The game waiting

Cast your mind back to when you were last waiting for news. Whether it was feedback from an interview letting you know if you’d been successful in getting your dream job, news about important medical results, or perhaps the grade on a career-defining exam, the chances are that the period of waiting itself was not particularly happy.

‘What’s really torturous is the combination of not knowing what’s coming and not being able to do much – or anything at all – about it,’ says Professor Kate Sweeny of the University of California, who has made a study of waiting, looking at both health and academic tests.

In the past, I’ve let this kind of situation undermine my peace of mind by thinking of what I should have done better; by worrying about the possible outcome; and even by trying to read something into the timing of the result’s arrival, as I stand in the hallway furiously tearing open