Mind Your Lucky Charms

Our brain is continuously trying to predict what will happen next by finding connections between our actions and how the environment or our own body reacts to them. If a reaction is particularly hefty, whether positive of negative, we pay special attention to that event. This mechanism, which we all use, might explain how rituals and superstitions form. Sects and gurus exploit these effects. But this is also how marketing and politics influence our behavior; the latest keywords for this are "framing" and "nudging." However, as Rebecca Böhme shows, we can also utilize these same effects to our own benefit, giving the lucky charm inside us an opportunity to give and putting its abilities to the test to show what it can do. Even so, keeping and caring for a lucky charm is complicated. But, compiling the best tips that science has on offer right now, as the message of this book goes: it's worth it.

Rebecca Böhme is a neuroscientist and researcher at the Center for Social and Affective Neuroscience in Linköping, Sweden. C.H. Beck has published the following of her works: "Human Touch: Warum körperliche Nähe so wichtig ist" (Human Touch: Why Physical Closeness is So Important; 2019); "Resilienz: Die psychische Widerstandskraft" (Resilience: The Power of Psychological Resistance; 2019).