For any one of us, there is just one mistake: a violation of the plan, a failure of execution. We fail to catch an error in DNA replication or we choke on a pretzel that we intended to swallow or we step repeatedly into the same ice puddle. We might mistakenly think we have the …
Parenting invites dichotomies: Not only are there two kinds of parent, mother and father, but their skills provoke questions about nature vs. nurture. In what sense are they innate or acquired? Are they necessary or superfluous? In each case the answer is “some of both” and we need to beware of false dichotomies. Single parents …
Some people cannot follow a beat. Such beat deafness, a form of amusia, appears in people who can hear, even in people who can dance, though some can’t clap or dance to a beat. (Here’s more.) Now, we all do things differently. Perhaps two percent of adults are unable to use mental imagery, and variations in …
Among Americans, 98 percent of scientists believe that humans evolved over time, and 81 percent of all Americans hold the same view, though in choosing evolution over intelligent design, the supporters are fewer. Not surprisingly, the answers you get depend on how you ask the question. Where do such beliefs come from, and what is …
Some people like the thrill of falling from a great height, while many others find it hard to decide about taking a jump from a high diving board. Both groups pay attention to what they’re doing. We can call them aroused. They differ on their decisions to jump, presumably because the adventure strikes some as …
The psychology curriculum has changed since some of you left the classroom. Not only has the Internet displaced many classrooms with online courses, but some courses that were once moderately popular have disappeared altogether. Fifty years ago, courses in comparative and differential psychology were common, along with behaviorism and requirements to take a foreign language. …
With the topics I’ve introduced so far, I have tried to show how biological, psychological and social approaches support each other in accounting for our experiences. I would like to be clear about what is excluded in using these paths to understanding. There are pseudoscientific and parascientific approaches that I would like to avoid, though …
For many of us, the voice is an unreliable tool. Through inflammation, stress, injury, and emotional trauma, we may lose our voices and discover that, for all its limitations, speech is an unreplaceable means of communication (though speech contains may unvoiced sounds also). We have an impressive ability to yell, though it’s not recommended. Yelling …
The absentminded professor will remind everyone of mental effort, distracted by a big idea from everything else going on in the world. People who must now work from home with online conferencing share the concentration fatigue that is familiar to those with hearing loss; only they call it zoom fatigue. Even more familiar to most …
Even walking through a door will make you forget—unless the door opens onto a toilet, I suppose, though approaching a toilet in outer space will still require you to keep your wits about you. Unless you completed your psychology courses recently, the essential facts of forgetting were probably neglected. The main point about forgetting is …
Once again a new disease is threatening us, this time a new coronavirus. We’re familiar with this kind of threat from centuries of suffering . Still, the unfamiliarity of novelty seems to be part of what strikes fear into us. After all, the bubonic plague that once ravaged Europe is still around, but it’s no …
Are you pro-play or anti-play? After recent concern about study crowding out exercise, schools are making recess periods longer and more frequent to enhance emotional and cognitive development, and similar benefits are available for adults as well. Play differs from person to person and from one culture to another, but there seems to be wide …