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Why are these borders so weird?
New book focuses on some of the world's most peculiar borderlines.

The bizarre international border at Märket Island is just one of dozens highlighted in Zoran Nikolic's 'Atlas of Unusual Borders'.
- Borders have a simple job: separate different areas from each other.
- But they can get complicated fast, as shown by a new book.
- Here are a few of the bizarre borders it focuses on.
Simple in theory
The island of Märket has a strange border dividing it into a Swedish and a Finnish half. Why? Because of a misplaced Finnish lighthouse (shown on the western half of the island).
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
What separates us humans from other animals? The use of tools or language? The invention of God or music? The ability to blush? (According to Mark Twain, we're the only animal that can – or needs to). The jury is still out. For a swifter verdict, ask what separates humans from each other. Quite literally, it's borders.
Those borders can be the subtle separators of culture and class; the more tangible distinctions of race and gender; or the physical demarcations between this country and that. The job description for political borders is simple and straightforward enough: draw a line between areas with different rules (and rulers). But, as shown in a new book, those lines are not always straight and simple.
For reasons geographical, dynastic, military or otherwise, things on the ground can get quite complex quite fast. In "The Atlas of Unusual Borders," map enthusiast Zoran Nikolic zooms in on some of the world's most egregious examples of border weirdness. Here are a few samples from the recently published book.
The Cypriot puzzle
Ideally, Cyprus shouldn't have any internal borders at all. Then, history happened.
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
Cyprus is a good example of the distance between theory and practice. As an island nation, it shouldn't even have land borders. Yet the small Mediterranean country is riven with borders, establishing four different political entities.
The oldest Cypriot border only goes back to 1960, when the island gained its independence from Britain. The former colonial overlord retained two large military bases, covering a total of 3 percent of the island's territory. Today, Akrotiri and Dhekelia – strategically close to the Middle East – remain under British control.
But while Akrotiri, near the city of Limassol, is a single, contiguous lump of land, Dhekelia, the other 'Sovereign Base Area', seems designed to make life difficult for the Cypriots: a tentacle pokes through in the direction of the island's eastern shore, almost touching Varosia, a former jet set hotspot just south of Famagusta, now a dystopian no man's land. The main body of Dhekelia is dotted with numerous exclaves of Cypriot sovereignty, containing two entire villages and one power station.
Dystopian no man's land? That goes back to 1974, when Turkey invaded, to help Turkish Cypriots set up their own, internationally unrecognised state in the north of the island. The as yet unresolved nature of that conflict is symbolised by the Green Line, separating the official, Greek-majority south of the island from the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus – recognised only by Turkey itself. That Green Line is not actually a line, but a UN-administered buffer zone, wide enough to contain the island's former international airport, for example.
The 1974 conflict has also stranded a Turkish-Cypriot coastal town south of the line. Erenköy (in Turkish; Kokkina in Greek), in the west, is a ghost port, a small Turkish garrison its only occupants. In the east, the Green Line intersects with the already complicated borders of Dhekelia, cutting off a large part of Greek Cyprus from its 'mainland'. However, traffic with the rest of Greek Cyprus is possible via Dhekelia, ensuring a steady flow of tourists to Ayia Napa, the exclave's main resort.
Four Corners Canada
'Four Corners Canada': North America's other quadripoint, where the Northwest Territory, Nunavut, Saskatchewan and Manitoba meet.
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
Quadripoints, where four political entities touch in a single point, are rare. The last international one was extinguished after World War I. There is a tangle of borders in southern Africa that comes close – but misses the mark by about 300 meters. At the sub-national level, the United States has its famous Four Corners. After a serious trek through the desert, tourists arrive at what must be one of the loneliest attractions in North America: the monument to the meeting point of Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Arizona.
Well, that attraction has a potential competitor far north. On April 1 1999, when Canada created the territory of Nunavut, it also created a new quadripoint, where the new territory of Nunavut meets the now reduced Northwest Territories, plus the prairie provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba. 'Four Corners Canada' already has its monument: the metal marker on the (former) Northwest-Saskatchewan-Manitoba tripoint.
