What do you want to be when you grow up? | Teagan Wall | TEDxSouthPasadenaHigh

Have you ever been told that you could do anything you want to do with your life? Teagan Wall explores the rationality of our decision-making process when we are confronted with choices to make, including the choice of what to be when we grow up.

Dr. Teagan Wall, PhD, is an Emmy-nominated writer, speaker and science communicator. She has previously written for "Young Sheldon" on CBS, the Netflix original series "Bill Nye Saves the World" and PBS Digital Studio's "Braincraft." Additionally, Wall is a founding member of the Los Angeles-based Nerd Brigade, a collective of science communicators working to engage the public in scientific storytelling, encourage collaborations between scientists and media, and facilitate events consistent with these goals.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx.

I'm really excited to be here;

I'm excited to talk with you all,

share some of what I know,
some of what I've learned.

But I'm also kind of confused.

Because in my mind, TED Talks,
TEDx Talks, TEDxYouth Talks,

they're given by people
with a path and a vision.

And I still have no idea
what I want to be when I grow up.

I've been putting off having to choose.

When I was very small,
I was told that I was smart.

And not just any kind of smart:

I was told that I was scientifically
and mathematically inclined,

as opposed to someone like my brother

who was deemed talented
in things like language and art.

I was told, "Girls can too,"

which was a phrase meant to inspire me

to keep studying mathematics
and go into the hard sciences.

I was told about my dad's work
for the Air Force,

about how he always wished
he had completed his pilot's license,

and how when he was a kid,
he used to build rockets.

I was told bedtime stories
of Shannon Lucid and Sally Ride,

and if I wanted to stay up late
to watch a shuttle launch,

my parents let me.

It's no surprise that I wanted
to be an astronaut.

At five,

I could have told you I wanted to earn
my bachelor's degree from Annapolis,

become a jet jockey,

and then apply to NASA.

Everyone was so proud
and so impressed at this little kid

with this well-thought-out
and well-researched life.

But when I was 14,
I stopped really caring about school.

Our country was two years into a new war,

and as I started to learn
more about the military,

I realized I didn't want to be
a part of that system.

Despite being one of the most common paths
to becoming an astronaut,

I started to find
I didn't want to go Annapolis,

I didn't want to be a jet jockey,

I didn't want to become an astronaut.

This thing,

this goal that I had been pointed at
by parents and teachers and friends,

this piece of my identity,

was suddenly gone.

I had lost my destiny.

I felt like such a disappointment,

like whatever I did
for the rest of my life,

no matter how well I did it,

it would always be in the shadow
of this monumental failure,

a failure to even get started.

Luckily, the grownups
weren't completely wrong.

I still depend on mankind's number one
evolutionary advantage:

our brains.

We don't have the biggest brains
in the animal kingdom,

not by a long shot.

But this is the prefrontal cortex,

and we've evolved to have really big ones
when compared to the rest of our brains.

The prefrontal cortex is responsible

for everything that we think
that make us different from other animals.

It's responsible for executive function.

It's responsible
for our ability to empathize,

our ability to think ahead and plan,

predict what's going to happen
in the future.

It's responsible for social control.

Our really big prefrontal cortexes
makes us problem-solving machines.

We're decisions makers.

When presented with a list of options,

we're not only able to quickly
and efficiently make a choice,

but we're able to generate new options

from outside of
the originally defined set.

Think of all of the choices
that you're making right now,

just sitting in this theater.

You're choosing not to get up
and start dancing.

You're choosing to listen.

You're choosing not to wet your pants,

(Laughter)

I hope.

(Laughter)

Most of these choices

your brain makes without you having
to devote any conscious awareness to them.

But some choices, like what to be
when you will grow up,

are a much, much bigger deal.

Since closing the door
on being an astronaut,

my education background
has been in economics, political science,

mathematics, neuroeconomics
and neurobiology.

Which basically means

when I was presented
with a list of majors in college,

I just refused to make a decision

and looked for the box
marked "All of the above."

(Laughter)

But I'm going to let you in
on a little secret.

It turns out that economics,
neuroscience and political science

all actually study the exact same thing,

which is, Why do people make
the decisions that they make,

sometimes even working
against their own best interest?

We see people working minimum-wage jobs
voting against minimum-wage hikes.

We see parents refusing to vaccinate
their otherwise healthy kids

despite the fact that
that is evolutionary disadvantageous

at both the individual
and societal levels.

We see teenagers who've been bombarded
with anti-smoking information

their whole lives,

who know the risks
associated with smoking,

start anyway.

And we as a society are so confused
about why people would do these things

that we use science and social science

and TED Talks and crystal balls
and mathematics

to figure out why.

Why would people do these things?

And everybody does this.

No one is immune from these breaks
in what economists call "rationality."

We all have things that can show us
predictably biased choices.

I'm going to give you an example.

Let's play a game.

I'm going to flip a coin -
it's a fair coin.

If the first flip comes up heads,
you get two dollars.

I flip it again;

if it comes up heads a second time,
you get four dollars.

A third time, eight dollars.

Fourth, 16, until the coin comes up tails.

And then I pay you your money.

So if the coin comes up heads five times
in a row before the first tails,

you get 32 dollars.

If it come up 20 times in a row
before your first tails,

you get over a million dollars.

So think to yourself,

how much would you be willing to pay
to play this game?

If you're like most people,

you'd be willing to pay
less than 25 dollars.

But if you played this game forever,

you would be expected to make
an infinite amount of money,

no matter how much you paid per game.

This game has an infinite expected value,

and yet everybody has a point,
a number usually really low,

that they'd no longer
be willing to pay to play.

Here's another one.

It's like getting your eyes
checked at the eye doctor:

I'm going to present A or B, and you'll
tell me which one you think is better.

So A, I give you a million dollars,

just like that.

