Interesting (73)
Thursday, 09 October 2008 16:43
Narcissists Assume Leadership Roles
A couple of weeks ago we reported that it is possible to spot a narcissist from their facebook profile. This week new research has found that narcissists are more likely to assume leadership roles in groups - they do not, however, perform any better than non-narcissists when leading a group.
Published in
Interesting
Wednesday, 08 October 2008 12:26
The Impossible to Fake Personality Test
Imagine you are going to a job interview and as part of the assessment you have to fill in a personality test (psychologists sometimes call them personality inventories). You are asked all sorts of questions and the answers reveal what your personality is like - how extrovert, agreeable, conscientious, neurotic and open to new experience you are. Would you try to portray yourself in a particular way? Participant's attempts to fake responses is a big problem with personality tests and often a 'lie' scale is added to detect attempts to fake responses; however, this does not solve the problem of measuring peoples personalities accurately. Now psychologists from the University of Toronto have developed a personality test that can predict who will excel in academic and creative domains, even when respondents are trying hard to fake their answers.
Published in
Interesting
Sunday, 05 October 2008 13:22
Loss of Control Leads to Superstition and Conspiracy Theories
New research published in the journal Science has found that people see images that are not there, become more superstitious and are more likely to percieve conspiracies when they experience a loss of control over events.
Published in
Interesting
Wednesday, 01 October 2008 15:41
Distractions Help When Solving Difficult Problems
Back in August alevelpsychology.co.uk reported research that showed that it is best to use conscious effort to solve complex problems, rather than 'sleep on it' and let unconscious processes reach a decision; however, a new peice of research now claims that unconscious decision making is superior, but it needs to be followed by a period of conscious thought to select the correct solution.
Published in
Interesting
Tuesday, 30 September 2008 13:13
Children Over 12 Learn Better From Negative Feedback While Younger Children Learn From Positive Feedback
According to new research by Dr Eveline Crone, eight-year-old children have a radically different learning strategy from twelve-year-olds and adults. Eight-year-olds learn primarily from positive feedback ('Well done!'), whereas negative feedback ('Got it wrong this time') scarcely causes any alarm bells to ring. Twelve-year-olds are better able to process negative feedback, and use it to learn from their mistakes. Adults do the same, but more efficiently.
Published in
Interesting
Tuesday, 23 September 2008 05:42
How to Spot a Narcissist From Their Facebook Profile
Narcissism is a personality disorder, characterised by "a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and a lack of empathy" (DSM IV-TR). Narcissists have an exaggerated sense of self-importance, believe they are special and unique, have fantasies of unlimited success and require excessive admiration from others. There are more symptoms than this,but I'm sure you get the point. A new study has analysed facebook profiles to see if untrained strangers can detect narcissists.
Published in
Interesting
Tagged under
Monday, 15 September 2008 17:40
Out In The Cold: More Than A Metaphor
When we hear somebody described as "frosty" or "cold", we
automatically picture a person who is unfriendly and antisocial. There
are numerous examples in our daily language of metaphors which make a
connection between cold temperatures and emotions such as loneliness,
despair and sadness. We are taught at a young age that metaphors are
meant to be descriptive and are not supposed to be taken literally.
However, recent studies suggest that these metaphors are more than just
fancy literary devices and that there is a psychological basis for
linking cold with feelings of social isolation.
Published in
Interesting
Friday, 12 September 2008 10:46
The Future Is Going To Be Fantastic
How satisfied are you with your life as it is now? How satisfied were you ten years ago? How satisfied do you think you will be in ten years time? New research suggests that your answers to these questions depend on your age. The study, which appears in the September issue of Psychological Science, found that young and middle aged people rated the future as likely to be much better than it actually turned out to be when the researchers contacted them ten years later. Older people, on the other hand, were more realistic in their predictions.
Published in
Interesting
Wednesday, 10 September 2008 16:48
People Use the Same Style When Searching For Things As They Do When Seaching Their Minds
When you lose a treasured posession, like your ipod, wedding ring or psychology textbook, how do you search for it? Do you search around frantically, moving quickly from place to place, or do you search each place thoroughly before moving on? New research by Thomas Hills and his colleagues Peter Todd and Robert Goldstone appears to show that our style of searching for real things is the same searching style we use when searching for words or solutions to problems.
Published in
Interesting
Sunday, 07 September 2008 11:44
Credit Cards Make You Spend More
New research in the September issue of the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, published by the American Psychological Association shows that people are willing to spend more if they use credit cards or gift certificates rather than cash - unless, that is, they consider the details of their purchases.
Published in
Interesting
