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The Dark Side of Empathy
Conventional wisdom, backed up by substantial experimental research, holds that we’re more cooperative in negotiations when we can truly see the other person’s point of view. But in some cases, seeing a situation from the other’s perspective can lead us into unethical behavior. A team of behavioral researchers suspected that in competitive contexts, perspective-taking draws our attention to conflicting interests and to how a competitor’s actions may threaten our own self-interest. They confirmed their hypothesis in a series of experiments, the results of which are reported in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.
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Fast Forward Yourself
People who are able to sock away a healthy degree of resources for the future have essentially a relationship with their future selves, emerging research shows.
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Dissecting the Perceptions of White Male Privilege
Despite all the advances that women and people of color have made in professional settings over the last several decades, White men still tend to have the upper hand on getting the corner offices, the lofty job titles, or the hefty salary hikes. But how do women perceive the marginalization that people of color face in the workplace? And how do minorities perceive the obstacles faced by women? A report published in Psychological Science, a publication of the Association for Psychological Science, provides some answers to these questions.
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Engaging in a Brief Cultural Activity Can Reduce Implicit Prejudice
A small cue of social connection to someone from another group — such as a shared interest — can help reduce prejudice immediately and up to six months later.
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A Founder of the Cognitive Revolution
As one of the most influential cognitive psychologists of the 20th century, Jerome S. Bruner changed the public discourse - and policy - regarding education and how children learn. He is one of the founders of the "cognitive revolution" that transformed not only psychology but other fields related to the mind, such as anthropology, neuroscience, and linguistics. Many of his ideas, which may seem intuitive now, ran counter to the prevailing wisdom of the time, primarily his belief that learning is an active process.
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A Seat at the Table
Youth violence. Unemployment. Heart disease. Teen pregnancy. Climate change. Practically every challenge facing modern society is fueled in part by entrenched behaviors that science can help understand and perhaps change. Historically, the US government has relied heavily on economists to help set policies on healthcare, commerce, consumer protection, education, law enforcement, and other domains where psychological and behavioral factors play a major role. But the federal government is creating a team that will give a broader set of behavioral scientists a seat at the table in policymaking.