A couple weeks ago we were walking our dogs past our neighbor’s house when we noticed that there was a smashed car parked out front. We asked our neighbor what happened. “My son fell asleep. He’s okay, and fortunately it was a single-car crash.” For years I didn’t cover sleep in Intro Psych. And then a colleague’s teenage son fell asleep while driving, crossed the center line, and hit a semi head-on. He was killed instantly. The next time I taught Intro Psych, I covered sleep. And I have ever since. The AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety has released their latest report, Acute Sleep Deprivation and Risk of Motor Vehicle Crash Involvement (2016). Here are some clicker questions to get your students thinking about the scope of the problem driving while drowsy before launching into your coverage of sleep. (Answers are at the bottom.) What percentage “of U.S. adults usually sleep for less than 7 hours daily”? Less than 10% 10% to 20% 21% to 30 % 30% to 40% “[D]rivers who reported having slept for less than 4 hours in the past 24 hours had an estimated ________ times the odds of having contributed to the crash in which they were involved, compared with drivers who reported having slept for 7 or more hours in the past 24 hours.” 11.5 4.3 1.9 1.3 What are the odds that someone with a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) level of 0.08 (legal limit in all U.S. states) will be in a crash as compared to someone with a BAC of 0.0? 6 to 7.8 3 to 6.5 0 to 5.2 7 to 3.9 The authors of this report acknowledge a number of limitations. “Possibly the most significant limitation of the study was that crashes that occurred between midnight and 6 AM” were not included in the dataset used in this study. Ask students to consider what impact including that data could have on the results. Interestingly, “drivers involved crashes in the first and last hours of data collection each day (i.e., 6:00 – 6:59 AM and 11:00 – 11:59 PM) reported having slept for an average of one full hour less in the past 24 hours than did drivers involved in crashes during the remainder of the day.” For more research and recent statistics, check out the Governors Highway Safety Administration report, Wake Up Call! Understanding Drowsy Driving and What States Can Do (2016). ANSWERS D. 35% (That is “including 12% who report usually sleeping for 5 hours or less.”) A. 11.5. Drivers that slept between 4 and 5 hours were 4.3 times as likely to crash. Drivers that slept between 5 and 6 hours were 1.9 times as likely to crash. And drivers that slept between 6 and 7 hours were 1.3 times as likely to crash. D. 2.7 to 3.9. That’s approximately equivalent to sleeping between 4 and 5 hours. In other words, driving on less than 5 hours of sleep is about the same as driving with a BAC of 0.08. ... View more

A political science grad student, Kevin Munger (2016a, b), decided to conduct an experiment on Twitter. His goal was to reduce the amount of hate speech posted to that media platform. To that end, he searched Twitter for a particular racial slur and sent every writer of such a tweet the same message: “@[subject] Hey man, just remember that there are real people who are hurt when you harass them with that kind of language.” But that’s not all. Munger reasoned that the impact of the message on future use of racial slurs likely depends on the communicator of that message, such as the perceived race and status of the person who is sending the reminder of the impact of language. Munger created four Twitter accounts: “High Follower/White; Low Follower/White; High Follower/Black; and Low Follower/Black.” The high followers had over 500 followers whereas the low followers had two followers. The White accounts displayed a White avatar and had a more stereotypically White-sounding name, Greg. The Black accounts displayed a Black avatar and had a more stereotypically Black-sounding name, Rasheed. Following Munger’s be-nice tweet, Munger tracked daily use of the racial slur over the next two months. The results. When Munger’s twitter account was High Follower/White, the number of racial slurs dropped .3 per day, the highest of any group. High status ingroup members do have power to influence. With about an equal, but smaller, decrease in daily use of racial slurs where the High Follower/Black and Low Follower/White avatars, although these differences disappeared within a few weeks (Munger, 2016b). Ingroup membership and high status both have an immediate, but not lasting impact, all on their own. What about Low Follower/Black? No Impact. In Intro Psych, you can give your students a little practice with experimental design by using this article at the beginning of the course when you cover research methods or as a research methods refresher later in the course when you cover social psychology. Ask students to identify the independent variables and dependent variable. The response to Munger’s missive wasn’t uniform; reponses differered by the anonymity of the Twitter user who received Munger’s message. Munger looked at the profiles of the Twitter users in his experiment. Of those users who were not anonymous, Munger reports that the High Follower/White Twitter account had no impact on the ensuing use of racial slurs. But the Low Follower/Black Twitter account “actually caused an increase (emphasis in original) in the use of racist slurs.” These were largely directed at Munger’s Twitter account that sent the be-nice message. Shout out to Danae Hudson (Missouri State University) for finding this article and suggesting this activity!   