Observer > 2018 > July/August

Science in San Francisco

Coverage of the 30th APS Annual Convention

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Volume 31, Issue6July/August 2018
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Published 6 times per year by the Association for Psychological Science, the Observer educates and informs on matters affecting the research, academic, and applied disciplines of psychology; promotes the scientific values of APS members; reports on issues of international interest to the psychological science community; and provides a vehicle for the dissemination on information about APS.

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    Technology is not just changing the way people interact with the world, it’s also changing the way scientists study human behavior and the brain. New technologies are allowing psychological scientists to take their research out of the lab and “into the wild,” where theories can be tested in real world settings. San Francisco is a world-famous hub of technology, and a fitting locale for a symposium on research on tech and the human experience. In a Cross-Cutting Theme Program at the 30th APS Annual Convention, speakers presented interdisciplinary work on the ways technology shapes learning, attention, behavior, and our social lives from childhood through old age.

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  • Preparing Teachers for the Unexpected

    A month into her first job at an elementary school, a newly minted teacher encountered a situation her master’s degree in education had never prepared her for: a 7-year-old girl who, seemingly at random, would get up out of her seat and start spinning in a corner of the classroom. No one in any of her education classes had ever mentioned how to deal with a “spinner,” she told APS Fellow Daniel T. Willingham, a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, and yet, when Willingham brought her predicament up with the other elementary school teachers he encountered through his work in educational psychology, they knew exactly the behavior she was talking about.

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