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Single, childless and want work-life balance? How taboo
The Washington Post: The Yahoo no-work-from-home brouhaha had working moms up in arms last week. Professional women with children had been dealt a blow, they said. Oh, and as one writer reminded us, it’s an issue for working dads, too. Okay, but what about all the single people? And all the people without kids? We need to stop acting like they’re not part of the work-life conversation. Whether it’s our pets or our parents, our health or our education, there are many facets of our lives besides children that, thanks to work, get short shrift.
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Our brains, and how they’re not as simple as we think
The Guardian: I never used to discuss neuroscience on the bus but it's happened twice in the last month. On one occasion a fellow passenger mentioned that her "brain wasn't working properly" to explain that she had gone through a long period of depression. On another, an exchange student enthusiastically told me that one of the advantages of learning abroad is that a new language "made your brain more efficient". In each case, the conversation was spattered with references to the brain as casually as we mention family members– "I don't think my brain can handle multi-tasking" gliding between us as easily as "my cousin studied in Paris".
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‘Queen Bee’ stereotype in the workplace is a rarity
TODAY: Jing Wang Herman has plenty of experience as the lone female in the office. Currently the CEO for the USA operations of GetTaxi.com, Wang Herman previously racked up eight years on Wall Street, landed on a Forbes 30 Under 30 list - and earned her taxi driver’s license. “I’m always in male-dominated environments. I don’t even realize it anymore,” she said. As she climbed the corporate ladder, her mentors have been men, a fact of little consequence, said Wang Herman, whose tech company makes an app to hail and pay taxis. “To me, mentoring is gender neutral.” Some might wonder if she’s a Queen Bee, a powerful, conniving woman who undermines competing females.
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For frustrated bad boys, violent video games become more alluring
Los Angeles Times: Are people playing violent video games blowing off steam, or are they developing habits of violence that may play themselves out off-screen? In the wake of a wave of school shootings that have touched off debate about the roots of violence, those are more than academic questions. The second of those questions -- do video games promote violent behavior -- remains a matter of fierce debate. But a new study does offer some evidence to answer the first -- whether violent video games provide an outlet for negative feelings such as anger or frustration.
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Why a good deed sometimes leads to bad behavior
NBC: Doing a good deed can lead some people to more kind acts while spurring others to backslide. But how people respond depends on their moral outlook, according to a new study. People who believe the ends justify the means are likelier to offset good deeds with bad ones and vice versa. By contrast, those who believe right and wrong are defined by principle, not outcome, tend to be more consistent, even if they're behaving unethically. The findings were published Feb. 27 in the journal Psychological Science.
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How to Defuse a Hateful Slur
The Huffington Post: Well, now we have a psychological explanation for this counterintuitive phenomenon of self-labeling. Columbia University psychological scientist Adam Galinsky and his colleagues have come up with an elaborate model to illuminate self-disparagement -- its origins, intentions, and consequences. The scientists ran ten experiments to begin documenting this novel theory. It all has to do with power, and perceptions of power, in society. If social power is control over valuable resources, Galinsky argues, then self-labeling is the act of controlling words and their meaning.
