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The Twisted Paths of Perception
The King Pedro IV Square in Lisbon, Portugal, better known as the Rossio, regales visitors with a delightful exemplar of the traditional pavement called calçada portuguesa. Originally cobbled in 1848, the dizzying light and dark undulations symbolize the sea voyages of Portuguese navigators and predate 20th-century designs by Op Art creators such as Victor Vasarely and Bridget Riley, while inducing similar perceptions of flowing motion. But does the vibrant pattern stand in the way of safety? A recent study from the University of Bristol in England asked participants how walking on floors patterned with visual illusions affected their discomfort levels and feeling of instability.
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‘Self-Care’ Isn’t the Fix for Late-Pandemic Malaise
If years could be assigned a dominant feeling (1929: despair; 2008: hope), 2021’s might be exhaustion. As the coronavirus pandemic rumbles through its 20th month, many of us feel like we are running a race we didn’t sign up for, and it’s getting longer every mile we run. With this slog has come a renewed focus on mental health. During the pandemic, universities have poured money into psychological resources. Corporations have hired chief health officers and invested in wellness services. In 2020, the mindfulness app Headspace saw a 500 percent increase in corporate-subscription requests.
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Science Rewind: Revisiting Three of Our Favorite Early Stories
As Under the Cortex enters its second year, we decided to comb through the archive and revisit three exciting stories from our early days.
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New Content from Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science
A sample of articles on a replication of a study on spontaneous verbal rehearsal in memory, generalizable effects of feedback across college classes, Bayesian model-averaged meta-analysis, views of replication, model evaluation, chow replications influence future citation patterns, and data visualization (with tutorials).
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Sex, Drugs, and Genes: Moral Attitudes Share a Genetic Basis
By studying both identical and fraternal twins, researchers suggest that largely the same heredity factors that influence openness to casual sex also influence a person’s moral views toward recreational drug use.
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Improving Psychological Science Articles Through Wiki Education
Wiki Education supports faculty at institutions of higher education in the U.S. and Canada who assign their students to contribute to Wikipedia as part of their coursework.
