A Lecture in Psychology: The Psychology of Change: Self-Affirmation and Social Psychological Intervention

Geoffrey L. Cohen, Professor in Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education, Department of Psychology, and (by courtesy) the Graduate School of Business, and David Sherman, Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara, talk about their article "The Psychology of Change: Self-Affirmation and Social Psychological Intervention," which they wrote together for the 2014 Annual Review of Psychology. In this lecture, the explain how self-affirmation affects social and education outcomes. Focusing on values affirmation, in which people write about values they hold dear, they show how short, inexpensive exercises can help counter the effects of stress and improve performance in members of certain socioeconomic categories.