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Fragmented Sleep, Fragmented Mind: A New Theory of Sleep Disruption and Dissociation
This summary has been removed. The original research article on which it is based, “Dissociation and Dissociative Disorders: Challenging Conventional Wisdom,” remains published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, available to journal subscribers and members of APS.
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The Dubious Science of Online Dating
The New York Times: How scientific are the “matching algorithms” of online-dating Web sites? For a fee, many dating sites will collect data about you, crunch the numbers and match you with someone who, as eHarmony puts it, has been “prescreened for deep compatibility with you across 29 dimensions.” Sites like Chemistry, PerfectMatch and GenePartner make similar scientific-sounding claims. But can a mathematical formula really identify pairs of singles who are especially likely to have a successful romantic relationship? We believe the answer is no. It’s hard to be certain, since the sites have not disclosed their algorithms.
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Looking for Facebook friends? Keep it positive
Discovery News: Updating your Facebook status with the torrid details of your bad day? Think twice: People with low self-esteem who post negative details about their lives on Facebook may find their online friends diminishing. Amanda Forest, a graduate student at the University of Waterloo, in Canada, had expected that a new study, which she and her adviser, Joanne Wood, recently had published in Psychological Science, would show that Facebook promoted stronger relationships for those with low self-esteem. Instead, the researchers found that too many negative posts can cause social harm.
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Should Sugar Be Regulated like Alcohol and Tobacco?
TIME: Sugar poses enough health risks that it should be considered a controlled substance just like alcohol and tobacco, contend a team of researchers from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). In an opinion piece called “The Toxic Truth About Sugar” that was published Feb. 1 in the journal Nature, Robert Lustig, Laura Schmidt and Claire Brindis argue that it’s a misnomer to consider sugar just “empty calories.” They write: “There is nothing empty about these calories. A growing body of scientific evidence is showing that fructose can trigger processes that lead to liver toxicity and a host of other chronic diseases.
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Réseaux sociaux : plus addictifs que l’alcool ou la cigarette ?
Yahoo! France: Passer une journée sans "checker" Facebook ou Twitter ? Impossible! Une étude américaine démontre que les réseaux sociaux sont aujourd'hui devenus totalement addictifs. Si parmi les addictions les plus fréquentes, l'alcool et le tabac sont souvent pointés du doigt, il y a désormais pire. Selon des spécialistes américains, vérifier son smartphone ou son ordinateur serait devenu une addiction bien plus importante, notamment parce qu'elle concerne une part massive de la population. Publiée dans le Psychological Science et menée par l'Université de Chicago, l'étude montre que nous sommes tout à fait capables de résister à nos envie de tabac, d'alcool ou encore de shopping.
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The emoticon on your face
Boston Globe: What’s in a face? We generally see it as a window into our inner lives — so much so that it’s possible to read our emotions from our facial expressions. And in recent decades, we have become enchanted by the notion that with a little specialized knowledge, we can read these feelings very, very accurately. A program launched at Logan Airport last year has trained security personnel to converse with passengers while scanning their facial movements for suspicious emotions. Companies like Affectiva, a spinoff of MIT’s Media Lab, are developing ways to automatically judge a person’s mood in part by observing the movements of facial muscles.
