On the Facebook page for the Society for the Teaching of Psychology, Pooja V. Anand posted this excellent list of 16 “strategies for maintaining well-being during COVID19 Crisis.” Self-reflection : reflect on yourself, your values, goals Self-regulation : manage your emotions, create a daily routine Love of learning : learn new skills, develop new hobbies Flow : identify activities which you enjoy and engage in them Relationships : nurture your relationships, spend time with family, online conversations with friends Kindness : practicing random acts of kindness, being helpful Self-compassion : being kind to yourself, accepting yourself Mindfulness : focus on the present moment and current experiences Savouring : savour the little joys of life like time spent with family, doing your favourite activities like reading, writing Gratitude : count your blessings; express gratitude for the blessings in your life, appreciate what you have Optimism : cultivate optimism, expecting that good things will happen in the future Humour : make other people smile and laugh Growth : Use this challenging situation as an opportunity for growth Developing strengths: focus on developing your strengths Purpose and meaning : reflect on your purpose in life and what gives your life meaning Hope : set goals for the future, plan how you will achieve them and motivate yourself   Here are a few ways you can use this list with your students. Reflection assignment Give students this writing prompt: “In the last week, have you, a friend, or family member used any of these sixteen strategies? If so, pick one strategy, and provide an example of how you, your friend, or family member has used it. Of the strategies that you personally have not used, choose two and describe how you can work them in over next month.” Online discussion assignment For the initial post, use the same prompt as for the reflection assignment. For responses, ask students to reply to two or more classmates using Jenn Stewart-Mitchell’s three comments and a question (3C & Q) model: A compliment, e.g., "I like how... because...," I like that... because..." A comment, e.g., "I agree that... because...," "I disagree that... because..." A connection, e.g., "I have done something similar,...," "I have also thought that...," "That reminds me of..." A question, e.g., "I wonder why...," "I wonder how..."  Zoom discussion assignment If you’re teaching via Zoom, paste Anand’s list of strategies into or upload a file to chat (or make the list available in your learning management system). Next give students this discussion prompt before sending small groups of students to breakout rooms. “Which of these strategies is or would be easiest for you to engage in? What about it makes it feel easiest? Give an example of how you do it in your life or how you could do it. After everyone has shared their ideas, which idea does the group like the best? Identify a spokesperson to report out to the class.” After fifteen minutes, bring the class back together, and ask each spokesperson to identify the strategy and how it has been or could be implemented. Library database practice Assign, say, four of these sixteen strategies to each of your students. “Visit our library databases to find two peer-reviewed articles related to each of your assigned strategies. For each article, download the pdf and then upload it with your assignment. Note whether the findings reported in each article help support or help refute the argument that the strategy helps with well-being. Briefly explain each of your support/refute decisions.” That may be enough for this assignment. If you would like to expand it, here are some other possible additions. Write the references in APA format. Provide an annotated bibliography. Identify whether each study was correlational or experimental, and briefly describe how you know. Identify the variables in each study. If your students have not had practice using your library databases to date, contact your institution’s librarians for the best ways to help students get started on this assignment. Consider taking all of the resources your students found, compiling them into separate reference lists by strategy, and making those lists available to your students. ... View more

During this please-stay-away-from-other-people time, I have been thinking a lot about people who are trapped at home with an abuser. Yesterday morning we went to the grocery store for our next two-week round of supplies. No, we didn’t buy toilet paper. We had just happened to stock up before COVID-19, and we are still well-supplied. We were in the snacks aisle, when I realized that I had passed the sour cream and onion potato chips. I turned around to retrieve them, when a large man substantially farther away than the recommended six feet said, “So you’re coming this way then?!” I replied, pointing behind me, “Oh, you want to go this way?” “Not anymore!!” With that, he and the woman who was with him turned around and went down another aisle. Later, as I exited the frozen food aisle, he and she were about to pass that aisle. He spotted me, came up short, glared at me, huffed, and made a wide swing around me. Clearly, the grocery store was to be his and his alone that morning, and I had ruined his plan.   I have been having a hard time shaking the memory of these interactions. It’s the woman who was with him that I keep seeing. She was small, both in size and demeanor. She said nothing and was expressionless. She stood at his elbow and when he moved, she moved.   Now, I admittedly have no idea what the nature of their relationship is, but my he’s-abusive alarms were ringing loudly. And there was nothing I could do about it. At my college, I’m part of the team that helped our faculty move their winter quarter classes online for the end of the quarter. We’ve spent the last week helping our faculty get geared up to spend all of spring quarter online. While my focus has been on our faculty working from home, I’ve had to dedicate some time to thinking about my own spring quarter class and the students who will be in it. And now I can’t help but think about everyone’s living situation. How many of our college’s faculty and staff are trapped at home 24/7 with an abuser? How many of our students? How many of your faculty, staff, and students? The National Domestic Violence Hotline (2020) reports Here’s how COVID-19 could uniquely impact intimate partner violence survivors: Abusive partners may withhold necessary items, such as hand sanitizer or disinfectants. Abusive partners may share misinformation about the pandemic to control or frighten survivors, or to prevent them from seeking appropriate medical attention if they have symptoms. Abusive partners may withhold insurance cards, threaten to cancel insurance, or prevent survivors from seeking medical attention if they need it. Programs that serve survivors may be significantly impacted –- shelters may be full or may even stop intakes altogether. Survivors may also fear entering shelter because of being in close quarters with groups of people. Survivors who are older or have chronic heart or lung conditions may be at increased risk in public places where they would typically get support, like shelters, counseling centers, or courthouses. Travel restrictions may impact a survivor’s escape or safety plan – it may not be safe for them to use public transportation or to fly. An abusive partner may feel more justified and escalate their isolation tactics. Please consider sharing this information with faculty, staff, and students. If you are living with an abuser, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or text LOVEIS to 22522. Or you can visit thehotline.org and click the “Chat Now” button in the top right corner of the page. After relating my grocery store experience to a colleague, they said they kept thinking about the LGBTQ youth who are now trapped at home with unsupportive family. And now I keep thinking about them, too. Please consider sharing this information about how to get help from The Trevor Project (2020). If you are an LGBTQ youth who is struggling or an ally who knows someone who is struggling, please call the TrevorLifeline at 1-866-488-7386 or text START to 678678. Or you can visit TheTrevorProject.org on your computer to chat. And there are children and teens who are living with abusive parents, guardians, or others for whom school may have been their only reprieve. Please consider sharing this information about how to get help from Childhelp (2020) . If you are a teenager or child and you are being hurt by someone, know someone who may be, or are afraid that you may hurt someone, please call or text the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-422-4453 or visit Childhelp.org for live chat.   References Childhelp. (2020). https://www.childhelp.org/childhelp-hotline/ National Domestic Violence Hotline. (2020). https://www.thehotline.org/ The Trevor Project. (2020). https://www.thetrevorproject.org/ ... View more