However, pending an official land survey, some doubt remains as to whether the legal definition of Nunavut's border actually aligns with reality. Furthermore, 'Four Corners Canada' is located 1,200 km (725 miles) north by northwest from Winnipeg, which makes it vastly more remote than 'Four Corners USA'. So it's doubtful whether North America's newest quadripoint will ever become a tourist attraction.
Looters and poachers
So small and insignificant is this Russian exclave that it is left off most maps. But don't count on Russia abandoning it.
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
Russia's most famous exclave is Kaliningrad, the northern half of what used to be East Prussia. After the disintegration of the USSR and the independence of the Baltic states, it got separated from Mother Russia – yet another burden for the fledgling post-communist state. Amid the confusion and economic collapse of the early 1990s, there was even some talk of just selling it back to Germany. No more. A resurgent Russia will no longer tolerate territorial shrinkage. The annexation of the Crimea was a symbol of the turning tide.
So don't expect Russia to give up this little exclave either. Even though, unlike Kaliningrad, it has no strategic value. Sankovo-Medvezhye is a small fragment of Russia misplaced just across its border with Belarus – 35 km east of Gomel, 530 km southwest of Moscow. The two small villages making up the exclave were abandoned after Chernobyl. The population at present is zero.
Most Russians have never even heard of this particular exclave, and it's so small that it's left off most maps. The only people remotely interested in Sankovo-Medvezhye are looters, who by now have stripped both villages of almost anything of value; and poachers, who use the exclave as a sanctuary both from the Belarus authorities, who can't go there; and the Russian ones, who don't bother.
Hamburg-by-the-Sea
Bremen has a coastal exclave? Then Hamburg wants one too!
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
Germany is composed of 16 Bundesländer – federal states that typically are big enough to be a small European country on their own, like Bavaria or Brandenburg. Three, however, are Singapore-sized city-states: the capital Berlin, and the North Sea port cities of Hamburg and Bremen – the latter being smallest of all Länder.
Those two rival states are mirror images of each other: proud and ancient trading centers, landlocked in or between larger states, accessible to seagoing vessels via their respective rivers. Bremen has the Weser, Hamburg the Elbe. But zoom in further, as this map does, and they're even more alike.
At the 1815 Vienna Congress, Bremen obtained direct access to the sea in the shape of an exclave called Bremerhaven – big enough to be visible on most maps of Germany. (Actually, Bremen consists of three separate bits of land: Fehmoor is separated from Bremerhaven by a narrow strip of Lower Saxony. But let's not get distracted).
What's not so visible, is that Hamburg too has its own sea enclave. In fact, it has three: islands so small they usually don't appear on any map. Thinking it would need a coastal toehold to develop a deep-draft port, Hamburg acquired Neuwerk (current population: 40) and its uninhabited sister island of Scharhörn after the Second World War.
Those deep-draft plans were eventually shelved, due to cost and environmental protests. A third island, Nigehörn, was created artificially to protect the bird sanctuary on Scharhörn. The three islands are still part of Hamburg, 120 km (75 miles) further up the Elbe, but they are now the anchors of a national park rather than a busy port.
From no man's land to microstate
In a region fought over so bitterly, Siga Island presents a remarkable exception: it is claimed by neither Croatia nor Serbia.
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
Never set a border in a river. The river will shift, and then you're stuck with a mess made by two lines meandering all over each other. For some prime examples, check out the U.S. states who trusted the Mississippi to provide a neat and easy demarcation between them.
It gets worse when international borders are involved, as is the case between Croatia and Serbia. Of course, that border wasn't international until Yugoslavia bloodily tore itself apart in the 1990s. Much of that border is formed by the Danube. And both countries have different opinions of how that river should be used to demarcate the border.
Right down the middle, Serbia says. Following old cadastral borders, Croatia maintains. Those cadastral borders follow a previous course of the river, which is why Croatia claims 10,000 hectares on the 'Serbian' side of the river. It also explains why Croatia doesn't claim the 2,000-hectare Siga Island on 'its' side of the Danube – an area not claimed by Serbia either.
