315 posts · 104,190 views
Reports on the latest psychology research plus psych gossip and comment. Brought to you by the British Psychological Society.
BPS Research Digest
315 posts
Sort by Latest Post, Most Popular
View by Condensed, Full
- March 8, 2010
- 12:24 AM
- 38 views
We're slower at processing touch-related words than words related to the other senses
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
People are slower at responding to tactile stimuli than to input from the other senses. It's not immediately obvious why this should be. It's unlikely to be for mechanical reasons: the retina in the eye is slower at converting input into a neural signal than is the skin. Psychologists think the answer may have to with attention. Perhaps we're not so good at keeping our attention focused on the tactile modality compared with the others. Now Louise Connell and Dermot Lynott have added to the pictu........ Read more »
Connell L, & Lynott D. (2010) Look but don't touch: Tactile disadvantage in processing modality-specific words. Cognition, 115(1), 1-9. PMID: 19903564
- March 5, 2010
- 04:15 AM
- 46 views
Darkness encourages unethical behaviour even when it makes no difference to anonymity
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Imagine a man sits alone, hunched over his desk, fingers tapping out a project progress report to his boss. Does he decide to lie? If I told you that the sun had nearly set, filling the man's room with darkness, would that make any difference to your answer? It should do. A new study suggests that darkness encourages cheating, even when it makes no difference to anonymity. Chen-Bo Zhong and colleagues had dozens of undergrad students complete a basic maths task against a time limit. Afterwards t........ Read more »
Zhong, C., Bohns, V., & Gino, F. (2010) Good Lamps Are the Best Police: Darkness Increases Dishonesty and Self-Interested Behavior. Psychological Science. DOI: 10.1177/0956797609360754
- March 3, 2010
- 01:05 AM
- 83 views
Hour-glass figure activates the neural reward centre of the male brain
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
There's little doubt that many conceptions of attractiveness are faddish - the size zero female model being an obvious example. However, other notions of beauty are more hard-wired, perhaps reflecting an evolutionary adaptation. These aspects of appearance have come to be associated with fertility, signifying 'reproductive fitness' to potential mates. Male facial symmetry is one example. Another is the hour-glass female form. Men in cultures across world report a preference for women with a lowe........ Read more »
Platek, S., & Singh, D. (2010) Optimal Waist-to-Hip Ratios in Women Activate Neural Reward Centers in Men. PLoS ONE, 5(2). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0009042
- March 1, 2010
- 04:59 AM
- 41 views
Can therapists tell when their clients have deteriorated?
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
About five to ten per cent of the time, people in therapy get worse instead of better. What should psychotherapists do in such cases? Hang on a minute. There's no point answering that question unless therapists can recognise that a client has deteriorated in the first place. A new study tackles this precise issue, finding, rather alarmingly, that the vast majority of therapists appear blind to client deterioration. Derek Hatfield and colleagues took advantage of therapy outcome data gathered at ........ Read more »
Hatfield, D., McCullough, L., Frantz, S., & Krieger, K. (2009) Do we know when our clients get worse? an investigation of therapists' ability to detect negative client change. Clinical Psychology . DOI: 10.1002/cpp.656
- February 26, 2010
- 06:44 AM
- 55 views
Video-game exercise bikes - not just a gimmick
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Exercise is going techno. People are playing Wii fit sports games in their homes and gyms are full of ever more interactive exercise machines. But is this trend anything more than gimmickry? Yes, according to a new study by Ryan Rhodes at the Behavioural Medicine Lab at the University of Victoria, and his colleagues.Rhodes' team had 29 previously inactive young men embark on an exercise regime, involving three half-hour cycling sessions a week for six weeks. Crucially, half the men trained on Ga........ Read more »
Rhodes, R., Warburton, D., & Bredin, S. (2009) Predicting the effect of interactive video bikes on exercise adherence: An efficacy trial. Psychology, Health , 14(6), 631-640. DOI: 10.1080/13548500903281088
- February 24, 2010
- 01:33 AM
- 71 views
When doubt about doubt leads to confidence
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Can confidence ever be a bad thing? What if it happens to be confidence in your own self-doubt? In a pair of mind-bending experiments Aaron Wichman and colleagues show that doubt layered on doubt doesn't lead to more doubt but rather to increased confidence, as the initial self-doubt is undermined. The researchers say their findings have clinical implications - for instance, by turning a belief that one is definitely going to fail into a belief that one might fail, a therapist could help inspire........ Read more »
Wichman, A., Briñol, P., Petty, R., Rucker, D., Tormala, Z., & Weary, G. (2010) Doubting one’s doubt: A formula for confidence?. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 46(2), 350-355. DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2009.10.012
- February 22, 2010
- 04:24 AM
- 79 views
At what age do children recognise the difference between sarcasm and irony?