After covering experiments and correlations in Intro Psych or as a research methods booster in the Stress & Health chapter, ask your students if they have heard that you should walk 10,000 steps a day. Do they know where that recommendation comes from? Did anyone guess that it seems to come from a 1964 Japanese marketing campaign for a pedometer (“Do you really need to take 10,000 steps a day to keep fit?,” 2015)? Recent correlational research with almost 17,000 women aged 62-101 (average age 72) found that those who took about 4,400 steps per day were 41% less likely to die during the study (mean study length: 4.3 years) than those who took 2,700 per day. The more steps walked per day, the lower the mortality. Benefits maxed out at 7,500 steps; walking more than that did not reduce mortality rates. Annually, researchers asked participants for “sociodemographic characteristics, health habits, and personal and family medical history,” as well as at the start of the study, “a 131-item food frequency questionnaire.” All things being equal, those who walked more (up to 7,500 steps per day), lived longer (Lee et al., 2019). When you have this many participants who are in that age range, you can use mortality as your primary dependent measure. Experimental research using other dependent measures such as blood pressure (Moreau et al., 2001) and cholesterol (Dasgupta et al., 2017; Sugiura et al., 2002) have found benefits to increasing number of steps walked per day. With students working in small groups, ask students to design an experiment to test the effects of walking on a dependent measure of their choosing. How many levels of the independent variable would they use? How would they ensure the number of steps walked by their participants? What dependent measures would they choose? How long would they run the study? What population would they choose as participants? Visit the groups answering any questions they may have. After the groups have finished their discussion, ask each group to report their independent variable and dependent variables. Complete this activity by explaining to students the importance of understanding the theory behind the research (on what dependent measures can we expect a benefit of exercise?), the importance of reading research articles on what has already been done (what have others found and how may that inform our study?), and the importance of doing research in many different ways (such as using different operational definitions).   References Dasgupta, K., Rosenberg, E., Joseph, L., Cooke, A. B., Trudeau, L., Bacon, S., … Smarter Trial Group. (2017). Physician step prescription and monitoring to improve ARTERial health (SMARTER): A randomized controlled trial in patients with type 2 diabetes and hypertension. Diabetes, Obesity, and Metabolism, 19(5), 685–704. https://doi.org/10.1111/dom.12874 Do you really need to take 10,000 steps a day to keep fit? (2015, June 17). BBC News. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-33154510 Lee, I.-M., Shiroma, E. J., Kamada, M., Bassett, D. R., Matthews, C. E., & Buring, J. E. (2019). Association of step volume and intensity with all-cause mortality in older women. JAMA Internal Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2019.0899 Moreau, K. L., Degamo, R., Langley, J., McMahon, C., Howley, E. T., Bassett Jr, D. R., & Thompson, D. L. (2001). Increasing daily walking lowers blood pressure in postmenopausal women. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 33(11), 1825–1831. Sugiura, H., Suguira, H., Kajima, K., Mirbod, S. M., Iwata, H., & Matsuoka, T. (2002). Effects of long-term moderate exercise and increase in number of daily steps on serum lipids in women: Randomised controlled trial. BMC Women’s Health, 2(1). ... View more

Dog walking, according to a recent news report, is healthy for people. That little report follows three massive new research reviews that confirm earlier findings of the mental health benefits of exercise: An American Journal of Psychiatry analysis of 49 studies followed 266,939 people across an average 7 years. In every part of the world, people of all ages had a lower risk of becoming depressed if physically active rather than inactive. JAMA Psychiatry reports that, for teens, “regular physical activity [contributes] to positive mental health.” Another JAMA Psychiatry analysis of 33 clinical trials found an additional depression-protecting effect of “resistance exercise training” (such as weight lifting and strength-building). Faba-Photography/Moment/Getty Images A skeptic might wonder if mentally healthy people have more energy for exercise. (Being really depressed comes with a heaviness that may entail trouble getting out of bed.) But the “prospective studies”—which follow lives through time—can discern a sequence of exercise predicting future reduced depression risk. Moreover, many clinical trial experiments—with people assigned to exercise or control conditions—confirm that exercise not only contributes to health and longevity, it also treats and protects against depression and anxiety. Mens sana in corpore sano: A healthy mind in a healthy body.   Indeed, given the modest benefits of antidepressant drugs, some researchers are now recommending therapeutic lifestyle change as a potentially more potent therapy for mild to moderate depression—or as a protection against such. When people modify their living to include the exercise, sunlight exposure, ample sleep, and social connections that marked our ancestors’ lives—a lifestyle for which they were bred—they tend to flourish, with greater vitality and joy. In one study, substantial depression relief was experienced by 19 percent of patients in a treatment-as-usual control group and by 68 percent undergoing therapeutic lifestyle change.   Finally, more good news—for dog walkers: Dog walking is said to be healthy and calming for dogs, too. But I suspect that will not surprise any dog owner or their dog. ... View more

Money matters. For entering U.S. collegians, the number one life goal—surpassing “helping others in difficulty,” “raising a family,” and 17 other aspirations—is “being very well off financially.” In the most recent UCLA “American Freshman” survey, 82 percent rated being very well off as “essential” or “very important.” Think of it as today’s American dream: life, liberty, and the purchase of happiness.   For human flourishing, fiscal fitness indeed matters . . . up to a point. In repeated surveys across nations, a middle-class income—and being able to control one’s life—beats being poor. Moreover, people in developed nations tend to be happier and more satisfied than those in the poorest of nations.   Beyond the middle-class level, we seem to have an income “satiation point,” at which the income-happiness correlation tapers off and happiness no longer increases. For individuals in poor countries, that point is close to $40,000; for those in rich countries, about $90,000, reports a new analysis of 1.7 million Gallup interviews by Andrew Jebb and colleagues. And consider: The average U.S.  per-person disposable income, adjusted for inflation, has happily tripled over the last 60 years, enabling most Americans to enjoy today’s wonderments, from home air conditioning to wintertime fresh fruit to smart phones. “Happily,” because few of us wish to return to yesteryear. Yet not that happily, because psychological well-being has not floated upward with the rising economic tide. The number of “very happy” adults has remained at 3 in 10, and depression has been on the rise . What triggers the diminishing psychological payoff from excess income? Two factors: Our human capacity for adaptation: Continual pleasures subside. Our tendency to assess our own circumstances by “social comparison” with those around us—and more often those above us. People with a $40,000 income tend to think $80,000 would enable them to feel wealthy—whereas those at $80,000 say they would need substantially more. Become a millionaire and move to a rich neighborhood, you still may not feel rich. As Theodore Roosevelt said, “Comparison is the thief of joy.”   The outer limit of the wealth–well-being relationship also appears in two new surveys (by Grant Donnelly, Tianyl Zheng, Emily Haisley, and Michael Norton) of an international bank’s high net-worth clients. As you can see in figures I created from their data, having $2 million and $10 million are about the same, psychologically speaking. If wealth increases well-being only up to a point—and much evidence indicates that is so—and if extreme inequality is socially toxic (great inequality in a community or country predicts lower life quality and more social pathology), then could societies increase human flourishing with economic and tax policies that spread wealth?   Let’s make this personal: If earning, accumulating, and spending money increases our happiness only to a satiation point, then why do we spend our money for (quoting the prophet Isaiah) “that which is not bread” and our “labor for that which does not satisfy?” Quite apart from moral considerations, what’s to be lost by sharing our wealth above the income-happiness satiation point?   And if one is blessed with wealth, what’s to be gained by showering inherited wealth, above the satiation point, on our children? (Consider, too, another Donnelly and colleagues finding: Inherited wealth entails less happiness than earned wealth.)   Ergo, whether we and our children drive BMWs or Honda Fits, swim in our backyard pool or at the local Y, eat filet mignon or fish filet sandwiches, hardly matters. That fact of life, combined with the more important facts of the world’s needs, makes the case for philanthropy. ... View more

