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Worried? Get Your Scrub On
Global Handwashing Day (October 15, 2011) may be on to something! If you’re feeling guilty or doubtful, simply washing your hands or taking a shower may make you feel better. In a literature review published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, Spike W.S. Lee and Norbert Schwartz concluded that “people can rid themselves of a sense of immorality, lucky or unlucky feelings, or doubt about a decision” by cleaning themselves. In one study, scientists found that people asked to judge the moral wrongdoing of others saw them as worse when exposed to an unkempt room or bad odor than when sitting in a clean room.
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<em>Better Angels</em>, Believe It or Not
Two World Wars, the Cold War, and the rise of terrorism must make the past century one of the most violent in the history of our species, right? Not according to Harvard psychologist and APS member Steven Pinker, who argues in his new book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, that violence is declining. According to Pinker, we are actually living in the most peaceful era in human history. Watch Pinker’s TED talk on the myth of violence to learn more about why Pinker thinks our “better angels” are winning out. You can learn more about Pinker’s by reading coverage from The New York Times and Time.
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World Series Psychology
The Red Sox won’t be participating in this year’s World Series, but it’s safe to say that the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry is here to stay. That makes those teams’ fans an obvious choice for studying rivalry and aggression. Read Wray Herbert’s summary of what happened when Princeton University social neuroscientists studied which neurons light up when loyalists and rivals experience moments of victory or defeat. In other baseball-related psychology, fans aren’t the only ones whose aggression at the baseball stadium has become the subject of psychological research.
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How to Learn by Believing In Yourself
If you want to be smarter, the first step might be to believe that you can get smarter. In a study that will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, Jason S. Moser and his colleagues found that people who believe they can learn from their mistakes are more likely to do so. In the study, participants were asked to identify the middle letter of a five-letter series like “MMMMM” or “NNMNN.” This task may seem simple, but task is repeated several times in a row, people tend to make mistakes and feel bad about it.
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First Annual International Multidisciplinary Collaborative Conference on Violence Research & Evidence-Based Practice: Sexual Homicide
Dates: November 7 and 8, 2011 Location: Holiday Inn Arena & Conference Center Binghamton, NY For more information visit: http://www2.binghamton.edu/continuing-education/non-credit-programs/sexual-homicide/
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Loving the iPhone? Thank Steve Jobs and Human-Computer Interactions
iTechnologies pave the way for new fields of psychological science The late Steve Jobs is considered the Thomas Edison of our time. His innovations not only sold in a down economy, but the technology created by Jobs revolutionized the way we live our lives and interact with others. With the anticipated release of the iPhone4, a New York Times op-ed by Martin Lindstrom said that brain scans of participants who saw a vibrating iPhone “responded to the sound of their phones as they would respond to the presence or proximity of a girlfriend, boyfriend or family member. In short, the subject didn't demonstrate the classic brain-based signs of addiction.