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
People hold strong feelings about the meanings of irony and sarcasm. Just look at the reaction to Alanis Morissette's global hit 'ironic' - despite commercial success, the apparent misunderstanding of irony conveyed by the song provoked a chorus of derision (at least everyone agreed that this state of affairs was ironic). So I'd say it's with some courage that Melanie Glenwright and Penny Pexman have chosen to investigate the tricky issue of when exactly children learn the distinction between sa........ Read more »
Glenwright M, & Pexman PM. (2010) Development of children's ability to distinguish sarcasm and verbal irony*. Journal of child language, 37(2), 429-51. PMID: 19523264
- February 19, 2010
- 05:15 AM
- 86 views
Your left brain has a bigger ego than your right brain
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Psychologists have used an inventive combination of techniques to show that the left half of the brain has more self-esteem than the right half. The finding is consistent with earlier research showing that the left hemisphere is associated more with positive, approach-related emotions, whereas the right hemisphere is associated more with negative emotions. Ryan McKay and colleagues used a version of the self-esteem 'implicit association test' (IAT). This compares how readily participants associa........ Read more »
McKay, R., Arciuli, J., Atkinson, A., Bennett, E., & Pheils, E. (2010) Lateralisation of self-esteem: An investigation using a dichotically presented auditory adaptation of the Implicit Association Test. Cortex, 46(3), 367-373. DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2009.05.004
- February 17, 2010
- 06:11 AM
- 42 views
Obsessive driving fanatics are prone to drive aggressively
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Here's one for the boys at Top Gear to think about - apparently having an obsessive passion for driving can predispose people towards aggression behind the wheel. The idea is that for these people, driving has become an overpowering compulsion, such that an obstacle - for example, a slow driver in front - provokes great frustration, which leads to anger, which explains why they sometimes drive right up your bumper and flash their headlights.Frederick Philippe and his colleagues make their claims........ Read more »
FL Philippe, RJ Vallerand, I Richer, E Vallieres, & J Bergeron. (2009) Passion for Driving and Aggressive Driving Behavior: A Look at Their Relationship. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 3020-3043. info:/
- February 15, 2010
- 05:02 AM
- 75 views
Repression debunked
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Psychologists in Denmark may have hammered the final nail into the coffin containing 'repression' - the idea, made popular by psychoanalysis, that negative, emotional memories are particularly prone to be being locked up out of conscious reach.Simon Nørby and his colleagues at the University of Copenhagen presented dozens of undergrad participants with word pairs, each made up of a cue word and an unrelated target word. Past research has suggested that people are able to deliberately forget som........ Read more »
Nørby S, Lange M, & Larsen A. (2010) Forgetting to forget: on the duration of voluntary suppression of neutral and emotional memories. Acta psychologica, 133(1), 73-80. PMID: 19906363
- February 12, 2010
- 07:45 AM
- 66 views
Social flow - how doing it together beats doing it alone
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Ever had that wonderful, timeless feeling that arises when you're absorbed in a challenging task, one that stretches your abilities but doesn't exceed them? Pioneering psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi called this state 'flow'. Countless studies have shown that flow is highly rewarding and usually provokes feelings of joy afterwards. Little researched until now, however, is the idea of 'social flow', which can arise when a group of people are absorbed together in a challenging task. In a new ........ Read more »
Walker, C. (2010) Experiencing flow: Is doing it together better than doing it alone?. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 5(1), 3-11. DOI: 10.1080/17439760903271116
- February 9, 2010
- 05:37 AM
- 78 views
Intrusive images and intrusive verbal thoughts are different phenomena
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