The teen years are, for many, a time of rewarding friendships, noble idealism (think Parkland), and an expanding vision for life’s possibilities. But for others, especially those who vary from teen norms, life can be a challenge. Nonheterosexual teens, for example, sometimes face contempt, harassment, or family rejection. And that may explain their having scored higher than other teens on measures of anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts and attempts (see here, here, here, and here).   But many of these findings are based on older data and don’t reflect the increasing support of gay partnerships among North Americans and Western Europeans. In U.S. Gallup polls, for example, support for “marriages between same-sex couples” soared from 27 percent in 1996 to 64 percent in 2017. So, have the emotional challenges of being teen and gay persisted? If so, to what extent?   I’ve wondered, and recently discovered, an answer in the 2015 data from the annual UCLA/Higher Education Research Institute American Freshman survey (of 141,189 entering full-time students at a cross-section of U.S. colleges and universities). The news is mixed: Most gay/lesbian/bisexual frosh report not having struggled with depression. Being gay or lesbian in a predominantly heterosexual world remains, for a significant minority of older teens, an emotional challenge.   Can we hope that, if attitudes continue to change, this depression gap will shrink? In the meantime, the American Psychological Association offers youth, parents, and educators these helpful resources for understanding sexual orientation and gender identity, including suggestions for how “to be supportive” of youth whose sexual orientation or gender identity differs from most others. ... View more

While it had been common for astronauts to spend six months at the ISS, NASA wanted to know what happens when humans spend even longer in space. Depending on the orbit trajectory chosen – which depends on how much fuel you want to take with you – a trip to Mars could take 7 to 9 months (Carter, n.d.). And then once you get there, you probably want to spend some time there. Heck, I spend more than a few days in Australia when I travel there, and that’s just 7,744 miles/12,462 km. And then you have to travel home from Australia – I mean, Mars. If you’re NASA and you have identical twin astronauts, there’s only one reasonable thing to do. You put together a team of researchers who are experts in human physiology, behavioral health, microbiology, and epigenetics to find out everything you can about the twins today. Next, you send one of them into space for twelve months. When the astronaut comes back to earth, repeat the measurements for both astronauts. This is NASA’s Twin Study. Mark Kelly* was the twin who stayed on earth; Scott Kelly was the twin who spent a year aboard the International Space Station (ISS)**. In January, 2018, NASA shared some preliminary research findings from their twin study.   Another interesting finding concerned what some call the “space gene”, which was alluded to in 2017. Researchers now know that 93% of Scott’s genes returned to normal after landing. However, the remaining 7% point to possible longer term changes in genes related to his immune system, DNA repair, bone formation networks, hypoxia, and hypercapnia. This makes it sound like Scott’s genes underwent some kind of change. Journalists grabbed hold of this and declared that Scott and Mark were no longer twins since their DNA was not the same. This was not what the researchers meant. NASA clarified: Mark and Scott Kelly are still identical twins; Scott’s DNA did not fundamentally change. What researchers did observe are changes in gene expression, which is how your body reacts to your environment. This likely is within the range for humans under stress, such as mountain climbing or SCUBA diving. What changed were not Scott’s genes, but rather his gene expression – in other words, his epigenetic code. A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived by scientist and science writer Adam Rutherford is a nice summary of what we know, what we don’t know, and what we would like to know about genetics and, to a lesser extent, epigenetics.  Our epigenome is what turns genes on and off. Women who have two X chromosomes (that’s most of us) have all the genes on one X chromosome in each of our cells turned off. “In mammals, epigenetic modifications tend to get reset each generation, but some, very limited, rare epigenetic tags appear to be passed down from parent to child, at least for a couple of generations.”  Pregnant women who starved in the Netherlands during the winter of 1944 gave birth to low-birthweight babies (no surprise) who then grew up to give birth to babies who were high-birthweight (surprise). Other research in a rural Swedish community with variable harvests found that boys who experienced a lean year just before entering puberty were more likely to have grandsons – yes, grandsons – who lived longer. But most epigenetic changes are temporary (Rutherford, 2017). In the case of reporting that astronauts Mark and Scott Kelly were no longer identical twins, the journalists were merely reporting what they understood the NASA press release to be saying, so I’m not going to fault them. Earlier this month we read headlines declaring that despite years of research showing that the adult human hippocampus produces stem cells that grow into new neurons, that a new study declares that’s not the case at all. I was poised to pounce on journalists for getting this wrong. But I can’t. Once again, it’s the Public Relations department, this time at the University of California at San Francisco. Now UC San Francisco scientists have shown that in the human hippocampus – a region essential for learning and memory and one of the key places where researchers have been seeking evidence that new neurons continue to be born throughout the lifespan – neurogenesis declines throughout childhood and is undetectable in adults (Weiler, 2018). Rutherford (2017) reminds us that “[j]ournals are not all equal, and publication in a journal is not a mark of truth, merely that the research has passed the standard that warrants entering formal literature and further discussion with other scientists.” This is worth hammering into the heads of our students, our students who are the future writers of press releases, the future writers of news articles, and the future readers of those new articles. Our science journals are just one huge chat room. "Hey! This is what I found!" "Huh. How did find that?" "What if we looked at it this way instead?" "Anna used this other method and found something different. Anyone know why that would produce different results?" With additional research, we may discover that, indeed, the human hippocampus does not produce new neurons. And we may discover that living in space where a person is subject to the radiation equivalent of 10 chest x-rays a day (Kelly, 2017) does indeed change one’s genes, and not just the epigenetic code. Those who turn to science for definitive answers may find the responses couched in probabilities less than satisfying. But that’s how science works. Here’s a cautionary tale: Everyone knows that tongue-rolling is genetic. If you can roll your tongue, you have the dominant allele for tongue-rolling. As it turns out, everyone is wrong. The research was easy to do. Find a bunch of identical twins and see who could roll their tongues and who couldn’t. If tongue-rolling were completely genetic, each twin pair should be, well, identical in their tongue-rolling ability. Philip Matlock (1952) looked in the mouths of 33 pairs of twins. In 7 pairs, one twin could tongue-roll while the other one could not. And, yes, that date is right; he did this research in 1952. Similar studies in the 1970s found similar results (Martin, 1975; Reedy, Szczes, & Downs, 1971). If you had asked me last week, “Hey, Sue, is tongue-rolling simply controlled by our genes?” I would have said yes. But now my response is more nuanced. “There’s likely a gene or set of genes that controls it, but there is also probably an epigenetic code that turns that gene or genes on or off for different people. Let me tell you about this interesting research done with identical twins…” The more I learn, the less confidence I have in what I have always known to be true. “Half of what I’m going to tell you is wrong, but I don’t know which half.” I love this quote (or paraphrase?) as it nicely captures the moving nature of science, but I can’t find the origin – and I find that very fitting. My memory says it was something Paul Meehl said to his students, but I can’t find any such reference. A Psychology Today blogger credits an uncited and unnamed surgeon. If you know the origin, please contact me. References Carter, L. (n.d.). If Mars is only about 35-60 million miles away at close approach, why does it take 6-8 months to get there? (Intermediate). Retrieved from http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/physics/64-our-solar-system/planets-and-dwarf-planets/mars/267-if-mars-is-only-about-35-60-million-miles-away-at-close-approach-why-does-it-take-6-8-months-to-get-there-intermediate Kelly, S. (2017). Endurance: A year in space, a lifetime of discovery. New York City: Knopf. Martin, N. G. (1975). No evidence for a genetic basis of tongue rolling or hand clasping. Journal of Heredity, 66(3), 179–180. https://doi.org/doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.jhered.a108608 Matlock, P. (1952). Identical twins discordant in tongue-rolling. Journal of Heredity, 43(1), 24. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.jhered.a106251 Reedy, J. J., Szczes, T., & Downs, T. D. (1971). Tongue rolling among twins. Journal of Heredity, 62(2), 125–127. https://doi.org/doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.jhered.a108139 Rutherford, A. (2017). A brief history of everyone who has ever lived. New York City: The Experiment. Weiler, N. (2018). Birth of new neurons in the human hippocampus ends in childhood. Retrieved March 24, 2018, from https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2018/03/409986/birth-new-neurons-human-hippocampus-ends-childhood **************** *Mark Kelly’s wife is Gabrielle Giffords, the US Representative from Arizona who survived an assassination attempt in 2011.   **”at the International Space Station” – I had a hard time deciding on the right preposition to use. Can one be on a space station if one is really floating inside it, except when Velcro-ed to a wall? In seemed to be a better choice, but felt clunky when I read it. I was ready to settle for at. NASA dodges the entire question and uses “aboard the ISS.” If aboard is good enough for NASA, it’s good enough for me. I’m confident we’ll get this figured out before we head to Mars. ... View more

