Study says gossiping at work frees your mind, makes you more productive
Keeping a secret ‘is similar to carrying a physical weight’ which can sap you of your energy
Are you prone to gossiping at work? Worry not, because most secrets are better shared with those around you, contrary to public perception.
A new study has found that keeping a secret is similar to carrying a physical weight which can sap you of your energy — it diminishes motivation and makes people less productive at work.
“The more you feel preoccupied by a secret and are thinking about it, the more you are using your personal resources — cognitive and motivational — the less energy you feel you have available to pursue other tasks,” said Michael Slepian, lead author of the study and a researcher at Columbia Business School.
“Being preoccupied by a secret at work can be demotivating,” said Slepian, who is an adjunct assistant professor of negotiations at the business school. “The burden of secrecy can make things around you appear more challenging and if you’re less motivated to tackle these challenges, your performance can suffer.”
As part of the study, Slepian, along with co-researchers Nicholas Camp of Stanford University and EJ Masicampo of Wake Forest University, asked participants to think of either a ‘preoccupying’ secret or a ‘non-preoccupying’ secret and then to judge the steepness of a hill. Individuals’ perception of ‘hill slant’, as this test is known, has been shown to vary depending on whether subjects are carrying additional weight.
Those that dubbed their secrets as preoccupying judged the hill to be steeper than it actually was, the Huffington Post reported.
“This is the same kind of outcome we see when people are carrying physical burdens, seeing the world as more challenging, forbidding and extreme,” added Slepian.