Stephanie posted this in
Psychology on
February 26th, 2012
By Stephanie, on February 26th, 2012
As he prepared for his blind date, Kevin was determined to leave nothing to chance. For starters, his date for Valentine’s evening thought his name was Jake. You see, Kevin was a shrewd chap who’d decided he was going to use all the latest psychological science to boost his romantic chances. A recent paper showed that unfashionable names could put people off. He’d even made a name badge with Jake written in bold, and pinned it to his (carefully chosen) bright red shirt.
That was one of the easier lessons to implement. The fake scar, a long, jagged line down his right cheek, was trickier to get hold off. Of course, he was also wearing his boots with the chunky heels. He’d also been listening to Barry White tapes to help practise speaking with a more manly voice than usual. Attention to detail, that was key, Kevin kept telling himself, attention
Continue reading A cautionary tale about using psychology to boost your Valentine’s chances
Stephanie posted this in
Psychology on
February 22nd, 2012
By Stephanie, on February 22nd, 2012
It’s only in recent times that scientists have discovered there are dedicated nerve pathways for communicating the sensation of itch. This troublesome skin signal provides us with a mixed experience. The prickly discomfort of an itch can be agonising. Yet to scratch an itch is one of life’s great pleasures. In fact, it often seems that the more intense the itch, the more unreachable its source, then the greater the ultimate pleasure that’s derived from finally reaching and clawing at it.
Now the aptly named Gil Yosipovitch and his colleagues have performed one of the first comparisons to see if itches are itchier on some body parts than others. They also investigated whether scratching itches in some places brings more satisfaction than others.
The researchers used cowhage spicules to induce itchiness on either the forearm, ankle or the back of 18 healthy volunteers (10 women; mean age 34). After the spicules were
Continue reading The particular pleasure of scratching an itch on the ankle
Stephanie posted this in
Psychology on
February 3rd, 2012
By Stephanie, on February 3rd, 2012
Social networking sites have changed our lives. There were 500 million active Facebook users in 2011 and approximately 200 million Twitter accounts. As users will know, the sites have important differences. Facebook places more of an emphasis on who you are and who you know. Twitter restricts users to 140-character updates and is more about what you say than who you are. A new study asks whether and how the way people use these sites is related to their personality, and whether there are personalty differences between people who prefer one site over the other.
David Hughes at Manchester Business School and his colleagues surveyed 300 people online – most (70 per cent) were based in Europe, others were from North America, Asia and beyond. There were 207 women and the age range was from 18 to 63. Participants answered questions about the way they used Facebook and Twitter and which site they
Continue reading Facebook or Twitter: What does your choice of social networking site say about you?
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