Psychology

Children Born Ready To Learn Languages

To learn a language is to learn a set of all-purpose rules that can be used in an infinite number of ways. A new study shows that by the age of seven months, human infants are on the lookout for abstract rules – and that they know the best place to look fo ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 5 2007 - 2:01am

High Self-esteem May Be Culturally Universal

The Japanese are a polite people. If your host on a trip is Japanese they often make you feel like you are the most important person in the world. Low self esteem? Awe of your culture? No, they have very high self-esteem and probably feel superior, a study ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 7 2007 - 12:41pm

The Twilight Of Expertise

In a TED talk, Stewart Brand pointed out that all over the world, poor villages — the same villages that Jeffrey Sachs seems to want to preserve — are vanishing. The people who lived in them have moved to squatter cities, where, according to Brand, there ...

Article - Seth Roberts - Feb 11 2011 - 10:56am

Sexual Imprinting: Are You A Daddy's Girl?

Women who enjoy good childhood relationships with their fathers are more likely to select partners who resemble their dads research suggests. In contrast, the team of psychologists from Durham University and two Polish institutions revealed that women who ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 13 2007 - 1:57am

Separating Fact From Fiction In Recovered Memories Of Childhood Sexual Abuse

A decade or so ago, a spate of high profile legal cases arose in which people were accused, and often convicted, on the basis of “recovered memories.” These memories, usually recollections of childhood abuse, arose years after the incident occurred and oft ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 13 2007 - 4:47pm

A New And Useful Word

The word is black-and-white-ism. For instance: Paul Berman’s chief problem as a thinker is black-and-white-ism, and this is a good example of his failure to make subtle distinctions. ...

Article - Seth Roberts - Jun 20 2007 - 6:04pm

Writing Down Feelings Really Does Make Us Feel Better, Study Says

Why does putting our feelings into words — talking with a therapist or friend, writing in a journal — help us to feel better? A new brain imaging study by UCLA psychologists reveals why verbalizing our feelings makes our sadness, anger and pain less intens ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 23 2007 - 12:57pm

Meditation Improves Concentration, Says Study

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania say that practicing even small doses of daily meditation may improve focus and performance. Meditation, according to Penn neuroscientist Amishi Jha and Michael Baime, director of Penn's Stress Management P ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 25 2007 - 7:56pm

Brand Matters Most In Choosing Search Engines- And It Isn't Google

Penn State researchers did a study and found that web searchers who evaluated identical search-engine results preferred Yahoo first and Google second even though more claimed to use Google regularly. These results, they say, provide evidence that branding ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 28 2007 - 9:40am

Therapeutic Value Of Meditation Unproven, Says Study

“There is an enormous amount of interest in using meditation as a form of therapy to cope with a variety of modern-day health problems, especially hypertension, stress and chronic pain, but the majority of evidence that seems to support this notion is anec ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 28 2007 - 5:01pm