We humans have an overwhelming fear of death. That’s the core assumption of “terror management theory.” It presumes that, when confronted with reminders of our mortality, we display self-protective emotional and cognitive responses. Made to think about dying, we self-defensively cling tightly to our worldviews and prejudices.   On the assumption that dying is terrifying—that death is the great enemy to be avoided at all costs—medicine devotes enormous resources to avoiding death, even to extending life by inches. And should we be surprised? I love being alive and hope to have miles of purposeful life to go before I sleep.   So, do we have the worst of life yet to come? Are we right to view life’s end with despair?   Two psychological science literatures reassure us:   The first: The stability of well-being. Across the life span, people mostly report being satisfied and happy with their lives. Subjective well-being does not plummet in the post-65 years. In later life, stresses also become fewer and life becomes less of an emotional roller coaster.   The second: Human resilience. More than most people suppose, we humans adapt to change. Good events—even a lottery win—elate us for a time, but then we adapt and our normal mix of emotions returns. Bad events—even becoming paralyzed in an accident—devastate us, but only for a while. Both pleasures and tragedies have a surprisingly short half-life. Facing my increasing deafness, the reality of resilience is reassuring.   And now comes a third striking finding: Dying is less traumatic than people suppose. Amelia Goranson and her colleagues examined      blog posts of terminally ill cancer and ALS patients, and      last words of death row inmates before their execution. Others, asked to simulate those posts and words, overly expressed messages filled with despair, anger, and anxiety. More than expected—and increasingly as death approached—the actual words of the dying expressed social connection, love, meaning, and faith.   Goranson and her colleagues presume (though it remains to be shown) that the same acceptance and positivity will be exhibited by those dying at the more expected time on the social clock—very late in life, when people (despite stereotypes of grumpy old men) tend to focus on the positive. Thus, conclude the researchers, “death is more positive than people expect: Meeting the grim reaper may not be as grim as it seems.” ... View more

Do you remember life before the Internet? Do you remember when you first got dial up? And then when cable internet first came along? And each time we were so excited. And then the excitement faded. Whatever change we experienced soon became the new normal. This is called adaptation-level phenomenon.  In 2015, Louis C. K., on Conan, gave us several good examples of adaptation-level phenomenon. He said, “Everything is amazing right now, and nobody‘s happy.” He blames it on the current generation. I blame it on being human. After playing this 4-minute clip for your students, ask your students to work in pairs or small groups to generate other examples that illustrate adaptation-level phenomenon. Ask volunteers to share their examples. Video Link : 2041 Vacuum cleaners? They were originally billed as a labor-saving device. But we adapted to them pretty quickly, and the end result? Standards of cleanliness went up. Washing machines? Same thing (Roy, 2016). [Shout out to my sister, Carol Laughlin, for sending me the video!]   Reference Roy, R. (2016). Consumer product innovation and sustainable design: The evolution and impacts of successful products. London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group. ... View more

Originally posted on Quartz on July 2, 2017. I'm often asked how I was able to go from inactive academic to participating in invitation-only ultramarathons.  While it's no small feat, the three components of self-control--standards, monitoring, and strength--fortified my self-discipline. With those factors, and the additional and necessary support from my close relationships, practicing self-control ensured my success and gave me the opportunity to grow.  Read more about my running journey the factors of self control here.  ... View more

Imagine that you and a colleague (or spouse) have been at odds. You have argued and fought, each trying to persuade the other. Alas, there has been no meeting of the minds. What might you do next to create an opportunity for conflict resolution? To “put behind” where you have been stuck, to “move on” from your standstill, to “get beyond” your impasse, one simple, practical strategy is literally to take steps forward—to go for a walk. In a new American Psychologist article, Christine Webb, Maya Rossignac-Milon, and E. Tory Higgins argue “that walking together can facilitate both the intra- and interpersonal pathways to conflict resolution.” At the individual level, they report, walking supports creativity. It boosts mood. It embodies notions of forward progress. At the interpersonal level, walking does more. Walkers’ synchronous movements, as they jointly attend to their environment and coordinate their steps, increases mutual rapport and empathy. It softens the boundary between self and other. And it engenders cooperation beyond the shared walking cadence. If, indeed, synchronous walking increases rapport and prosociality, might there be a similar effect of synchronized singing? Does group singing help unify a diverse audience? The question crossed my mind as folk singer Peter Yarrow (of “Peter, Paul and Mary”) rose near the beginning of a recent small group retreat of diverse people and invited us to join him in singing “Music Speaks Louder Than Words.” Yarrow, now age 79, has spent his career—from the civil rights and anti-war movements of the ´60s to today—in engaging audiences in synchronized singing of prosocial poetry. Photo courtesy Byron Buck What do you think? Does music speak louder than words alone? Do synchronized walking and group singing have overlapping psychological effects? Can both lift us beyond where words, in isolation, can take us? ... View more

