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When Power Goes To Your Head, It May Shut Out Your Heart
NPR: Even the smallest dose of power can change a person. You've probably seen it. Someone gets a promotion or a bit of fame and then, suddenly, they're a little less friendly to the people beneath them. ... But if you ask Sukhvinder Obhi, a neuroscientist at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada, he might give you another explanation: Power fundamentally changes how the brain operates. Obhi and his colleagues, Jeremy Hogeveen and Michael Inzlicht, have a new study showing evidence to support that claim. Obhi and his fellow researchers randomly put participants in the mindset of feeling either powerful or powerless.
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Infused with faith: Religious ritual and hope for peace
Israeli-Palestinian peace talks begin this week, and it’s fair to say that attitudes range from guardedly hopeful to sneeringly cynical. After all, this conflict has been going on since the mid-20th century, with a lot of dashed promises along the way. It was just a year ago that missiles from Gaza were raining down daily on Israel. All of the final status issues are on the table, both sides agree—land, borders, settlements, Jerusalem. It’s widely assumed that the animosity and conflict between Palestine and Israel are fueled by these geopolitical issues, rather than by clashing religious values.
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Afraid to Get Tested? Slow Down and Think About It
The New York Times: Many patients are eager to search bottomless troves of health information on the Internet. But when it comes to learning whether they are at risk for certain diseases by getting a medical test, millions would rather just not know. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in three patients infected with H.I.V. do not get tested in sufficient time to benefit from existing treatments. The research literature is rife with studies of low rates for colonoscopies, mammograms and an array of genetic testing. ...
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Scientists trigger ‘out-of-body’ experience using heartbeats
The Telegraph: Seventeen volunteers were fitted with head cameras and shown a live video of themselves from behind. Some of the volunteers were shown images which flashed in time with their own heartbeat. The scientists found that those who were in effect watching their own heartbeat began to identify with their "virtual self" more than their own body. The researchers claim this shows the experience had altered their "self-location" and had in effect produced an "out of body experience".
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Visualized Heartbeat Can Trigger ‘Out-of-Body Experience’
A visual projection of human heartbeats can be used to generate an “out-of-body experience,” according to new research to be published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. The findings could inform new kinds of treatment for people with self-perception disorders, including anorexia. The study, conducted by Jane Aspell of Anglia Ruskin University in the UK and Lukas Heydrich of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, is novel in that it shows that information about the internal state of the body — in this case, the heartbeat — can be used to change how people experience their own body and self.
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Tidy or Messy Environment Can Impact Decisions and Behavior, Study Says
ABC News: Here's a toast to the slob in the office, the gal with so much junk on her desk she can't find her telephone. All that clutter may be part of the reason she is so creative. For years, we've been told that piles of personal rubbish have got to be a liability. Now there's a flip side to that theorem. Researchers at the University of Minnesota decided to take a look at a long-established principle of human honesty and productivity -- keep your work area clean and you will be more likely to work your tail off, stay honest, be generous with your coworkers, and on and on. Read the whole story: ABC News