And there you have it: terra nullius. That's legalese for No Man's Land. However, like nature, geopolitics abhors a vacuum. Rather than wait or both countries to come to a compromise, various parties have sought to lay claim to the grey zone between them, and proclaimed it to be the Free Republic of Liberland, or the Kingdom of Enclava.
How will this end? While our hearts are with the micro-nationalists trying to do something new here, attempts at secession have generally not gone down well in this part of the world. Get ready to migrate your dreams to cyberspace, Liberlanders. (OK, check!)
Room(s) for the Resistance
During the Second World War, Hotel Arbez could simultaneously host both German solders (on the French side) and members of the French Resistance (on the Swiss side).
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
About 30 km (20 miles) north of Geneva, La Cure is a small village slap bang on the Franco-Swiss border. Quite literally so: half the village is French, the other half Swiss. The same goes for a bunch of buildings in town: the international border runs right through it.
One of those is the Hotel Arbez, and while that curiosity might have been a selling point for some of its earlier guests – the border passes through the double bed in the honeymoon suite, for example – during the Second World War, it became a major geopolitical fault line. While France was occupied by the Germans, Switzerland stayed neutral, independent and unoccupied.
It is said that during the war, on several occasions the French side of the hotel hosted German soldiers and officers, dining on the fine fare of the hotel's kitchen; while members of the French Resistance stayed in rooms on the Swiss side. Naturally, if the Germans had caught the Resistance fighters on the 'French' side of the hotel, it would have ended in an arrest, or worse: a BBC comedy. But as long as they stayed on the Swiss side, they were untouchable – a very practical benefit of Switzerland's famed neutrality.
A republic of monks
Athos is a monastic republic, with some peculiar rules. Only men are allowed - exceptions are made for female cats and chickens.
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
Greece is not one country, but two. The more familiar one, simply called 'Greece', is a medium-sized modern European democracy with its capital in Athens. The other is a religion-based microstate on the easternmost of the three peninsulas of Chalkidiki – the only country in the world inhabited only by men. Its name? Mount Athos.
Named after its highest peak, Athos is sometimes also simply called 'Holy Mountain', because of the 20 monasteries and 2,000 monks on its territory. The monks have been here since the 8th century and have survived centuries of war and occupation (not the exact same monks, obviously). The Greek constitution recognises the Monastic State as a self-governing territory of the Greek state. The governor it sends to Athos is merely an observer.
For Athos is run by a religious council, made up of one representative per monastery. It has an executive body of four members (the 'Holy Administration'), headed by a CEO (the 'protos'). The monasteries attract monks from all over the orthodox world; residence at Athos gets them automatic Greek citizenship. In order not to disturb the contemplative life of the monks, no females are allowed on Athos. This includes female animals, with two exceptions: hens (to lay eggs) and cats (to catch mice; although one suspects the mice are co-eds too).
Where Tasmania meets Victoria
Tasmania is Australia's only island state, yet it does share a land border with the rest of the country.
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
A small island beyond the island-continent's south-eastern shore, Tasmania is Australia's afterthought; Down Under's own Down Under. It is the only state of Australia that is also an island. And yet Tasmania manages to share a land border with Victoria, the southernmost state on the Australian mainland.
It does so entirely by accident. When Tasmania's sea border with Victoria was drawn at a latitude of 39°12' South, it was thought the line crossed open water only. Upon closer inspection, however, the line did cross a tiny island, which an earlier survey had misplaced somewhat.
Too small and barren to be of any other interest, the rock, originally called North East Islet, was rechristened Boundary Islet, and its sole raison d'être now is to be a geopolitical footnote: the only land border of the island state of Tasmania, and the shortest of all land borders between Australian states: all of 85 m (93 yards).
Asterix in the North-West Atlantic
St Pierre and Miquelon is the last surviving fragment of what was once the vast North American dominion of 'New France'.
