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The Gregarious Salesman: Death of a Stereotype?
I had to buy a car recently, my first in many years, and I confess I couldn’t stop thinking about Jerry Lundegaard. Jerry Lundegaard is a Minneapolis car salesman, and the central character in the Coen brothers’ 1996 film classic, Fargo. He is fast-talking, weasely, dishonest. Played to great comic effect by William H. Macy, Lundegaard is a caricature of all that we expect and fear in those who are out to sell us something. Okay, so maybe some of this is my stereotyping of car salesmen, and perhaps I’m being unfair. But like a lot of stereotypes, mine has some basis in fact. Not the inept criminal part, but certainly the blustery, glad-handing, over-the-top enthusiasm.
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The Retirement Game
Retirement is an odd notion when you think of it, and a modern one in the scheme of human history. For our ancestors, the idea that you had earned enough money for one lifetime, that it was okay to stop working and enjoy the fruits of your labor—would have been incomprehensible. Indeed, until quite recently the deal was: You worked, you used what you had earned, and then you worked some more. Then you died. This is still true for way too many of the world’s people, who continue to live hand to mouth. But there are also many more people—and a growing number every year—who don’t really have to work anymore, but do, who forgo the leisure of their golden years to earn yet more money.
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Having Heart: Can We Rethink Life’s Stresses?
Imagine that you are at the top of a ski slope, about to make a run. It’s a challenging slope, black diamond—steep and narrow, lots of trees. Plus it’s windy, and there’s that treacherous drop-off on the right. You’re an inexperienced skier, not a novice but not at all confident that you belong in such extreme terrain. Your heart is pounding and your gut is tight. Now imagine that you’re on top of the very same slope, but you are a skilled downhill racer, an Olympic contender. You’re sure you know how to attack this slope—you’ve done it many times before—but even so, your heart is pounding and butterflies are fluttering in your gut.
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Flu psychology: Who risks what for whom?
My local pharmacy is offering flu shots. The sign grabbed my attention the other day, because it was a sweltering, muggy day, and it seemed way too early to think about winter flu bugs. But a little digging proved me wrong. The vaccine takes a couple weeks to click in, and seasonal flu bugs can arrive as early as October. So I did the arithmetic, and I’m lining up to get poked. I’ve gotten flu shots for years, though I’m not in any high-risk group. It just seems prudent to me. And the fact is, public health officials count on people who are at low or moderate risk to get inoculated anyway.
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Where are the conservative social psychologists?
Scientific meetings are not usually confrontational events, so it was notable when University of Virginia psychological scientist Jonathan Haidt roiled his colleagues at the 2011 gathering of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. Addressing an audience of more than a thousand, the best-selling author of The Righteous Mind asked all of those who considered themselves politically conservative to raise their hands. Three hands went up. He then described two other attempts he had recently made to locate conservative social psychologists.
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Looking For Trouble (And Seeing It)
I’ve known a few troublemakers over the years. These were guys with huge chips on both shoulders, who would gladly pick a fight if you looked at them wrong. And looking at them wrong could really mean doing nothing provocative at all, because they saw signs of hostility and threat where others did not, especially in others’ faces. They were literally looking for trouble. Scientists and clinicians are interested in the dynamic interaction of perception and aggression. Looking for trouble, and seeing it, may be a deep cognitive bias—a negativity bias—that distorts normal emotional processing.
