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A more peaceful world if women in charge?
CNN: Would the world be more peaceful if women were in charge? A challenging new book by the Harvard University psychologist Steven Pinker says that the answer is “yes.” In The Better Angels of Our Nature, Pinker presents data showing that human violence, while still very much with us today, has been gradually declining. Moreover, he says, “over the long sweep of history, women have been and will be a pacifying force. Traditional war is a man’s game: tribal women never band together to raid neighboring villages.” As mothers, women have evolutionary incentives to maintain peaceful conditions in which to nurture their offspring and ensure that their genes survive into the next generation.
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Numeracy: The Educational Gift That Keeps on Giving?
Cancer risks. Investment alternatives. Calories. Numbers are everywhere in daily life, and they figure into all sorts of decisions. A new article published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, examines how people who are numerate—that’s like literacy, but for numbers—understand numbers better and process information differently so that they ultimately make more informed decisions. People who are numerate are more comfortable thinking about numbers and are less influenced by other information, says Ellen Peters of Ohio State University, the author of the new paper.
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Facebook can alienate people further – study
The Sydney Morning Herald: Facebook can help you accumulate hundreds of instant friends, but people with low self-esteem should limit their woeful comments or risk losing their cyber pals, a study reports. While the social media site is a convenient outlet to share feelings and maintain friendships, researchers have found people who had a poor opinion of themselves were more likely to post negative messages that irritated their existing online friends and alienated themselves further.
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Distraction Reduces Pain, Study Finds
Yahoo!: When you distract yourself from pain, you actually hurt less, a new study suggests. Study participants who were subjected to slight pain on their forearms reported less discomfort when they were asked to perform a distracting mental test as the pain was delivered. Moreover, when participants were given a placebo "pain relief" cream, and distracted at the same time, their pain was even more reduced. "Both placebo and distraction are effective mechanisms for reducing pain. You can combine them and you don't lose anything," said study researcher Jason Buhle, who conducted the research as part of his doctoral dissertation from Columbia University.
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Les réseaux sociaux rendent plus accro que la cigarette
Le Parisien: Le besoin de vérifier ses courriels ou son statut Facebook serait plus pressant que celui de fumer. C’est l’étonnant résultat d’une étude réalisée en Allemagne sur le contrôle des désirs, qui sera prochainement publiée dans la très sérieuse revue « Psychological Science ». Ainsi, les 205 personnes interrogées ont eu peu de mal à réfréner leurs envies de tabac ou de café. En revanche, les pulsions de se connecter aux réseaux sociaux sont parmi les plus difficiles à repousser. Read the whole story: Le Parisien
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You May Be Discriminating Against Your Coworkers And You Don’t Even Know It
Business Insider: People with easier-to-pronounce names have a better chance of being favored and even getting promotions than those with names that don't flow as well (via BusinessWire). According to a study published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, names that were easier to pronounce were viewed more positively and even helped in voting ballots compared to names that were more difficult to say aloud.