Cold million, you walk away,
go home, it's wonderful.

Or B,

you can take a gamble.

There's an 89% chance
of winning a million dollars,

a 1% chance of winning nothing -
you walk home empty-handed -

and a 10% chance
at winning five million dollars.

Which would you choose?

If you're like most people,
you'd actually choose A -

no risk, no gamble,

you just walk away with the cold million.

Here's the next one: choice C.

There's a 89% chance
of getting zero dollars

and an 11% chance of getting a million,

or D, there's a 90% chance
of getting zero dollars

and a 10% chance of getting five million.

This time, if you're like most people,

you'd pick D and hope
for the five million.

But if we do some quick math,

we actually find that
the first two choices are equivalent.

and that when it's framed one way,

you pick A,

and when it's framed another way,

you pick D.

Just based on how the information
is presented to you,

I can get you to pick door number one
or door number two.

And the weird thing is
that making any other decision

probably feels really wrong.

It turns out that intuition
and economic rationality

don't always agree.

So these are just two economic examples
of biases in decision making.

It turns out that
there's actually a lot of factors

that can predictably bias
what we choose.

The first was an example

of inappropriately weighting
small probabilities.

There's less than a 3% chance

that you'll win at least $32
in the quarter-flipping game,

and as a result, we have a hard time
even taking into account

the chance of making a million.

This same bias is seen in people
who fail to vaccinate their kids.

If your unvaccinated child
only has a 5% chance of getting sick,

it's really hard to take into account

the possible consequences
of them not being vaccinated,

which could be as high
as the child's life.

The second example is of a framing effect.

This affects everything
from what cereal we buy at the store

to how we report judgments
of our own emotions.

For example, you're much more likely
to report being happy

if I ask, "Are you happy?"

than if I ask, "Are you unhappy?"

Other biases include
aversion to uncertainty

and making choices that try to avoid it.

We can miss out on
some really great opportunities

by trying to avoid unknown unknowns.

We're also biased by the number
of options that are presented to us.

Having a wide range of options,
it turns out, isn't always better.

It can make deciding harder

and actually affect both our levels
of happiness and anxiety.

So how do these biases
affect big decisions

like what to be when you grow up?

We're going to do
some quick audience participation.

Raise your hand if you've ever been told

that you can be anything
you want to be when you grow up.

Yeah? You can put your hands down.

Being told that you can be anything
you want feels pretty good.

It feels like you can live your life

according to your own rules,
your owns wants, your own goals.

Like you can become
the person you want to be:

proud, successful, happy.

It give you a feeling
of agency over your life,

a feeling of freedom.

Life is an open field,

and you can go anywhere you want to go.

But humans don't have infinite time.

While you may be able
to do anything you want,

you probably won't be able
to do everything you want.

Having to choose between so many options

can be anxiety inducing
and detrimental to our happiness.

We as humans hate eliminating options,

even if we know that
that's not a path we want to choose.

We feel like we're losing out on something

simply by giving up
the possibility of something.

I want you to raise you hand
if you're even been told

anything similar to one of the statements
that I'm about to say.

Just put your hand up and leave it, okay?

If you put your mind to it,
you could be really great at blank.

Whatever that is for you.

If you dedicate your life to it,

you could help cure cancer

or do some other difficult
and yet very specific feat.

If you really try,

you could win a Nobel Prize
or an Olympic gold medal or an Oscar.

How about this one?

You'd make a really great astronaut.

(Laughter)

You can put your hands down.

These statements are very different
from the first statement.

Well, both are meant
to motivate and inspire.

The first instills a sense
of freedom and agency.

The second implies a responsibility
to the path that's been laid out.

If this person is right,

and I could help cure cancer
if I just devote my entire life to it,

then is it bad if I want to become
a professional cellist?

If I truly could win a Nobel Prize,

am I depriving the world
by focusing on painting?

If I can be the next Meryl Streep,

is it wrong that I want to code
for a tech startup?

If we're told that we can be
anything we want to be,

then we make our own decisions,

bearing the stress and the anxiety
that come with that.

When someone else sets our path,

we don't have to worry
about closing doors,

but we lose a sense of autonomy.

And taking any other path
than the one laid out for us

feels like we're letting someone down
or doing something wrong.

The pressure that comes with being told
that you could be great at something,

that you have the potential
to win a Nobel Prize

or save the polar bears
or be an astronaut,

can actually prevent you

from doing something
that you really want to do.

Almost every smart, talented
or hardworking person I know

has felt this pressure
at some point in their lives.

Even if they don't know exactly
what they want to be when they grow up,

being told that they could be great
at a specific thing

makes them feel responsible
for achieving that goal.

It's a responsibility
that is placed on them,

often accidentally,
by parents or teachers or friends,

and if it's internalized,
it can be destructive,

fueling anger or resentment.

The possible anxiety
of having too many choices

doesn't seem so bad when it comes
with the freedom to set your own path.

I don't have the answers

on how to decide
what to do with your life,

what doors to close
or what opportunities to pursue.

But it can help to recognize
that you have choices,

no one sets your path but you.

But in case the anxiety
does start to get paralyzing,

I want to leave you with this:

No matter what you choose
to do with your life -

and you can do anything,
including nothing at all -

you are still important,

you are still worthy of love,

and there will still be
people who love you.

Being smart or talented is a privilege.

It allows you to do something,
possibly multiple things,

better, faster or easier
than the average person.

But being smart or talented
is not a responsibility.

It's not your job to save anyone;

it's not your duty to fix anything;

it's not your responsibility to create.

You, just like everybody else
in this world, have only one job:

love.

Love yourself,

do your very, very best to love others,

and whatever it is
you decide to do with your life,

do it for love.

If you follow that, you can't go wrong.

Thank you.

(Applause)