A team of psychologists led by Kostadin Kushlev of Georgetown University examined the idea that individual happiness may act as an impediment to solving the world’s problems. “As nations across the globe become more interested in human happiness, some have expressed concerns about the downsides of being happier,” state Kushlev More
Like so many people, I grew up watching the TV show “Friends,” dreaming of the day I would be living a glamorous city life surrounded by a group of close friends. Over the years, I’ve made lots of friends: childhood friends, work friends, college friends, writer friends. I have friends More
A few years ago, Jason Rentfrow, a psychologist at the University of Cambridge, dug into a question that has captivated him for decades: Do different places have different personalities? Do people in Los Angeles, for instance, have measurably different temperaments from the residents of Augusta, Georgia? If so, what does More
Being lonely hurts — it can even negatively impact your health. But the mere act of being alone with oneself doesn’t have to be bad, and experts say it can even benefit your social relationships, improve your creativity and confidence, and help you regulate your emotions so that you can better More
The old expression “It’s not rocket science…it’s much, much harder” may well apply to a new study published in the journal Psychological Science. A team of researchers led by Bradley Turnwald of Stanford University took on the challenge of figuring out how to get college students to eat more vegetables. … More
Humility is a relative newcomer to social and personality psychology, at least as a trait or behavior to be studied on its own. It arrived as part of the effort, beginning in the 1990s, to build a “positive” psychology: a more complete understanding of sustaining qualities such as pride, forgiveness More
