Liftology 24: The ‘Emotional’ Component

Too often, we think of learning as serious business. And it is, but also too frequently we ignore the whole emotional side of the equation. And that’s wrong. Emotions, we’re learning, play a big role in learning success. What role, and what does it mean?

Let me ask, do you learn best when you’re really anxious, or bored? It’s unlikely. We also don’t learn when the learning’s trivial, in several ways. We don’t learn best if the questions are knowledge test, or relevant to our interests or the task at hand. 

We do learn best when learning is what’s termed ‘hard fun’. That notion, that the right level of difficulty is optimal for learning is matched by what is the best level for engagement. In fact, it’s been posited that what makes games fun is learning! That whole notion of being not too anxious, but being interested because of relevancy, is key. 

Humor, too, plays a role in learning. Admitting to some vulnerability helps, as does humor that’s specific to the topic. If it’s not, of course, it’s distracting and interferes, but if it’s aligned, it works. Humor works well as a break between sections, such as introducing or concluding a learning experience, whether event or reactivation. So does just a bit of humanity, acknowledging the effort. 

We start, opening the experience by tapping into the intrinsic motivation, the What’s In It For Me. We need three things from the learner to begin: an acknowledgement that this learning is needed, that it isn’t already known, and that this experience will change that. Then, of course, we need to deliver on the implied promise. Finally, we can conclude the overall journey with congratulations, acknowledgement of effort, pointers to further directions (both more and deeper), and encouragement to continue. 

Overall, we want to keep anxiety low, maintain motivation, and build confidence. We can make a safe place to learn for the first, ensure the right level of challenge and relevancy for the second, and showing progress builds the latter. We can, and should, address the emotional component of learning as well as ensuring we’re meeting the learning objective. 

Learning is faster, sticks better, and thus yields the optimal impacts when we pay attention to all the details. That includes the content, the activation and reactivation of knowledge and skills, etc, but also the emotions.