Cognitive Psychology
Heraclitus of Ephesus, the ancient Greek philosopher, told us, "If you do not the expect the unexpected you will not find it, for it is not to be reached by search or trail."
Two and a half thousand years later Daniel Simons, a professor of psychology at the Beckman Institute at the University of Illinois, has shown that expecting the unexpected does not mean that you will see it.
[videos now working!]
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
Tagged under
Wednesday, 20 January 2010 09:37
The Ability to Recognise Faces Is Inherited Separately From IQ
Written by Keiron Walsh
A new study involving the collaboration of researchers from the US and China has revealed that the ability to recognise faces has a genetic component and is inherited separately from IQ. This means that some people could have a high IQ, but be poor at recognising faces, while some people with low IQs could be very good at recognising faces.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
Thursday, 03 December 2009 10:38
Endel Tulving Wins 2009 Pasteur-Weizmann/Servier International Prize
Written by Keiron Walsh
Professor Endel Tulving, the Canadian cognitive psychologist, has been awarded the 2009 Pasteur-Weizmann/Servier International Prize for his work on the Neuropsychology of memory.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
The body of research showing that sleep contributes to memory consolidation continues to grow. New research has demonstrated that playing external sounds during deep sleep can improve memory for spatial tasks associated with those sounds.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
New reseach suggests that the ability to perceive shapes is innate. Despite minimal exposure to the regular geometric objects found in developed countries, African tribal people perceive shapes as well as westerners.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
German scientists have created a nasal spray that improves memory for information that has just been learned if it is followed by a good night's sleep. The study by Christian Benedict, Jürgen Scheller, Stefan Rose-John, Jan Born, and Lisa Marshall , published in the October edition of the FASEB Journal, found that interleukin-6, when administered through the nose helps the consolidation of emotional and procedural memories during REM sleep.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
The Innocence Project in the United States has, through DNA testing, led to the release of 242 people wrongfully convicted of a crime. Of these 242 wrongful convictions, 75% were due to faulty eyewitness testimony. In Loftus Speaks, the new DVD from Uniview Worldwide, Elizabeth Loftus explains just how easy it is for the memories of eyewitnesses to become distorted.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
Sadly, one of the most famous people in the history of psychology died last Tuesday at the age of 82. Henry Molaison, better known as H.M. died of respiritory failure at the nursing home where he was being cared for. H.M. famously had surgery to reduce epileptic seizures; however, removal of his hippocampi resulted in him being unable to form new memories.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
One way to improve memory that AS Psychology students may have come across is Bizarre Imagery. To remember a list of words using bizarre imagery, imagine the items in the list interacting in a strange way, for example if the first two words in the list are 'fish' and 'bicycle' you could imagine a fish riding a bicycle. Now new reasearch suggests that the success of this strategy depends on how funny the imagery is.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
Tuesday, 19 August 2008 19:35
False Memories Can Have Long-term Effect on Behaviour
Written by Keiron Walsh
Do you know someone who claims to remember their first day of
kindergarten? Or a trip they took as a toddler? While some people may
be able to recall trivial details from the past, laboratory research
shows that the human memory can be remarkably fragile and even
inventive.
In fact, people can easily create false memories of
their past and a new study shows that these false memories can have long-term
effects on our behavior.
Published in
Cognitive Psychology