References Munger, K. (2016a, November 17). This researcher programmed bots to fight racism on Twitter. It worked. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/11/17/this-researcher-programmed-bots-to-fight-racism-on-twitter-it-worked Munger, K. (2016b). Tweetment effects on the tweeted: Experimentally reducing racist harassment. Political Behavior. doi:10.1007/s11109-016-9373-5 ... View more

Sure, you can explain what a prototype is, but what if students could experience generating a prototype and seeing how it compares with others? Maria Vita (Penn Manor High School, Millersville, PA) suggests using Google’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) experiment “Quick, Draw!” to do just that. After explaining prototypes, send students to the Google “Quick, Draw!” website on any web-enabled device, although a device with a touchscreen, such as a smartphone, is better. Students click the “Let’s Draw!” button to start. Students will be given 20 seconds to draw an object or a concept, such as boomerang. Google uses machine learning to try to guess what the object is. Once Google has correctly guessed or 20 seconds is up, whichever comes first, Google presents another concept or object to draw. After six trials, Google shows all six drawings along with the results. Tap on a drawing to see what other people have drawn for that concept or object as well as see drawings created for other objects that look like that one. Once students have had a chance to do a set of drawings, ask students to explain what this activity had to do with prototypes. (After being given an object or concept, whatever popped into their minds was likely their prototype for that concept.) Vita (2016) suggests instructors “[c]hallenge students to get 6 drawings guessed and/or when the program is unable to guess a drawing explain why it did not fit the prototype.” What’s in it for Google? This department within Google is exploring machine learning. Being given hundreds of drawings of, say, flamingos, helps Google identify any future drawings of flamingos as flamingos.   References Vita, M. [AP Psychology Teachers]. (2016, November 18). Challenge students to get 6 drawings guessed and/or when the program is unable to guess a drawing explain why it did not fit the prototype. [Facebook group post]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/556665311050841/ ... View more

Open your discussion of sensation and perception by showing students this image. Note the white on the clear bulb where the light is reflecting. Our eyes detect white, but our brains know that those white spots aren’t really white. Based on past experience, our brain perceives the white as merely reflections of light. Image source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/clear-glass-light-bulb-75427 Next, show students this photo. Image source: http://cheezburger.com/8985651968/shiny-legs-optical-illusion-paint-whats-making-these-legs-look-so-shiny     It’s not quite The Dress, but this is still pretty cool. Like many people, what you see are shiny legs. Do they look like they are covered in a hard, clear plastic? But what if I told you that there is no plastic. It’s just strategically placed white paint? If you saw shiny legs, you were perceiving the white as reflected light, as you rightly did with the light bulb. Once you’re told the white is paint, the shininess disappears, and you are just left with, well, white paint. ... View more