Image reproduced by kind permission of HarperCollins
Until the mid-18th century, it was the French who were winning North America. They controlled New Orleans in the south, Acadia in the north, and a vast, unbroken stretch of territory in between. Then the Brits kicked them out of Canada, courtesy of the French and Indian War (1754-63), and the Americans bought the remainder off Napoleon in the Louisiana Purchase (1803).
But did the French give up all their possessions in North America? No! Like Asterix's Gallic village that bravely holds out against the Roman invasion, there is one part of the formerly vast dominion of 'New France' that remains French to this day – St Pierre and Miquelon, two small islands in the North-West Atlantic, 25 km (15 miles) off the coast of Newfoundland (and 3,800 km - 2,350 miles - west of the Metropolitan France).
If it isn't weird enough to find a slice of France stuck on Canada's eastern seaboard, a look at the territory's Exclusive Economic Zone raises eyebrows even further. The EEZ is the part of the sea over which a state has special rights (without having total sovereignty). The size and shape of St Pierre and Miquelon's EEZ was long an object of dispute between Canada and France. In 1992, an international panel granted the islands the EEZ you see on this map. Extremely elongated, the 200 km (125 miles) long, 10 km (6 miles) wide zone has been compared to a key, a mushroom and (perhaps inevitably) a French baguette.
The reason given for the shape is that it would provide a corridor for French ships to have unhindered access to St Pierre and Miquelon from international waters. However, Canada later exercised its right to extend its own EEZ, stranding the baguette within Canadian waters. Game over, you might think; but only if you're not French.
Zoran Nikolic: The Atlas of Unusual Borders, published by HarperCollins.
Images reproduced with kind permission.
Strange Maps #1033
Got a strange map? Let me know at strangemaps@gmail.com.
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How New York's largest hospital system is predicting COVID-19 spikes
Northwell Health is using insights from website traffic to forecast COVID-19 hospitalizations two weeks in the future.
- The machine-learning algorithm works by analyzing the online behavior of visitors to the Northwell Health website and comparing that data to future COVID-19 hospitalizations.
- The tool, which uses anonymized data, has so far predicted hospitalizations with an accuracy rate of 80 percent.
- Machine-learning tools are helping health-care professionals worldwide better constrain and treat COVID-19.
The value of forecasting
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTA0Njk2OC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYyMzM2NDQzOH0.rid9regiDaKczCCKBsu7wrHkNQ64Vz_XcOEZIzAhzgM/img.jpg?width=980" id="2bb93" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="31345afbdf2bd408fd3e9f31520c445a" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" data-width="1546" data-height="1056" />Northwell emergency departments use the dashboard to monitor in real time.
Credit: Northwell Health
<p>One unique benefit of forecasting COVID-19 hospitalizations is that it allows health systems to better prepare, manage and allocate resources. For example, if the tool forecasted a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations in two weeks, Northwell Health could begin:</p><ul><li>Making space for an influx of patients</li><li>Moving personal protective equipment to where it's most needed</li><li>Strategically allocating staff during the predicted surge</li><li>Increasing the number of tests offered to asymptomatic patients</li></ul><p>The health-care field is increasingly using machine learning. It's already helping doctors develop <a href="https://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/early/2020/06/09/dc19-1870" target="_blank">personalized care plans for diabetes patients</a>, improving cancer screening techniques, and enabling mental health professionals to better predict which patients are at <a href="https://healthitanalytics.com/news/ehr-data-fuels-accurate-predictive-analytics-for-suicide-risk" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">elevated risk of suicide</a>, to name a few applications.</p><p>Health systems around the world have already begun exploring how <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7315944/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">machine learning can help battle the pandemic</a>, including better COVID-19 screening, diagnosis, contact tracing, and drug and vaccine development.</p><p>Cruzen said these kinds of tools represent a shift in how health systems can tackle a wide variety of problems.</p><p>"Health care has always used the past to predict the future, but not in this mathematical way," Cruzen said. "I think [Northwell Health's new predictive tool] really is a great first example of how we should be attacking a lot of things as we go forward."</p>Making machine-learning tools openly accessible
