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Brain on Sports Podcast: The athletic payoffs of positive body language
Sports Illustrated: “This is Your Brain on Sports” is a new podcast from Sports Illustrated in which SI executive editor Jon Wertheim and Tufts University psychology professor Sam Sommers explore the intersection of sports and human nature—what the world of sports has to teach us about who we are, what we care about, and the forces that shape our behavior. In this week’s episode, Sommers is joined by Dr. Amy Cuddy, a world-renowned expert in body language, to discuss the subconscious messages the body sends and how those physical messages can shape the mental sharpness of top athletes. Read the whole story: Sports Illustrated
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How helping kids with their math homework can make them worse off
Quartz: It’s understandable that parents worry about their children’s math performance, even at a very young age, and that they try to help. But they may need to start thinking about how they help; according to a new study in Psychological Science, the more that anxious parents try to help their kids with math homework, the more harm they do. “When parents have a poor relation with math and frequently help their children with their homework, their children learn less math,” write the researchers, led by Erin Maloney at the University of Chicago. Read the whole story: Quartz
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Who Apes Whom?
The New York Times: WHEN I learned last week about the discovery of an early human relative deep in a cave in South Africa, I had many questions. Obviously, they had dug up a fellow primate, but of what kind? The fabulous find, named Homo naledi, has rightly been celebrated for both the number of fossils and their completeness. It has australopithecine-like hips and an ape-size brain, yet its feet and teeth are typical of the genus Homo. ... News reports spoke of a “new ancestor,” even a “new human species,” assuming a ladder heading our way, whereas what we are actually facing when we investigate our ancestry is a tangle of branches.
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Extraverted Populations Have Lower Savings Rates
Particular personality traits may have a powerful influence on a country’s economic outlook, according to new research. Across three studies, University of Toronto psychological scientist Jacob Hirsh found that populations that tend to have higher levels of extraversion are less likely to save for the future. Hirsh argues that understanding this link between personality and economic behavior will become even more essential as the world’s aging population begins to retire. High levels of debt accompanied by low savings pose national economic risks, including vulnerability to economic downturns and higher levels of unemployment.
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When Trauma Isn’t Traumatic
Longitudinal data collected from university students suggest that exposure to an acute trauma may be linked with an improvement in symptoms of anxiety or depression for some individuals. The research, led by Anthony Mancini of Pace University and co-authors Heather Littleton of East Carolina University and Amie E. Grills of Boston University, investigated human resilience in the wake of the Virginia Tech shooting that occurred in 2007. The shooting left 33 people dead (including the shooter) and 25 others injured, making it the most deadly civilian shooting in U.S. history.
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How Effective Is Telecommuting? Assessing the Status of Our Scientific Findings
Psychological Science in the Public Interest (Volume 16, Number 2) Read the Full Test (PDF, HTML) The term telecommuting was first coined in the early 1970s, and since that time the number of people taking advantage of the ability to work remotely has grown dramatically. By 1997, more than 100,000 U.S. federal employees were telecommuting, and by 2014, more than 3.3 million U.S. workers reported their home as their primary place of work. This number is only expected to grow as a result of the increasingly global nature of our economic and employment systems.
