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The Plight of the Eldest Daughter
Being an eldest daughter means frequently feeling like you’re not doing enough, like you’re struggling to maintain a veneer of control, like the entire household relies on your diligence. To be clear, birth order doesn’t influence personality itself—but it can influence how your family sees you, Brent Roberts, a psychology professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, told me. Eldest kids, for example, aren’t necessarily more responsible than their siblings; instead, they tend to be given more responsibilities because they are older. That role can affect how you understand yourself.
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The Pandemic Disrupted Adolescent Brain Development
Before COVID, American teenagers’ psychological health was already in decline. The pandemic, with its sudden lockdowns, school closures and other jolts to normal life, made that downward slope steeper. The ensuing mental health crisis has given researchers a rare opportunity to gauge how an extraordinary event such as a public health catastrophe can physically affect the brains of teenagers. ...
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How Gratitude Improves Your Relationships and Your Future
For the millions of Americans that celebrate Thanksgiving, it's a time when a lot of us reflect on the things and the people in our lives that we appreciate. But according to Dr. Laurie Santos, psychology professor at Yale and host of the podcast, The Happiness Lab, a practice of gratitude can improve our lives year-round. Host Brittany Luse chats with Dr. Santos about the surprising science of how gratitude can affect our brains — and how it leads us to be more generous with our future selves.
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Trauma and Resilience in Disaster’s Wake: A Scientific Perspective
In a November 15 Science for Society webinar, scientists and advocates shared their expertise and perspectives on well-being in collectively traumatic situations.
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I Was Trying to Build My Son’s Resilience, Not Scar Him for Life
... Resilience is a popular term in modern psychology that, put simply, refers to the ability to recover and move on from adverse events, failure or change. “We don’t call it ‘character’ anymore,” said Jelena Kecmanovic, director of Arlington/DC Behavior Therapy Institute. “We call it the ability to tolerate distress, the ability to tolerate uncertainty.” Studies suggest that resilience in kids is associated with things like empathy, coping skills and problem-solving, though this research is often done on children in extreme circumstances and may not apply to everybody.
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To Lead a Meaningful Life, Become Your Own Hero
What do Beowulf, Batman and Barbie all have in common? Ancient legends, comic book sagas and blockbuster movies alike share a storytelling blueprint called “the hero’s journey.” This timeless narrative structure, first described by mythologist Joseph Campbell in 1949, describes ancient epics, such as the Odyssey and the Epic of Gilgamesh, and modern favorites, including the Harry Potter, Star Wars and Lord of the Rings series. Many hero’s journey stories have become cultural touchstones that influence how people think about their world and themselves.
