The Reason You’re Burned Out at Work May Surprise You

Workplace burnout has a lot of different causes: long commutes, horrible bosses, unrealistic expectations, the list goes on and on. But a new study suggests that one significant source of job stress isn’t necessarily a part of the job itself—it’s how mismatched your responsibilities are with your personality.

This may seem obvious. After all, why would anyone take a job that doesn’t suit her personality? But according to study author Veronika Brandstätter, PhD, professor of psychology at the University of Zurich in Switzerland, it happens quite often. The problem is, she says, people can have perceived notions of themselves that don’t match up with their true, “unconscious needs.”

“People often choose a job because it fits their ‘conscious’ motives that are formed by social norms and expectations of others,” Brandstätter says. “For example, an individual with the self-concept of being a person of influence might choose a career as a manager, though the activities associated with a manager’s job do not provide the real affective satisfaction.”

So Brandstätter and her colleagues performed a study to see how people’s implicit motives affected their overall mental health in various workplace environments. They recruited 97 adults from a Swiss website for people suffering from burnout, asked them questions about their health and job responsibilities, and then gave them a writing exercise to tease out parts of their personality they wouldn't necessarily report themselves.

RELATED: 7 Subtle Signs You’re Burned Out

The researchers focused on two important traits: the “power motive” and the “affiliation motive.” People who have a strong power motive have a need to take responsibility for others, maintain discipline, and engage in arguments or negotiation, they wrote. Those with an affiliation motive crave positive personal relationships, and want to feel trust, warmth, and belonging.

The study, published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, found that burnout happened across all types of jobs—those with lots of power, those with no power at all, those that offered plenty of opportunity to interact with others, and those that didn’t. In other words, the main predictor of burnout was not one single thing, but the discrepancy between the job and a person’s implicit motives. 

The greater the mismatch, the higher the burnout risk. Mismatches pertaining to the power motive—how much oversight and influence a person desired versus how much they actually got—were even linked to an increase in physical symptoms like headache, chest pain, faintness, and shortness of breath.

“We found that the frustration of unconscious affective needs, caused by a lack of opportunities for motive-driven behavior, is detrimental to psychological and physical well-being,” Brandstätter says. “The same is true for goal-striving that doesn’t match a well-developed implicit motive for power or affiliation, because then excessive effort is necessary to achieve that goal.”

This is important for employer and employees, says Brandstätter, since workplace burnout can cause both financial and heath burdens. It can lead to absenteeism, employee turnover, and reduced productivity—and it’s been linked to chronic conditions such as anxiety, heart disease, immune disorders, insomnia, and depression. The American Institute of Stress estimates that burnout costs companies $300 billion a year.

RELATED: Job Killing You? 8 Types of Work-Related Stress

So how do you avoid this kind of mismatch?

First, think about about what types of situations you truly thrive in: Is it when you’re making new friends and forming close bonds with others? If so, you’re affiliation-motivated. Or is it when you’re making decisions and yielding influence over other people? That shows you’re power-motivated. (And yes, it’s possible to be both.)

Now, Brandstätter suggests, run through a sort of “fantasy exercise” when considering a potential new job.

“Ask yourself: ‘When doing my job, how would I feel? Would I experience intensive positive feelings, such as joy, happiness, and pleasure? Would it be possible for me to experience a feeling of strength and impact?‘ The anticipated experience gives us a clue whether the job in question might match our motives,” she says.

For someone with a strong affiliation motive, it’s important that you anticipate feelings of joy, happiness, and friendly contact with others while doing that job. If you can’t picture experiencing that during day-to-day activities, it may not be the right job for you. Likewise, someone with a strong power motive should hope to experience feelings of strength, and have the sense that they’re making an impact.

RELATED: Here’s How to Stop Work Stress From Turning Into Burnout

That advice is only helpful, though, if you’re considering a new job. For those stuck in a current job that doesn’t match their motives, Brandstätter recommends talking with your boss and colleagues about ways you might “craft” your position to be more in line with your needs.

