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Distinct Stages of Thinking Revealed by Brain Activity Patterns
Neuroimaging data can reveal the mental stages people go through as they are solving challenging math problems, according to a new study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. By combining
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Memories of Spence
APS Past President Janet Taylor Spence, who died in March 2015 at the age of 91, loved the pursuit of psychological science and inspired all who worked with her. In a special symposium chaired by
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Better Math Skills Predict Bigger Bank Accounts
Having a head for numbers is an ability that people can bank on—quite literally. Being good with numbers gives people an edge in all kinds of jobs, from investment banking to professional poker. But the
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Girls are still afraid of math, even when their moms are scientists
Quartz: Understanding why girls do worse than boys (pdf) in math, and why they have more anxiety about the subject, is complicated. Cultural norms that favor boys, teacher bias, and even parents’ own math anxiety
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What We Have and Haven’t Learned
In psychological science, as in other sciences, it is difficult to establish broadly consequential conclusions beyond reasonable dispute. It therefore sometimes seems that we make no progress at all; however, when I look back on
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The Minimum Description Length Principle
Both as scientists and in our everyday lives, we make probabilistic inferences. Mathematicians may deduce their conclusions from their stated premises, but the rest of us induce our conclusions from data. As scientists, we do