<p>Northwell Health has made its predictive tool <a href="https://github.com/northwell-health/covid-web-data-predictor" target="_blank">available for free</a> to any health system that wishes to utilize it.</p><p>"COVID is everybody's problem, and I think developing tools that can be used to help others is sort of why people go into health care," Dr. Cruzen said. "It was really consistent with our mission."</p><p>Open collaboration is something the world's governments and health systems should be striving for during the pandemic, said Michael Dowling, Northwell Health's president and CEO.</p><p>"Whenever you develop anything and somebody else gets it, they improve it and they continue to make it better," Dowling said. "As a country, we lack data. I believe very, very strongly that we should have been and should be now working with other countries, including China, including the European Union, including England and others to figure out how to develop a health surveillance system so you can anticipate way in advance when these things are going to occur."</p><p>In all, Northwell Health has treated more than 112,000 COVID patients. During the pandemic, Dowling said he's seen an outpouring of goodwill, collaboration, and sacrifice from the community and the tens of thousands of staff who work across Northwell.</p><p>"COVID has changed our perspective on everything—and not just those of us in health care, because it has disrupted everybody's life," Dowling said. "It has demonstrated the value of community, how we help one another."</p>3,000-pound Triceratops skull unearthed in South Dakota
"You dream about these kinds of moments when you're a kid," said lead paleontologist David Schmidt.
Excavation of a triceratops skull in South Dakota.
- The triceratops skull was first discovered in 2019, but was excavated over the summer of 2020.
- It was discovered in the South Dakota Badlands, an area where the Triceratops roamed some 66 million years ago.
- Studying dinosaurs helps scientists better understand the evolution of all life on Earth.
Credit: David Schmidt / Westminster College
<p style="margin-left: 20px;">"We had to be really careful," Schmidt told St. Louis Public Radio. "We couldn't disturb anything at all, because at that point, it was under law enforcement investigation. They were telling us, 'Don't even make footprints,' and I was thinking, 'How are we supposed to do that?'"</p><p>Another difficulty was the mammoth size of the skull: about 7 feet long and more than 3,000 pounds. (For context, the largest triceratops skull ever unearthed was about <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02724634.2010.483632" target="_blank">8.2 feet long</a>.) The skull of Schmidt's dinosaur was likely a <em>Triceratops prorsus, </em>one of two species of triceratops that roamed what's now North America about 66 million years ago.</p>Credit: David Schmidt / Westminster College
<p>The triceratops was an herbivore, but it was also a favorite meal of the T<em>yrannosaurus rex</em>. That probably explains why the Dakotas contain many scattered triceratops bone fragments, and, less commonly, complete bones and skulls. In summer 2019, for example, a separate team on a dig in North Dakota made <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/26/science/triceratops-skull-65-million-years-old.html" target="_blank">headlines</a> after unearthing a complete triceratops skull that measured five feet in length.</p><p>Michael Kjelland, a biology professor who participated in that excavation, said digging up the dinosaur was like completing a "multi-piece, 3-D jigsaw puzzle" that required "engineering that rivaled SpaceX," he jokingly told the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/26/science/triceratops-skull-65-million-years-old.html" target="_blank">New York Times</a>.</p>Morrison Formation in Colorado
James St. John via Flickr
Triceratops illustration
Credit: Nobu Tamura/Wikimedia Commons |
Put on a happy face? “Deep acting” associated with improved work life
New research suggests you can't fake your emotional state to improve your work life — you have to feel it.
What is deep acting?
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTQ1NDk2OS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYxNTY5MzA0Nn0._s7aP25Es1CInq51pbzGrUj3GtOIRWBHZxCBFnbyXY8/img.jpg?width=1245&coordinates=333%2C-1%2C333%2C-1&height=700" id="ddf09" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="9dc42c4d6a8e372ad7b72907b46ecd3f" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" data-width="1245" data-height="700" />Arlie Russell Hochschild (pictured) laid out the concept of emotional labor in her 1983 book, "The Managed Heart."
