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Body Doubling

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Re: Body Doubling

#111

Post by telesilla »

bnralt wrote: post #37
telesilla wrote: post #27

I finished my thesis thanks to a group of people scattered over the internet, all agreeing to do pomodoro. In the breaks we'd chat about our day to day lives then get back to work when the bell rang. I'll always be grateful for their presence, getting me through hard times when I'd perhaps have given up if I felt completely alone; or at least not worked so deeply and thoroughly.

Where did you find the group?

It was an early (private invite) precursor to what others have linked in this forum for focused study groups.

Re: Body Doubling

#112

Post by kelnos »

iandanforth wrote: post #20

Again pop-sci loves to invent terms and then sell those terms. Psychology is regularly guilty of this. This is not a "phenomenon" with "invisible power" and it doesn't need a litany of semi-awed, near mystical, and pseudoscientific testimonials. That's just nonsense branding. This isn't new or magical and there are other services that do just this with less BS.

Yeah, I was pretty turned off by that. I clicked on the link wondering if it was some sort of cloning technology, or perhaps just some sort of video editing/generation technology, but was disappointed to see it's just "co-working" or "physically-present emotional support" if you want to capture the essence of it. Sure, that latter term is a bit wordy, but "body doubling" is IMO just a very strange thing to call this.

Re: Body Doubling

#113

Post by klyrs »

WallyFunk wrote: post #63

I'm reminded of this meme[0]. For me, typing commands into my terminal with someone looking at the screen gives me feelings of power. They assume I'm an elite hacker, but really I'm clearing my bash history. [0] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/what-gives-people-feelings-of...

If you weren't an elite hacker, would you be erasing the record of your activities?

Re: Body Doubling

#114

Post by pixl97 »

unity1001 wrote: post #103
munificent wrote: post #61

There was a thread on Reddit recently asking what leisure time was like for people before radio, TV, and the Internet. Someone mentioned a memoir they'd read from the early 1900s and the part that stuck with them was how social everyone was. After work, people would go to friends houses, putter around town and catch up with neighbors, visit shops where they knew everyone, etc. I can't but think that so many of the ma…

> many of the malaises that people suffer today, which we ascribe as individual psychological problems, are really just a result of how profoundly lonely and isolating media consumption is Media consumption is just a replacement for social interaction. And it exists only because people dont have time and energy left for socialization and other activities after work. Our society is geared towards extracting maximum pr…

>And it exists only because people dont have time and energy left for socialization and other activities after work.

Did people not socialize in the days before worker protections demanded worker protections? I just don't think your reasoning covers the causes well, especially in the suburbanite 40 hour week type that travel by car for an hour+ a day to a single family home.

Media consumption exists because technology has allowed media to show up everywhere at all times very rapidly and we have not had a society wide inoculation to its negative effects.

Re: Body Doubling

#115

Post by klyrs »

golemotron wrote: post #24

Remote office workers reinvent the office.

Not me! My chosen field is what I naturally hyperfocus on, which is the typical recipe for high functioning ADHD. The WFH struggle for me is stopping work.

It's the rest of life that I struggle with, and I've had friends literally come to my house to veg out in front of the TV while I clean. And then, once the kitchen is clean, it's suddenly easy to cook a meal. It's honestly quite embarrassing to need that as an adult, but by making it win-win, I've managed to convince myself to do it. Cool to see that other folks do this.

Re: Body Doubling

#116

Post by autoexec »

Spivak wrote: post #35
autoexec wrote: post #3

from the linked site https://psychcentral.com/adhd/adhd-body-doubling : > “While there’s not a lot of research on ADHD and body doubling, anecdotal clinical reports seem to point to its utility,” Roberts says. Shame this stuff isn't backed by research. Hopefully it gets looked into. I wouldn't be surprised if it's helpful for some people though.

What’s the question you want the research to answer? Because you don’t really need a study to figure out if it works for you. Just try it! Because I can literally feel my understimulation block fade when there’s another person around — it stokes a little guilt and anxiety to get you started and then they act like a pace runner providing some artificial forward momentum. It’s not one of those things where you won’t be…

> What’s the question you want the research to answer?

Is it actually effective at all? Who is it effective/ineffective for? Why is it effective or ineffective for them? How effective is it? How can its effectiveness be optimized? In what other ways can its effectiveness be achieved? What other types of problems can this be used to help with?

