Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

Making a VooDoo Doll of Your Boss May Make You Happier at Work

According to a recent study, workers are happier and perform better on cognitive tests after abusing a voodoo-doll likeness of their boss.

Has your boss ever asked you to stay late? Take over someone else’s project? Or make do with an impossibly small budget? Have you at times fantasized about creating a voodoo doll in their likeness?

As it turns out, science says that’s exactly what you should be doing.


According to a study published in February in The Leadership Quarterly, a couple hundred full-time employees in the U.S. and Canada who had felt wronged or mistreated by their supervisors were asked to complete a cognitive test. First, however, one group was asked to visualize the incident and then abuse an online effigy of their boss. The workers poked the voodoo doll with pins, burned it with a candle and pinched it with pliers.

As the study reports, the participants who took their frustrations out on the online voodoo doll not only felt “lower feelings of injustice” and were “far less likely to still feel bitter” about their boss; they also performed better on the cognitive test. Similar results were found in a follow-up study performed with business-school students who had some work experience.

“We wanted to see, rather than actually retaliating against the abusive boss, whether mistreated employees could benefit from harmless acts of symbolic retaliation,” study author Dr. Lindie Liang, of Lazaridis School of Business and Economics at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada, told The Telegraph.

The findings probably would not surprise most psychologists, as many studies over the years have found that the No. 1 contributor to human happiness is a sense of autonomy, or the belief that one has some control over one’s life.

“When a subordinate receives abusive treatment from a supervisor, a natural response is to retaliate against the supervisor,” reads the Leadership Quarterly study. “Although retaliation is dysfunctional and should be discouraged, we examine the potential functional role retaliation plays in terms of alleviating the negative consequences of abusive supervision on subordinate justice perceptions.”

Even if burning an effigy of the boss with a candle doesn’t have as direct an effect as, say, telling the boss exactly how they feel, the ritual itself can still help individuals feel they’ve exacted revenge, thus contributing to their internal sense of control.

“As weird as it sounds…,” Liang told The Telegraph,  “we found a simple and harmless symbolic act of retaliation can make people feel like they're getting even and restoring their sense of fairness. It may not have to be a voodoo doll per se: theoretically anything that serves as a symbolic act of retaliation, like throwing darts at a picture of your boss, might work. Symbolically retaliating against an abusive boss can benefit employees psychologically by allowing them to restore their sense of justice in the workplace.”

Looking to enact some safe revenge? The study participants used the “Virtual Voodoo Doll” on Dumb.com, but physical versions abound on Etsy.com, with many vendors able to include an actual photo of your boss’s face, or specific details like a tie or custom hairdo.

More from News

Halle Berry Hilariously Trolls Ex-Husband After His Comments About Her Not Being 'Motherly'
Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for Joylux & Playground; Paul Archuleta/Getty Images

Halle Berry Hilariously Trolls Ex-Husband After His Comments About Her Not Being 'Motherly'

Halle Berry's ex-husband, former MLB star David Justice, recently had a lot to say about why he divorced her back in the '90s—and Berry is giving it right back.

Justice sparked quite a bit of controversy online last week when he told the host of podcast All the Smoke that he divorced Berry because she wasn't "motherly" enough and didn't cook or clean to his liking at the time.

Keep ReadingShow less
Jennifer Welch
@ivehaditpodcast/YouTube

Podcast Host Goes On NSFW Rant About 'Triple Trump' Voters—And It's Truly A Must-See

Oklahoma based interior designer, former Bravolebrity, and podcast host Jennifer Welch had some harsh words for White voters who supported Donald Trump in 2016, 2020, and 2024.

The designer gained national attention after being featured on the Bravo show Sweet Home Oklahoma—retitled just Sweet Home for season two—in 2017. Welch now hosts the I've Had It podcast alongside her Sweet Home costar Angie "Pumps" Sullivan.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshot of Elon Musk
Fox News

Elon Musk Gets Blistering Reminder After Ranting About The Sun Destroying Life On Earth

Billionaire Elon Musk was given a blunt reminder about what will actually destroy life on Earth after he claimed in an interview with Fox News personality Jesse Watters that he's he's looking to colonize Mars and other planets because the Sun will eventually destroy life on Earth

The Sun, our life-sustaining star, is essentially a massive nuclear reactor, continuously converting hydrogen into helium through fusion and radiating energy outward. But like all stars, it has a finite lifespan. Scientists estimate that the Sun will exhaust its core hydrogen supply in about five billion years, marking the beginning of the end of its stable life.

Keep ReadingShow less
AG Pam Bondi, sandwich throwing man outside Subway in Washington, D.C.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images; Andrew Leyden/Getty Images

Bondi Makes Bizarre Claim About Fired DOJ Staffer Who Threw Sandwich At Border Patrol Agent In DC

Attorney General Pam Bondi was called out after she claimed she'd fired a Justice Department employee because he was part of the "deep state" after he threw a Subway sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection officer in Washington, D.C., over the weekend.

Court documents identify the man as Sean Dunn, who allegedly shouted profanities at a group of officers before tossing a “submarine-style sandwich” at a Customs and Border Protection agent standing at a busy intersection on Sunday. Dunn was employed by Office of International Affairs within the department's Criminal Division as a paralegal.

Keep ReadingShow less
Man and woman in bed
Photo by Toa Heftiba on Unsplash

People Who Slept With An Ex's Sibling Break Down The Aftermath

Though everyone has different thresholds for what is acceptable in a relationship and what they're okay with experiencing, there are certain things that are generally no-nos, like cheating, dating someone's best friend, and dating someone's family member.

But there are exceptions to everything.

Keep ReadingShow less