Psychology in Action

Tag: psychology

  • Gene linked to psychological resources

    UCLA psychology graduate student Shimon Saphire-Bernstein and Dr. Shelly Taylor identified the first gene to be linked to the psychological resources of optimism, self-esteem and mastery (the belief that you have control over your own life). They have been getting major media attention for their great scientific contribution. Check out the UCLA press release here. 

  • Schoolyard Picks: How People Evaluate Friend Potential in Others

    We all use a variety of clues to figure out whether a person we’re interacting with is going to like us. After all, being rejected hurts, and we typically would rather not pursue a friendship with someone who might reject us. To determine whether we’re likely to be rejected by a potential friend, we might…

  • Perceptual Learning: Applications to Education

    My lab at UCLA has been in the news twice recently, which is very exciting for us! You may have seen this article in the NYTimes last week or this interview on CBS’ The Early Show this morning. Both stories are about perceptual learning and its applications to education. I thought in this post I…

  • Investigative Interviewing and the Detection of Deception – Professor R. Edward Geiselman, UCLA

    Information is the lifeblood of investigations and it is the ability of investigators to obtain useful and accurate information from witnesses that is most crucial.  Yet full and accurate memory recall is difficult to achieve.  The Cognitive Interview (CI) technique developed by Geiselman and Fisher is a systematic approach to interviewing witnesses toward increasing the…

  • How effective are political campaign advertisements?

    While the media buzz surrounding the 2012 Presidential Election is just starting up, now is as good a time as any to think about how effective political advertisements really are at influencing our candidate choices.  Every election season, political candidates shell out thousands and even millions of dollars on televised campaign advertisements.  But how persuasive…

  • Children with ADHD have greater likelihood of trying substances and developing substance use disorders.

    Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most commonly diagnosed disorders in childhood. In fact, estimates of the rates of ADHD had found that between 5-10 percent of all children meet diagnostic criteria for the disorder. Children with and without ADHD, at a group level, show several differences, including poorer school performance, more…

  • How Does Early Life Stress Affect Health Across the Lifespan? — Professor Shelley Taylor, UCLA

    How does early life stress affect health across the lifespan? This question has intrigued our research team for many years. People who experience early life stress, in the form of poverty, exposure to violence, noise, and other stressors, or who experience a harsh early family environment in the form of conflict-ridden, cold non-nurturant parenting, or…

  • Are you more of a conformist during flu season?

    Looking back on social psychology’s greatest hits, my mind always drifts first to studies on conformity, largely because they make such good stories. Take Asch, for instance. Who would’ve thought that so many people would willingly follow the crowd in giving a blatantly wrong answer about line length? And then, of course, there’s Milgram. It…

  • Career Options for How to Become a Therapist: Multiple Pathways Exist

    Many individuals find the idea of helping people for a living to be appealing. There is no one path to this type of career. Clinicians, therapists, coaches, social workers, or psychologist, provide psychotherapy and guidance to people. Below are several popular avenues to becoming a professional therapist. Psychiatrist A psychiatrist is a medical doctor that…

  • What are the Areas of Study within Psychology?

    The field of psychology had its modern origin just over 100 years ago, and yet interest in the field has grown rapidly. Researchers with broad and varied interests have expanded the field, and as a result there are many different subdisciplines. Highlighted here are several key areas of psychology. Biological psychologists apply biological principles to…