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John Cacioppo, Who Studied Effects of Loneliness, Is Dead at 66
She was a brain researcher and an authority on the scientific basis of love. He, too, was a neuroscientist, but with an expertise in loneliness. She was in her mid-30s, he in his late 50s. Both were wedded to careers in separate hemispheres — until they happened to be seated beside each other, serendipitously, at dinner on the last night of a neuroscience research symposium in Shanghai. Before going their separate ways, they left the restaurant together. A romantic full moon was rising over the East China Sea. He snapped a photograph. A few weeks later, she emailed him to request a copy (which she later admitted was just a pretext to resume their brief acquaintance).
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Why ‘Sorry’ Seems to Be the Hardest Word
Offenders may not apologize if they have little concern for the victim, if they perceive a threat to their positive self-image, or if they predict that their apology won’t be effective.
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Special Perspectives Issue Revisits Most Impactful APS Journal Articles
A new, special issue of Perspectives on Psychological Science marks the 30th anniversary of APS with a collection of reflections, insights, and forward-looking articles from authors of the 30 most-cited articles published in APS journals. In an introduction to the issue, Editor Robert J. Sternberg considers some of the factors that lead to high-impact articles, including how the research is presented, whether the research relates to issues that are important to scholars and lay people, and the extent to which the research propels the field forward. The authors discuss the origin and central hypotheses of their articles, and why they believe the work has had such an impact in the field.
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Judges and examiners get laxer with practice
Students are widely judged on their abilities before being allowed to enter top universities. Athletes are assessed on their physical prowess before being awarded medals. And academic papers, like those reported in this section, must run the gauntlet of peer review before being published. In making their determinations, evaluators study that which they are judging in a sequence, one student, athlete or paper after another, and apply standardised criteria. This approach is supposed to afford equal treatment to all.
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The Psychology Of Fake News
During the past two years, fake news has been a frequent topic of real news, with articles considering the role of social media in spreading fake news, the advent of fake videos and the role these play in the political process. Something less well-known, though, is that fake news has also become a topic of scientific investigation. --- As a cognitive scientist, one of the questions that most fascinates me is whether and how fake news affects people's attitudes and behaviors. This is a question for social science, with a particular role for social and cognitive psychology.
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April 4 Webinar: Tools and Applications for Naturalistic Driving Data
Learn about ways to take advantage of the Strategic Highway Research Program 2 Naturalistic Driving Study (SHRP 2 NDS), an enormous dataset on driving behavior, in an upcoming April 4, 2018 webinar.
