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New Content From Perspectives on Psychological Science
A sample of articles on childhood adversity, habit formation and mental illness, implicit bias, teleological reasoning, article length, choice and losses, and psychological science in the wake of COVID-19.
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The Science Behind Ouija Boards
Maybe you’re at a sleepover, or a Halloween party. Maybe it’s night, it’s probably night. You sit before a board with the alphabet printed on it, a little sun and moon, the words “yes” and “no” and “goodbye.” You rest the tips of your fingers on a heart-shaped plastic platform and ask a question. You’re not moving it, you swear, and your friend says they’re not moving it either, but the platform glides across the board, from one letter to the next, spelling out a name, an answer to a question it couldn’t possibly know. What’s really happening? For over 130 years, Ouija boards have amazed, entertained, and even frightened people with mysterious messages from the beyond.
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Why We’re Obsessed with Halloween Haunted Houses, According to a Psychologist
Many Halloween fans love that the holiday is an excuse to dress up and eat orange-ified versions of their favorite candy. I’m obsessed with Halloween for a different reason. Every year, I make a list of the best, most frightening haunted house attractions in Southern California and try to hit as many as my calendar allows. I’m kind of a scaredy-cat in most other areas of my life (like, you’re never going to catch me lingering on top of a tall building), yet when it comes to paying people to scare me by wearing clown masks and wielding fake chainsaws, I’m like, yes, please take my money.
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Reinventing Yourself in Retirement Sounds Great. But It Isn’t So Easy.
Kathleen Kostrzewa knew when she retired from her job as an IT and business-development executive at Avon Products Inc. in 2015 that she wanted to pivot to a nonprofit where she could “do good work and give back.” An outplacement counselor she consulted told her she’d likely go through “multiple tries and not get it right at first,” she says. The advice helped Ms. Kostrzewa, who is now 71, to experiment and accept that changing courses later in life is less a sprint than a slow jog with a lot of stumbles and retries along the way. She volunteered at a charter school, but soon quit because she spent more time waiting to be assigned students than helping anyone.
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The Brain Guesses What Word Comes Ne-
In the midst of a conversation with an acquaintance, your brain might skip ahead, anticipating the words that the other person will say. Perhaps then you will blurt out whatever comes to mind. Or maybe you will nurse your guess quietly, waiting to see if—out of all the hundreds of thousands of possibilities—your conversational partner will arrive at the same word you have been thinking of. Amazingly, your companion will often do so. How does the brain do this? Figuring out how we process language has long been a focus for neuroscientists. Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers brought a new take to the question using a technique called integrative modeling.
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The Twisted Paths of Perception
The King Pedro IV Square in Lisbon, Portugal, better known as the Rossio, regales visitors with a delightful exemplar of the traditional pavement called calçada portuguesa. Originally cobbled in 1848, the dizzying light and dark undulations symbolize the sea voyages of Portuguese navigators and predate 20th-century designs by Op Art creators such as Victor Vasarely and Bridget Riley, while inducing similar perceptions of flowing motion. But does the vibrant pattern stand in the way of safety? A recent study from the University of Bristol in England asked participants how walking on floors patterned with visual illusions affected their discomfort levels and feeling of instability.
