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Tiny Foragers: How Do We Know What’s Safe To Eat?
It’s the holiday season, and we’ll soon be decorating our home with greenery—holly sprigs, poinsettia, maybe a mistletoe, and of course the tree, probably some kind of spruce. We’ll have young kids around, and most of this greenery is benign. But some of these plants are toxic, possibly even deadly, if eaten. So what we are doing in effect is creating a treacherous world for our youngest revelers to explore. Re-creating really. Our holiday home will be a microcosm of the ancient world in which our early ancestors lived, and died. Throughout evolutionary history, humans have gathered leaves and berries to eat, but they have done this with little information to guide their choices.
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Money May Corrupt, but Thinking About Time Can Strengthen Morality
Experimenters have found that implicitly activating the concept of time seems to reduce cheating behavior by encouraging people to engage in self-reflection.
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Think Again: Nostalgia Increases Positive Feelings Towards Out-Groups
Have you ever caught yourself wistfully thinking about a past event? If so, you aren’t alone; research has shown that almost everyone engages in nostalgic thinking and that these types of memories occur quite often — around 3 times per week. Historically, nostalgia was thought to be a variant of depression, but new research is changing the way we view this emotion. There is now a large body of evidence suggesting nostalgia has positive impacts on how people feel about themselves and how connected they feel towards others.
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Understanding Cognition Through Mathematical Models
In order to improve our understanding of the human mind it is essential to collect data by measuring brain and behavior. Proper interpretation of such data, however, requires coherent data analysis and the development of formal process models. Eric-Jan Wagenmakers advocates Bayesian analysis tools and instantiates cognitive mechanisms in specific mathematical models. Such models stimulate the development of new theory and allow a more effective interaction between psychology and neuroscience.
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Modeling the Brain and Mind
Cognitive neuroscientists study people at two explanatory levels: the brain and behavior. Using psychometric models and brain imaging tools, Rogier Kievit explores how theoretical psychology, neuroscience, and philosophy of mind can be used to understand the links between the brain and behavior. His current research relates brain function and structure (using MRI) and cognition in aging populations using structural equation models and network analysis. With the goal of increasing health in older populations, Kievit’s particular interests are in models that effectively capture how cognitive changes across lifetime relate to brain reorganization, adaptation and compensation.
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Insiders and Outsiders
When social groups interact, notions of “insiders” and “outsiders” develop. Using a variety of approaches – psychological, physiological, and neurobiological – Valerie Purdie-Vaughns seeks to understand relationships between social groups and reduce intergroup bias and conflict. In particular, she investigates how minority and majority groups interact, focusing on experiments that closely mirror real-world scenarios. For instance, several recent studies have examined how the anxiety of feeling stigmatized can lead to dysregulated eating and psychological distress.
