Are funny people smarter than average?
s: To explain the pervasive role of humor in human social interaction and among mating partner preferences, Miller (2000a) proposed that intentional humor evolved as an indicator of intelligence. To test this, we looked at the relationships among rater-judged humor, general intelligence, and the Big Five personality traits in a sample of 185 collegeage students (115 women, 70 men). General intelligence positively predicted rater-judged humor, independent of the Big Five personality traits. Extraversion also predicted rater judged humor, although to…
1 min read
This Is How Long It Takes You To Make Up Your Mind About Someone
0 milliseconds. People often draw trait inferences from the facial appearance of other people. We investigated the minimal conditions under which people make such inferences. In five experiments, each focusing on a specific trait judgment, we manipulated the exposure time of unfamiliar faces. Judgments made after a 100-ms exposure correlated highly with judgments made in the absence of time constraints, suggesting that this exposure time was sufficient for participants to form an impression. In fact, for all judgments—attractiveness, likeability, trustworthiness,…
1 min read
Can being happy make you less able to resist temptation?
investigate the interfering influence of elevated arousal on the impact of positive mood on resistance to temptation. Three studies demonstrate that when a temptation activates long‐term health goals, baseline positive mood facilitates resistance to temptation in (1) the choice between two snack items, one of which is more unhealthy, sinful, and hard to resist (M&Ms) than the other (grapes) and (2) the monitoring of consumption when the sinful option is chosen. However, this influence is attenuated when positive mood…
1 min read
Can back massage improve forehead wrinkles?
e show that body massage aimed at alleviating muscle tension in the neck and upper back alleviate frontalis muscle tension and improve forehead wrinkles." The organs and tissues of the human body function together, and many women know that facial skin quality can be influenced by the condition of other areas. From the perspective of esthetics, the condition of other tissues and organs can have significant impact on facial skin. In our lives, increasing numbers of people experience pain and…
1 min read
Think you have good self-control? Yes? Now you don’t.
ur studies examined how impulse-control beliefs—beliefs regarding one's ability to regulate visceral impulses, such as hunger, drug craving, and sexual arousal—influence the self-control process. The findings provide evidence for a restraint bias: a tendency for people to overestimate their capacity for impulse control. This biased perception of restraint had important consequences for people's self-control strategies. Inflated impulse-control beliefs led people to overexpose themselves to temptation, thereby promoting impulsive behavior. In Study 4, for example, the impulse-control beliefs of recovering smokers…
1 min read
What can you do to someone to make their lies easier to detect?
ntally exhaust them: We present two lie detection approaches based on cognitive theory. The first approach, 'measuring cognitive load', assumes that the mere act of lying generates observable signs of cognitive load. This is the traditional cognitive lie detection approach formulated by Zuckerman, DePaulo, & Rosenthal (1981). The second approach, 'imposing cognitive load', was developed by us (Vrij, Fisher, Mann, & Leal, 2006) and goes one step further. Here, the lie detector attempts to actively increase the differences between lying…
1 min read
If your neighbor gets a new car, do you buy a new car?
ch week, the Dutch Postcode Lottery (PCL) randomly selects a postal code, and distributes cash and a new BMW to lottery participants in that code. We study the effects of these shocks on lottery winners and their neighbors. Consistent with the life-cycle hypothesis, the effects on winners’ consumption are largely confined to cars and other durables. Consistent with the theory of in-kind transfers, the vast majority of BMW winners liquidate their BMWs. We do, however, detect substantial social effects of…
1 min read
Here’s How Much Of Your Sexuality Is In Your Voice
ve you ever felt that someone might be sexy because of the sound of their voice? Well it's true. Voice attractiveness predicts symmetry, which is one of the primary markers of attractiveness: Previous research (Hughes et al. Evolution and Human Behavior 23:173–180, 2002) has shown that ratings of voice attractiveness are negatively correlated to fluctuating asymmetry (FA, a measure of developmental stability and fitness) but are unrelated to the second to fourth digit ratio (2D:4D, a measure of prenatal sex hormone…
5 minutes
