Person
Amy Cuddy
Psychologist; author
Psychologist known for her widely-viewed TED Talk on "power posing" — the claim that holding an expansive body posture for two minutes measurably raises testosterone, lowers cortisol, and increases risk tolerance. Referenced (not interviewed) in Episode 141, where Pete Judo states power posing has been comprehensively disproven under later scrutiny, and that Cuddy herself no longer endorses the original claim. See Replicability Crisis.
Discussed again in Episode 195 with the original study's specific figures: 42 participants, an 86%-versus-60% gambling-willingness gap between high- and low-power poses, and a roughly 20% testosterone rise (versus a 10% decrease) — figures that drove a TED talk viewed over 71 million times, despite a sample size too small to support the claims, and despite one of Cuddy's own co-authors later disavowing the finding (see Amy Cuddy Power-Pose Study).
Discussed in
- Episode 141 — 141-emergency-pod-harvard-fake-data-scandal
- Episode 195 — 195-the-lying-psychologist-who-fooled-the-world