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Matters of Belief
The Sydney Morning Herald: The argument over whether mankind is the sole cause, a contributing factor, or irrelevant to climate change is, to say the least, a vexed one for many Australians. Or, put another way, it's right up there with religion, politics and Star Wars versus Star Trek on the list of ''Things You Really Shouldn't Get into an Argument About, Not if Your Blood Pressure Means Anything to You, Matey Boy''. It is with that in mind that we draw your attention to University of Western Australia cognitive psychologist Stephan Lewandowsky's recent research, soon to be published in the journal Psychological Science.
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Please, make me be selfish
CNN: People are inherently selfish. Research shows we're happier and our lives improve when we focus on ourselves. Makes sense, right? So why does research also show that we often put others first and fail to choose what will make us happy? The problem comes, researcher Jonathan Berman says, when we have to decide between spending the $20 we found on the ground on new shoes and donating it to charity. If you're walking by a shopping center when you pick up the money, you're more likely to freely spend it on yourself. But if you're walking by a homeless shelter, "suddenly spending $20 on yourself feels so different," Berman says. Read the whole story: CNN
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Facebook More Tantalizing Than Sex
Discovery News: I wish I could resurrect some of the great literary libertines -- Baudelaire, Nin, Rimbaud, to name a few -- if anything, just to see their puzzled reactions and responses when they read things like this about contemporary culture: According to a new study, checking Facebook and Twitter may be more tempting than sex and cigarettes. Researchers from the University of Chicago's Booth Business School used BlackBerrys to record participants temptation, will power and desires over the course of a week.
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New Research on Vision From Psychological Science
Read about the latest research on vision published in Psychological Science. A Bayesian Optimal Foraging Model of Human Visual Search Matthew S. Cain, Edward Vul, Kait Clark, and Stephen R. Mitroff When searching displays containing an unknown number of targets, it can be difficult to know when to stop searching. In this study, researchers quantified visual-search strategies by having participants look for targets among distractors. In the first condition, only 25% of the trials had one or more targets; in the second condition, 50% of the trials had one or more targets; and in the third condition, 75% of the trials had one or more targets.
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Wealth and the 47 percent: An ancient debate
The first two debates of this presidential campaign have left little doubt about the central political and philosophical issue dividing the country today. The candidates have all drawn a bright line between the two parties on the issue of wealth, and how much we as a society should share it. Should we tax the haves to help out the have-nots, or let only the fittest thrive in a Darwinian struggle? This core idea shapes policy positions on Social Security, government health care programs, student loans, veterans’ benefits, and more. But it basically comes down to what’s called redistribution. Republicans think redistribution is a dirty word, a handout for the feckless 47 percent.
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Phobia about holes is not officially recognized, but U.K. scientists look into it
The Washington Post: During an introductory psychology course at Britain’s University of Essex in 2009, Arnold Wilkins asked his class to participate in a quick experiment. Wilkins projected two images on a wall and asked students to write down whether they found either of them disturbing. One was a photograph of a woody landscape. The other was a close-up of a lotus-flower seedpod — a flat-faced pod pocked with small holes. Most of the students were unmoved, but one, freshman An Le, recalls being both transfixed and revolted by the lotus image. “It felt like I was in shock,” he says. Le is far from alone in his response.
