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Curmudgeons, Rejoice: Being Grumpy Might Be Good For You!
Australian psychology professor Joe Forgas has concluded through his research that grumpy people tend to think more clearly, and because of their skepticism, they also make better decisions than their more cheerful and gullible counterparts.
Cheerfulness isn't all bad, though. Forgas says it encourages creativity.
Are People With Sensitive Noses More Empathetic?
Are you cursed and blessed with a good sense of smell? Cursed because you smell every ungodly stink no matter how far away, and blessed because lovely smells affect you deeply?
Psychology professor Denise Chen at Rice University thinks you may also be more empathetic than your olfaction-challenged neighbor.
Next Up For Male Contraception: Reversible Hormone Injections
When it comes to birth control options, women have the pill, the patch, the ring, the diaphragm, IUDs . . .
Love: The Key to Creativity
Love has been the driving theme of artistic creations stretching over generations. Researchers from the University of Amsterdam recently decided to verify that love can change the way we think. The study found that love makes us more creative, while sexual desire makes us more logical.
Are You a Fan of the Surreal? It May Make You Smarter
Franz Kafka, David Lynch, and Rene Magritte were my Kevin, Joe and Nick Jonas as a teenager. (Yeah, I was a weirdo.) So imagine my delight when I read a study that claims that surrealism may be good for the brain.
Research psychologists at UC Santa Barbara and the University of British Columbia concluded that exposure to surrealist art, film or literature, because it puts you in worlds whose elements don't make sense, drives you to look for structure and sense elsewhere, hence raising "the cognitive mechanisms that oversee implicit learning functions."
News Flash: Men Are Bigger Liars
After scrutinizing 2,000 Britons, researchers found that in general, men lie twice as much as women. On average, they lie six times a day and women lie "just" three times a day.
The most common lie told by both men and women is, "Nothing's wrong.
Men Get Dumber Speaking to Attractive Women
In news that will surprise absolutely no one, researchers have found that men get so flummoxed when speaking to attractive women — using up most of their cognitive abilities trying to impress them — that they sometimes forget basic personal information like their own addresses!
Research showed that if (presumably straight) men spent even a few minutes with an attractive woman, they didn’t perform as well on tests that measure brain function than they did after speaking to someone they didn’t find attractive. Women didn’t seem to have this reaction in the presence of men they considered handsome.
Are You Afraid of Spiders?
About four percent of the adult, American population has arachnaphobia — a fear of spiders — and of that percentage, women are four times as likely to be afraid.
Researchers concluded that girls have a genetic predisposition to be afraid of dangerous animals like spiders. Coded into our DNA, apparently, is the desire to stay away from dangerous things and protect our children, where men are supposed to be risk-takers and generally less likely to be afraid of spiders.
It's Complicated: How Women Determine Facial Attractiveness
It's no surprise that how women determine facial attractiveness is complicated. Unlike many men who may give a woman's body a once-over, and then look at her face, deeming her attractive or unattractive, women, when checking out a man's face, tend to evaluate it on two levels, according to a study that was just published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.
The first level women use to evaluate men's faces is sexual: they zero in on features like the jawbone, cheekbones, and lips.
Calling All Neurotics! Another Thing to Worry About
As a self-described neurotic, news that my neurosis may lead me to an early grave did not surprise me in the least. Unlike many neurotics who may read this story, however, I will not be adding "fear of premature death" to my list of things I like to worry about. There are too many things there as it is!
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