Credit: Wikimedia Commons
<p>Deep and surface acting are the principal components of emotional labor, a buzz phrase you have likely seen flitting about the Twittersphere. Today, "<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/article/5ea9f140-f722-4214-bb57-8b84f9418a7e" target="_blank">emotional labor</a>" has been adopted by groups as diverse as family counselors, academic feminists, and corporate CEOs, and each has redefined it with a patented spin. But while the phrase has splintered into a smorgasbord of pop-psychological arguments, its initial usage was more specific.</p><p>First coined by sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild in her 1983 book, "<a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520272941/the-managed-heart" target="_blank">The Managed Heart</a>," emotional labor describes the work we do to regulate our emotions on the job. Hochschild's go-to example is the flight attendant, who is tasked with being "nicer than natural" to enhance the customer experience. While at work, flight attendants are expected to smile and be exceedingly helpful even if they are wrestling with personal issues, the passengers are rude, and that one kid just upchucked down the center aisle. Hochschild's counterpart to the flight attendant is the bill collector, who must instead be "nastier than natural."</p><p>Such personas may serve an organization's mission or commercial interests, but if they cause emotional dissonance, they can potentially lead to high emotional costs for the employee—bringing us back to deep and surface acting.</p><p>Deep acting is the process by which people modify their emotions to match their expected role. Deep actors still encounter the negative emotions, but they devise ways to <a href="http://www.selfinjury.bctr.cornell.edu/perch/resources/what-is-emotion-regulationsinfo-brief.pdf" target="_blank">regulate those emotions</a> and return to the desired state. Flight attendants may modify their internal state by talking through harsh emotions (say, with a coworker), focusing on life's benefits (next stop Paris!), physically expressing their desired emotion (smiling and deep breaths), or recontextualizing an inauspicious situation (not the kid's fault he got sick).</p><p>Conversely, surface acting occurs when employees display ersatz emotions to match those expected by their role. These actors are the waiters who smile despite being crushed by the stress of a dinner rush. They are the CEOs who wear a confident swagger despite feelings of inauthenticity. And they are the bouncers who must maintain a steely edge despite humming show tunes in their heart of hearts.</p><p>As we'll see in the research, surface acting can degrade our mental well-being. This deterioration can be especially true of people who must contend with negative emotions or situations inside while displaying an elated mood outside. Hochschild argues such emotional labor can lead to exhaustion and self-estrangement—that is, surface actors erect a bulwark against anger, fear, and stress, but that disconnect estranges them from the emotions that allow them to connect with others and live fulfilling lives.</p>Don't fake it till you make it
<p>Most studies on emotional labor have focused on customer service for the obvious reason that such jobs prescribe emotional states—service with a smile or, if you're in the bouncing business, a scowl. But <a href="https://eller.arizona.edu/people/allison-s-gabriel" target="_blank">Allison Gabriel</a>, associate professor of management and organizations at the University of Arizona's Eller College of Management, wanted to explore how employees used emotional labor strategies in their intra-office interactions and which strategies proved most beneficial.</p><p>"What we wanted to know is whether people choose to engage in emotion regulation when interacting with their co-workers, why they choose to regulate their emotions if there is no formal rule requiring them to do so, and what benefits, if any, they get out of this effort," Gabriel said in <a href="https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200117162703.htm" target="_blank">a press release</a>.</p><p>Across three studies, she and her colleagues surveyed more than 2,500 full-time employees on their emotional regulation with coworkers. The survey asked participants to agree or disagree with statements such as "I try to experience the emotions that I show to my coworkers" or "I fake a good mood when interacting with my coworkers." Other statements gauged the outcomes of such strategies—for example, "I feel emotionally drained at work." Participants were drawn from industries as varied as education, engineering, and financial services.</p><p>The results, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fapl0000473" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">published in the Journal of Applied Psychology</a>, revealed four different emotional strategies. "Deep actors" engaged in high levels of deep acting; "low actors" leaned more heavily on surface acting. Meanwhile, "non-actors" engaged in negligible amounts of emotional labor, while "regulators" switched between both. The survey also revealed two drivers for such strategies: prosocial and impression management motives. The former aimed to cultivate positive relationships, the latter to present a positive front.