How Competition Affects Your Brain

We all might have at different stages in our lives encountered people who can be described as ‘born competitors’. It could be that colleague hell-bent on beating everyone else on the quarterly sales targets, that classmate who will stop at nothing to top the class in a favorite subject, or even a sibling that wants to outdo the rest in all sorts of family engagements. While this might give the impression that there are some people who are naturally competitive and others who are not, this is not the case. As research by Texas-based clinical psychologist Craig Dike reveals, competition has been at the core of the survival of the human species, driving both our biological and psychological evolution. In fact, an examination of hominid skulls from the past two million years by researchers at the University of Missouri concluded that social competition was the biggest cause of increased cranial capacity of humans, partly explaining why the size of the human brain has tripled over that period as compared to other mammals. While climate change and ecological demands also contributed to the increasing brain capacity in humans, the research findings suggest that areas with higher population density were associated with bigger skulls (hence greater brain capacity). A possible explanation offered for this positive association was that higher population density resulted in greater intensity of social competition for necessities and status, and having a bigger brain helped early humans survive in such situations. This shows that competition has a physical impact on the brain. Now, an even more relatable incidence of human competition is in sporting activities of all levels. There is the thrill of the sport itself and the glory of winning that spurs participants into a struggle to outdo each other. Think of a time you participated in […]

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