You just had another one of those conversations. You know, the one where a colleague casually drops “learning styles” into the conversation assuming that we’re all on board with this commonly known fact of learning. Did you respond with “well, actually…” or did you try to extract yourself from the situation as quickly and gracefully as possible? Or did you just glance at your phone and say, “Oh! I have to go! I’m late for a meeting.” If you’re looking for a comprehensive treatment of the topic, then the Pashler, et.al. (2008) paper is the place to start. The authors provide a nice overview, some history on how we got to here, the kind of research evidence needed to “validate interventions based on learning styles,” and then a review of the literature itself. The punch line? “We conclude therefore, that at present, there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning styles assessments into general educational practice.” After reading about the dearth of experimental testing regarding learning styles Rogowsky and colleagues (2014) matched students’ “learning style preference” with “instructional mode.” The results? No impact. Interestingly, those who preferred to read – “visual word” – to learn performed the best overall as compared to those with an “auditory word” preference. The authors write, “It is important to keep in mind that most testing, from state standardized education assessments to college admission tests, is presented in a written word format only. Thus, it is important to give students as much experience with written material as possible to help them build these skills, regardless of their preferred learning style.” If you’re looking for a Q & A approach, Daniel Willingham has a nice “Learning Styles FAQ.” Twelve questions, twelve answers. The first question: “How can you not believe that that people learn differently?  Isn’t it obvious?” The first sentence of the first answer: “People do learn differently, but I think it is very important to say exactly how they learn differently, and focus our attention on those differences that really matter.” Twelve questions are too many? How about five questions and a statement (Jarrett, 2015)? Or maybe you want some guidance on how to gauge the utility of learning styles articles. Megan Smith of the Learning Scientists blog suggests four criteria to look for: 1. Explanation of why we can’t shake this myth; 2. Description of the kind of data what would be helpful; 3. Explanation of the harm that meshing teaching to learning styles can cause; and 4. Description of better approaches to teaching. Smith uses these criteria to walk us through a few learning style articles.  What are the alternative approaches to teaching? Stephen Chew brings us the “Cognitive Principles of Effective Teaching” 5-part video series. The first video addresses common beliefs about teaching. Videos two, three, and four, address “cognitive challenges of teaching,” such as mindset, ineffective learning strategies, and the constraints of working memory. Samuel Moulton (2014) provides a more extensive review of the literature of learning. He addresses areas such as “effective and active learning” (e.g., spaced practice, deep processing), “mental architecture” (e.g., cognitive load, dual coding), and “motivation and persistence” (e.g., achievement motivation, social learning). Would you prefer a free ebook on the topic? Benassi, et.al. (2014) edited a wonderful 24-chapter book published by the Society for the Teaching of Psychology, Applying Science of Learning in Education: Infusing Psychological Science into the Curriculum. Conclusion Now that you are up to speed on the learning styles literature and other – better – ways of teaching, you will be ready for that next hallway conversation. Special thanks to Kristie Morris who raised this topic on the Society for the Teaching of Psychology’s PsychTeacher listserv and to Molly Metz, Bill Goffe, Kristina Dandy, Xiaomeng Xu, and Karen Huxtable-Jester for providing their favorite resources on the topic.   References Benassi, V. A., Overson, C. E., & Hakala, C. M. (2014). Applying science of learning in education: Infusing psychological science into the curriculum. Retrieved from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology web site: http://teachpsych.org/ebooks/asle2014/index.php   Chew, S. (n.d.). Cognitive principles of effective teaching. Retrieved October 25, 2016, from https://www.samford.edu/employee/faculty/cognitive-principles-of-effective-teaching Jarrett, C. (2015, January 5). All you need to know about the ‘learning styles’ myth, in two minutes. Retrieved from https://www.wired.com/2015/01/need-know-learning-styles-myth-two-minutes Moulton, S. T. (2014). Applying psychological science to higher education: Key findings and open questions. Retrieved October 25, 2016, from http://hilt.harvard.edu/files/hilt/files/moulton_2014_applying_psychological_science_to_higher_education_april16.pdf Pashler, H., Mcdaniel, M., Rohrer, D., & Bjork, R. (2008). Learning styles: Concepts and evidence. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 9(3), 105-119. doi:10.1111/j.1539-6053.2009.01038.x Rogowsky, B. A., Calhoun, B. M., & Tallal, P. (2015). Matching learning style to instructional method: Effects on comprehension. Journal of Educational Psychology, 107(1), 64-78. doi:10.1037/a0037478 Smith, M. (n.d.). Weekly digest #9: How to talk about learning styles. Retrieved October 25, 2016, from http://www.learningscientists.org/blog/2016/5/8/weekly-digest-9  Willingham, D. (n.d.). Daniel Willingham's Learning Styles FAQ. Retrieved October 25, 2016, from http://www.danielwillingham.com/learning-styles-faq.html ... View more

