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If it’s Hard to Read, it’s Hard to Do: Study Shows Difficult to Read Instructions Decrease Motivation
It is not surprising that people are more willing to participate in a task if it does not require too much effort. What is interesting, however, is the way we determine just how easy a task will be and therefore, how motivated we are to complete it. New research from University of Michigan psychologists Hyunjin Song and Norbert Schwarz investigates how thinking about a task (i.e., how complex or simple it will be) affects our attitude toward the task itself. The researchers tested this by trying to motivate a group of college students to exercise regularly by providing them with directions on how to implement an exercise regimen.
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New Study Explores Social Comparison in Early Childhood
It has been shown (and probably experienced by all of us) that performing worse than our peers on a particular task results in negative self-esteem and poorer subsequent performance on the same task. How people respond when their peers perform better than they do has been studied in a variety of age groups and it turns out that preschoolers have thicker skin than adults do!
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Baby Talk: The Roots of the Early Vocabulary in Infants’ Learning From Speech
Although babies typically start talking around 12 months of age, their brains actually begin processing certain aspects of language much earlier, so that by the time they start talking, babies actually already know hundreds of words. While studying language acquisition in infants can be a challenging endeavor, researchers have begun to make significant progress that changes previous views of what infants learn, according to a new report by University of Pennsylvania psychologist Daniel Swingley.
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It All Adds Up: Early Achievement in Math May Identify Future Scientists and Engineers
New research published in the October issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, suggests that there may be a way to identify budding scientists and engineers and thus be able to guide them, from a young age, to careers that will enable them to make the most of their abilities. Vanderbilt University psychologists Gregory Park, David Lubinski and Camilla P. Benbow wanted to see if early mathematical reasoning ability would be predictive of future accomplishments in scientific and technical fields. The researchers identified 1500 young adolescents who had scored in the top 1% on the math portion of the SAT.
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Phony Friends? Rejected People Better Able to Spot Fake Smiles
“There are hundreds of languages in the world, but a smile speaks them all.” It’s true too—next time you are lost in a foreign country, just flash a smile and the locals will be happy to help you find your way. An honest smile can convey a wide range of meanings, from being happy to having fun. Although, not all smiles are genuine. All of us have “faked a smile” at some point.
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Could Your Initials Influence Where You Choose to Work? A Systematic Test of the “Name-Letter Effect”
One of the most important decisions that we can make is what company we will work for. There are a number of factors to consider when making this decision, including salary, benefits and work location. However, there may also be less-obvious factors in play that sway our decision, and without us even knowing it. It is well known that unconscious thoughts can influence certain aspects of our behavior. An intriguing example of this is the “name-letter effect,” a phenomenon which shows that we have a preference for things that begin with the same letter as our first name.
