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The Importance of Sharing Experiences
The Atlantic: Given the choice between going to a bar with Jessica Alba and going to a bar with our same group of friends, most of us would probably pick the date with the onetime “Sexiest Woman in the World” and impresario of eco-friendly baby-products. But perhaps we should rethink that choice and opt for another night of beers with the gang. A recent study in Psychological Science suggests that unusual experiences have a social cost, in that they alienate us from our peers.
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Remember Me: Personal Legacy and Global Warming
The Huffington Post: Later this month, the UN's International Panel on Climate Change will release its fifth and latest assessment of the scientific evidence regarding human interference in the world's climate. Based on the working papers that have preceded this final synthesis, the IPCC will echo the alarms of earlier assessments -- that global warming is unequivocal and unprecedented and extremely likely to have been caused by human activity. The report will call for new policies to mitigate climate change and the likelihood of severe and irreversible consequences.
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The Surprising Problem of Too Much Talent
Scientific American: Whether you're the owner of the Dallas Cowboys or captain of the playground dodge ball team, the goal in picking players is the same: Get the top talent. Hearts have been broken, allegiances tested, and budgets busted as teams contend for the best athletes. The motivation for recruiting peak performers is obvious — exceptional players are the key to team success — and this belief is shared not only by coaches and sports fans, but also by corporations, investors, and even whole industries. Everyone wants a team of stars.
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New Research From Clinical Psychological Science
Read about the latest research published in Clinical Psychological Science: Jenny Yiend, Andrew Mathews, Tom Burns, Kevin Dutton, Andrés Fernández-Martín, George A. Georgiou, Michael Luckie, Alexandra Rose, Riccardo Russo, and Elaine Fox Studies examining anxiety-related attention bias have found differences in orienting mechanisms such as engagement and disengagement of attention for targets; however, much of this research has been conducted with subclinical samples.
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One Scary Boss Can Spook the Whole Office
Coping with an abusive boss can have major impacts on employee well-being, and research has even shown that a bad boss can make people sick, leading to increased rates of heart attack, high blood pressure, anxiety, and chronic stress among employees. But a scary boss doesn’t just impact his or her immediate subordinates – new research from a team of psychological scientists led by Mary Bardes Mawritz of Drexel University shows that an abusive boss’s bad behavior can trickle down throughout the entire office.
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You Can Recover From a Snippy Email, But Prepare to Grovel
The Wall Street Journal: Stephanie Freeman recently wrote an email to a friend to say she missed her and thought of her often. The two women had previously made lunch plans, but they hadn’t followed through. Ms. Freeman added that she’d still love to get together. The reply? “You always say you are thinking of me but never do anything about it,” her friend wrote. “You are all talk and no action.” Ms. Freeman, 45, got angry. “How dare she put all the responsibility of this relationship on me?” she recalls thinking. She fired off a reply telling her friend to be grateful that she thought of her in a positive way and reminding the friend that she was capable of taking action, too.