For example, an affiliation-motivated employee who has little contact with others might find a way to work more collaboratively with coworkers. And a power-affiliated person who is frustrated by her lack of influence might take a leadership-training course or apply for a supervisory position.

Admittedly, Brandstätter says, there is one situation that’s not as easily resolved. “A manager required to take responsibility of a team but who does not enjoy being in a leadership role probably would have to change jobs,” she says. Finding a position that doesn’t require these traits could make that person’s workday more enjoyable—and maybe even improve their well-being overall.  

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The Mental Tricks Laurie Hernandez Uses to Summon Crazy Confidence

Team USA gymnast Laurie Hernandez is blowing us away in Rio: Her talent is obviously out of this world, but what’s just as impressive is the poise and confidence the 16-year-old first-time Olympian exhibits pretty much every time she’s on camera.

Take her performances so far. At the Olympic trials back in July, Hernandez calmly stood before a huge crowd, closed her eyes, put one hand on her stomach, and breathed deeply. Then she proceeded to kill it on beam. (She took first.)

This week, as she struck her starting pose for the floor exercise, she sent the judges a smile and sneaky wink. Later, before hopping up on the beam, the camera caught her whispering to herself, “I got this.” And she was right.

But these little pre-routine behaviors aren’t just a fun part of her personality, says sports psychology consultant Robert Andrews. They’re actually valuable tools for getting in the right mindset for optimal performance—and they’re easy enough for anyone to learn, elite athlete or not.

Breathing like a champ

Andrews, who has a master’s degree in psychology and a background in fitness, runs the Institute of Sports Performance in Houston. He’s worked with hundreds of professional athletes, including Hernandez and her teammate Simone Biles; in fact, he taught Hernandez that very breathing routine she practices before competition.

“I like to say that oxygen is the cure for stress and anxiety,” says Andrews. “A lot of athletes, when they’re stressed out, start breathing a lot shallower and faster. So learning how to monitor and be aware of breathing patterns under stress is important.”

What Hernandez is doing before she competes, he explains, is called diaphragmatic or “belly” breathing. “She’s moving her diaphragm down so that her lungs can open up,” he says. “Laurie, like a lot of people, tends to hold her stress in her stomach—so she’s connecting her mind to her stomach and her breathing patterns.”

Deep, diaphragmatic breathing can release tension in the body, says Andrews, which can also relax the mind. That changes hormonal function in the brain, and lowers the production of the stress hormone cortisol.

RELATED: How 6 Olympic Athletes Deal With the Pressure

Acting confident goes a long way

Andrews also works with athletes on body language and posture, which he says can have a big psychological influence on performance. “Laurie has a very upright, straight posture when she’s getting ready for a routine,” he points out. Not only does that make an impression on the judges, he says, it can also make an impression on her own brain.

“Strong body language like that can actually increase the production of testosterone and lower the production of stress-related hormones,” he says. “It creates brain chemistry that increases assertiveness and confidence, which you need just the right amount of when you’re on the bars, the beam, the floor, wherever.”

The same goes for Laurie’s now-famous “I-got-this” pep talk. Andrews didn’t teach her those words exactly, but he says he has talked with her about the power of positive thinking.

“Where you point your mind, your body follows—so Laurie has figured out that those words are very empowering for her mind and body, and they’re going to help her bring out that fierceness that she needs,” he says. “I can’t think of a better powerful, affirmative statement of belief in herself.”

RELATED: What 5 Olympic Athletes Can Teach You About Body Confidence

You can use belly breathing too—and not just for sports

Anyone can benefit from diaphragmatic breathing before a stressful event, says Andrews—from an age-group runner competing in a race to a teenager taking an exam. The practice can help in the corporate world, too, with everything from job interviews to sales pitches to public speaking. 

“I’ve had high school and college students who report back to me that they’re making better grades on tests and giving better presentations in front of the class because they’re using these mindfulness techniques,” says Andrews. “Athletes call it their peak performance zone, but really everyone works better when they’re in a mindful, centered state.”

