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Heartbreak Puts Brakes on Heart
HealthDay: Waiting for another person's opinion of you will slow your heart, and its rate will dip even further if you get rejected, a new Dutch study has found. "Unexpected social rejection could literally feel 'heartbreaking,' as reflected by a transient slowing of heart rate," the study authors wrote in a news release from the Association for Psychological Science. Read more: HealthDay
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Thirst for career happiness is bumming us out
MSNBC: Finding career happiness seems to be what everyone wants these days. The shelves in bookstores are lined with books on how to find career happiness, and an endless stream of life coaches are trying to help workers attain it. Twitter is rife with advice and corny quotes about finding job joy. But is happiness a wise career goal? There is growing evidence that our thirst to find happiness, especially during tough economic times, is actually bumming us out.
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Meditation helped Jane Anderson fight seasonal affective disorder
Zee News India: Landscape artist Jane Anderson struggled with seasonal affective disorder in the winter months. She tried meditation and noticed a change within a month. "My experience was a sense of calmness, of better ability to regulate my emotions," she says. Her experience inspired a new study which found changes in brain activity after only five weeks of meditation training, the journal Psychological Science reports. Read more: Zee News India
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New Research From Psychological Science
A Functional Role for the Motor System in Language Understanding: Evidence From Theta-Burst Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Roel M. Willems, Ludovica Labruna, Mark D’Esposito, Richard Ivry, and Daniel Casasanto Previous studies have revealed that motor areas of the brain can be activated when people read or listen to action words. To determine whether motor areas are necessary for language comprehension, researchers used theta-burst transcranial magnetic stimulation to stimulate an area in either the left or the right premotor cortex.
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Want to make friends? Imitate them . . . just don’t talk finances
What is a little money between friends? According to new research, at the very least, it's not going to stimulate bonding. Researchers have longknown mimicry strengthens social bonding between strangers. By subtly imitating a person's posture or gestures, you can create goodwill. But a new study looking at the psychological effects of money on our behaviour suggests this does not apply when money is involved. The Montreal Gazette: Mimic someone and he'll feel a warm glow; but mimic someone while he's being reminded of money and he'll feel threatened.
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Harry Potter And The Well Of Medical Research
Los Angeles Times: Who knew the world of Harry Potter was such a rich source of material for medical researchers? For more than a decade, the phenomenally popular series has provided grist for studies on topics ranging from genetics to social cognition to autism. PubMed, an online database of medical studies, lists 30 studies that invoke the young wizard — "Harry Potter and the Recessive Allele," "Harry Potter and the Structural Biologist's (Key)stone," even "Harry Potter Casts a Spell on Accident-Prone Children." That last study found that children's emergency department visits decreased significantly when new Harry Potter books went on sale.
