Jamil Zaki: Hope for Cynics, Positive Gossip, and Why People Are Better Than We Think

Jamil Zaki (0:05)

I wish I could tell you 60% of people act in a good way most 80% of the time, or whatever. But in fact, what I know to be true from the science is not that people are good or bad. I think that's almost a theological and philosophical question. What is very clear is that people are better than people think they are.

So, you can ask people to estimate what percentage of others will be donating to charity or volunteering. And over and over again, people underestimate the kindness and trustworthiness and general positivity of others.

Frank Blake (0:40)

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Crazy Good Turns, the podcast that recognizes and celebrates people who do amazing things for others.

I'm your host, Frank Blake. And today, I'm really excited to bring you this episode with our guest, Jamil Zaki. Jamil is a Professor of Psychology at Stanford and Director of its Social Neuroscience Lab. He has spent more than 20 years studying how people connect. He is also the author of Hope for Cynics, a book that makes a compelling case that the world may be better than we think. Well, that's a great idea. The world may be better than we think and the people may be better to each other than we expect, especially in times of crisis. In our conversation today, Jamil and I discuss the difference between a cynic and a skeptic and why cynics may sound smart, but are actually often pretty naive. While Jamil compares so much of what we read and watch to the, and here I'm quoting, ultra-processed calories of information, unquote. What AI is doing to people's trust in one another, and how the same technology could be rebuilt to connect us instead. Lastly, Jamil will introduce you to a practice called positive gossip. It's the habit Jamil's family does at the dinner table, and I think it's actually a great idea, and it would make the world better if everyone tried it. So let's jump right in. Here is our conversation with Jamil Zaki.

Jamil, welcome to Crazy Good Turns. It's a great honor to have you on the podcast.

Jamil Zaki (2:25)

Thanks very much, Frank. I'm glad to be here.

Frank Blake (2:27)

So you're a professor of psychology at Stanford, and the director of the Stanford Social Neuroscience Lab. Maybe you can explain for our listeners what social neuroscience is, and what the director of a neuroscience lab does.

Jamil Zaki (2:47)

Of course, I consider myself to have the best job in the world, but I'm sure there are many people who would not like it as much. Social neuroscience is the application of techniques to study the brain, but used to understand not just how we think, and how we remember, and see, and hear, but how we relate to one another. How do our interactions with each other affect us, affect what we feel, or think, or do?

How do we understand other people? And to, I think, the point of what you do, why are we kind to people? So my lab and I use, again, brain imaging and other physiological techniques to understand what happens inside us that affects our social lives.

Frank Blake (3:32)

That's fascinating. I can imagine your classes are highly subscribed. How long have you been doing this? How long have you been teaching?

Jamil Zaki (3:40)

I've been at Stanford for almost 14 years, but I've been a behavioral scientist and a social neuroscientist for more than 20 So this is really, the vast majority of my adult life has been pointed towards these questions. Again, very lucky for me, although maybe not for everyone.

Frank Blake (3:58)

So one place I'd like to start is in your books and your writings, you point to a lot of decline over time in terms of levels of trust as revealed in various polls. And I'm curious, as you look at your students, what changes have you seen over the last 20 years?

Jamil Zaki (4:19)

Oh, that is a great question. So let's first stipulate that there is a decline in trust. And it's a very sad thing. You know, in 1972, about half of Americans believed that most people could be trusted.

By 2018, that had fallen to a third of Americans, which is a drop as big as the stock market took during the financial collapse of 2008

And over that same period, Americans and people around the world have lost faith in all sorts of institutions, from education to science to government to media. So we're really living in a five decade long trust deficit, whether we know it or not. How do I see this in my students and what do I see happening with them? Well, the first thing I want to say is I want to get right out in front of the stereotype that young people today are selfish or narcissistic. I see the opposite in my students and I think the data point in this direction as well. My students are very caring and they're globally conscious. You know, from a very young age, they're aware, not just of what's happening in their town or city, but what's happening all over the world. And that includes the suffering that's happening all over the world. They feel responsible for being global citizens in a way that I never did at their age. So I think they're very good people in so many ways. I also think that being awakened to things like injustice and inequality and corruption through social media and through this global consciousness very early on might make it way harder to trust people than it might have been for us at their age if we had a smaller view of the world.