I confess that for many years in my Intro Psych course I didn’t cover sleep or stress. In retrospect, I’m sorry that I didn’t use that opportunity to give those students that information they could use to live better lives. While I can’t go back and change the past, I can make sure that the students I have today – and hopefully, my students’ families and friends – have this information.   The cover story to the March 2017 Monitor on Psychology is on “how smartphones are affecting our health and well-being, and points the way toward taking back control.” The article cites 2015 data from the Pew Research Center that said 72% of U.S. adults have a smartphone (Weir, 2017). In 2016, that number jumped to 77%. If you’re between 18 and 29, 92% of your cohort has one. For those of us 50 to 64, 74% of our peers have one – last year, only 59% of people in this age group owned a smartphone (Smith, 2017). Ask your students to raise their hands if they own a smartphone. After almost all of the hands go up, ask students to take a couple minutes to jot down a few ways in which their phones help them and a few ways in which their phones interfere with their lives. Ask students to share their lists in pairs or small groups, adding other ideas as they come up. Ask groups to identify one student as the recorder. After a few minutes of discussion, starting on one side of the room, ask the recorder from each group to share one benefit their group identified. If it was a benefit other groups had on their list, they should cross it off. List the benefits on the board/computer screen. Repeat this process for the ways smartphones interfere with their lives. One of the interferences cited in the article is lack of sleep – due to blue light disrupting the circadian rhythm, due to getting worked up reading email and text messages before bed, due to waking up to answer phone calls or respond to text messages. Lack of sleep can cause all sorts of problems, including making it harder to cope with stress or poorer school or work performance thus upping stress levels. As a clicker question, ask students: Imagine that you didn’t have your phone for an hour. How freaked out would you be? I’d be fine. A little nervous. Pretty anxious. Totally freaked out. As a research methods booster, describe Nancy Cheever, Larry Rosen, and colleagues’ quasi-experiment (2014) described in the Monitor article. They asked participants to estimate how much time they spent each day on their phones doing various activities, e.g., “send and receive email,” “play video games.” I’m not sure how good any of us are at making such estimates. Given that the range of responses they got was from 1 hour a day to 64.5 (?!) hours a day, I’m even less confident in our ability to make such ratings. (If time allows, give students a few minutes to brainstorm other ways phone usage could be estimated or tracked.) The researchers soldiered on and divided participants into three groups: low smartphone usage (1 to 7 hours a day), moderate usage (7,5 to 16.5 hours a day), and heavy usage (17 or more hours a day). And then the researchers took away the participants’ phones. Participants completed the State/Trait Anxiety Inventory after 10 minutes, after 35 minutes, and after 60 minutes. The low usage participants were fine the entire time. The moderate users were fine after 10 minutes, but by 35 minutes they were a little anxious, and they were still just as anxious after an hour. The high users though were already anxious by the 10-minute mark, and their anxiety continued to climb through 35 minutes and was even higher by 60 minutes. Ask students to take a look at the benefits and interference lists you have on the board/screen, and invite students to hypothesize why the heavy smartphone users would be so freaked out.   Part of what may be driving that anxiety is FOMO – a fear of missing out. “What are my friends texting me? Are they thinking I’m mad at them because I’m not responding? What’s happening on Facebook? On Instagram? On Twitter? On Snapchat?” That gives you a good opportunity to revisit operant conditioning. The Monitor article notes that checking one’s phone provides instant reinforcement. If you check your phone to relieve anxiety, phone-checking is negatively reinforced. If you check your phone to see a loving text message from your sweetie, then your phone-checking is positively reinforced. The stress chapter in your Intro Psych textbook likely talks about the importance of feeling like we have control over our lives. Have our smartphones taken over control? Notifications tell us to look now (discriminative stimulus – “If you look now, I’ll reinforce your looking behavior with a new text message, information about who liked your most recent Facebook status update, or that you have a new life in that game that you started playing”). Can we resist the buzz, the blinking lights, the special text notification sound we assigned to our new love? Constantly ducking into our phones takes time and cognitive energy. If we’re reading, writing, or studying, every time we check the latest buzz, we take our minds away from what we’re doing. When we are done with the phone, it takes time to figure out what we had been doing and refocus… only for another buzz to take us away. While this may interfere with our productivity, greatly increasing how long it takes to do what we need to do, at least it’s not going to kill us. But when we engage in exactly that same behavior when driving, it may very well kill us or cause us to kill someone else. “A newly released survey shows that cell phone use is the greatest cause of distracted driving in Washington state and that fatalities from distracted driving have increased dramatically over a one-year period” (KOMO Staff, 2017). This is not just a Washington state problem. “After steady declines over the last four decades, highway fatalities last year [2015] recorded the largest annual percentage increase in 50 years. And the numbers so far this year are even worse. In the first six months of 2016, highway deaths jumped 10.4 percent to 17,775, from the comparable period of 2015” (Boudette, 2016). Also, as a bonus, if a driver is sleep deprived because of the phone interrupting their sleep, they don’t need to check a phone while driving to get killed. They can fall asleep while driving. Since we know that dramatic stories or footage are a more powerful persuasive tool than mere statistics, here are some car crashes. The view out the car window is on the left, and the view of the driver is on the right. Point out to students how little time it takes for a crash to happen. Video Link : 1947 While the video shows drivers looking at their phones instead of the road, the distracted driving research makes it clear that mentally doing something else while driving, like talking on the phone, is just as dangerous. If your mind is not on driving, you’re at risk of crashing. Crashing. Not having an accident, but crashing. An accident makes it sound like something that could not be avoided, after all, accidents happen. Crashes, however, can be avoided. This change in terminology, recommended by the National Traffic Safety Administration, is to help drivers take more responsibility for the havoc they can cause (Richel, 2016). I don’t know that there are any data to support this, but here’s a blog post by a linguist that explains why it should make a difference. Conclude this activity by asking students to take a minute to reflect on what they can do to regain control from their phones. Ask students to share in pairs or small groups, then ask volunteers to share some of their suggestions. Here are seven suggestions from the Monitor on Psychology article. “Make choices.” Decide what you are going to use your phone for. I know several people who have uninstalled the Facebook app from their phones specifically because it was sucking up too much of their time. “Retrain yourself.” Gradually wean yourself off habitual phone-checking. Don’t look at it first thing in the morning or the last thing at night. “Set expectations.” Let everyone know that you’re not going to respond to their text message or email immediately. Assure them that it’s about you, not about them. “Silence notifications.” If you don’t need to know NOW, turn off the notifications. Push notifications for my work email are turned off between 6pm and 8am and all day on the weekend. I made that change the night I was at a play and during intermission I was reading work email. I thought, “What am I doing?!” I changed the notifications then and there. “Protect sleep.” My phone automatically sets itself to silent between 9pm and 8am. When I still couldn’t resist the urge to check it when I woke up in the middle of the night, I started leaving it in a different room. “Be active.” When on social media, participate. That’s more likely to make us feel connected to others. “And, of course, don’t text/email/call and drive.” If you can’t stay off your phone, lock it in the trunk. References Boudette, N. E. (2016, November 15). Biggest spike in traffic deaths in 50 years? Blame apps. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/16/business/tech-distractions-blamed-for-rise-in-traffic-fatalities.html Cheever, N. A., Rosen, L. D., Carrier, L. M., & Chavez, A. (2014). Out of sight is not out of mind: The impact of restricting wireless mobile device use on anxiety levels among low, moderate and high users. Computers in Human Behavior, 37, 290-297. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2014.05.002 KOMO Staff. (2017, February 13). New survey: Distracted driving deaths up 32 percent; cell phone use a key factor. Retrieved from http://komonews.com/news/local/new-survey-distracted-driving-deaths-up-32-percent-cell-phone-use-blamed Richtel, M. (2016, May 22). It's no accident: Advocates want to speak of car 'crashes' instead. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/23/science/its-no-accident-advocates-want-to-speak-of-car-crashes-instead.html Smith, A. (2017, January 12). Record shares of Americans now own smartphones, have home broadband. Retrieved from http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/01/12/evolution-of-technology Weir, K. (2017, March). (Dis)Connected. APA Monitor on Psychology. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/monitor/2017/03/cover-disconnected.aspx ... View more

Speaking to military personnel on February 6 th , President Trump lamented that terrorist attacks are “not even being reported. And in many cases, the very, very dishonest press doesn’t want to report it.” The implication was that opposition to his seven-country immigration ban arises from our being insufficiently aware and fearful of the terrorism threat.   Or, we might ask, are we instead too afraid of terrorism? In 2015 and again in 2016, feared Islamic terrorists (none from the seven countries) shot and killed fewer Americans than did armed toddlers (see here and here). Homicidal, suicidal, and accidental death by guns claim more than 30,000 American deaths each year.   After vivid media portrayals of terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, 27 percent of Americans identified terrorism as their biggest worry. In two national surveys (here and here), terrorism topped the list of “most important” issues facing the country.   Ergo, does the evidence not compel us to conclude that we are, thanks to the hijacking of our emotions by vividly available images, too much afraid of terrorism . . . and too little afraid of much greater perils? And might we instead fault the media for leaving us too unafraid of the future’s great weapon of mass destruction—climate change? Are some prominent voices today, as in George Orwell’s 1984, seeking to control us by manipulating our fears? To me, George Gerbner’s cautionary words to a 1981 congressional subcommittee seem prescient: Fearful people are more dependent, more easily manipulated and controlled, more susceptible to deceptively simple, strong, tough measures and hard-line postures. ... View more

