Are you more likely to cave to weak temptations than powerful ones?
is series of studies examined the effect of temptation strength on self-regulation processes in the context of eating behavior. Based on the critical level model, it was hypothesized that weak, rather than strong, temptations yield the most unfavorable conditions for effective self-regulation, because the negative consequences of the former are underestimated. In line with the assumptions of this model, Studies 1 and 2 showed that weak temptations inhibited the mental accessibility of the weight watching goal, in contrast to strong…
1 min read
Can your brain tell the difference between heartbreak and heart attack?
a CNN: Science has finally confirmed what anyone who's ever been in love already knows: Heartbreak really does hurt. In a new study using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), researchers have found that the same brain networks that are activated when you're burned by hot coffee also light up when you think about a lover who has spurned you. In other words, the brain doesn't appear to firmly distinguish between physical pain and intense emotional pain. Heartache and painful breakups…
1 min read
Could many of the beneficial results of exercise be due to the placebo effect?
om APA: The researchers studied 84 female housekeepers from seven hotels. Women in four hotels were told that their regular work was enough exercise to meet the requirements for a healthy, active lifestyle, whereas the women in the other three hotels were told nothing. To determine if the placebo effect plays a role in the benefits of exercise, the researchers investigated whether subjects’ mind-set (in this case, their perceived levels of exercise) could inhibit or enhance the health benefits of…
1 min read
An Easy Way To Reduce Stress And Pain
cent research has supported a link between laughter, coping with stress, and psychological and physical well-being. According to this work, people who spontaneously use humor to cope with stress have especially healthy immune systems, are 40 percent less likely to suffer a heart attack or stroke, experience less pain during dental surgery, and live 4.5 years longer than most. And: Participants were shown scenes from films that were likely either to make them feel anxious (such as the opening thirty…
2 minutes
What can I predict about your future just by looking at your smile?
few years ago, Dacher Keltner and LeeAnne Harker, from the University of California at Berkeley, looked at the photographs of the women that had been taken for the college yearbook when they were in their early twenties. Nearly all the women were smiling. However, when the researchers carefully examined the images, they noticed that about half of the photographs showed a Pan Am smile and half a genuine Duchenne smile. They then went back to the information that had…
1 min read
What’s a quick and easy way to improve learning?
e gestures children spontaneously produce when explaining a task predict whether they will subsequently learn that task. Why Gesture might simply reflect a child’s readiness to learn a particular task. Alternatively, gesture might itself play a role in learning the task. To investigate these alternatives, we experimentally manipulated children’s gesture during instruction in a new mathematical concept. We found that requiring children to gesture while learning the new concept helped them retain the knowledge they had gained during instruction. In…
1 min read
What techniques are proven to help students study more effectively?
a Science Daily: ...undergraduates in the study scored 29 to 63 percentage points higher on tests when they used study techniques like recording complete notes, creating comparative charts, building associations, and crafting practice questions on their screens. Kiewra, a professor of educational psychology, calls the method SOAR: Selecting key lesson ideas, organizing information with comparative charts and illustrations, associating ideas to create meaningful connections, and regulating learning through practice. It complements how the brain processes information, he said. "Learning occurs…
1 min read
Does literally “washing our hands” make us feel less guilty?
eaning one’s hands removes more than physical contaminants; it also removes residues of the past, from the guilt of past transgressions to doubts about past decisions. We review recent evidence for these and other clean slate effects from the perspectives of neural re-use, grounded cognition, and conceptual metaphor, discuss their implications, and suggest promising future directions. As you use water and soap to remove dirt and contaminants, may you also be removing psychological residues of your past? A growing body of research suggests so. For…
1 min read
