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Benefitting Ourselves While Benefitting Others: The Importance of Generativity
“How to Talk About Dying” was the name of one of the “Most Emailed” articles on The New York Times website in early July. Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End, written by bestselling author and MacArthur “Genius Grant” recipient Dr. Atul Gawande, has an average of 5 out of 5 stars with…
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Love Me Tinder: A Psychological Perspective on Swiping
Several months ago, I wrote a post about how online dating has shifted the way people search for and establish romantic relationships in the modern era. Notably absent from that article was any mention of what has become the fastest growing, and arguably the most popular, dating app of the past several years: Tinder. Why…
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Outwit, Outplay, Outlast: The Psychology of Survivor
Watching Survivor also offers opportunities for social comparison and reflection, especially when it comes to morals and ethics.
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Surrendering to Creativity: The Psychology of Remembering to Breathe (Part 3 of 3)
Up until graduate school, I often indulged the myth that good writing was a sacred thing to be done under the most precise conditions. Akin to knowing without a timer when the soufflee has finished (sorry, I have holidays sweets on the mind), the creativity dedicated to a well-written piece had to be carefully cultured…
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I’ll take one Lassie, no wait…make that an Air Bud
A study published in PLOS ONE looked at 100 films that featured a dog as a main character from 1939 to 2003 along with the number of registrations with the American Kennel Club by breed in the 10 years before and after each film
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New research: From Screen to Green: What happens to kids social skills when they go cold turkey on all media?
The fact is we all stare at screens more than we would like and many of us rely on these tools to communicate with others, even during times when we should be spending quality time with our families and friends. So does all this time staring at screens, which may take time away from looking…
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The Significance of Impression Formation: Reinterpreting Early Social Psychology Findings Using Modern Stats
Solomon Asch may be best known in social psychology for his 1951 Conformity Studies in which he brought participants into a room with seven confederates—actors pretending to be other participants—and had them recount the length of a line. Before demonstrating that normative pressure can lead people to lie, Asch was one of the foremost researchers…
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East and West: Two Faces of Depression
“This post is co-written by Michael Sun and guest writer Rachel McCrystal, both authors contributed equally.” Sam Davis* is a 20 year old sophomore at UCLA. He attends class every day, and by and large, Sam lives a relatively normal college student life. But lately, he has been weighed down by something he finds hard…
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E. coli, food, and mood: How toxins in food could affect not only your belly, but also your brain
It’s well-known that toxin-producing bacteria in food, such as E. coli, can affect your belly — often not for the better — but research by UCLA’s Naomi Eisenberger, Michael Irwin, and others now indicates that food toxins may influence your mood, as well. In a study in which I am glad I was not a participant,…