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The New Science of Forgetting
A baby zebrafish is just half the size of a pea. A recent look inside its transparent brain, however, offers clues to the far bigger mystery of how we remember—and how we forget. In an experiment that yielded insights into memory and the brain, a team of researchers at the University of Southern California taught the tiny creature to associate a bright light with a flash of heat, a temperature change the fish responded to by trying to swim away. Using a custom-designed microscope, the team then captured images of the animals’ brains in the moments before and after they learned to associate the light and the heat.
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Why Are Masks Such a Big Deal for So Many? Psychologists Have Thoughts
If you've been on a flight or taken public transit recently, you might've a lot fewer masks. A Florida judge struck down the federal travel mask mandate last Monday, and while companies aren't being forced to drop their mandates, many have. Meanwhile, the Omicron subvariant BA.2 now accounts for 75 percent of new COVID cases in the U.S. To mask or not to mask continues to be a divisive question. We get into the psychology of why. Dr. Anthony Fauci, Gretchen Chapman, and Steven Taylor join us for the conversation. ...
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The Bias Hunter
In February 2021, cognitive psychologist Itiel Dror set off a firestorm in the forensics community. In a paper, he suggested forensic pathologists were more likely to pronounce a child’s death a murder versus an accident if the victim was Black and brought to the hospital by the mother’s boyfriend than if they were white and brought in by the grandmother. It was the latest of Dror’s many experiments suggesting forensic scientists are subconsciously influenced by cognitive biases—biases that can put innocent people in jail.
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Few Transgender Children Change Their Minds After 5 Years, Study Finds
Young children who transition to a new gender with social changes — taking on new names, pronouns, haircuts and clothing — are likely to continue identifying as that gender five years later, according to a report published on Wednesday, the first study of its kind. The data come from the Trans Youth Project, a well-known effort following 317 children across the United States and Canada who underwent a so-called social transition between ages of 3 and 12. Participants transitioned, on average, at age 6.5.
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In Praise of Anxiety
Nobody likes to feel anxious. Anxiety is among the most pervasive and reviled of human emotions. An entire industry has sprung up to aid us in eradicating it, from self-help books and holistic remedies to pharmaceuticals and cutting-edge cognitive behavioral therapy. Yet we are an ever more profoundly anxious society. Epidemiological studies show that over 100 million people in the U.S. will suffer from an anxiety disorder in their lifetime. Rates, especially among the young, have been rising for the past decade. Our efforts to contain anxiety aren’t working.
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Wendy Wood Elected Incoming APS President-Elect
Wendy Wood, provost professor of psychology and business at the University of Southern California, has been elected President-Elect of the Association for Psychological Science.
