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Why It’s So Hard to Admit You’re Wrong
The New York Times: Despite your best intentions and efforts, it is inevitable: At some point in your life, you will be wrong. Mistakes can be hard to digest, so sometimes we double down rather than face them. Our confirmation bias kicks in, causing us to seek out evidence to prove what we already believe. The car you cut off has a small dent in its bumper, which obviously means that it is the other driver’s fault. ... Another study, from the Stanford researchers Carol Dweck and Karina Schumann, found that subjects were more likely to take responsibility for their mistakes when they believed they had the power to change their behavior.
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Struggling Relationship? Science Says Puppy Pictures May Help.
National Geographic: Struggling to stay happy in a long-distance relationship? Here, have some puppy pictures. It may sound like a mere distraction, but a new study published this week in Psychological Science found that people who were shown photos of puppies and bunnies next to a photo of their partner developed more positive associations with that partner than control groups. The study was funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Defense, in part to help families dealing with long separations during deployment. Read the whole story: National Geographic
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New Research From Psychological Science
A sample of new research exploring statistical learning in speech segmentation and links between weight-related perceptions and long-term health outcomes.
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How to Turn Stigma about Mental Illness into Compassion
Greater Good Magazine: What is it like to grow up in a household with a parent displaying serious mental illness? Renowned psychologist Stephen Hinshaw knows firsthand. His father suffered major bouts of psychosis that kept him periodically hospitalized during Hinshaw’s childhood. Yet, the reasons for these absences were never explained to Hinshaw, until he turned 18 and his philosopher father started to divulge his lifetime of struggles (which included being (mis)diagnosed with schizophrenia for decades). Read the whole story: Greater Good Magazine
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How to Raise a Feminist Son
The New York Times: We’re now more likely to tell our daughters they can be anything they want to be — an astronaut and a mother, a tomboy and a girlie girl. But we don’t do the same for our sons. Even as we’ve given girls more choices for the roles they play, boys’ worlds are still confined, social scientists say. They’re discouraged from having interests that are considered feminine. They’re told to be tough at all costs, or else to tamp down their so-called boy energy. ...
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Hooked on your phone?
CBS: That phone in your pocket is like a slot machine. Every time you check it, you're pulling the lever to see if you get a reward. At least that's how former Google product manager Tristan Harris sees it. This week on 60 Minutes, he tells correspondent Anderson Cooper that Silicon Valley programmers are engineering your phone and its apps to make you check them more and more. ... Psychologist Larry Rosen says technology really does wreak havoc on anxiety levels. He and his team at California State University Dominguez Hills have found that when people spend time away from their phones, their brain signals the adrenal gland to produce a burst of the hormone cortisol.
