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The Real Key to Influencing the Behavior of Other People

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Summary

This article discusses the concept of emotional bank accounts, which was first proposed by Stephen R. Covey in his book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. It explains how emotional deposits, such as making an effort to understand someone, keeping commitments, responding to their bids for attention, and expressing appreciation, can build trust, understanding, and positive emotions in relationships. It also explains how emotional withdrawals, such as lying, criticizing someone, breaking promises, dismissing emotions, ignoring needs, and asking them to change their behavior, can degrade the bond. The article then tells the story of a wild squirrel and how the author's sister-in-law was able to successfully influence the author's father to set the squirrel free. By observing their relationship, the author learned that her sister-in-law had a healthy balance in her emotional bank account with the author's father. The article then outlines three steps for how to put deposits in an emotional bank account, such as responding to the other person's bids for attention in a way that directly responds to the way they are asking, making timely and consistent deposits, and maintaining a 5:1 ratio of positive to negative interactions. It concludes by advising readers to assess if they have enough balance in their emotional bank account with the person they want to influence before making a request.

Q&As

What is the real key to influencing the behavior of other people?
The real key to influencing the behavior of other people is having a healthy balance in their emotional bank account.

What is the concept of an "Emotional Bank Account" and how does it work?
The concept of an "Emotional Bank Account" is a metaphorical representation of the amount of positive emotional connection in relationships. An emotional deposit is every time we do something that builds trust, understanding, and positive emotions. An emotional withdrawal is every time we do something to degrade the bond. Asking someone to change their behavior is an emotional withdrawal.

How can one make timely and consistent deposits in an emotional bank account?
To make timely and consistent deposits in an emotional bank account, one should pay attention to the other person's bids for attention and respond in a way that directly responds to the way they are asking. It is also important to respond when it is not most convenient for oneself.

What is the "Magic Ratio" for building successful emotional relationships?
The "Magic Ratio" for building successful emotional relationships is to make sure that there are five positive interactions for every negative interaction.

How can one reframe the question of influencing behavior?
To reframe the question of influencing behavior, one should ask if they have enough balance in their emotional bank account to make the withdrawal.

AI Comments

👍 This article provides an insightful and creative approach to influencing people's behavior. It provides a helpful and relatable example of the emotional bank concept and offers practical steps to build up trust and understanding.

👎 This article does not provide any new or unique information and fails to adequately address some of the nuances and complexities of the topic.

AI Discussion

Me: It's about how trust isn't always enough to influence people's behavior and how you need to have an emotional bank account with them. The article talks about how you can make deposits into the account to build trust and understanding and how to maintain a 5:1 ratio of positive interaction to negative interaction.

Friend: That's interesting. What are the implications of this article?

Me: The implications of this article are that relationships take more work than we may think. It's not enough to simply have trust in a relationship, but also, it's important to make the effort to build trust and understanding and to maintain a healthy balance of positive interactions to negative interactions. This is especially true for relationships with family members, where there is often an existing dynamic that can be difficult to change. By making deposits into the emotional bank account, it can be possible to influence behavior and create lasting positive change.

Action items

Make a list of people in your life whose behavior you would like to influence and assess the balance in your emotional bank account with each of them.
Identify ways to make deposits in each of these relationships, such as responding to their bids for attention, expressing appreciation, and making an effort to understand them.
Make a commitment to yourself to practice the 5:1 ratio of positive to negative interactions in your relationships.

Technical terms

Trust: A feeling of confidence in the reliability, truth, or ability of someone or something.
Emotional Bank Account: A metaphor used to represent the amount of positive emotional connection in relationships.
Love Languages: A concept developed by Gary Chapman that describes the five ways people express and experience love.
Magic Ratio: A ratio of five positive interactions for every negative interaction in a relationship.