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Deconstructing Decision Making
We make decisions all the time and often in uncertain circumstances. Elke Webers research focuses on how we judge those choices, the decisions we end up making, and individual and cultural differences in risk-taking. Specifically, her research examines behavioral models of decision making and how to measure and model risk-taking behavior. Her work has tied together psychology and economics, by examining risky financial decision making. Additionally, she studies environmental decision making, for example, how people respond to climate change and ways in which policymakers can present programs to the public to make them most effective.
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Managing Stress the Healthy Way
Shelley E. Taylors research explores our ability to perceive some stressful situations in ways that have both psychological and biological benefits. Taylors research shows that in some circumstances, we can develop “positive illusions” – such as an illusion of personal control or unrealistic optimism about the future – to handle stressful situations. Taylors tend-and-befriend model illustrates how people, especially women, will come together support one another in stressful situations.
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Money can’t buy generosity, study finds
Calgary Herald: Turns out the rich really are different. But not necessarily in the ways we assume. Though economically privileged, people from upper-class backgrounds consistently display deficits in empathy, social engagement, generosity and sensitivity as compared to those from the lower classes. The differences in behaviour are so marked, in fact, that naive observers are able to detect a person's socioeconomic background based on 60 seconds of interaction. The findings, published in the journal Current Directions in Psychological Science, have researchers concluding that wealth comes at considerable personal cost - and that being poor isn't without its wages.
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Understanding the Power of Stereotypes
Throughout his career Claude Steele has been interested in processes of self-evaluation, in particular in how people cope with threatening self-images. This work has led to a general theory of self-affirmation processes. A second interest, growing out of the first, is a theory of how group stereotypes—such as stereotypes about African Americans in academic domains and women in quantitative domains—can influence intellectual performance and academic identities.
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Frauen sind anders mutig als Männer
Berliner Morgenpost: Frauen sind nicht grundsätzlich weniger risikofreudig als Männer, wie eine Studie der Columbia Business School in New York zeigt. So seien sie zum Beispiel eher bereit als Männer, auch noch mit Mitte 30 eine neue berufliche Karriere zu starten. Auch sprächen sie eher als Männer bei geschäftlichen Treffen unangenehme Themen an, erklären die Forscher um die Sozialwissenschaftler Elke Weber und Bernd Figner im Fachblatt "Current Directions in Psychological Science". Männer sind demgegenüber risikobereiter, was Finanzfragen betrifft. Lesen Sie mehr/Read the whole story: Berliner Morgenpost
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Yes, love really IS blind! Rose-tinted glasses aren’t just for foolish romantics – they’re the key to lasting bliss, say scientists
Daily Mail: When my friend Emma invited me to meet her new boyfriend, Jerry, I was keen, but a bit intimidated. For weeks, she’d been going on about him. I knew all about his brilliant legal career, wit and, most of all, physique. As far as Emma was concerned, he was Brad Pitt with a brilliant brain. So when they walked in together, my jaw dropped — because he was so short that he barely came up to her waist. There is something irritating about the utter blindness of a man or woman in love. It takes a will of steel not to snigger as your friend rhapsodises about her Prince Charming who, to the eyes of the rest of the world, is all too clearly a frog.
