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To Fight Fraud, Psychological Scientists Issue a Call to Arms
Scams are now one of the most common crimes in the world. In the most recent issue of PSPI, real-life accounts are used to illustrate how pervasive and indiscriminate fraud can be.
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Want to ‘Optimize’ Your Happiness? This Happiness Expert Says: Don’t
Are you happy? It’s a deceptively simple question, but for me, at least, a difficult one to answer. Another tough question: Why is it so hard to be happy for so many? Despite a culture full of wellness influencers with their happiness hacks and mind-set tricks, all of the indicators show that we Americans are less happy than ever. It’s as if the more energy we focus on trying to feel happy, the harder it is to achieve. So what is going on and what can we do about it? I put these questions to Laurie Santos. Santos is a cognitive scientist and professor whose class on happiness quickly became the most popular in Yale’s history.
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Why Is Economic Inequality the Status Quo?
The latest PSPI issue examines the political psychology of economic inequality and highlights the cognitive processes that sustain high levels of inequality across nations.
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APS Announces Winners of the 2026 Student Poster Awards
Read the personal stories behind some of the best student posters accepted for the APS Convention 2026, 28–30 May, in Barcelona, Spain, as selected by reviewers for the three categories of awards.
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Harvard Faculty Votes to Make It Harder for Undergrads to Earn A’s
Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences announced Wednesday that it would limit the number of A grades awarded to undergraduates, adopting one of the most ambitious efforts by a major university to curb grade inflation. The decision was made by faculty vote earlier this month. ... The move comes after top grades became so common that some Harvard faculty argued they no longer reliably distinguished exceptional work. More than 60% of all grades awarded to undergraduates in recent years were in the A range, according to university data cited by faculty members who supported the measure.
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1.7 Million Unspoken Words
Have you noticed? Compared to prior decades, we’re spending more time alone. American Time Use Surveys from 2003 to 2024 found that 15- to 25-year-olds’ in-person socializing plummeted—from 60 to 36 minutes daily, with parallel, but lesser, declines among older folks. We’re working more from home. We’re less often dining out with others and more often eating take-out food. We’re shopping more online. We’re more often living alone—with U.S. single-person households having doubled since 1960. We’re also spending much more time online. For some people, online time includes chatbot friends, which are available 24/7 to offer comfort, support, and encouragement.
