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Being Neurotic May Help You Live Longer
TIME: Neuroticism isn’t generally considered a desirable attribute, and many studies have linked the personality trait to poorer health and an increased risk of mental disorders. But a new study in Psychological Science suggests that for some people, neurotic tendencies may actually reduce the risk of dying early. The new paper analyzed data from more than 500,000 people in the UK, ages 37 to 73, who answered questions about their lifestyle behaviors, medical conditions and how healthy they felt. They also completed a personality assessment to measure levels of neuroticism.
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Don’t Believe in God? Maybe You’ll Try U.F.O.s
The New York Times: Are Americans becoming less religious? It depends on what you mean by “religious.” Polls certainly indicate a decline in religious affiliation, practice and belief. Just a couple of decades ago, about 95 percent of Americans reported belonging to a religious group. This number is now around 75 percent. And far fewer are actively religious: The percentage of regular churchgoers may be as low as 15 to 20 percent. As for religious belief, the Pew Research Center found that from 2007 to 2014 the percentage of Americans who reported being absolutely confident God exists dropped from 71 percent to 63 percent. Read the whole story: The New York Times
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We know better, so why can’t we stop making snap judgments based on appearance?
Science: Imagine you are part of an experiment. You and your coparticipants are shown photographs of two individuals and are asked to choose who is more leader-like. Unbeknownst to you, the individuals in the photographs are real-life candidates vying for a seat in the U.S. Congress. Would it surprise you to learn that the average ratings of the participants in the experiment could reliably predict which candidate would go on to win the electoral contest? In 2005, I pondered this very experiment, published in Science by psychologist Alexander Todorov and colleagues. Read the whole story: Science
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How to fight ‘time famine’ and boost your happiness
CNN: Ashley Whillans' summer started with what she calls "time famine." Time famine, a term that first emerged in the scientific literature around 1999, refers to the universal feeling of having too much to do but not enough time to deal with those demands. After earning her doctorate degree in social psychology at the University of British Columbia in Canada, Whillans was offered a coveted assistant professorship at Harvard Business School. Last month, Whillans and her husband uprooted to Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the United States -- and it was overwhelming, she said. ...
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New Research in Clinical Psychological Science
Read about the latest research published in Clinical Psychological Science: Unpacking Rumination and Executive Control: A Network Perspective Emily E. Bernstein, Alexandre Heeren, and Richard J. McNally Rumination is defined as perseverative passive self-focused thinking about aspects of one's affective state. Rumination has been identified as a potential transdiagnostic vulnerability factor for affective disorders and is hypothesized to arise from impairments in executive control. The researchers examined the interactions of three executive-control processes (set shifting, updating working memory, and inhibition) and their influence on rumination.
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We fear death, but what if dying isn’t as bad as we think?
The Guardian: “The idea of death, the fear of it, haunts the human animal like nothing else,” wrote Earnest Becker in his book, The Denial of Death. It’s a fear strong enough to compel us to force kale down our throats, run sweatily on a treadmill at 7am on a Monday morning, and show our genitals to a stranger with cold hands and a white coat if we feel something’s a little off. But our impending end isn’t just a benevolent supplier of healthy behaviours. Researchers have found death can determine our prejudices, whether we give to charity or wear sun cream, our desire to be famous, what type of leader we vote for, how we name our children and even how we feel about breastfeeding. ...