Maybe I try it and find that it works, but maybe that's simply a placebo, the way someone might find that crystals or charms help them. It's easy to say it shouldn't matter so long as it works for someone, but I think we'd agree that its better to have things properly researched and understood.

Maybe I try it and it doesn't work but could have with some modifications to accommodate my needs or situation. Maybe a sort of digital avatar or AI works or can work just as well for a body double as a real person! Maybe it even works better than a real person in some cases! How great would it be not to always have to coordinate schedules with another person or impose on their time to get those same benefits! Maybe employers could benefit from pairing people for work in certain tasks!

It's all idle speculation, theory, and guesswork until people put in the time and effort to research it all properly. The anecdotal evidence is encouraging, but only the start.

Re: Body Doubling

#117

Post by klysm »

munificent wrote: post #61

There was a thread on Reddit recently asking what leisure time was like for people before radio, TV, and the Internet. Someone mentioned a memoir they'd read from the early 1900s and the part that stuck with them was how social everyone was. After work, people would go to friends houses, putter around town and catch up with neighbors, visit shops where they knew everyone, etc. I can't but think that so many of the ma…

This is one of the reasons living in a college dorm can be incredibly fun.

Re: Body Doubling

#118

Post by Riseed »

eyelidlessness wrote: post #110
marshmallowmad wrote: post #57

I think this is the reason why in-person work environments will be more productive over the longer term for any larger organization. Not saying I’m against remote work, as I actually prefer it myself.

Surely it’ll depend on many factors: employees’ own preferences, level and sincerity of support-in-principle from leadership, actual working environments, relative distribution of remote vs in-person, level and burden of effort to accommodate mixed teams. I also prefer remote (and have been remote probably 75% of my career). I’m also ADHD, and while I’d never even heard of ”body doubling” by name it’s something I’ve…

To add on to your "helpful sometimes":

As someone else with ADHD, I've found that one of the downfalls of "body doubling" is that it works both ways. Productivity can lead to more productivity because the body double can help me overcome the urge to research woodgas vehicles or the history of bread in Mesoamerica. But the double's lack of focus (e.g. being social, or forced meetings) destroys all focus because it's already enough of a task to manage my own executive functioning in a good environment.

The best balance I've found is remote work (so I am my only distraction), maybe with occasional in-person focused work sessions (à la hackathon), and occasional remote "body doubling" sessions with a friend or internet stranger.

TLDR: Solo remote work is better than attempting body doubling in an office environment, but remote "body doubling" is also occasionally helpful.

Re: Body Doubling

#119

Post by pixl97 »

rospaya wrote: post #93
munificent wrote: post #61

There was a thread on Reddit recently asking what leisure time was like for people before radio, TV, and the Internet. Someone mentioned a memoir they'd read from the early 1900s and the part that stuck with them was how social everyone was. After work, people would go to friends houses, putter around town and catch up with neighbors, visit shops where they knew everyone, etc. I can't but think that so many of the ma…

I don't get it. Do people not do that anymore?

I grew up in the midwest and I remember a lot of non-commercial social events like potlucks that were commonplace. Some based around churches, others family groups, and others friend/community based. Talking to my family that still lives there, the number of these events over the decades has dropped dramatically. In general these types of events were low cost and had high socialization. It is thought by some that the commercialization of leisure [1] in advertising culture gives too much time and importance to high expense low socialization gatherings and focuses on convincing the consumer to consume more media thereby increasing advertising. Many social media outlets are thought to worsen this situation by optimizing to keep clicking an app (anger clicking, parasocial relationships, etc) rather than focusing on closer in person relationships.

So I would say yes, a lot less people meet in person [2]

[1] https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/encyclopedias-almana...

[2] https://theconversation.com/teens-have-less-face-time-with-t...

Re: Body Doubling

#120

Post by afarrell »

411111111111111 wrote: post #75
vorpalhex wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a reminder, you can still do those things. Have a weekly hangout day with friends with no firm plans. Spend time at hobbyist shops on the regular. Play board games with strangers.

It's theoretically possible, but not really if you're honest. People have gotten used to the isolation, so they're not gonna enjoy it if you randomly invite yourself literally every day of the week. You'll need like-minded friends and that's not something you can really "just decided" to change.

The trick is to have a living room and a regular habit of hosting something like “Monday night in” where people come over and just hang out.
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