Originally posted on October 13, 2016. Amid the uproar over leaked audio of Donald Trump’s boasting about his sexual predation, there was a secondary story—the complicity of interviewer Billy Bush, who appears to snicker approvingly at Trump’s reprehensible comments. “Obviously I’m embarrassed and ashamed,” Bush tweeted after his enabling behavior was revealed. Surely, we can each reassure ourselves: Had we been in a small group situation in which someone injected blatant sexist or racist remarks, we would not play along. But do we underestimate the power of the situation, especially if we have motives to impress a famous or powerful person? Social psychologists Janet Swim and Laurie Hyers put this question to an experimental test. They asked Pennsylvania State University women students to imagine themselves in a small group deciding whom to select for survival on a desert island. If one of the others injected three sexist comments, such as “I think we need more women on the island to keep the men satisfied” or to do the cooking, how would they react? Only 5 percent predicted they would ignore the comments. But when the women actually experienced this very situation, 55 percent said nothing. Other researchers have found people similarly docile—despite predictions of being courageous—when hearing someone utter a racial slur. As Billy Bush now understands, it’s so easy to become complicit—to “get along by going along.” As Marian Wright Edelman observed in The Measure of Our Success (1992), “Have you ever noticed how one example—good or bad—can prompt others to follow? How one illegally parked car can give permission for others to do likewise? How one racial joke can fuel another?” If we attribute Billy Bush’s behavior only to a Trump-like sexist disposition then we can distance ourselves from it. Not us. Never. But in doing so we forget one of the big lessons of social psychology—the corrupting power of evil situations. In horror movies and suspense novels, evil is the product of the depraved bad apple. In real life (as in Stanley Milgram’s obedience experiments), evil more often results from toxic situations that make the whole barrel go bad. The drift towards evil can therefore occur without any conscious intent to do evil. As Mister Rogers used to say, “Good people sometimes do bad things.” Or as James Waller, a social psychologist who has studied evil, has written, “When we understand the ordinariness of extraordinary evil, we will be less surprised by evil, less likely to be unwitting contributors to evil, and perhaps better equipped to forestall evil.” Mindful of the power of the situation, my occasional advice to my teen children when heading out on a Friday night—and to myself when wishing for others’ approval—has been: “Remember who you are.” Perhaps Billy Bush can help us remember how easy it is to forget who we are and what we stand for. ... View more

You and your spouse are in a grocery store. You see a man in his mid-40s walking with a 5-year-old girl. He has the girl’s hair wrapped around the handle of the grocery cart. The girl is “crying: ‘Please stop! I won’t do it again’” (Mele, 2016). Before covering the bystander effect, describe that scenario to your students. Ask your students to jot down what they would do, and then share their responses with one or two students near them. Ask for volunteers to share their responses (or collect anonymous responses by paper or using a classroom response system). Note the responses. Do they fall into the bystander intervention decision tree? We first have to notice that something is happening. Since the scenario is presented, students have no choice but to notice. But do some students respond by saying that they would act like they hadn’t noticed? After noticing, we have to interpret what we are seeing as something that needs our attention. Did some of your students decide that it was okay for this man to treat this child this way? Do your students differ on what appropriate parenting looks like? Lastly, we have to decide that we have a responsibility to help. That help can take many forms, from confronting the man to contacting store security to calling the police. The type of help given may depend on how threatened the students believe they would be by the man. Introduce this decision tree to students using their responses. This incident took place in Cleveland, Texas in mid-September, 2016. A woman, Erika Burch, who was shopping with her husband did respond. She confronted the man. He did not let the girl go. The woman called 911. A police officer who happened to be in the store quickly appeared, and at that point, the man – the girl’s father – let go of the child’s hair. If time allows, ask students who chose not to intervene in the hypothetical situation how the scenario would have needed to be different for them to intervene. For students who chose to intervene, ask what kinds of parenting discipline would be okay enough for them not to intervene.   References Mele, C. (2016, September 28). Should you intervene when a parent harshly disciplines a child in public? Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/29/us/should-you-intervene-when-a-parent-harshly-disciplines-a-child-in-public.html ... View more