Have you expanded the amount of positive psychology you cover in Intro Psych? Here’s an in-class activity to get students to consider their happiness and the happiness of others around the world. Ask students, “What is the happiness country in the world?” Before they answer, ask students to consider how such a thing could be measured. Give students a minute or two to jot down some ideas, then ask students to turn to one or two nearby students to share ideas. After a couple minutes of sharing ask for a few volunteers to share their ideas. Researchers (Helliwell, Layard, & Sachs, 2016) looked at Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita (World Bank data), “healthy life expectancy” (World Health Organization data), social support, freedom of choice, generosity, perceptions of corruption, and self-report on yesterday’s positive and negative affect (all from Gallup World Poll data). From these data, researchers calculated scores for 157 countries. Ask students to guess which country is the happiest. The answer: Denmark. Switzerland, Iceland, Norway, and Finland round out the top 5. Canada is number 6. The United States? Number 13. Why is Denmark so happy? The Danes and Dana Dunn (2017) will tell you it is (at least partially) because of the concept of hygge (HOO-gah) -- cozy. “Danes burn 13 pounds of [unscented] candle wax a person a year, doing so even in classrooms and office buildings” (Green, 2016). “How to get hygge? Go home and stay there, preferably in your hyggekrog – a.k.a. ‘cozy nook’ – wrapped in a blanket, drinking a cup of coffee and watching a Danish police procedural about a serial killer with your friends” (Green, 2016). Ask your students to take a couple minutes to think about whether they have hygge in their own lives. If so, what does it look like? If not, what might it look like? Then give students a couple minutes to share their hygge experiences with one or two other students. Following this short discussion, ask for volunteers to share with the class.   References Dunn, D. (2017, January). Quotidian positive psychology: Helping students seek strengths and apply what they learn. Paper presented at the National Institute on the Teaching of Psychology, St. Petersburg Beach, FL. Green, P. (2016, December 24). Move over, Marie Kondo: Make room for the hygge hordes. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/24/fashion/wintering-the-danish-way-learning-about-hygge.html Helliwell, J., Layard, R., & Sachs, J. (2016). World Happiness Report 2016, Update (Vol. I). New York: Sustainable Development Solutions Network. ... View more

“Hundreds of studies” have found an association between religiosity and health or well-being, observes Harvard biostatistician and epidemiologist, Tyler VanderWeele in a forthcoming chapter. But “only a very small number” have rigorously examined causality. If people who worship regularly are healthier or less depressed (which they tend to be), is that because religious engagement promotes health and well-being, or because healthy, buoyant people more often leave their homes to worship?   Cecilie_Arcurs /E+/Getty Images To discern causality, new studies are assessing people’s health, their religiosity, and other health predictors, and then following them through time—for 20 years among 74,534 women in one Nurses Health Study. When controlling for various health risk factors, those who attended services more than weekly were a third less likely to have died than were non-attenders. In another analysis, the same comparison yielded a “5-fold lower rate of suicide.”   These and other such findings lead VanderWeele to conclude that “religious participation . . . is a powerful social determinant of health.”   But why? Unpacking the religiosity variable, VanderWeele and his colleagues, in the mortality study, report that social support explained 23 percent of the religiosity effect, not smoking explained 22 percent, less depressive symptoms explained 11 percent, and optimism 9 percent. People who are active in faith communities experience more social support, smoke less, are less depressed, and  are more optimistic than are those not active in such communities. ... View more

When covering research methods or as a research methods boost in health psych in Intro, ask your students, “Do fitness trackers, like Fitbit, work? If you were a psychological scientist trying to answer this question, how would you do it?” Give students a couple minutes to think about this on their own. Next, ask students to work in pairs or small groups to design an experiment that would help answer this question. As you circulate among the groups, make sure the groups are answering the question “Do fitness trackers work… at doing what?” As discussion is winding down, bring the class back together and ask for groups willing to volunteer their experimental designs. There should be some sort of random assignment to wearing a fitness tracker or not. Ask students why? [Because if you compared existing users with existing non-users, the users may already be more motivated to engage in physical activity.] Ask students to identify the independent variable [fitness tracker usage] and the experimental condition [fitness tracker] and control condition [no fitness tracker]. How long did students think participants should use/not use a fitness tracker to ensure a fair test? Why that amount of time? Ask students to identify the dependent variable(s) [perhaps weight loss]. With class discussion on the design wrapping up, share with students the results of such a study (Jakicic, et.al., 2016). Participants (470 of them) were six months into a 2-year weight-loss study when they were randomly assigned to either wear a fitness tracker that included a website for monitoring diet or self-monitor exercise and diet via a website (74.5% completed the study; every six months, participants were given $100). Note that this study did not have a no-treatment control group. Ask students to predict the results by a show of hands or via an audience response system. A. Fitness-tracker users lost the most weight B. Self-monitors lost the most weight C. Fitness-tracker users and self-monitors lost about the same amount of weight. Ready for the results? Those assigned to wear fitness trackers lost 3.5 kg (7.7 lbs). Those assigned to self-monitor lost 5.9 kg (13 lbs). There were no differences in the groups at the 6-month mark, the point in the study where they were randomly assigned to wear the fitness tracker or self-monitor. But at the next three check-ins (12 months, 18 months, and 24 months), the self-monitoring group had always lost more weight. Did your students guess right? Were they surprised by the results? Some explanations for these results are offered in this NPR story. But before you share these with students, ask students to generate some hypotheses as to why the self-monitoring group lost more weight than the fitness-trackers. If time allows, give students a couple minutes to think on their own before sharing in pairs or small groups.  Ask student volunteers to report out their hypotheses. Write the hypotheses where students can see them. If you’d like to send students off with a take-home assignment, assign students to design an experiment (but not conduct it!) that would test one of the student-generated hypotheses. Students should identify their independent and dependent variables and anything else they would do that would eliminate confounding variables. You can either let students choose the hypothesis, or assign hypotheses by last name, e.g., “If you’re last name begins with A through F, you have hypothesis 1.” Students can submit as a written assignment, or if you have time at the beginning of the next class, give students an opportunity to share their designs with each other, and then take a few minutes to ask volunteers to share their designs.   Reference Jakicic, J. M., Davis, K. K., Rogers, R. J., King, W. C., Marcus, M. D., Helsel, D., . . . Belle, S. H. (2016, September 20). Effect of wearable technology combined with a lifestyle intervention on long-term weight loss: The IDEA randomized clinical trial. Retrieved from http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=2553448 ... View more

Originally posted on February 19, 2015. Soapbox alert: An earlier post expressed one of my pet peeves: the favoritism shown today’s senior citizens over more economically challenged Millennials and their children. A half century ago, I noted, it made good sense to give often-impoverished seniors discounts at restaurants, at movie theaters, and on trains. Today, the percent in poverty has flipped—with under-35 adults now experiencing twice the poverty of their over-65 parents. Since 1967, seniors’ poverty rate, thanks to economic growth, social security, and retirement programs, has dropped by two-thirds. (Social security payments have been inflation-adjusted, while minimum wage, dependent tax exemptions, and family assistance payments have not.) So, should it surprise us that new data from an APA national stress survey reveal that “Parents and younger generations are less likely than Americans overall to report being financially secure”? And should we, therefore, consider instead giving discounts to those who, on average, 1) most need it (perhaps custodial parents), and b) are the most stressed by financial worries? ... View more

Originally posted on April 15, 2014. For those of us living in the American Midwest, it’s been an historic winter. The phrase “polar vortex,” once beholden to meteorologists, crept into daily conversation. Dozens of inches of snow, frozen pipes, and school cancellations can build stress, weariness, and even depression. To get rid of the blues, find the green space. Green spaces refer to parks, forests, or other parcels of land meant to connect people to nature. Numerous studies have shown that green spaces relate to better mental health. But one recent study took things to an entirely new level. A group of University of Wisconsin researchers, led by Kirsten Beyer, surveyed a representative sample of Wisconsin residents for mental health issues. They also used satellite imagery to estimate the amount of local green space. What did they find? The more green space people had close to them, the better their mental health. When people search for a new apartment, condo, or house, the only green they often consider is the money they need to spend. But these findings suggest that living near green spaces pays off by predicting better mental health. ... View more

