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A Study Looks At the Nature of Change in Our Aging, Changing Brains
As we get older, our cognitive abilities change, improving when we’re younger and declining as we age. Scientists posit a hierarchical structure within which these abilities are organized. There’s the “lowest” level— measured by specific tests, such as story memory or word memory; the second level, which groups various skills involved in a category of cognitive ability, such as memory, perceptual speed, or reasoning; and finally, the “general,” or G, factor, a sort of statistical aggregate of all the thinking abilities. What happens to this structure as we age? That was the question Timothy A.
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Beautiful Brains
National Geographic: Although you know your teenager takes some chances, it can be a shock to hear about them. One fine May morning not long ago my oldest son, 17 at the time, phoned to tell me that he had just spent a couple hours at the state police barracks. Apparently he had been driving "a little fast." What, I asked, was "a little fast"? Turns out this product of my genes and loving care, the boy-man I had swaddled, coddled, cooed at, and then pushed and pulled to the brink of manhood, had been flying down the highway at 113 miles an hour. "That's more than a little fast," I said. He agreed. In fact, he sounded somber and contrite.
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Lying Is More Common When We’re Emailing, Study Shows
Huffington Post: Conversing online might make you more inclined to lie, a new study suggests. Researchers from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst found that people lied more when they were emailing or instant-messaging, compared with when they talked to someone in person. Their study was published in the journal Journal of Applied Social Psychology. "It's not news that we lie. What's new is that we lie even more online," study researcher Mattitiyahu Zimbler, a graduate student at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, told HealthDay.
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Understanding the Psychological Science Behind Negotiations
This week, the deficit reduction supercommittee failed to reach a consensus in creating a plan to reduce the national deficit by at least $1.2 trillion. Psychological science can provide some insights into the difficulties faced by the supercommittee members as they proceeded with the negotiations under intense political pressure and public scrutiny. “Interestingly, from negotiation research we know that it is much easier to negotiate deals that involve gains, instead of losses,” says Carsten de Dreu, Professor of Psychology at the University of Amsterdam.
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Walk Through a Door and Throw Memories out the Window
National Geographic: Forgot to turn off the stove? Can’t figure out why you have that piece of string tied to your finger? Don’t blame yourself; blame the door you just walked through. According to Notre Dame Psychology Professor Gabriel Radvansky, the simple act of walking through a doorway makes people forgetful. Radvansky conducted numerous experiments in which subjects’ memories were tested after crossing a room or exiting through a doorway. In all cases, the research subjects forgot more after walking through a doorway than they did walking the same distance across an open room. Read the whole story: National Geographic
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This column will change your life: burning bridges
The Guardian: Not long ago, in an interview conducted at his home – the Butner Federal Correctional Institution, in North Carolina – the convicted fraudster Bernie Madoff said something surprisingly profound. "I have… no decisions to make," Madoff, who's scheduled for release in 2139, told Barbara Walters. "I know I will die in prison. I lived the last 20 years of my life in fear. Now I have no fear because I'm no longer in control." In all honesty, the interview hardly gave the sense he'd seen the light, and I suspect the world's not yet ready for a book entitled The Spiritual Wisdom of Bernie Madoff.
