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Geld maakt echt niet gelukkig
GezondheidsNet: Onderzoekers van universiteiten van Yale, Denver en Jeruzalem vergeleken meerdere onderzoeken naar geluk en concludeerden dat geluk niet gezien moet worden als een universeel goed 'iets'. In hun artikel in het tijdschrift Perspectives on Psychological Science beschreven ze een aantal negatieve voorbeelden van geluk. Geluk nastreven Geluk als doel stellen is eigenlijk per definitie al negatief. Mensen die geluk nastreven, eindigen in veel gevallen ongelukkiger. De verschillende methoden die in zelfhulpboeken vaak aangedragen worden zijn op zich zelf niet slecht.
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US psychologist Howard Gardner wins award in Spain for research into human intelligence
The Washington Post: Harvard University psychologist Howard Gardner has won Spain’s Prince of Asturias award for social sciences in recognition of his studies of how human intellect expresses itself in different kinds of skills. The prize was announced Wednesday by a foundation run by Spain’s Crown Prince Felipe. It said the American’s work has been “decisive for the evolution of educational models by taking into account the innate potentialities of each individual.” Read the whole story: The Washington Post
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Pursuing happiness can make you feel worse
Times of India: They say that happiness shouldn't be thought of as a universally good thing, and outline four ways in which this is the case. Indeed, not all types and degrees of happiness are equally good, and even pursuing happiness can make people feel worse. People who want to feel happier can choose from a multitude of books that tell them how to do it. But setting a goal of happiness can backfire, said June Gruber of Yale University, who co- wrote the article with Iris Mauss of the University of Denver and Maya Tamir of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. It's one of the many downsides of happiness – people who strive for happiness may end up worse off than when they started.
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True Love May Wait—But Waiting Won’t Make You a Safer Lover Later On
Whether sex education focuses only on abstinence or teaches students about contraception and other topics as well, it all shares one main message: Wait. In abstinence-only, students are exhorted to wait for sex until they’re married. In “comprehensive” or “abstinence-plus,” the idea is to delay sexual relations until . . . later. “The underlying assumption is that delay reduces sexual risk-taking”—and with it unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases, says University of South Florida psychologist Marina A. Bornovalova.
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Mind Reading: Positive Psychologist Martin Seligman on the Good Life
TIME: These days Martin Seligman, author of the best-selling book Authentic Happiness, is perhaps best known as a father of positive of psychology — the study of people's strengths and virtues, rather than on pathological behavior. But, previously, Seligman's work focused on "learned helplessness" — when people or animals learn helpless behavior as a result of exposure to powerful experiences over which they have no control. That research spawned thousands of related studies and helped researchers better understand the basis of depression. It was also used by the Bush administration to help devise its torture policy.
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All in the Mind
BBC Radio: Hot chilli sauce and a computer game called Cyberball are tools in the lab of psychologist Kip Williams. He explains his research on ostracism to Claudia Hammond. Listen to the broadcast: BBC Radio