Prosopagnosia – face blindness – used to be thought a rare condition caused only by head trauma. We now know that is not that rare – 2% in the U.S., perhaps (Radden Keefe, 2016) – and that the cause can also be genetic. It also used to be thought that you were either normal or had prosopagnosia. We now know that facial recognition falls on a spectrum. If there is an end of the spectrum where faces are not recognized, it stands to reason that there is another end of the spectrum where faces are easily recognized. And there is research to back up that reasoning. They are called super-recognizers. For your students who are 18+, invite them to take the Cambridge Face Memory Test.  “The average score on this test is around 80% correct responses for adult participants.” The page gives 60% as the cut-off for potential face blindness. I came in at 68%. I should add that this test uses only Caucasian males.  Those of you familiar with the other-race effect may wonder about that. And you are right to wonder. They created a Chinese version and compared performance of participants of European descent and participants of Asian descent on both the Chinese version and the European version. As predicted by the other-race effect, participants of Asian descent did well on the Chinese version (average of 85% correct) but less well on the European version (average of 73% correct). Participants of European descent did well on the European version (76%), but less well on the Chinese version (average of 66%) (McKone, et.al., 2012). Developmental psychologists may be wondering how kids perform. A separate study with five- to twelve-year-olds found that kids develop better facial memory as they age. For example, five-year-olds got 66% correct, 8-year-olds got 76% correct, and 12-year-olds got 85% correct (Croydon, et.al., 2014).  While we’re in the middle of this topic, I might as well throw in how good crows are at recognizing human faces (see this article for more information). Don’t ever tick off a crow. What about those super-recognizers, though? How do they perform? Russell, Duchaine, and Nakayama (2009) found four people who were likely candidates for super-recognizer status. They tested them using the Cambridge Face Memory Test. Three of them earned perfect scores; one person missed one. And what are super-recognizers looking at when they look at a face? The eyes? Nope. The nose. It’s unlikely that that’s because the nose has some sort of special significance. It’s more likely that it’s because the nose is in the center of the face, allowing the super-recognizer to take in the whole face (Bobak & Bate, 2016). The forensically-minded may be wondering if the power of super-recognizers could be harnessed to fight crime. Yes, yes it can. New Scotland Yard created the Super-Recogniser Unit comprised of seven (as of August, 2016) police officers who are, well, super-recognizers. What do they do? Most commonly they look at closed circuit television (CCTV) video of crime suspects, and they look at photos of people who have been arrested. They are looking for a match. “It is not uncommon for a super-recognizer, out on the town with friends, to bolt off after spotting someone with an outstanding warrant.” One officer, James Rabbett, “since joining the team full time, six months ago… has made nearly six hundred identifications.” Yeah, but can’t computer recognition software do the same thing? Following riots in London, computers pegged one rioter. How did a super-recognizer do? He identified 190. Are they sometimes wrong? Yep. About 13% of the time. Their identifications alone are not enough to convict, though. Instead their identifications “help direct the investigation” (Radden Keefe, 2016). After sharing this information with students, ask students where else the power of super-recognizers could be put to good use. If students need a hint, point out that looking at ID and looking then looking at someone’s face requires some facial recognition power. Shout out to Ruth Frickle (Highline College) for posting the Radden Keefe New Yorker article to the STP Facebook page, an act that sent me down this research rabbit hole. References Bobak, A. K., & Bate, S. (2016, February 2). Superior face recognition: A very special super power. Retrieved from http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/superior-face-recognition-a-very-special-super-power Croydon, A., Pimperton, H., Ewing, L., Duchaine, B. C., & Pellicano, E. (2014). The Cambridge Face Memory Test for Children (CFMT-C): A new tool for measuring face recognition skills in childhood. Neuropsychologia, 62, 60-67. doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2014.07.008 McKone, E., Stokes, S., Liu, J., Cohan, S., Fiorentini, C., Pidcock, M., . . . Pelleg, M. (2012). A robust method of measuring other-race and other-ethnicity effects: The Cambridge Face Memory Test format. PLoS ONE, 7(10). