Win a Bobo Doll OCR are running a free psychology prize draw where teachers have the opportunity to win one of 25 BoZo dolls, based on the original Bobo doll used in the Bandura and Ross's Transmission of Aggression study.

Liar Liar There is an interesting story out today, that 15 local councils in the UK are to start using lie detectors to combat benefit fraud. They plan to use a "voice risk analyser" to detect changes in people's voices when asked questions during telephone conversations. Harrow council introduced the equipment last year and have saved £420,000 because one-third of people who were contacted using the equipment admitted that their circumstances had changed and they were no longer eligible for the benefits they were receiving. However, there is doubt over whether these lie detectors actually work.

Be a Crime Fighter! My beloved sister sent me this. It may be interesting for anyone studying the criminal psychology unit in the OCR or Edexcel A level Psychology course. If you are doing AQA it’s still good fun.

Researchers J. Kiley Hamlin, Karen Wynn & Paul Bloom have found that babies as young as six months are able to make judgements about the helpfulness or nastiness of others and show a preference for those who are helpful. The infants watched a puppet show which depicted a circle with googly-eyes trying to climb a hill. it was either helped by a triangle with googly-eyes or hindered by a googly-eyed square. When later given the opportunity to hold the helper or hinderer, 14 out of 16 10-month-olds and all 12 6-month-olds chose the helper.