Ready to give it a try? Here’s what to do next time you’re in a stressful situation and feeling nervous. (If you’re not in one right now, just picture yourself there.)

• Close your eyes and sit or stand up straight.
• Find the spot in your body where your stress is building up. Is it in your throat? Your chest? Your stomach? Focus on that spot.
• Inhale deeply, so that your stomach expands out and not up. It can help to put your hand on your stomach to feel this movement happening.
• Concentrate on slowly breathing in and out, and feel your stress levels come down.

Andrews works with athletes on bringing those emotions down to the appropriate level. If 1 means no stress at all and 10 means all-out freak out, some people might perform best at a 5, others at a 3, he says. The key is to learn what works best for you.

And while Andrews says that the mental aspect of competition is especially important in Olympic sports—where a hundredth of a point or a literal split second can determine the winners—he agrees that it’s also a big part of successful performances of any type, at any level.

So next time you’re feeling unsure of yourself, try giving yourself a little mental boost a la Laurie Hernandez. Close your eyes, focus on your breath, and maybe even give a little wink. Because guess what? You’ve got this.

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Mediterranean Diet Boosts Memory and Keeps Brain Young, Study Finds

You know that the Mediterranean diet is good for your heart. Now, research confirms that it’s also good for your brain. In a new review of previous studies, following the plant-heavy meal plan was associated with better memory and less cognitive decline. The benefits weren’t just exclusive to seniors, either; in the two included studies that looked at young adults, cognitive scores improved in people 19 to 40, as well. 

The review, in the journal Frontiers in Nutrition, included 18 papers published between 2000 and 2015 that looked at the effect of the Mediterranean diet on cognitive processes over time. All together, the findings were impressive: Thirteen of the studies found some association between adherence to the Mediterranean diet and brain benefits, including slower rates of decline and improvement in memory and recall.

Some studies also linked the diet to improved attention and language skills, or found that its followers were less likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease.

RELATED: 7 Ways to Protect Your Memory

The most surprising result, says lead study author Roy Hardman, is that these positive effects were seen in people from all around the world. (The studies took place in the United States, France, Spain, Sweden, and Australia.) 

“Regardless of being located outside of what is considered the Mediterranean region, the positive cognitive effects of a higher adherence to a MedDiet were similar in all evaluated papers,“ Hardman, a PhD candidate at the Swinburne University of Technology in Australia, said in a press release.

The diet’s health benefits are likely due to a combination of several factors, says Hardman. For example, it has been shown to reduce inflammation, improve vitamin and mineral imbalances, lower cholesterol, and boost metabolism. Some research suggests it may also be good for your gut, reduce fracture risk in old age, and even slow aging on a cellular level.

In other words, Hardman says, “the MedDiet offers the opportunity to change some of the modifiable risk factors” for cognitive decline, as well as other chronic diseases.

The study authors characterize the Mediterranean diet’s key components as “abundant consumption of plant foods, such as leafy greens, fresh fruit and vegetables, cereals, beans, seeds, nuts, and legumes.” The diet also includes small amounts of dairy and minimal red meat, and uses olive oil as its major source of fat.

RELATED: 22 Mediterranean Diet Recipes

Of course, the idea that a plant-based, minimal-meat meal plan is good for the mind is not new, says Keith Fargo, PhD, director of scientific programs and outreach at the Alzheimer’s Association. In fact, the Alzheimer’s Association has recommended the Mediterranean diet (along with another whole foods-based eating plan, the DASH Diet) for years.

"In recent years, there has been growing scientific support for the concept that lifestyle factors that are good for your heart are also good for your brain,” Fargo says. “Eating right and regular physical activity appear to be particularly important.”

Maintaining an overall healthy diet is probably more important than the impact of a few specific vitamins or foods, Fargo adds. And a growing body of research—including Hardman’s new study—support the idea that a Mediterranean diet is one way to do that.

