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Brain scans of passengers on near-disastrous Air Transat flight studied
The Globe and Mail: Brain scans of passengers who believed they were about to die when their plane ran out of fuel over the Atlantic in 2001 are helping researchers better understand traumatic memories. Air Transat Flight 236, bound for Lisbon from Toronto on Aug. 24, 2001, crash-landed in the Azores after gliding powerless over the ocean for 30 minutes. Some of the 306 passengers and crew on board developed post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, as a result of the terrifying scare.
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The SCOTUS Fair Housing Act Decision a Welcome & Needed Win Following Racial Tragedy
The Huffington Post: It was in the wake of the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr. in April 1968 that President Lyndon Johnson signed into law a major pillar of U.S. civil rights legislation, the Fair Housing Act. Nearly 50 years later, it is in the wake of the murders of nine Black worshippers in Charleston, South Carolina at the hands of a reported white supremacist that the Supreme Court recently ruled to uphold it. The 5-4 decision last week in Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. The Inclusive Communities Project is both a surprising and necessary win on the road toward racial justice.
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US Supreme Court Recognizes Role of Unconscious Bias in Disparate Treatment
Most people aim to treat others with fairness and equality -- and yet, research from psychological science shows that, despite our best intentions, our behavior is often influenced by subtle biases that operate outside our conscious awareness. In an historic decision on the Fair Housing Act issued last week, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy acknowledged that such implicit biases have the potential to be just as damaging as more explicit motivations, noting that housing policies can be considered discriminatory even without evidence of overt discriminatory intent.
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For Job Interviews, Earlier in the Day May Be Better
During a job interview, many applicants worry that their professional fate rests in the first few moments of the interview. After a few minutes—or even seconds—the interviewer has sized them up and arrived at a decision. But new research suggests that there may be a different factor for job candidates to worry about: timing. Data gathered by psychological scientists Rachel Frieder (Old Dominion University), Chad Van Iddekinge (Florida State University), and Patrick Raymark (Clemson University) challenge the common belief that interviewers rely on near-instantaneous snap judgements.
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Longer Acquaintance Levels the Romantic Playing Field
Partners who become romantically involved soon after meeting tend to be more similar in physical attractiveness than partners who get together after knowing each other for a while, according to new findings published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. “Our results indicate that perceptions of beauty in a romantic partner might change with time, as individuals get to know one another better before they start dating,” says lead researcher Lucy Hunt of the University of Texas at Austin.
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Character Lab Announces New Request for Proposals
Character Lab, a nonprofit that was cofounded by Angela Duckworth, is excited to share our newest Request for Proposals (RFP), which can be found here. Character Lab will award a total of up to $1.2 million in grants to support the execution of 2-year, school-based research projects focused on character development interventions during the 2016–2017 and 2017–2018 school years. Each proposal may request up to $300,000. Proposals must focus on advancing one (or more) of the following character strengths and skills: curiosity, gratitude, grit, optimism, purpose, self-control, social/emotional intelligence, and/or zest.
