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Think Less, Think Better
The New York Times: A FRIEND of mine has a bad habit of narrating his experiences as they are taking place. I tease him for being a bystander in his own life. To be fair, we all fail to experience life to the fullest. Typically, our minds are too occupied with thoughts to allow complete immersion even in what is right in front of us. Sometimes, this is O.K. I am happy not to remember passing a long stretch of my daily commute because my mind has wandered and my morning drive can be done on autopilot. But I do not want to disappear from too much of life. Too often we eat meals without tasting them, look at something beautiful without seeing it.
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After seeing the results of a clever psychological study, I’m considering making a major change to my daily commute
Business Insider: As a born-and-raised New Yorker, I'm an expert at ignoring people. Nowhere does that skill come in handier than on a crowded subway, where my limbs are often entangled with those of other riders, our faces close enough for me to smell the latte on their breath. The key, I've learned, is to pretend they don't exist. Seriously — don't acknowledge the physical intimacy, don't try to crack a joke about it, and definitely don't use it as an opportunity to ask where they're headed. ...
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Children Learn to Take Turns for Mutual Gain
It takes children until they are about 5 years old to learn to take turns with others, while the social skill seems to elude chimpanzees, according to new findings published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. The findings show that 5-year-old children adopted a turn-taking strategy more effectively than their younger counterparts, suggesting that the skill emerges as children’s cognitive abilities mature.
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For Teens, Learning That Personalities Change Buffers Against Stress
Teaching teens that social and personality traits can change helps them cope with social challenges such as bullying, which can help mitigate stress and improve academic performance.
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Getting smarter
aeon: Is it just me, or is everybody out there looking for a quick fix? There is something highly compelling about the idea that there is a secret switch we can flip to become suddenly smarter, to reveal cognitive abilities hidden inside each of us. It is a notion that certainly has commercial appeal. Over just seven years, the games-maker Lumosity rocketed from zero to 50 million users, promising rapid improvements in general intelligence by playing brain-training video games for just a few weeks.
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Phone-Sick at Camp
The New York Times: Leaving for sleepaway camp is, for many children, a major step toward independence. Today, when cellphones keep parents and children in nearly constant contact, the fact that most camps have phone-free policies makes breaking away even more of a challenge. “Camp-age kids, by even 10 or 11, are used to texting and being in frequent contact with their parents,” said Christopher Thurber, a clinical psychologist who focuses on youth development and summer camp. “How we communicate has changed the nature of attachment, and it complicates the separation that kids and parents go through,” he said.
