At least an unchecked ego benefits someone.

Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University had an interesting news release headline today:

Boosting Self-Esteem Can Backfire in Decision-Making

According to the release, the group’s research indicates that previously-received praise can make an employee recommit to a bad decision rather than admit a mistake and try a new approach.

I’m sure there’s some truth to that – lots of people don’t like to admit mistakes.

I once assembled an IKEA armoire so that it was unquestionably crooked and whenever someone pointed it out, I said, “Well of course it looks like it’s leaning when you’re looking at it from over there – at a distance!”

But my insistence had more to do with me being completely stubborn and less to do with someone complimenting me on a job well done on the nightstand the day before.

Here’s the thing: some people are just plain bad at admitting mistakes. And other people are bad at realizing that their employees are bad decision-makers.

So maybe the best thing to do isn’t necessarily to question the effect of doling out praise or compliments, but just not let the person in question make any more decisions.

After all, isn’t that the Kellogg School’s main message:

“In one study, participants, acting as senior managers of a large investment bank, received feedback about how rational they were before revisiting a hiring decision. After learning that the person they had hired was not working out, they overwhelmingly recommended spending additional time and money on training, rather than simply acknowledging the poor decision and cutting their losses,” reads the release.

In that case, I hope someone keeps inflating the ego. At least someone wins.

Books are dangerous.

My mother used to joke that I could hurt myself doing just about anything.

She’s right. I once put on hand lotion before attempting to do a triceps dip on my coffee table and I slipped right off the edge and hit the back of my head on the way down.

“Do you have a concussion?” my mother asked, clearly more annoyed than concerned.

She had to ask me things like that a lot while I was growing up and I’m sure the trip to the emergency room was not her proudest moment as a parent.

But at least – at least – I'm not like 80% of college students who claim to have physically hurt themselves on a text book.

According to a new study conducted by Zogby International on behalf of CafeScribe.com, “Many of the 600 students surveyed reported potentially serious health issues as the result of buying, reading, carrying, or using a textbook…”

It seems I really lucked out. I bought textbooks all through college and I never managed to injure myself on them.

Not even when I put them on my coffee table.

A spoonful of smart.

Two women in my shared workspace were comparing the nutritional value of two types of instant oatmeal today.

Carb-for-carb, I think the Quaker packet came out on top.

At the time they were talking, I could be observed eating peanut butter by the tablespoon right out of the jar.

It seems they didn’t get the message from the University of Pittsburgh and the University of California.

Never mind all those details about Omega-this and fleshy fish-that or the fact that the research didn’t really do anything besides correlate being "curvy" and having “higher” test scores – it turns out that being fat can make your kids smart.

Does your oatmeal do that?