Turns out, it's stress.  Think about it--not many other members of the animal kingdom suffer from stress-related illnesses, but humans and primates, intelligent and social creatures that they are, have enough spare time (ie, not hunting for food) to actually create stressful situations for themselves.

Robert Sapolsky, a professor of neurological science at Stanford, explains it this way.  "Primates are super smart and organized just enough to devote their free time to being miserable to each other and stressing each other out, but if you get chronically, psychosocially stressed, you're going to compromise your health. So, essentially, we've evolved to be smart enough to make ourselves sick."

To understand why, Sapolsky suggests breaking down what happens during real matter life and death stress, like being chased by something that wants to eat you, versus what your body does when you're stressed out for months on end for purely psychosocial reasons.

In the first case, "You mobilize energy in your thigh muscles, you increase your blood pressure and you turn off everything that's not essential to surviving, such as digestion, growth and reproduction.  You think more clearly, and certain aspects of learning and memory are enhanced. All of that is spectacularly adapted if you're dealing with an acute physical stressor-a real one."

But in the second non-life-threatening case, when you're constantly worrying about money or work, you still trigger the release of adrenalin and other stress hormones, which, over time, can have devastating consequences to your health. Sapolsky again: "If you turn on the stress response chronically for purely psychological reasons, you increase your risk of adult onset diabetes and high blood pressure. If you're chronically shutting down the digestive system, there's a bunch of gastrointestinal disorders you're more at risk for as well.  Furthermore...neurons in the parts of the brain relating to learning, memory and judgment don't function as well under stress."

So why bring baboons into all of this? Turns out they make great groups for stress-related research.  Sapolsky explains, "The reason baboons are such good models is, like us, they don't have real stressors.  If you live in a baboon troop...you only have to work three hours a day for your calories, and...you've got nine hours of free time every day to devote to generating psychological stress toward other animals in your troop. So the baboon is a wonderful model for living well enough and long enough to pay the price for all the social-stressor nonsense that they create for each other. They're just like us: They're not getting done in by predators and famines, they're getting done in by each other." 

One of the tools we've got to combat stress that baboons largely lack is behavioral flexibility and multiple social outlets.  While someone may be low on the totem pole at work, that same person can be captain of their bowling team or lead volunteer at a food bank.  What Sapolsky is finding, after a decade's worth of research, "is the recognition that protection from stress-related disease is most powerfully grounded in social connectedness, and that's far more important than rank."

Basically, if you make it to the top alone, but get there by stepping on people's heads, you're not doing your heart or blood pressure any favors. 

This is where Recess comes in.  Not only are the activities and classes Recess provides, fun stuff like yoga, pilates, group exercise and cooking, good stress reducers in themselves, having another social outlet for your employees is good for their long-term prevention of stress-related illnesses, and thus, for the health of your company. 




But we know how it is.  Maybe your company already has well established groups and roles within those groups.  Things are going fine and there's no reason for change.  Or even if things aren't fine, what could change such deeply ingrained habits anyway? 

For those of you in this boat, take a listen to this excerpt from a RadioLab show on change.

Sapolsky makes an appearance again, this time talking about one particular baboon troop he observed over a long period of time.  This troop, like all baboon troops, was lead by violent alpha males who called all the shots.  That is, until an unexpected outside force shook up the leadership roles.  Suddenly, the troop became more peaceful, grooming increased, and the baboons became more social with each other.  Now, 20 years later, this troop remains peaceful and calm, while troops around them continue to function through constant violence and aggression. 

Is your office in need of a gentle shake from an outside force?  Recess can shake things up in the best possible way--burning calories, creating new social connections, and lowering stress for the long term.  But no, we won't take fries with that shake.  Or soda.