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0047956 Radden Keefe, P. (2016, August 15). The detectives who never forget a face. Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/08/22/londons-super-recognizer-police-force Russell, R., Duchaine, B., & Nakayama, K. (2009). Super-recognizers: People with extraordinary face recognition ability. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 16(2), 252-257. doi:10.3758/pbr.16.2.252 ... View more

At the Stanford Psych One Conference, Bridgette Hard (Stanford University) suggested clips from the British game show Golden Balls. Before covering the prisoners dilemma, show students the first 2.5 minutes of this 4-minute video. Stop the video at the 2:40 mark. Walk students through the prisoners dilemma, and then make sure students understand how this British game show presents contestants with a version of this dilemma. Note that in the original prisoners dilemma, the “prisoners” can’t communicate with each other before making their decision. Allowing contestants to discuss adds a level of drama that makes for good TV, but certainly changes the nature of the dilemma itself. Before playing the rest of clip, ask students to consider what they would do if they were Golden Balls contestant Steven. If you use a clicker system, ask students to click in with their vote for split or steal. Ask students to consider what they would do if they were contestant Sara. Again, ask students to click in with their vote. Now play the rest of the clip. After the contestants give their soundbites at the end, give students a few minutes to discuss with each other their reactions to the contestants’ comments. Next, show a contestant who chose a different strategy in this 4-minute clip. (This clip starts with the contestants’ discussion.) At that same Stanford Psych One Conference, Garth Neufeld (Highline College, but soon to be at Cascadia Community College), reported that the good folks at Radiolab interviewed these contestants in a 20-minute episode. In the first few minutes the Radiolab hosts lay out the premise of the game, then segue into discussing the clip from first episode above before launching into discussing the clip from the second episode. At about the 11-minute mark, the Radiolab hosts get Nick, of the different strategy, on the phone. During that interview we learn that even though the edited version of Nick and Ibrahim’s discussion that eventually aired was about 4 minutes, the actual, unedited – and apparently heated – discussion was 45 minutes. At the 18-minute mark of the Radiolab interview, we hear exactly how brilliant Nick’s strategy was. If you’re feeling a little – let’s call it adventurous – you can now do a version of what Dylan Selterman (University of Maryland) does (read more here). Selterman gives this question on his final exam: Here you have the opportunity to earn some extra credit on your final paper grade. Select whether you want 2 points or 6 points added onto your final paper grade. But there’s a small catch: if more than 10% of the class selects 6 points, then no one gets any points. Your responses will be anonymous to the rest of the class, only I will see the responses. You can add such a question to an exam or as a separate question delivered through your course management system. Or if you use some type of clicker system and you want students to publicly discuss, ask the question in class. How many times has Selterman given the extra credit between when he started offering it in 2008 and when he was interviewed about it in 2015? Once. ... View more

