bit

he's very very funny he's also very

conscientious so you can trust him but

it's disagreeable as hell and so I gave

him this test because I thought it would

be funny and he came out as the most

disagreeable person in 10,000 so

reasonably reasonable in compassion

about 30th percentile but like point

zero zero one in politeness so he's

extraordinarily blunt and he'll just say

absolutely any

no matter how horrible it is and he was

often brought in to corporations to sort

of clean them up so if a corporation was

tilting and not doing well they'd bring

him in to find out who the useless

people were and fire them and I talked

to him about that because I've had the

missed opportunity to have to not have

graduate students in my lab for example

that weren't performing well and I'd

find it very very difficult to you know

dress someone down and certainly

difficult to fire them I just hate it

because I'm actually quite an agreeable

person much to my chagrin and I asked

him about that and I said well what do

you do you have to fire people all the

time how do you handle that he says

handle it I enjoy it and I thought wow

that's so interesting that someone would

have that response I said well what do

you mean you enjoy it he said look I go

into these companies and I analyze the

performance of groups of people right

and there's in those groups there are

people who are really striving really

trying hard and working themselves

really hard and being productive and

then there's these people that are just

doing nothing they're completely in the

way they don't carry their weight at all

they take advantage every chance they

get and they're always whining about why

they can't work it's like I find out who

they are I call them into my office and

I tell them exactly what they've been

doing it's like hit the road buddy

you've had your you've had your run of

it and I thought oh yeah ok fair enough

you know well I can tell you you know

I've had situations in my lab where I

had underperforming graduate students

and one of the things that was really

awful about that was that it was really

hard on the high performing graduate

students you know because they felt that

even being in the same category as the

people who weren't working hard and

pulling their weight devalued what they

were doing you know and that's exactly

right and so this is also why there's

there's a conscientiousness trait and an

agreeable this trait cuz conscientious

people judge you on your accomplishments

right they don't give a damn about your

feelings not a bit it's like are you

doing the work or not

whereas agreeable people think well you

know your mother's sick and you know

you've you've got a bunch of family

problems and and we all have to take

care of each other and it's no wonder

that you're having a rough time and like

you can't say that one of those

attitudes is correct and the other isn't

correct you can't say that there

wouldn't be those two dimensions if

there wasn't something correct about

both of them but you can certainly point

out that often they conflict you know

and so the demand for

for inclusiveness and unity and care and

the demand for high-level performance in

a hierarchical structure there are very

different orientations in the world and

so it's complicated for people who are

agreeable and conscientious and actually

I think often that large corporations

and large large institutions of any sort

run on the unheralded labor of people

who are high in agreeableness and high

in conscientiousness and they're

disproportionately women and my

experience in large institutions has

been that if you want to hire someone to

exploit appropriately no not

appropriately if you want to hire

someone to exploit productively you hire

middle-aged women who are hyper

conscientious and who are agreeable

because they'll do everything they won't

take credit for it and they won't

complain and that's nasty and I think

that happens all the time and so one of

the things you have to be careful of if

you're agreeable is not to be exploited

because you'll line up to be exploited

and I think the reason for that is

because you're wired to be exploited by

infants and so that just doesn't work so

well in that actual world and one of the

things one of the things that happens

very often in psychotherapy you know

people come to psychotherapy for

multiple reasons but one of them is they

often come because they're too agreeable

and so what they get is so-called

assertiveness training although it's not

exactly assertiveness that's being

trained what it is is the ability to

learn how to negotiate on your own

behalf and one of the things I tell

agreeable people especially if their

conscientious is say what you think tell

the truth about what you think there's

going to be things you think that you

think are nasty and harsh and they

probably are nasty and harsh but they're

also probably true and you need to bring

those up to the forefront and deliver

the message and it's not straightforward

at all because agreeable people do not

like conflict not at all

they smooth the water you know when you

can see you can see why that is in

accordance with the hypothesis that I've

been putting forward you don't want

conflict around infants it's too damn

dangerous you don't want fights to break

out you don't want anything to disturb

the the relative peace you know and if

you're also more prone to being hurt

physically and perhaps emotionally you

also may be loath to engage in the kind

of high intense

a conflict that will solve problems in

the short term because a lot of conflict

it takes a lot of conflict to solve

problems in the short term and you know

if that can spiral up to where it's

dangerous which it can if it gets

uncontrolled it might be safer in the

short term to keep the water is smooth

and to not delve into those situations

where conflict emerges the problem with

that is it's not a very good medium to

long term strategy right because lots

lots of times there are things you have

to talk about because they're not going

to go away and so partly what you do

with agreeable people is you get them to

figure out and they have a hard time

with this too if you ask a disagreeable

person what what he wants say or she

wants they'll tell you right away they

know it's like this is what I want and

this is how I'm going to get it but

agreeable people especially if they're

really agreeable are so agreeable that

they often don't even know what they

want because they're so accustomed to

living for other people and to finding

out what other people want into trying

to make them comfortable and so forth

that it's harder for them to find a

sense of their own desires as they move

through life and that's not look there's

situations where that's advantageous but

it's certainly not advantageous if

you're going to try to forge yourself a

career that just doesn't work at all so