July 2009

 

What is it leads us to change? Do we just suddenly wake up one morning and decide to change? Do we change because we want to or because we have to?

 

Don Beck & Chris Cowan (1996), co-developers of Spiral Dynamics, identified 7 factors which are part of the change process. Beck (2009) later identified another 3 factors; and this article will use Beck’s 10 factors to set a broad frame for understanding change and how and why it takes place.

 

1. Potential

The individual - or, for that matter, the organisation - has to have the capability to change. Beck & Cowan, from the seminal work of Clare W Graves, identified that someone could be in one of 3 states:-

• Open to the possibilities of change - they are ready for something new. The Open state is often characterised by the acceptance that change is inevitable and a relatively non-judgemental tolerance of differences.
• Arrested - caught up so much in their present way of thinking and being that change - without the introduction of dissonance - simply will not occur. This is particularly so if the way of thinking the dominant vMEME creates suits the individual’s temperamental mix - I call this a centre of gravity - eg: a Phlegmatic individual is kept safe and secure by PURPLE; or RED’s need for excitement is fuelled by the impulsivity of Psychoticism. Organisations can get trapped in an Arrested state when there are not the resources (people, finance) to enable change. The Arrested state can be changed; but it will often require considerable intervention into whatever Life Conditions are facilitating the person or organisation staying in the Arrested state. If some dissonance is introduced but not enough to bring about a major change in thinking, then some degree of 1st Order Change may be possible.
• Closed to change, with serious ‘blockages’. The ‘blockages’ could be emotional - some excruciating trauma quite possibly repressed - or physiological - eg: neural damage in the brain or out-of-control hormone and/or neurotransmitter fluctuations. Closed thinking is often characterised by inappropriateness and an inability to adapt to changing Life Conditions, the unwillingness to accept any other viewpoint and over-the-top reactions to frustration.

 

2. Current problems resolved

Beck & Cowan state, that for change to new ways of thinking to take place to resolve a new problem, the existing problem set  facing the person or organisation is faced with need to be resolved. In other words, for a new vMEME to emerge in the selfplex  the  vMEME currently dominant in the selfplex’s vMEME stack has to have done its job in terms of those Life Conditions it was emerged to deal with. This principle of needing to deal with current problems before being able to tackle new and more complex problems was first articulated by Abraham Maslow with the original Hierarchy of Needs (1943). However, Graves (1970) and Beck & Cowan emphasise the importance of context. Clearly we can deal with multiple problems of different complexity provided they are in different contexts.

 

The idea that you have to resolve the current problem set in one context before being free to engage fully with a further problem set is reflected in Fritz & Laura Perls’ Gestalt Cycle  - documented by Fritz Perls, Ralph Hefferline & Paul Goodman, 1951). Only when the current problem set is resolved, are your senses free to withdraw from that issue and take on further issues. In Maslowian terms...if you are starving to the point where you are distressed, the quality of friendships available to you will matter little until your hunger is abated.

3. Dissonance

There has to be dissatisfaction with the present mode of existence. That dissatisfaction could be of the negative type – ie: you’re under threat and you will suffer if you don’t change – triggering a Move Away From meta-programme.Or the dissatisfaction could be of the more positive type - ie: you’re made aware of something that appeals to you sufficiently for you to change to get it, triggering a Move Towards meta-programme.

 

To take the issue of dissonance from the start, let’s work with concepts from Richard Atkinson & Richard Shifrin’s  (1968) Multi-Store Model of Memory.

 

Through our 5 senses information hits the sensory memory stores at a phenomenal rate – see Linked Models of Memory. This data is lost almost immediately unless we pay attention to it – which causes it  to enter short-term memory (consciouness).

 

 

Graphic adopted from a format by Christopher Cooke

In terms of the Gestalt Cycle,  Perls states that we are programmed to notice difference more than sameness. From an Evolutionary perspective, it would be adaptive to pay attention more to something different than something familiar - in case that ‘something different’ is either a threat or a desired opportunity. So the data in the sensory memory stores is paid attention to and enters consciousness more if it is different. Thus, Sensation becomes Awareness.

 

The entering of consciousness affects us both physiologically and cognitively. Awareness creates a Mobilisation of Energy, leading to Excitement. As the sensory relay station of the thalamus has a neurological ‘hot wire’ to the amygdala, perception of either threat or something desirable will produce some degree of stress reaction, resulting in arousal of the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system. Thus, we experience ‘fear’ or ‘excitement’, perhaps accompanied by a faster heartbeat, more agitated breathing, greater muscle tension and feelings of ‘nerves’, etc. As the limbic system has a much faster reaction than the evaluative circuits of the frontal cortex, if the amygdala’s reaction to the data entering consciousness is extreme, then there may well be physiological reaction  eg: running or fighting - way ahead of the cognitive evaluation being completed.

