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We dislike being alone with our thoughts
Nature: Which would you prefer: pain or boredom? Given the choice, many people would rather give themselves mild electric shocks than sit idly in a room for 15 minutes, according to a study published today in Science. The results are a testament to our discomfort with our own thoughts, say psychologists, and to the challenge we face when we try to rein them in. “We lack a comfort in just being alone with our thoughts,” says Malia Mason, a psychologist at Columbia University in New York, who was not involved in the study.
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You Look More Powerful When You Avoid Talking Details, Study Shows
People may see you as powerful based not only on your job title or your income, but on the very words you use in conversation and speeches. That’s the conclusion from a new study on how power is signaled in interpersonal communications. Building on studies showing that people in positions of power use more abstract language (such as interpretive or visionary descriptions) than those with less clout, a trio of psychological researchers explored how people who use abstract language are perceived by others. Over seven experiments, Cheryl J. Wakslak and Albert Han of University of Southern California and Pamela K.
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DID FACEBOOK HURT PEOPLE’S FEELINGS?
The New Yorker: It’s no secret that social media can affect your mood, making you experience certain feelings based on the information you see and the people you interact with. Those feelings are one of the reasons that people use sites like Facebook or Twitter to begin with. But what if you found out that what you felt was the result of a deliberate manipulation by the social network itself?
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How to Get Over Stage Fright, Jenny Slate Style
New York Magazine: What if you suddenly became intensely afraid of some integral part of your own career? In a recent interview with Fresh Air about her new film Obvious Child, Jenny Slate talked about her sudden-onset stage fright, a potentially career-killing phobia for a stand-up comic and actress. She says her fear, which took hold after she accidentally swore on Saturday Night Live and was subsequently dismissed from the show, lasted two long years.
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This Is Your Brain on Writing
The New York Times: A novelist scrawling away in a notebook in seclusion may not seem to have much in common with an NBA player doing a reverse layup on a basketball court before a screaming crowd. But if you could peer inside their heads, you might see some striking similarities in how their brains were churning. That’s one of the implications of new research on the neuroscience of creative writing. For the first time, neuroscientists have used fMRI scanners to track the brain activity of both experienced and novice writers as they sat down — or, in this case, lay down — to turn out a piece of fiction. Read the whole story: The New York Times
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How People Perceive ‘Driving Gone Green’
More than 405,000 fully electric vehicles (EVs) are on the road worldwide this year, according to a recent report from a German renewable energy company. That may not seem like many – after all, there are over 1 billion cars in the world. But that number is fully double the number of EVs that were on the road just 2 years ago. Despite what seems to be a burgeoning market for plug-and-play vehicles, misinformation and stereotypes about the cars have proved a major impediment for manufacturers. Researchers from Oxford Brookes University in the United Kingdom recently investigated public perceptions of electric cars by surveying 55 EV drivers.
