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Why Do We Feel Uneasy About a ‘New Normal’?
Ever since we were first confined to our homes, we’ve daydreamed about the return to normal life, from the exhilarating to the mundane. We want to visit our favourite pubs, theatres or shops, and we suddenly feel an odd nostalgia for taking the train, trying on new clothes or even shaking hands. But as mandatory lockdowns around the world start to ease and businesses slowly open their doors, many of us who are not healthcare providers or essential workers are facing a puzzling dilemma: we feel anxious about resuming our normal routines, even though they’re precisely what we’ve been looking forward to.
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4 Rules for Identifying Your Life’s Work
My oldest son graduates from college this month. Graduation is a leap into uncertainty even during ordinary times, and COVID-19 times are far from ordinary. It’s a scary moment to be heading out into the world. But my advice to my son—and to all graduates—remains the same as it would have been without a pandemic: Find your marshmallow. Maybe that sounds like some groovy ’60s code language for dropping acid or joining a commune, but it’s actually just a nod to a classic social-science experiment. In 1972, the Stanford University social psychologist Walter Mischel undertook a psychology experiment involving preschool kids and a bag of marshmallows.
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Optimism: Is It A Personality Trait, Or Could People Possibly Learn It?
Research shows that optimism is correlated with various good outcomes: higher life expectancy, better recovery rates, success at work. But is optimism a personality trait, or could it be learned? ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: There's a lot of research showing that optimism is correlated with all kinds of good outcomes like increased life expectancy, better recovery rates from heart operations, even success in work. But optimism, particularly right now, can be hard to come by. So NPR's Alix Spiegel decided to ask, can we choose it? ALIX SPIEGEL, BYLINE: There's so much packed into the simple word optimist, a whole galaxy of complicated meanings and judgments.
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Forced Social Isolation Causes Neural Craving Similar to Hunger
The need for connection-- to form and maintain at least a minimal number of positive, stable, intimate relationships-- is a fundamental need that affects our whole being, permeating our entire suite of emotions, thoughts, and behaviors. While voluntary solitude can be great fodder for creativity, and being alone doesn't necessarily indicate loneliness, what happens when people are forced into isolation and are severely deprived of this fundamental human need? Surprisingly, while the physical and mental health effects of loneliness are well documented, there is a lack of research on the consequences of severe forced isolation.
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New Content From Current Directions in Psychological Science
A sample of articles on fake news and aging, emotion regulation in psychopathology, brain structures, information search, and spouse’s death.
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New Research in Psychological Science
A sample of research on economic behavior, motivation interventions in education, perception, neural representations of procedural knowledge, empathy and romantic relationships, and stereotype-threat in chess.