RELATED: 17 Ways to Age-Proof Your Brain

While it’s important to recognize that diet is frequently associated with other factors that may impact cognition in aging, Fargo says—such as smoking, education levels, and socioeconomic status—he does believe that there is “sufficiently strong evidence to conclude that a healthy diet may reduce the risk of cognitive decline.”

Hardman is sold on the idea, as well. “I follow the diet patterns and do not eat any red meats, chicken, or pork,” he says. “I have fish two to three times per week and adhere to a Mediterranean style of eating.”

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What Your View of the Olympics Says About Your Personality

Who do you think should be the real winner of the Olympic Games: the country with the most gold medals, or the country with the most medals overall? How you answer that question may provide a clue about how happy you are, says a new study.

Happy people value silver and bronze medals more than unhappy people, say researchers from the Center for Happiness Studies at the University of Seoul in South Korea. Because of that, they tend to celebrate second and third place finishers more—and to prefer the “total-medal method” for ranking countries in the Olympics, rather than the “gold-first method.”

This makes sense, say the study authors, since previous research has shown that happy people tend to appreciate and find joy in the “little things” in life. But since there hasn’t been much research about how happy and unhappy people value societal events (as opposed to personal events), they wanted to test their hypothesis—using the Olympics as a theoretical scenario.

The researchers recruited South Korean and American participants, and gave them questionnaires to determine their overall self-perceived happiness. Then they asked them about Olympic medals: In one experiment, the South Korean group was asked about how countries’ medal counts should be ranked (gold only versus all medals). In two additional experiments, both groups were asked how many silver and bronze medals they thought equalled one gold medal.

In the first experiment, people with higher happiness scores were more likely to favor the total-medal method for country rankings, while those who scored lower tended to think that gold medals should be the deciding factor.

In the second two experiments, participants who scored higher on the happiness scale also tended to give more weight to silver and bronze medals. This pattern existed in both groups, suggesting that the association between happiness and medal preference is the same across different cultures.

On average, study participants who saw themselves as happy estimated that it would take 2.68 silver medals to equal a gold one. Self-perceived unhappy people, on the other hand, though it would take 4.14.

The study couldn’t show why happy people appreciate bronze and silver medals more, but the researchers have a theory. Previous studies have shown that happy people tend to group things together, they say—and this is just another example of that.

“This finding implies that happy people, compared to unhappy people, tend to group gold, silver, and bronze medals together into an inclusive category (‘achievement’) and treat them equally,” they wrote in the study. “Conversely, unhappy individuals might discriminate among the medals more and group them separately into three hierarchically distinct categories of gold, silver, and bronze medals.”

The study, which will be published in the January 2017 issue of the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology and was posted early online, looked at happiness and medal valuation from a spectator perspective.

Previous research that’s looked at happiness from an athlete perspective suggests another interesting pattern: Olympians who win bronze medals tend to seem happier than those who win silver, they say. After all, the second-place finisher just narrowly missed the top spot, while the person in third place is happy to be on the podium at all.

This article originally appeared on RealSimple.com.

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Reading Books Might Help You Live Longer

3 Reasons You Sometimes Have Déjà Vu, According to Science

You know that feeling you get when you step inside a new house or walk around a foreign city—places you know you’ve never been before—and you can’t help but think, I’ve done this already? It’s déjà vu, and if you’ve never had it before, take it from us: It’s kind of creepy.

Déjà vu is French for “already seen,” and about two out of three people have experienced the phenomenon at one time or another, according to a 2003 review in the journal Psychological Bulletin. Despite being fairly common, “it’s not a widely studied subject,” says Alice Medalia, PhD, a professor of medical psychology at Columbia University Medical Center. And because déjà vu is a subjective experience—in other words, it’s difficult to induce in research subjects—testing the theories behind it can be tricky.