The vivid, intrusive visual images that are a hallmark of post-traumatic disorder (PTSD) are based on a separate memory system from intrusive verbal thoughts. That's according to a new study that claims to provide empirical support for psychologist Chris Brewin's dual-representation theory of PTSD.Brewin's theory posits two memory systems, one that's largely sensation-based, inflexible and automatically accessed and another that's more deliberately accessible, containing material that is context........ Read more »
Hagenaars, M., Brewin, C., van Minnen, A., Holmes, E., & Hoogduin, K. (2010) Intrusive images and intrusive thoughts as different phenomena: Two experimental studies. Memory, 18(1), 76-84. DOI: 10.1080/09658210903476522
- February 8, 2010
- 04:30 AM
- 100 views
How framing affects our thought processes
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
A take-away restaurant near my house offers customers free home delivery or a ten per cent discount if you pick up. It sounds much better than saying you get no discount for picking up and suffer a ten per cent fee for delivery – this is the power of ‘framing’. Now David Hardisty and colleagues have dug a little deeper into framing, to show first, that these kinds of effects can interact with people's political persuasion, and second, that they can act by altering the order of people's tho........ Read more »
Hardisty, D., Johnson, E., & Weber, E. (2009) A Dirty Word or a Dirty World?: Attribute Framing, Political Affiliation, and Query Theory. Psychological Science, 21(1), 86-92. DOI: 10.1177/0956797609355572
- February 5, 2010
- 05:14 AM
- 97 views
CBT-based self-help books can do more harm than good
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Self-help books based on the principles of CBT, including titles like 'CBT for Dummies', could do more harm than good, according to a new study. The risks were highest for readers described as 'high ruminators' - those who spend time mulling over the likely causes and consequence of their negative moods.The new research focuses on the use of self-help books as a preventative intervention for people at risk of developing depression. Gerald Haeffel identified 72 undergrads at risk and allocated ea........ Read more »
Haeffel, G. (2010) When self-help is no help: Traditional cognitive skills training does not prevent depressive symptoms in people who ruminate☆. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 48(2), 152-157. DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2009.09.016
- February 3, 2010
- 05:05 AM
- 79 views
Shiny, swanky car boosts men's appeal to women, but not women's appeal to men
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
It's a widely held, if much derided, belief that ownership of a prestige sports car can increase a man's sex appeal to women. Indeed, there's a scene in the American sit-com Friends in which Joey dons a ridiculous Porsche-branded costume of peak cap, gloves, jacket and trousers, so determined is he to convince female passers-by that he owns a fast, shiny car. Now Michael Dunn and Robert Searle have tested the shiny car effect scientifically, looking at the effect of apparent car ownership on bot........ Read more »
Dunn, M., & Searle, R. (2010) Effect of manipulated prestige-car ownership on both sex attractiveness ratings. British Journal of Psychology, 101(1), 69-80. DOI: 10.1348/000712609X417319
- February 1, 2010
- 12:54 AM
- 93 views
Why we tip and how to get a bigger tip
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
'I don't tip because society says I have to. All right, if someone deserves a tip, if they really put forth an effort, I'll give them a little something extra. But this tipping automatically, it's for the birds. As far as I'm concerned, they're just doing their job.'Mr Pink, Reservoir Dogs.Stats from the USA suggest that $40 billion is spent on tips every year. Yet from the traditional economic perspective, which sees us as rational agents operating in our own interest, tipping waiters, barbers,........ Read more »
Saunders, S., & Lynn, M. (2010) Why tip? An empirical test of motivations for tipping car guards. Journal of Economic Psychology, 31(1), 106-113. DOI: 10.1016/j.joep.2009.11.007
Seiter, J., & Weger, Jr., H. (2010) The Effect of Generalized Compliments, Sex of Server, and Size of Dining Party on Tipping Behavior in Restaurants. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 40(1), 1-12. DOI: 10.1111/j.1559-1816.2009.00560.x
- January 29, 2010
- 04:40 AM
- 122 views
What kind of Internet user are you?