 

Richard Lazarus (1976) is just one psychologist who has looked at the cognitive aspects of the stress reaction from a transactional point of view, with 2 factors:-

1. How great is the threat or opportunity?
2. How capable am I of dealing with the threat or seizing the opportunity?

 

How great the stress reaction is, according to Lazarus, will depend on the balance between these 2 factors.

 

Going back to the Gestalt Cycle, Lazarus’ evaluative measures bring us to the Cycle’s 2 mains stress points:-

1. Do I know what to do? (Can I take Action?)
2. Knowing what to do, am I able to do it? (Can I make Contact with the issue?)

 

Sticking at either point will result in more dissonance and, therefore, more stress.

 

And if there is no dissonance…?

 

In his Logical Levels of Learning model, Gregory Bateson (1972) identifies that at Level 0 there is no learning. The existing response is sufficient in the context. In other words, there is no dissonance to bring about change. So nothing is learned. There is no dissonance involved with the task to produce the stress that  induces learning.

 

An example of this might be driving the same way to work at the same time each day or taking a repeat order from an established customer. Unless something goes wrong, you can pretty much do this kind of thing on ‘automatic pilot’.

 

One of the reasons people tend to make mistakes on routine tasks is that, because it is mere repetition, there is too low a level of physiological arousal.

 

The role of dissonance is vital to change. Beck & Cowan refer to this dissonance as the Beta State in the Spiral Dynamics model of change, having moved from the ‘comfort zone’ of the Alpha State.

 

 

 

4. Insight  

If insight into causes of the problem and what to do is/becomes available, then change is possible. To change requires learning.

 

If change is possible within the existing paradigm -  Bateson calls this Learning Level 1 – and it leads, according to Beck & Cowan, to 1st Order Change. Beck identifies 3 basic types of 1st Order Change:-

• Fine Tune - tighten things up – eg: if goods inward test sampling lets in an unacceptable number of defective supplies, increase the sampling rate.
• Reform - find a different way of doing what you’re doing, to see if that is more effective.
• Upgrade - improve your means of doing things with better resources.

 

In many instances 1st Order Change will be enough to resolve the dissonance, taking you from Beta into the New Alpha.

 

Failure of 1st Order Change means there needs to be a paradigm shift. Typically this involves going up or down the Spiral in terms of which vMEME dominates in the selfplex’s vMEME Stack. More often than not, first try is lower down. For example, when the police fail to impose order – thus, failing BLUE’s needs – RED will get stronger to compensate and take the law into its own hands.

 

When going down doesn’t work because the situation is too complex for it, then going up the Spiral is the way to go. Beck & Cowan call this ‘Upshift’.

 

2nd Order Change may involve ‘stretching down’ or ‘stretching up’ to use the language and behaviours of the vMEME which is not usually in charge of the selfplex in that context. Sufficient stretching up or down to use the language of and behaviour of another vMEME can result in settling into that vMEME’s way of thinking and behaving so that it becomes dominant in the vMEME Stack.

 

This is Bateson Level 2 learning – challenging mindsets - which produces 2nd Order Evolution.

 

If someone experiences stress as a result of dissonance but cannot see how to respond satisfactorily in the situation – the first of Perls’ sticking points - then that stress will become acute. This, according to Beck & Cowan, is the Gamma Trap.

 

This is a horrible state to be in and can lead to Clinical Depression, psychoses and complete mental breakdown – with even the risk of suicide. At an organisational level, this can lead to dysfunctionality and failure – usually occurring at what Ichak Adizes (1988) refers to as the Pathological Go-Go or Recriminations stages on the Organisation LifeCycle.

 

No one yet understands yet quite how it happens but sometimes the sheer stress of the Gamma Trap will cause people to change dramatically and access vMEMES that weren’t previously available in their stack. It’s almost as if dormant neural circuitry were switched on suddenly! All of a sudden, you can see how to  do it – the insight is there and you can ‘Break Out’ in a ‘Delta Surge’ (Beck & Cowan) to go to the New Alpha. Bateson calls this kind of learning Level 3 and acknowledges

Spiral Dynamics model of change

Bateson Learning Levels mapped to Spiral Dynamics

that the change in thinking may be unlanguageable... mystical in nature, even. Beck & Cowan term the results 2nd Order Revolution. In some cases the change may be so violent that a person could access 2 or more new MEMES at once – ie: a ‘Quantum Leap’. (There is some disagreement here between Beck and Cowan, with Cowan’s position being that the multiple vMEMES are not actually accessed simultaneously but in very rapid succession.)