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The Paradox of Hard Work
... To say that long-distance runners embrace difficulty is to say the obvious. When you watch many thousands of people happily push themselves through a race that they might not even be allowed to finish, though, you start to get the hint that something deeply human is going on. People like things that are really hard. In fact, the enormity of a task often is why people pursue it in the first place. This is a puzzling phenomenon, when you stop and think about it. It violates all sorts of assumptions about rational action and evolutionary selection and economic theory. Psychologists call it the Effort Paradox.
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Typecasting Others and Self As Villain or Victim Can Hurt Relationships
This question from a patient may strike a chord with those who have felt wounded in relationship (which, of course, is all of us). When we feel hurt by others, our brains don’t simply process the pain — they become casting directors, auditioning people for the two starring roles: the blameless victim and the heartless villain. Social scientists call this “moral typecasting.” Most people will be familiar with the idea of typecasting in the entertainment industry.
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Transcendent Thinking May Boost Teen Brains
... These and a succession of other scholars, such as Richard Lerner of Tufts University, William Damon of Stanford and Kurt W. Fischer of Harvard, characterized adolescence as a period of emerging capacities for abstract thinking that, together with heightened social sensitivity and a propensity for strong emotion, enable teenagers to infer overarching principles or hidden personal lessons from specific experiences or events. Adolescents seem almost compelled to look for these connections and their deeper meaning, as I had seen in my Boston classroom. ...
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You Can’t Remember Being a Baby for a Reason, New Study Finds
... Dr. Simona Ghetti, a professor in the department of psychology at the University of California, Davis, whose research focuses on the development of memory in childhood, acknowledged that while many studies have already demonstrated infants’ capacity to encode memories, this latest research is unique in that it links memory encoding to hippocampal activation. Ghetti was not involved in the study. ... “One thing we have learned about memory in adults is that the information we tend to capture and encode into memory are things that are highly relevant to our experience,” said Dr.
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What Happens to Your Brain When You Retire?
For the millions of Americans who retire each year, stopping work might seem like a well-deserved break. But it can also precipitate big changes in brain health, including an increased risk of cognitive decline and depression. ... Doing something creative and novel can give you a sense of purpose and keep your brain agile. Research suggests you can practice creativity just like any other skill, said Jonathan Schooler, a distinguished professor of psychological and brain sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara. That could mean writing for a few minutes every day or attempting an adventurous new recipe for dinner.
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Patience Is a Process, Not a Virtue
You had to be really unlucky to be on the China National Highway 110 on August 14, 2010. One of the longest traffic jams on record ensued, ensnaring thousands of vehicles over more than 100 kilometers and lasting more than 10 days. The unluckiest drivers were stuck for five full days. As the days dragged out, vendors popped up along the highway to keep people fed and hydrated—often for a high fee. Would sitting in traffic for five days make you impatient? I strongly suspect that even the calmest, most zen among us would answer with a resounding “yes!” Patience fails everyone at some point or another.