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Before Kraft's Executive Board had even heard of Cadbury's, there used to be an advert on British television that showed people eating Cadbury's cream-eggs in a number of odd and inventive ways. The tag-line was 'How do you eat yours?' Now a pair of Turkish researchers, Leman Tosun and Timo Lajunen, have taken a similar tack with Internet use, asking hundreds of undergrad students how they use their time on the global interweb.More specifically, the researchers were interested in whether the stu........ Read more »
Tosun, L., & Lajunen, T. (2010) Does Internet use reflect your personality? Relationship between Eysenck’s personality dimensions and Internet use. Computers in Human Behavior, 26(2), 162-167. DOI: 10.1016/j.chb.2009.10.010
- January 27, 2010
- 05:34 AM
- 118 views
Time flew by ... I must have been enjoying myself
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
Have you ever been in the cinema and felt the time drag? It's happened to me. A glance at my watch and then the thought that I can't be enjoying the film all that much or else the time would surely have flown. My experience matches the findings from a series of studies by Aaron Sackett and colleagues. The folk psychology belief 'time flies when you're having fun' is so powerful and ubiquitous, the researchers say, that whenever we feel an event has passed more quickly than we expected, we infer ........ Read more »
AM Sackett, LD Nelson, T Meyvis, BA Converse, & AL Sackett. (2010) You're having fun when time flies: The hedonic consequences of subjective time progression. Psychological Science. info:/10.1177/0956797609354832
- January 25, 2010
- 01:20 AM
- 145 views
I'm not lying: Brain stimulation boosts people's deception skills
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
There's been so much excitement and hyperbole surrounding the promise of brain imaging as a lie detection technique, but what about the needs of the cads, thieves and vagabonds of this world? Has contemporary cognitive neuroscience nothing to offer them? It has now. In an exciting new development for fibbers everywhere, Ahmed Karim and his team have shown that the application of transcranial direct current stimulation over the anterior prefrontal cortex - the front bit of the brain - improves pe........ Read more »
Karim, A., Schneider, M., Lotze, M., Veit, R., Sauseng, P., Braun, C., & Birbaumer, N. (2009) The Truth about Lying: Inhibition of the Anterior Prefrontal Cortex Improves Deceptive Behavior. Cerebral Cortex, 20(1), 205-213. DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhp090
- January 22, 2010
- 04:10 AM
- 158 views
Early risers are more proactive than evening people
by Christian Jarrett in BPS Research Digest
I've always envied early risers, those who spring out of bed at the crack of dawn, ready, it seems, to take on the world. Of course their early vitality could be short-lived. Morning friskiness gives the impression of a positive nature but are 'larks' really more proactive people than 'owls'?Yes, according to Christoph Randler who surveyed 367 student participants and found a correlation between their self-reported 'morningness' (as revealed by their answers to questions about how easy they find........ Read more »
Randler, C. (2009) Proactive People Are Morning People. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 39(12), 2787-2797. DOI: 10.1111/j.1559-1816.2009.00549.x
topics
join us!
Do you write about peer-reviewed research in your blog? Use ResearchBlogging.org to make it easy for your readers — and others from around the world — to find your serious posts about academic research.
If you don't have a blog, you can still use our site to learn about fascinating developments in cutting-edge research from around the world.
News
Editor's Selections: Comparing brains, comparing bodies, comparing faces, and getting depressed
Editor's selections: chimps with tools, moon-bases, shrinky dink science, and earthquake predictions
Editor's Selections: The UV rays will kill you, caddisflies that make waterproof glue, and wasps that culture antibiotics