That said, researchers have a few guesses about why we experience déjà vu (and no, it’s probably not flashbacks to a previous life):

You’ve been somewhere similar before

Some researchers believe déjà vu is triggered when you enter an environment similar to one you’ve experienced in the past. For example, you could experience it when you enter a hotel lobby where the furniture is configured the same way as your childhood home’s living room. 

RELATED: 17 Ways to Age-Proof Your Brain

Researchers tested that theory in a 2009 study published in the journal Psychonomic Bulletin & Review. They showed volunteers images that had nothing to do with one another—a fenced-in courtyard, and then later, a locker room—and the volunteers felt déjà vu because the images were composed in a very similar way. The researchers concluded that there was probably a connection between déjà vu and the feelings of “familiarity.”

You travel a lot 

People who travel and people who can recall their dreams are more likely to experience déjà vu than those who stay at home or don’t remember their dreams, according to the 2003 review. These people can draw on a wider range of sources (either from, say, their adventures Europe, or just their own imagination), so it makes sense that they should think other environments feel familiar, too.

Something’s up with your brain

Some people who have temporal lobe epilepsy (a type of epilepsy that occurs in the part of your brain that handles short-term memory) experience déjà vu right before they have a seizure—another sign that the phenomenon may be connected with the way memories are activated. Plus, it’s why some experts think déjà vu is triggered by a kind of disruption in the firing of neurons in the brain, says Dr. Medalia.

It could also be the result of your brain struggling to process multiple pieces of information, but for some reason, can’t align them correctly, she says. That lack of “synchrony,” in med-speak, might be responsible for that déjà vu feeling.

RELATED: 21 Reasons You’ll Live Longer Than Your Friends

The bottom line?

Regardless of what’s happening (or what’s causing it), for the vast majority of people, déjà vu is pretty harmless. Unless you’re experiencing an epileptic seizure—and in that case, there are plenty of other signs to watch out for—it’s a relatively normal experience.

And you never know—maybe that castle in London looks so familiar because, in your past life, you were Kate Middleton’s great-great-great-great grandmother-in-law. Hey, we can dream, right?

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Women Feel Better About Their Bodies Than They Used To

Though women are still more dissatisfied than men when it comes to their size, a new study reveals that women’s views of their bodies are softening over the years.

The study, presented Friday at the American Psychological Association’s 124th Annual Convention, researchers found that women’s feelings about how thin they are have improved significantly over time. Looking at data from more than 100,000 men and women over 31 years, they found that from 1981 to 2011, on average women’s dissatisfaction dropped 3.3 points.

Though the change may seem small, study author Bryan Karazsia, an associate professor of psychology at The College of Wooster, says that statistically the drop is “substantial.” The researchers also looked at data from over 23,800 men and women over 14 years who were asked about their satisfaction with their muscular build. Men were more likely than women to report feeling dissatisfied with their muscles and that trend remained stable over time.

“If you walk into a store and see mens mannequins, they are really large,” says Karazsia, speculating why the opinion has remained unchanged for men. “Men just don’t look like that.”

What might be responsible for women’s drop in body criticisms? The researchers don’t know for sure, but they have a few theories. One is that Americans in general are getting larger. More than two-thirds of adults are overweight or obese, and Karazsia says “because people are larger, people are seeing what’s around them and feel more normal and less concerned.”

It’s also possible that the depictions of women in media are changing. Karazsia cites the popularity of ads by Dove, a company known for soap and deodorant, which feature women of all different body sizes and races. “You are seeing more images in the media of body diversity,” says Karazsia. “As those ideals are shifting, I think people are becoming a little more critical of the extreme images they see and the media is embracing [the idea] that bodies of all shapes and sizes can still sell products.”

There is also a possibility that a new body ideal is replacing women’s desire to be thin. Though the researchers didn’t look at the trend specifically, Karazsia said colleagues wondered whether a trend toward being lean and toned rather than thin also had a role.

“I am optimistic that [this study] is good news,” says Karazsia. “I am a dad of young girls so when I saw these findings I thought it was hopeful.”

This article originally appeared on Time.com.

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