As more and more clients are entering therapy with concerns related to abuse, such as domestic violence incidents, it seems prudent to review how these issues might play a role in mental health and treatment. The facts on domestic violence are st …
The idea of the tabula rasa is all but forgotten. Advances in modern genetics have taught us that not only are we not a blank slate at birth, but we are not even simply the product of our genes. The environment interacts with our genes to shape our dev …
This post is part of our ongoing series exploring classic experiments and theories in the history of psychological research.
Israeli scientists and UCLA’s Dr. Martin Monti recently found that former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon demonstrates significant brain activity. Seven years ago Sharon suffered two strokes. The second stroke caused him to lose most of his consciousness. …
This post is part of an ongoing series about applicant interview weekends in Psychology departments. Check back for posts about interviews in other areas of Psychology, and visit our Careers in Psychology section. This post was written by social psycho …
This post is part of an ongoing series about applicant interview weekends in Psychology departments. Check back for posts about interviews in other areas of Psychology, and visit our Careers in Psychology section. Interviewing for doctoral programs in …
This post is part of an ongoing series about applicant interview weekends in Psychology departments. Check back for posts about interviews in other areas of Psychology, and visit our Careers in Psychology section. So you want to be a Health Psychologis …
Psychologists aim to better understand the link between internal and external states, that is, between cognitions and behaviors. Behaviors are often clear enough to measure, but accurately capturing the essence of a cognition can be a much fuzzier task …
The following article contains spoilers. If you have not seen the film and do not wish to have key plot points and character dynamics revealed, do not proceed further
In the late 1980s, a university committee at the University of Michigan called for psychology professor Dr. Claude Steele to tackle the problem of academic achievement among minority students at the university. His subsequent research resulted in the discovery and identification of one of the most far-reaching and influential phenomena in social psychology
ames Pennebaker’s writing paradigm was an important contribution to the young field of health psychology at the time and continues to be used today to explore connections between disclosure and physical and mental health and to generate hypotheses about other psychological phenomena.
Are genetics destiny? Simplistic thinkers may say so, but what scientists are learning is that, though many traits are heritable (e.g., height, extraversion, IQ), it is difficult to find a “gene” for the vast majority of traits. At the completion of th …
When a baby starts to fall, our natural instincts tell us to protect them and quickly catch them. In general, parents’ instincts are to catch their children before they “fall” in many aspects in life. But, as with many things that require you to fail …
Beginning early in development, children learn from watching others and through social interaction. Do children learn about the social world when they watch screens, and can that compare with real life? Social interaction is an important pathway …
Have you ever seen a movie which has a great musical score? Wondered how film composers and music directors write and choose music to enhance the images and make the whole experience more powerful? Dr. Roger Kendall, a UCLA Ethnomusicology professor wi …
An article was published today in the Huffington Post, titled “Romney: ‘Some Gays Are Actually Having Children. It’s Not Right on Paper. It’s Not Right in Fact.’”The article reviews a Boston Globe piece from yesterday in which some of Romney’s actions …
Earlier today, I read an article published on Washington’s Blog titled “Fear of Terror Makes People Stupid.” The central claim of the post was that the government purposefully induces fear of a terrorist attack in order to get Americans to relinq …
There is a long history and a strong literature linking psychological aspects of peoples’ lives and coronary heart disease. Early research found a connection between coronary heart disease and a personality characteristic called Type A. Type A per …
Imagining the stereotypical executive doesn’t exactly conjure up the image of a zen-like state. Instead, we tend to associate leadership roles with too many demands and not enough time to meet them—in essence, a pretty stressful lifestyle. After all, m …
No matter how compelling their arguments are, attempts to legitimize “sex addiction” as bona fide psychopathology are most often met with dismissive eye rolls at best and sheer outrage at worst.
This post is the first of three on the Wason selection task (Part II), and part of our ongoing series exploring classic experiments and theories in the history of psychological research.