</p><p>The researchers found deep actors were driven by prosocial motives and enjoyed advantages from their strategy of choice. These actors reported lower levels of fatigue, fewer feelings of inauthenticity, improved coworker trust, and advanced progress toward career goals. </p><p>As Gabriel told <a href="https://www.psypost.org/2021/01/new-psychology-research-suggests-deep-acting-can-reduce-fatigue-and-improve-your-work-life-59081" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">PsyPost in an interview</a>: "So, it's a win-win-win in terms of feeling good, performing well, and having positive coworker interactions."</p><p>Non-actors did not report the emotional exhaustion of their low-actor peers, but they also didn't enjoy the social gains of the deep actors. Finally, the regulators showed that the flip-flopping between surface and deep acting drained emotional reserves and strained office relationships.</p><p>"I think the 'fake it until you make it' idea suggests a survival tactic at work," Gabriel noted. "Maybe plastering on a smile to simply get out of an interaction is easier in the short run, but long term, it will undermine efforts to improve your health and the relationships you have at work. </p><p>"It all boils down to, 'Let's be nice to each other.' Not only will people feel better, but people's performance and social relationships can also improve."</p>You'll be glad ya' decided to smile
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="88a0a6a8d1c1abfcf7b1aca8e71247c6"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QOSgpq9EGSw?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span><p>But as with any research that relies on self-reported data, there are confounders here to untangle. Even during anonymous studies, participants may select socially acceptable answers over honest ones. They may further interpret their goal progress and coworker interactions more favorably than is accurate. And certain work conditions may not produce the same effects, such as toxic work environments or those that require employees to project negative emotions.</p><p>There also remains the question of the causal mechanism. If surface acting—or switching between surface and deep acting—is more mentally taxing than genuinely feeling an emotion, then what physiological process causes this fatigue? <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2019.00151/full" target="_blank">One study published in the <em>Frontiers in Human Neuroscience</em></a><em> </em>measured hemoglobin density in participants' brains using an fNIRS while they expressed emotions facially. The researchers found no significant difference in energy consumed in the prefrontal cortex by those asked to deep act or surface act (though, this study too is limited by a lack of real-life task).<br></p><p>With that said, Gabriel's studies reinforce much of the current research on emotional labor. <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/2041386611417746" target="_blank">A 2011 meta-analysis</a> found that "discordant emotional labor states" (read: surface acting) were associated with harmful effects on well-being and performance. The analysis found no such consequences for deep acting. <a href="https://doi.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fa0022876" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Another meta-analysis</a> found an association between surface acting and impaired well-being, job attitudes, and performance outcomes. Conversely, deep acting was associated with improved emotional performance.</p><p>So, although there's still much to learn on the emotional labor front, it seems Van Dyke's advice to a Leigh was half correct. We should put on a happy face, but it will <a href="https://bigthink.com/design-for-good/everything-you-should-know-about-happiness-in-one-infographic" target="_self">only help if we can feel it</a>.</p>World's oldest work of art found in a hidden Indonesian valley
Archaeologists discover a cave painting of a wild pig that is now the world's oldest dated work of representational art.
Pig painting at Leang Tedongnge in Indonesia, made at 45,500 years ago.
- Archaeologists find a cave painting of a wild pig that is at least 45,500 years old.
- The painting is the earliest known work of representational art.
- The discovery was made in a remote valley on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi.
Oldest Cave Art Found in Sulawesi
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="a9734e306f0914bfdcbe79a1e317a7f0"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/b-wAYtBxn7E?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>What can Avicenna teach us about the mind-body problem?
The Persian polymath and philosopher of the Islamic Golden Age teaches us about self-awareness.