Originally posted on May 1, 2014. Julian grew up an active child, but those days are long gone. Now he struggles to walk up the stairs. When he walks two city blocks, he takes a break, clenches a light post, and tries to catch his breath. As he looks at passersby, Julian knows what they’re thinking: Obese people are lazy. But according to recent research, those onlookers have it backwards. In a recent UCLA study, researchers wanted to see which comes first, obesity or lack of motivation. They took 32 rats and separated them into two groups. The first group ate a diet designed to make them obese. It mimicked the standard Western diet. The second group ate food that maintained their weight. After six months, the rats completed a fun little motivation task. What happened? A lack of motivation did not cause obesity. It wasn’t until the rats became overweight that their motivation started waning. These findings debunk the myth people become obese because they lack discipline and motivation. Low energy and motivation follow, but do not cause, obesity. ... View more

Originally posted on May 7, 2014. The Iran and Afghanistan Wars introduced a new and troubling picture on the relationship between traumatic brain injury and mental health. Multiple deployments exposed soldiers to more frequent risks. New combat gear helped them survive blasts. Suicide, substance use, and strained relationships often followed. But according to an Ontario study, we shouldn’t forget another vulnerable group: adolescents who have experienced at least one traumatic brain injury, defined as a head injury that caused either 5 minutes of unconsciousness or an overnight hospital stay. By comparison, the severity of the soldier injuries probably trumped those of the Toronto teens. Yet the two groups experienced similar consequences. In a study of almost 5000 Canadian students Grades 7-12, those who experienced a traumatic brain injury, compared those who didn’t, were nearly three times more likely to attempt suicide. The brain injured adolescents were also more likely to engage in antisocial behavior and experience anxiety and depression. Here is the most stunning statistic of all: roughly 20% of Ontario adolescents have a lifetime history of traumatic brain injury. Part of this makes sense. Think back to when you were a teenager. Perhaps you skateboarded, played soccer, hockey, football, or roughhoused with your siblings. Learning how to drive, you might have been injured in a car accident. Our teenage years are often filled with risk because the teenage brain is hypersensitive to reward. (To watch some videos of a true genius on the topic of the teenage brain, click here). Yet the drive for reward can come at the greatest cost of all. By risking their bodies, adolescents risk their brains. And when that piece of equipment doesn’t run on all cylinders, life becomes more of a slog than a sweet dream. The next time you think of brain injury, think of those who put themselves in harm’s way. For some of us, risk if part of our job. For others, it’s part of our development. For all of us, it’s time to reconsider who needs help.      ... View more

Originally posted on May 9, 2014. The next time you’re facing potential social rejection, what should you do? New evidence suggests a puff of pot reduces the pain of rejection. But before we get to the pot smoking, how did we hatch this idea? Like most ideas, it was formed over an informal conversation. Previously, we had shown that the physical painkiller acetaminophen numbs people to the pain of rejection. Now we wanted to see whether another drug that works through similar brain receptors would also reduce the pain of rejection. It just happened that marijuana fit the bill. In four studies, participants reported how often they smoked marijuana. Next, we measured their feelings of social exclusion or manipulated how socially excluded they felt. Finally, we measured participants’ emotional distress. The four studies yielded a similar pattern: marijuana reduced the pain of rejection. What is the takeaway message? Rejection hurts, and drugs that reduce physical pain also lessen the pain of rejection. Don’t smoke up to prove a point. Just know that rejection is serious. When you’re feeling lonely, reach out to friends before you reach for a roach clip. ... View more

Originally posted on May 15, 2014. Each day we face stressors. Our pets get sick, lightning strikes the office, or we miss loved ones. New research identified another stressor lurking in our midst: men. This research , which was reported by the New York Times , showed that rats and mice get stressed out when they’re around men. Even catching a whiff of a men’s t-shirt was enough to raise their stress hormones. The scent of a woman didn’t increase stress. Most men don’t consider themselves stressors. When I walk into a classroom, I tell my students my mission: Motivate Encourage Advocate Learn But these findings suggest that no matter what I do, my maleness may spike their stress levels. The good news is that our bodies adjust. The first day of class might be stressful, especially when you have a male instructor. Over time that stress should wash away. How far can we extrapolate these findings? Although exposure to a single male increases stress that eventually drops off, what if people were constantly bombarded with men? In societies where men outnumber women, would stress levels peak? My next post will answer that question. ... View more

Originally posted on May 16, 2014. Being around men increases stress. Do countries with more man than women have higher stress levels? In my last post, I promised to answer this question. But it’s a harder question than it seems. How do you measure a country’s level of stress? Some organizations, such as Gallup, do an excellent job surveying people around the world. I don’t work at Gallup, nor do I have access to their data. So I had to do the best I could. First, I gathered country gender composition data from our friends at the World Bank . I separated countries according to whether they had a majority of male or female citizens. The average was 50.77% women (standard deviation 1.19; Minimum: 48.19%, Maximum: 54.30%). Of the 74 countries for which data were available, 19 were male-majority and 55 were female-majority. Next, I searched for a good, comprehensive measure of country-level stress. Bloomberg made things easy. They computed a country’s stress score by combining seven factors: Annual Homicide Rate per 100,000 Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita Income inequality (Gini coefficient) Corruption (as measured by Transparency International) Unemployment rate Urban air pollution (micrograms per cubic meter) Life expectancy (years at birth) Finally, I compared country-level stress between male-majority and female-majority countries. This would give me an initial answer to my question. What were the results? Countries with more men than women, compared to their female-majority counterparts, had higher levels of stress. Three factors drove the effect: corruption, pollution, and life expectancy. In each case, more men than women equaled a more corrupt, polluted, and shorter lived society. A close fourth, which wasn’t quite statistically significant (p= .063), was Gross Domestic Product per capita. If a country had a male majority (vs. female majority), GDP was lower. These findings offer a novel extension to the finding that being around men, versus women, increases rodent stress. But unlike those careful laboratory experiments, people weren’t randomly assigned to live in male- or female-majority countries. We can’t infer cause and effect. All we can conclude is that when men are present, stress seems to rise instead of fall. ... View more

Originally posted on May 20, 2014. Three years ago, I gained a new appreciation of consciousness. My mom had an accident that caused her brain to bleed. It seemed to rip away her consciousness. As I slept next to her bed before she died, I wondered, “Is she conscious of what’s happening?” New research suggests that the brain can give us a clue. Prior to this research, you had limited options to know if someone had consciousness. You could ask them. That’s easy. But what about those cases, like my mom’s, when a person hasn’t experienced brain death but is still unresponsive? To find out, researchers scanned the brain of a woman who was in a vegetative state. They asked her to imagine playing tennis, along with several other activities. The results, published in Science, made a big splash. Although the woman couldn’t answer the questions, her brain did. When she imagined playing tennis, her brain reacted by increasing blood flow to the motor cortex. She was immobile, but her brain acted as if she was playing on Wimbledon’s Centre Court. To watch a wonderful video of the researcher leading this effort, click here. It might change the way you think about consciousness. I know it helped me. ... View more

