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Suffer. Spend. Repeat.
The New York Times: In these final weeks before the holidays, it may strike you that retailers have gone out of their way to make holiday shopping as unpleasant an experience as possible. The odd truth is that they probably have. And there’s a reason for that: evidence suggests that the less comfortable you are during the seasonal shopping spree, the more money you’ll spend. ... In a vivid demonstration of the effect in 1999, the psychologists Barbara Price Davis and Eric W. Knowles sent researchers door to door, selling holiday cards for charity. When they described the price as $3 for one package of cards, 35 percent of people decided to buy.
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Is Depression an Emotional Mush?
The Huffington Post: I have a vivid memory of dropping my oldest son off at college, the first day of his freshman year, many years ago. He stood outside his dorm, waving as I drove away, and I was overcome by a complex mix of emotions. I was unquestionably sad -- the tears testified to that -- but I wasn't morose or agitated, and I kind of knew that this sadness would pass. In fact, I was in the same moment keenly aware of a range of powerful and positive emotions -- pride that my son had earned his way into a fine university, relief that he seemed well-adjusted and untroubled and had solid friends. He seemed to be landing OK, and the moment was bittersweet. ...
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Cheese And Raw Veggies May Be Antidote To Kids’ Mindless Eating
NPR: It's hard to eat just one potato chip. The salt, the fat, the crunch — no wonder we mindlessly munch away, especially if we're parked in front of the TV. ... But here's what Mindless Eating author Brian Wansink found in a recent study published in the journal Pediatrics: Kids who snacked on a cheese and veggie combo ate about 70 percent fewer calories than those who snacked on potato chips, yet reported feeling satiated. Wansink found that the effect of eating fewer calories was even most pronounced among overweight children. So who participated in the study? About 200 children in grades three through six.
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A Question for the Holiday Season: Who among Us Identifies with All of Humanity?
Scientific American: The holiday season is a time of giving and receiving, reflection on what is and what could be—and perhaps more than a little guilt. We all want to promote world peace and live in harmony, but what does that really mean? What does the intersection of praxis and theory look like? Is it a bumper sticker on your car, an annual donation to an international aid group, a bi-annual religious service attendance of your choice? New research attempts to quantify some of these philosophical questions. The results could shed light on everything from liberal-conservative differences to conflict resolution between Israel and Palestine.
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For the Old, Less Sense of Whom to Trust
The New York Times: There’s a reason so many older people fall for financial scams, new research suggests. They don’t respond as readily to visual cues that suggest a person might be untrustworthy, and their brains don’t send out as many warning signals that ignite a danger-ahead gut response. The research, published last week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is the first to show that older adults’ vulnerability to fraud may be rooted in age-related neurological changes.
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Q&A on Regifting With Gabrielle Adams
Gabrielle Adams is an assistant professor of organizational behavior at London Business School. Her research interests include morality and ethical behavior, as well as human behavior. In reference to "The Gifts We Keep On Giving," the research article in Psychological Science: What sparked your interest to study psychology and human behavior? As an undergraduate, I first decided to major in Philosophy because I wanted to ask questions about fundamental problems. When I took Thane Pittman’s social psychology course at Colby College, I realized that I could also come up with some answers to these questions by conducting empirical tests of the ideas I had about human behavior.
