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Teens’ Memory for Faces Shifts Toward Peers During Puberty
Adolescents begin to view faces differently as they prepare for the transition to adulthood, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. "We know that faces convey a lot of different social information, and the ability to perceive and interpret this information changes through development,” explained psychological scientist Suzy Scherf of Penn State, senior author on the study.
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You’re Joking: Detecting Sarcasm in Emails Isn’t Easy
“Well, that meeting was a really fantastic use of my time.” You may want to think twice before hitting send on that email with a sarcastic joke – regardless of whether your boss or your work buddies are on the receiving end. New research investigating how we determine the emotional content of text is showing that people have a very hard time catching on to sarcasm in emails and texts. This means that written communications aren’t the best medium for making a well-meaning joke; people often interpret a friendly riff as being overtly negative, or they don’t catch the sarcastic tone at all and assume a caustic jibe is actually praise.
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Exploring How Women’s Reproductive Health and Mental Health Intersect
Throughout their lives, women’s risk for various mental health problems fluctuates along with reproductive changes, yet research in psychological science seldom investigates the intersection of reproductive health and mental health. A special series in Clinical Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, addresses these intersecting issues directly, presenting a collection of research articles that takes a multilevel, integrative view of women’s mental health in the context of reproductive development.
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Yours or Mine? How We Handle Objects Depends on Who Owns Them
From scissors and staplers to car keys and cell phones, we pass objects to other people every day. We often try to pass the objects so that the handle or other useful feature is facing the appropriate direction for the person receiving the item, but new research shows that we’re less accommodating when it comes to handing over our own belongings. The findings are published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. “The associations or attachments that we have with an object leak into our movements in unintended ways when we interact with them,” says psychology researcher and study author Merryn Constable of the University of Toronto.
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People Prefer Hiring “Naturals” Over Hardworking “Strivers”
When deciding which candidate to hire or what company to invest in, do we favor someone who has a history of hard work and perseverance or the hotshot with a natural talent? Findings from three studies conducted by University College London professor Chia-Jung Tsay suggest that when assessing people with equivalent levels of achievement and success, we’re predisposed to judge someone who’s a “natural” as more talented, more hirable, and more likely to succeed than someone who’s a “striver.” “[T]here exists the belief that certain achievements cannot be explained solely by perseverance and hard work—that natural talent plays a role, and some ‘have it’ and others ‘do not,’” Tsay writes.
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The Right Music Can Bring Teams Together
A team researchers finds evidence that what we’re listening to at work might influence how willing we are to cooperate with coworkers.
