Emotional contagion

I just ran into a friend at the airport and spent an hour catching up. This is a guy who somehow has so much energy, always excited and passionate about everything he talks about. As we grabbed coffee to chat, I couldn’t help absorbing his positive energy, infectious in all the right ways. I find it both strange and powerful how something invisible shifts in those moments.

Of course, there’s the opposite version of this too. The person who arrives carrying a cloud. They don’t even need to say anything, but the tension just announces itself. The energy dips awkwardly.

Both versions exist, and most likely we’ve been both of these versions at various times in our lives and careers. The point is that moods can travel, and whatever energy we experience, it seems to move through us faster than we realize.

Adding to this, the strongest emotional transmitter is usually the leader (the manager, parent, coach etc). We watch them more closely and their mood gets interpreted as information.

When leaders are tense, distracted, sharp, or cynical… the team reads it that something is wrong. But when a leader is grounded, direct, and calm under pressure, the team reads it as confidence. There’s no hesitation to keep moving forward. 

Like a cold.

Psychologists call this transfer of energy emotional contagion. It’s the idea that we can “catch” emotions from those around us. We do it with physical traits too… if you’ve ever yawned because someone else just yawned, then you know what I mean (perhaps you’re even yawning now while reading the word “yawn”!).

It’s a type of mimicry that includes facial expressions, tone of voice, posture, and pace. And then our brains do the rest. And this is important because it means that, if we spend enough time around a certain emotional climate, our nervous system starts treating it as normal.

It might be easier to recognize in intimate relationships, but it also happens at work. It happens in the meetings, group chats, conference room, even zoom calls.

So if we care about our mental wellness and our personal resilience, we have to start caring about the emotional environment people are soaking up every day. And, if we’re leaders, we need to be even more vigilant in setting the tone for what we expect from those in the wider team.

And I’m not just talking about the big moments. I actually mean the tiny (sometimes mundane) ones that are repeated over and over such as entering the office to begin our day at work, or starting a meeting with the right tone. Because it’s in that consistency that we win.

Contagion also goes beyond emotions. 

In the early 2000s, two economists measured productivity data from a large supermarket chain in the USA. They noticed that when a fast, high-performing cashier was scheduled onto a shift, the cashiers around them sped up as well.

Interestingly, this “contagion of productivity” (my words) was related mostly to visibility and contact. What that means is that the productivity lift showed up mainly for coworkers who could actually see the high performer, and for those who interacted with them more often. It didn’t show up for workers out of sight so our performance can actually spread through proximity.

All of this to indicate that who we spend time with is not neutral. Which means it’s a critical piece of the puzzle if we want to maintain high levels of resilience and the kind of energy that aligns to who we are.

5 tools to manage our own energy.

1. Audit our circle. We can’t avoid every draining person we encounter through work or business, but we certainly can curate wherever possible. One of the best things to manage our energy is to conduct regular energy audits by looking closely at who we spend time with and how they make us feel. If it’s always drama, high-stress, complaints, it usually adds up to a lot of extra stress on our part. But if it’s light and enjoyable, sign us up!

2. Design our proximity. As noted above with the supermarket example, proximity creates influence. Being in the same space as productive people can impact us, just as laziness can too. This is why tiny shifts matter. If we sit somewhere different, or join a new group where the baseline is healthy, we take back control and exercise our agency. Sometimes this can mean the difference between living in complaint corner vs solutions city.

3. Create emotional buffers. Nothing keeps me calm like a few deep breaths. If we know a certain interaction tends to hijack our nervous system, we can’t go in unarmed. Sometimes its a slow breath beforehand, or maybe afterwards it’s a brisk walk outside for fresh air. These micro-boundaries let us stay kind without inadvertently second-hand smoking that energy around us.

4. Create mutual growth pacts. If all else around is us spiraling, finding an anchor in the storm can be really powerful. This is about finding someone who aligns to our vibes and we can trust to be part of our way forward. It also helps us be accountable, which can mean a higher chance of fulfillment. We call each other up, not out.

5. Control what matters. We can’t control someone else’s mood. We might influence it to a certain degree, but they’re ultimately responsible for how they feel. What we can control includes how long we stick around to be part of whatever energy they’ve got going on. Sometimes resilience is providing a bit of tough love by setting clear boundaries specifically for ourselves. Because that’s the piece that we can actually manage.

We can’t control everyone around us, but it’s worthwhile paying attention to what kind of emotional weather we’re operating in. There’s value in that pause, and then finding a way to protect our own energy, because that allows us to move forward the way we want to.

Until next time friends, stay resilient.

Carré at Resilient Minds