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Advancing Science Through the Use of “New Statistics”
There are several steps that researchers can take to bolster the integrity of their work, but embracing the use of the “new statistics” of effect sizes, estimation, and meta-analysis is a particularly important one, argues psychological scientist Geoff Cumming of La Trobe University in Australia. As Cumming notes in a new tutorial published online in Psychological Science, the critical flaw of the traditional statistical approach – null-hypothesis significance testing (NHST) – is that it disposes scientists to think of their research aims and results in black and white.
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24th Annual Rotman Research Institute Conference
Join world-renowned scientists in Toronto at the 24th annual Baycrest Rotman Research Institute conference titled "Memory and the Brain in Health and Disease”. March 10-11, 2014 at the Omni King Edward Hotel. Post-conference workshops on March 12, 2014 at Baycrest. Full details can be found on the website at research.baycrest.org/conference
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Your Brain ‘Sees’ Things Even When You Don’t
The brain processes visual input to the level of understanding its meaning even if we never consciously perceive that input, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. The research, led by Jay Sanguinetti of the University of Arizona, challenges currently accepted models about how the brain processes visual information. Sanguinetti, a doctoral candidate in the UA’s department of psychology in the College of Science, showed study participants a series of black silhouettes, some of which contained recognizable, real-world objects hidden in the white spaces on the outsides.
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Study: Grandiose narcissism can be beneficial for U.S. presidents
Raw Story: Narcissism isn’t all bad if you’re living in the White House, according to research published in Psychological Science in October. Though the trait is considered a personality flaw, it tends to help presidents — as well as hurt them. Ashley L. Watts, a doctoral student at Emory University and the lead author of the study, told PsyPost the findings “suggest that the relations between grandiose narcissism and indicators of successful narcissism are much more nuanced than previous literature suggests.” Narcissists tend to have fantasies of extraordinary success, heightened feelings of entitlement, and a lack of empathy.
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People Support Social Welfare When They’re Hungry Themselves
The Atlantic: It’s hard to know how to feel about Obamacare right now. One one hand, there’s outrage at stories that like that of San Francisco resident Lee Hammack and his wife, JoEllen Brothers, two middle-income people who had their affordable, comprehensive Kaiser plan cancelled and can only obtain a much less generous policy on the exchange, and without the help of the much-touted subsidies. At the same time, it’s heartening that people like Kentucky resident David Elson, who can’t afford to refill his diabetes prescriptions, keeps his unpaid medical bills in a cardboard box, and suffers from severe eye bleeding, can finally get some treatment. ...
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Gun violence in PG-13 movies has tripled
CNN: When was the last time you saw a blockbuster film that didn't include a gun? It might be hard to remember. Americans love movies that depict violence, a new study shows; 94% of the most popular movies since 1985 contain at least one violent scene, and half of those involve a gun. For the study, published this week in the scientific journal Pediatrics, researchers analyzed the 30 top-grossing films every year from 1950 to 2012. They identified violent sequences in each movie and noted whether the scenes included a character carrying a gun with the intention of harming or killing a living target. Since 1950, violence in films has more than doubled, the study authors concluded.
