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New Research on Perception From Psychological Science
Read about new research on visual and olfactory perception from Psychological Science. A Time-Based Account of the Perception of Odor Objects and Valences Jonas K. Olofsson, Nicholas E. Bowman, Katherine Khatibi, and Jay A. Gottfried There is some debate over how we perceive odor. Object-centered accounts of odor perception suggest that an odor is identified before its valence is determined, whereas valance-centered accounts suggest the opposite. Participants were presented with several categories of odors (floral, fishy, minty, and fuel).
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Music Makes a Brighter Future
Learning to play an instrument might lead us to feel more optimistic and motivated to seek opportunities, Michael M. Roy, Elizabethtown College, reported at the 24th APS Annual Convention in Chicago. In the spring of 2009, Roy and his colleagues established a fully functional concert band program in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. They returned in the fall of 2011 to assess the music program’s impact. During their initial and return visits, they measured feelings of self-esteem, optimism, positive affect, negative affect, motivation to avoid losses, and motivation to seek gains.
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National Multicultural Conference and Summit 2013
The National Multicultural Conference and Summit 2013 will be held January 17-18, 2013 in Houston, Texas. The theme of the conference is "Transforming Multicultural Psychology: Engagement, Renewal, and Action Across Generations." For more information visit: www.multiculturalsummit.org
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The Ins and Outs of In-Groups and Out-Groups
We humans organize ourselves in myriad kinds of social groups, from scout troops and sports teams to networks of friends, colleagues, or classmates. But how do these social groups work? How do we decide whom to trust and whom to follow? And how do we deal with people that don’t seem to fit the norms of our social groups? New research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, explores these issues by examining various facets of social perception and behavior. The Herding Hormone: Oxytocin Stimulates In-Group Conformity Mirre Stallen, Carsten K. W. De Dreu, Shaul Shalvi, Ale Smidts, and Alan G.
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8th Biennial Conference of the International Academy for Intercultural Research
The 8th Biennial Conference of the International Academy for Intercultural Research (IAIR) brings together scholars and practitioners from a variety of disciplines in the field of intercultural relations. This biennial conference of the Academy focuses on pushing the boundaries of intercultural research. June 23-27, 2013 Reno, Nevada, USA For more visit: www.intercultural-academy.net/iair-2013-home.html
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Causation Warps Our Perception of Time
You push a button to call the elevator to your floor and you wait for what seems like forever, thinking it must be broken. When your friend pushes the button, the elevator appears within 10 seconds. “She must have the magic touch,” you say to yourself. This episode reflects what philosophers and psychological scientists call “temporal binding”: Events that occur close to one another in time and space are sometimes “bound” together and we perceive them as meaningful episodes. New research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, suggests that binding may reveal important insights into how we experience time.