Introduction
What if recruiting your senses, mind, brain, nervous system, and body can accelerate the odds of reaching a critical leadership development goal? How might learning about your brain boost your effectiveness? Could awareness of both the conscious and non-conscious parts of our nervous systems help us be more successful when we work to achieve a goal? As part of a two-year research professorship awarded to Dr. Marcia Ruben, she and her team and interpersonal neurobiologist Dr. Debra Pearce-McCall designed and implemented an exploratory applied research study aimed at answering these questions. The research study employed a multi-modal, multi-sensory approach to investigate the hypothesis that an integrated methodology, based on research findings about the brain, body, cognition, and motivation, could enhance our ability to accomplish leadership development goals. The research was rooted/located in scholarly literature at the intersection of neuroscience, learning, change, and goal achievement.
Learning, change, and goal achievement are closely intertwined. We may set a new leadership development goal that will require a significant change to achieve it, or the process of achieving a goal may result in new learning that catalyzes behavior change. Whatever the starting point, change is difficult. It requires the motivation to change, coupled with the skills and knowledge needed to sustain a change effort and unlearn old ways of thinking and acting. We are using use our mind when we change some of the well-worn wiring patterns or neural circuits that support what we do and even who we are. Research on the brain has shed new light on how this process occurs, with some surprising ways that mind-body connections can aid or interfere with our best intentions.
Behavioral scientists and psychologists have long searched for answers to help individuals learn, achieve goals, and change behavior (Berkman, 2018). The prevailing wisdom has been that goal achievement, behavior change, and learning require focus, discipline, and attention – all conscious processes in the domain of the prefrontal cortex. But recent advances in neuroscience have allowed researchers to understand better both the conscious and non-conscious brain mechanisms involved in these processes, thus providing more precise guidance on how to access them.
Our brains are energy-intensive. They use up 20% of our body’s energy, although they comprise only 2% of our body’s weight (Medina, 2014). Learning something new requires focus and attention, which in turn drains our mental energy. As new neural pathways become established, the older paths that they replace shrink from a corresponding decline in use. As a result, the brain systems that control behavior shift from the energy-intensive prefrontal cortex to the ventral and dorsolateral striatum (Yin et al., 2009). The ventral and dorsolateral striatum need minimal energy resources to function. Our brains have evolved to allow the efficient use of mental resources to learn and routinize new habits (Berkman, 2018). One challenge is to understand and utilize new knowledge about how we learn, change and accomplish to facilitate this process and transfer the “brainwork” involved in new choices, thoughts, and behaviors from energy-intensive to more automatic newly established pathways.
This study drew on a wide range of literature to develop a multi-disciplinary, integrated approach that allowed participants to experience and choose which goal-setting modality/modalities would most accelerate the achievement of their goal. Other expert reviews of goal attainment conclude that the process involves specific cognitive strategies, such as implementation intentions (discussed below), and numerous other factors, such as emotional regulation and social support (Nowack, 2017).
The NeuroStroll™ was designed as a 2½-3 hour guided experience with seven activities. Research suggests that acronyms help with limited brain capacity (Bower, 1972; Cowan, 2000; Miller, 1956), so we used the acronym “stroll” as a guide and a memory aid. The first activity, an orientation, included the definition and importance of neuroplasticity. We introduced each exercise in the “Stroll” with a brief overview of relevant neuroscience findings. Participants were encouraged to identify what parts or circuits of the brain they needed to activate to increase their likelihood of achieving their goal. The last activity provided time for reflection, integration, and planning.
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