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POPSMen and women are programmed differently when it comes to temptation "One interpretation of these studies is that men are unable to ward off temptation. We do not subscribe to this. Instead, we believe men simply interpret these interactions differently than women do," said Lydon. "We think that if men believed an attractive, available woman was a threat to their relationship, they might try to protect that relationship."
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POPSWhy We're All Moral Hypocrites The researchers then "constrained cognition" by asking subjects to memorize long strings of numbers. In this greatly distracted state, subjects became impartial. They thought their own transgressions were just as terrible as those of others. This suggests that we are intuitively moral beings, but "when we are given time to think about it, we construct arguments about why what we did wasn’t that bad,"
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POPSIntuition can be explained However, these memories are stored only if they affect us. In other words, for experience to be built up, there must be commitment. This means, according to Lars-Erik Björklund, that we can never read or calculate our way to all the knowledge and abilities we need in our professional life. Practical experience is indispensable and needs to be reevaluated.
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POPS'Mind's eye' influences visual perception The new findings offer an objective tool to assess the often-slippery concept of imagination. This is an interesting and fascinating experiment. It is perhaps a far shot but this may point towards the roots of human's ability and inclination to envision a future reality and than change the world around to fit this reality.
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POPS10 Ways We Get the Odds Wrong And the two last ones: IX. We Love Sunlight But Fear Nuclear Power Why "natural" risks are easier to accept. X. We Should Fear Fear Itself Why worrying about risk is itself risky. Though the odds of dying in a terror attack like 9/11 or contracting Ebola are infinitesimal, the effects of chronic stress caused by constant fear are significant. Studies have found that the more people were exposed to media portrayals of the 2001 attacks, the more anxious and depressed they were. Chronically elevated stress harms our physiology, says Ropeik. "It interferes with the formation of bone, lowers immune response, increases the likelihood of clinical depression and diabetes, impairs our memory and our fertility, and contributes to long-term cardiovascular damage and high blood pressure."
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POPSThe Nearest Thing to Mind Reading “A person can put up a good face and avoid disclosing different types of information,” he added. “You would think depressed people party less, talk less, laugh less and interact less. But the students who reported having the most depressive symptoms did those things as much as anyone else.” The researchers uncovered a few things: Stream of consciousness writing often speaks more loudly about private personality traits than do public forms of expression and those who read personal narratives written by other people can most often come up with an accurate judgment of that person’s character.
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POPSFear can be cured, soon; somewhat disquieting. One little (or not so little) concern regarding these wonderful news, is that the same mechanism can be selectively used to implant fears not only to cure them, an hardly resistible temptation for those hungry for power & control.
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POPSA perspective on perspective In 1988, psychologists Shelly Taylor and Jonathon Brown published an article making the somewhat disturbing claim that positive self-deception is a normal and beneficial part of most people’s everyday outlook. They suggested that average people hold cognitive biases in three key areas: a) viewing themselves in unrealistically positive terms; b) believing they have more control over their environment than they actually do; and c) holding views about the future that are more positive than the evidence can justify. The typical person, it seems, depends on these happy delusions for the self-esteem needed to function through a normal day. It’s when the fantasies start to unravel that problems arise.
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