Originally posted on April 9, 2014. Most of us have dreamt of having a personal genie. We summon the genie, it grants our wishes, and our lives get better. But we forget that our genie is not bent on improving our lives. The same genie can make you a hero or a villain; grateful or green with envy; cooperative or antagonistic. It all depends on how you ask your question. On the heels of research showing these positive and negative responses to the hormone oxytocin, we have a new genie in a bottle. Instead of rubbing a lamp to summon our genie, we sniff nasal spray. And with oxytocin nasal spray showing impressive benefits in offsetting deficits associated with certain mental conditions, it is time for researchers to get a grip on understanding when oxytocin will inspire us toward benevolence or malice. Oxytocin motivates bonding. But personality traits and situations can bend oxytocin’s influence. For example, people use different strategies to maintain their relationships. Most people act nice, forgive, and adapt to their partner’s needs. Others dominate their relationship partners, pummeling them into submission. Oxytocin might affect these two groups of people differently. The nice guys and gals should continue their efforts to keep their relationship together by acting nice. The dominators, in contrast, might go on the offensive and try to dominate their partners. To test this hypothesis, my colleagues and I randomly assigned college students to sniff either a placebo or oxytocin. The students waited patiently as the oxytocin took effect. While they waited, they completed some uncomfortable activities meant to provoke an aggressive response. They gave a stressful speech and also put an icy bandage on their foreheads. Next, participants reported their aggressive intentions toward a current or recent romantic partner. Some example items were “slap my partner” and “push or shove my partner.” Could the love hormone lead to violence? It could. Oxytocin increased aggressive intentions, but the effect only occurred among those who were predisposed toward aggression. The implication is that aggressive people try to keep their romantic partners close by dominating them. When they get a boost of oxytocin, it triggers an aggressive response. Oxytocin continues to inspire interest and confusion. We’re hard-wired to connect, and oxytocin can help make that happen. But this study shows that it isn’t enough to look at people’s oxytocin levels to know if they will act nice or aggressive. By understanding their personality traits, we can better predict whether the love hormone will promote benevolence or violence. ... View more

Originally posted on June 2, 2014. We receive help every day. I don’t grow the food I eat, knit the clothes I wear, or assemble the TV I try to avoid. I don’t even cut my own hair. Nope, I rely on others to help me. But how do I get help when it involves asking? Amidst a recent report showing low levels of helpfulness among college professors (especially toward members of minority groups and women), I thought it would be good to help readers know how to increase helping. Here are the top 5 ways to do it (adapted from Latané and Darley, 1970). Notice help is needed. This goes both ways. I need to be aware that other people might need my help. I also need to make sure other people know I need help by asking. Realize when help is needed. If it’s an emergency, let people know it. Take personal responsibility for helping. Ignore what other people do. If you see someone in need, don’t wait for someone else to do the job. To quote Mahatma Ghandhi, “We need not wait to see what others do.” Make a decision to help. Think of this as the step between you wanting to help and you actually helping. Help! Now that you’ve made your decision, it’s time to put some feet on it. Take action and help. ... View more

Originally posted on October 16, 2014. One of my earliest memories is my dad giving me a high five. He was training for a marathon and agreed to take me, his talkative four year-old, on a run. I ran an entire mile. When I finished, red-faced and smiling, he said, “Give me five, son.” It was my first high five. According to a new study, high fives go a long way in motivating children. Five and six year-old children completed a task in which they imagined experiencing success. Next, the children received different types of praise. Some children received verbal praise that would highlight an individual trait (“You are a good drawer”), whereas other children received a high five. What motivated the children more, clear praise for being good at something or a high five? The high five won handedly. When the children bumped into a setback, those who received a high five persisted more than the other kids did. We might reconsider how we praise children’s behavior. If we tell children they’re geniuses, we’ve told them that they have a stable trait that isn’t under their control. If they fail a test, the responsibility can’t be theirs because they have a trait that should guarantee success on all intelligence test. Blame the teacher. Criticize the test. Give up and find something else to do. Don’t find a better way to study. By giving a high five, children know they have done something well. They also know that their success is under their control. I have run many miles since my first high five, but that first one with my dad will always hold a special place in my heart. It motivated me, either consciously or unconsciously, to continue to push my limits. For that high five, I’m grateful. ... View more

