Your source for the latest psychological research.


When Voting, Political Preferences Outweigh the Evidence

Supporters of a political measure are more influenced by their initial preferences than cold, hard evidence suggesting that the measure won’t go their way, according to new research published in the May 2013 issue of Psychological Science.

Yet Zlatan Krizan of Iowa State University and Kate Sweeny of the University of California, Riverside were interested in determining how people’s expectations, preferences, and political knowledge about a legislative bill might change in the weeks preceding a vote. They also wanted to know how people on both sides of the issue would feel after the final decision was made.

The researchers took advantage of a specific legislative bill in California that was debated in 2010 — the bill, titled California Proposition 19, would legalize cannabis for recreational use. The researchers asked 158 Californian participants…

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Perspectives Celebrates 25 Years of APS

APS is turning 25 — to celebrate, upcoming issues of Perspectives on Psychological Science will feature special sections that look back at the last 25 years of our field.

As Perspectives editor Barbara A. Spellman observes in her introduction to the first special section in the May issue, the field of psychological science has seen some huge changes since 1988:

“There are now research and statistical tools that did not exist then; theoretical perspectives that have arisen or disappeared; and entire fields of inquiry that have been born, merged, split, renamed, and disbanded.”

According to Spellman, the special sections will include two types of articles. A series of longer articles will deeply examine changes in a research area that have occurred since at least 1988, and shorter articles by prominent researchers — many of them William James or…

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2013 Swag in DC

Attendees will be snagging APS swag in the Exhibit Hall at this year’s Convention.

Visit the APS Booth for free pens, pocket buddy notebooks, hand sanitizers, experiMINTs to freshen your breath, “Risky Business” sunglasses, a variety of APS buttons, and 2014 Convention magnets for the 26th APS Annual Convention in San Francisco, California.

Don’t miss APS’s “shock box” t-shirts based on Stanley Milgram’s groundbreaking experiments on obedience to authority. The t-shirts commemorate the Milgram shock box’s trip to DC.

We will also be selling “Don’t think about this mug” mugs and “Don’t think about this t-shirt” t-shirts as a tribute to Harvard psychologist Daniel Wegner’s work on ironic process theory, also known as the “white bear phenomenon.” The theory describes the process whereby suppressing a certain…

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Stay Connected at the 25th APS Annual Convention

The 25th APS Annual Convention is fast approaching! Download our mobile app, and stay connected with up-to-date convention information at your fingertips.

The App is available on iPhone, iPad, and Android. Once downloaded, no Internet connectivity is required, though updates do require an Internet connection, which APS is providing free at the Convention.

To download:

You can search for “APS2013″ in your phone’s App Store or direct your device’s browser here.

Don’t have a smart phone or tablet? No problem! Use the web version of the App.

Once you’ve downloaded the App, here’s how to use it:

Manage Your Schedule

To view your schedule, just tap on the “Schedule” icon in the menu at the bottom of your screen.

To add an item to…

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Super-Smart Kids Become Super-Successful Adults

Students with profound mathematical and verbal reasoning skills at age 13 garner more awards, gather more grant money, have more patents, write more prolifically, are more likely to graduate with doctoral degrees, and are more likely to hold tenured positions at the best universities in the world, according to new research published in Psychological Science.

Psychological scientists Harrison Kell, David Lubinski, and Camilla Benbow of Vanderbilt University were interested in finding out just how successful super smart 13-year-olds would be later in life.

The researchers kept track of 320 adolescents who scored in at least the top 1% in mathematical and verbal reasoning ability on the SAT in the early 1980s, and they followed up with the participants more recently, when they were 38 years…

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