Originally posted on May 22, 2014. Runners pop up everywhere. They run alone, in pairs, and in mass hordes through major cities. Running can improve health. But what about extreme running? Is 100 miles too far? I get this question a lot. I run ultramarathons. An ultramarathon is any foot race longer than a standard 26.2 mile (42.2 kilometer) marathon. In the past year, I’ve run nine ultramarathons. This includes two 50 kilometer (31 miles) races, one 60 kilometer race (a little over 37 miles), a six hour timed event where I officially ran 40 miles (I got lost and ran a couple “bonus” miles, too), three 50 mile races, and two 100 mile races. When people learn about my running, they often ask two questions. The first is, “Why do you do that?” I like the challenge, they make me feel good physically and emotionally, and I love the camaraderie. The second question is almost always, “Is that good for you?” Many people think running isn’t good for you. “It’s bad for your knees,” many people tell me. When it comes to extreme running, the possible harm only increases, right? “Didn’t you hear about the ultrarunner, Caballo Blanco, from the book Born to Run? He died while running. That proves it.” Before we rush to judgment, let’s look at the data. When we do that, we’ll find two things. The first is that we don’t really know much. There aren’t many people who run ultramarathons. The sport is growing, but we’re a niche group. In late April, I ran a 100 mile race. 185 people started. Compare that to the most selective American marathon, the Boston Marathon, which in 2014 had 35,671 starters! The second thing we’ll learn is that ultrarunners have pretty good health. In one recent study, ultrarunners, compared to the general population, had better physical health, mental health, and missed fewer days due to illness. They do tend to have more allergies and asthma, which is probably due to wheezing from the gorgeously pollinated trails they traverse. Other research shows that ultrarunners have longer telomeres – DNA strands at the end of chromosomes that often shrink with age. With longer telomeres, ultrarunners may be less vulnerable to disease. So, we now have a better perspective on whether ultrarunning is good for you. You don’t have to run 100 miles to reap the benefits of running. Simply take one more step today than you did yesterday. ... View more

Originally posted on June 10, 2014. Many people run to enjoy better health, lower stress, and a slight endorphin buzz. But does running also zap our memories? To find out, researchers traded in their lab coats for workout clothes and put some adult guinea pigs on a serious running schedule. Others guinea pigs were assigned to a couch potato condition. Next, they tested how well the pigs remembered situations that used to terrify them. What happened? The runners forgot their fears. Faced with the prospect of painful electric shock, the runners fearlessly galloped. The couch potatoes cowered. This study might change how you respond the next time you hear a runner say, “I run to clear my head.” ... View more

Originally posted on July 10, 2014. Why don’t people vote? This question puzzles pollsters, political candidates, and people who cherish the right to choose their elected officials. To predict voter turnout, all you might need is a test tube, a willing participant, and a little saliva. So says a group of University of Nebraska-Omaha researchers, who tested the hypothesis that the stress hormone cortisol would predict voting behavior. Stress often leads people to avoid high pressure situations. If people have high cortisol levels, voting might only increase their stress. They might fear that their chosen candidate would lose the election, or that the candidate would underperform if elected. As a result, stressful souls might avoid the polls. In the study, people spit in a tube to provide a measurement of their cortisol levels. Next, the researchers collected the study participants’ actual voting behavior in six U.S. national elections. Sure enough, the most stressed out people voted about half as often as their more relaxed counterparts. To get people to vote, politicians might frame voting as a relaxing activity. “Take a break from work, relax, and make a difference in your community,” might help get even the most stressed out people to visit the polls. ... View more

Originally posted on August 5, 2014. We live in an era of mental fatigue. People sleep less, work more, and experience more stress now than any other time in recent history. How can we overcome mental fatigue? People go to extreme lengths to pep themselves up. They guzzle energy drinks, smoke cigarettes, or drink coffee and tea. But a growing trend, especially among college students, is to use psychotropic medications to battle mental fatigue. Many students abuse the popular drug, methylphenidate (also known as Ritalin), because they think it will improve their concentration when fatigued. Are the students right? To examine this question, researchers at the University of Michigan randomly assigned students to consume either Ritalin or a placebo pill. Next, the students completed a boring task. Crucially, half of the students completed a version of the task that was not only boring – it also made them mentally exhausted. The rest of the students were bored, but their mental faculties were left intact. What happened? Taking Ritalin undid the effects of mental fatigue. So, in a way, these findings offer a clue about why students abuse Ritalin. Students might not want a cheap buzz; they may simply want to overcome their exhaustion. In my next post, I’ll offer five healthier and safer options to deal with mental fatigue. ... View more

Originally posted on August 14, 2014. In my last post, I reviewed research that showed that Ritalin, compared with a placebo, helped research volunteers overcome mental fatigue. Now I would like to give you five healthier and safer ways to conquer your mental fatigue. Everyone experiences mental fatigue, whether it is the 3:00 pm “slump” or extreme sleep deprivation. Two weeks ago, I was awake for 40 consecutive hours as I helped a friend complete the Badwater 135 ultramarathon. Eighteen hours later, I was back in the office working. So, I know about fatigue and how to deal with it. 1.     Increase rest. This is the easiest, safest, and cheapest way to overcome mental fatigue. Increase your sleep until you reach at least seven to eight hours each night. If you’re sleep deprived, schedule extra time to catch up on your missed sleep. Once you’re caught up, your body will find a natural groove of how much sleep you need. Some people brag about how little sleep they need. Start bragging about how much sleep you get.   2.     Play offense against your environment. Open your windows in the morning. When we see the morning sunlight, retinal proteins trigger signals to something called the suprachiasmic nucleus (SCN). The SCN, in turn, helps our bodies produce less of our body’s natural sleeping hormone melatonin. In the evening, turn off your lights. Don’t go to sleep in front of your iPad, iPhone, or other brightly lit decide. The darker your room, the faster you’ll fall asleep. 3.     Exercise. Yes, exercise excites us. But exercise also bathes our minds with neurotransmitters that settle us down and boost our happiness. Try to avoid early morning and late evening exercise. A late afternoon walk, jog, or swim works best. 4.     Work smarter, not harder. Most of us have fallen prey to the mistaken idea that working more hours means that we are doing higher quality work. Yet few among us keep track of our daily activities. For example, how many minutes per day you do write, read, and check email? I use various websites and programs to help me accomplish my daily goals. Online-stopwatch.com is one of my favorites. I set the clock for four hours. When time is up, that means I’m done writing. Period. I also bought the “Freedom” program. It locks me out of the Internet. Freedom helps me plan my writing sessions (Will I need that document? Do I need to copy and paste this email?) and avoid lingering distractions. You’ll work fewer hours, making you less fatigued. 5.     Take the mind out of the middle. When we’re tired, it’s tough to make decisions. Try something different: Make a contract with yourself ahead of time. Psychologist Peter Gollwitzer calls these little contracts implementation intentions. For example, if you want to make sure you get your exercise, tell yourself, “When I get home from work, I will exercise for 20 minutes.” This way you’ve already made the decision. Instead of trying to rely on your groggy mind to make a good decision, refer to the mental contract you already drafted and signed. So, how did I overcome the extreme mental exhaustion I experienced post-Badwater? I followed each step. I prioritized my sleep. I soaked up as much sunlight as possible. I exercised each day. I set specific work goals to accomplish. I made implementation intentions so that I knew my decisions were made ahead of time. Finally, I relaxed and took it easy. ... View more

Originally posted on October 2, 2014. Everything psychological is biological. Stress wreaks havoc on our immune system, increasing our risk for many diseases. Psychological disorders can make us feel physically sick. We feel the sting of rejection as real pain. Might a healthier body help us have a stronger mind? To find out, a group of Brazilian researchers recruited a group of women who underwent bariatric bypass surgery. Before and after their surgery, the women completed a measure of executive function — a test of how well people manage their mental processes. Not surprisingly, the bariatric bypass surgery caused the women to lose weight. It also reduced their inflammation and boosted brain activity in regions associated with cognitive function. But the coolest finding was that the women’s executive functioning improved. A healthier body related to a stronger mind. No matter how disconnected our mind and body might seem, they are close friends who rely on each other for everything. By improving our physical health, we can change not only the shape of our bodies but also strengthen our minds. http://www.talkpsych.com/talk-psych-blog/2014/9/22/can-a-lean-waist-strengthen-your-mind#commenting ... View more