Originally posted on November 20, 2014. Have you ever seen a baby so cute you wanted to snuggle it and take a bite out of it at the same time? Ever said to a new niece or nephew, “You’re so cute, I could just eat you up?” Have you cried after a happy occasion, such as crossing the finish line of a race for which you’ve long prepared, or proposing to your girlfriend and getting a yes? Two weeks ago, I experienced these conflicting emotions when I shed several tears after finishing a 100 mile running race. These conflicting concurrent emotions help us maintain emotional balance, according to research from Yale University. An adult’s reaction to an adorable baby is to kiss them and coo at them. But an adult may also pinch, squeeze, and playfully nip at them. Knowing that most people don’t intend to actually harm babies, the researchers designed several experiments to find out why adults respond to them with aggressive behavior. In one study, participants looked at and evaluated photos of different babies, some of whom appeared more infantile than others. The participants said they wanted to care for and protect the infantile babies, but they also reported higher expressions of aggression in response to the babies. Participants were also more likely to feel overwhelmed with very strong positive feelings in response to the more infantile babies. What do these findings tell us? Being overwhelmed by positive emotion produce responses designed to bring us down to our emotional baseline. Ever in need of emotional equilibrium, people will engage in behaviors aimed at leveling off their extreme emotional reactions. So the next time you cry during a happy scene in a movie, laugh nervously, or feel compelled to take a bite out of a cute baby, remember that it is just your body’s way of maintaining emotional balance. ... View more

At the 2016 Stanford Psych One Conference, Linda Woolf (Webster University) suggested that during the Intro Psych learning chapter we talk about Hero Rats. This is a very nice way to help students see an example of the contributions psychological science is making to promote human rights around the world.   After covering operant conditioning, show Bart Weetjens 12-minute 2010 TED talk, How I Taught Rats to Sniff Out Land Mines (below). (Why rats, other than they are easy and cheap to train? They are too light to set off the mines.) In the second half of his talk, Weetjens discusses his new work on training rats to detect tuberculosis.   Video Link : 1669   Alternatively, show students this 11-minute 2007 Frontline segment on Hero Rats. Before you play it, inform students that there is an error in the video. Can they identify it? [In the video, the conditioning is called classical/Pavlovian, but it's actually operant. The rats are clicker-trained. The rats learn that when they hear a click, they can run to a location, such as back to their trainer, to get a tasty treat. The click is a discriminative stimulus - "that sound is my cue to go get a snack".]   This website provides a nice written explanation of the process used to train the rats.   Is your class, psych club, or honor society looking for a project? Consider raising funds to support Weetjeens organization, Apopo.   Besides, Gambian (aka African) pouched rats are pretty darn cute. Even if (or because) their bodies can be a foot and a half long with a tail that matches their body length. (Photo source: Gambian pouched rat - Wikipedia) ... View more

Originally posted on May 23, 2014. John Watson and Rosalie Rayner made psychologist history with their 1920 report of the fear conditioning of 11-month old “Little Albert.”  After repeated pairings of a white rat with an aversive loud noise, Albert reportedly began whimpering at the sight of the rat.  Moreover, his fear reaction generalized, to some extent, to the sight of a rabbit, a dog, and a sealskin coat, but not to more dissimilar objects. Ever since, people have wondered what became of Little Albert.  One team of psychologist-sleuths identified him as Douglas Merritte, the son of a campus hospital wet nurse who died of meningitis at age 6.  For a forthcoming article in the American Psychologist, another team of sleuths—Russell Powell, Nancy Digdon, Ben Harris, and Christopher Smithson—have identified an even more promising candidate.  William Albert Barger who went by “Albert B”—the very name used by Watson and Rayner—neatly fits many of Little Albert’s known characteristics.  This Albert was not brain-damaged and was easy-going, though (likely coincidentally, given how Albert’s fears would diminish between sessions) he had an aversion to dogs! Albert died in 2007, without ever knowing of his early life in a hospital residence, or of his apparent part in psychology’s history. ... View more