Archive

Why a New Popular Press Psychology Book Refrains from Giving Advice

During this pandemic winter, many of us will be away from the people we love most. The absence of the physical presence of loved ones deprives us of hugs, physical touch, and feelings of physical and psychological warmth that no amount of Skype or Zoom ever seems to fully replace.

In his forthcoming book, Heartwarming, one of the authors of this editorial (Rocha IJzerman) explores the science of why this is, a...

The year the journals changed

Where do all the studies come from? Behind every headline trumpeting a new finding in psychology, you can usually find an article in a peer-reviewed psychology journal. But how reliable are these findings? This is what many scientists have recently started to wonder. Because of this, journals in psychology are starting to insist on better reporting of research studies. In this first post of a two-part series, I will explain some of the standards that have typically been used to judge whether a study deserves publication or not. / more

Sense-making through science

People are sense-making creatures in a world that does not always make sense. This is a problem – although we prefer our world and environment to be orderly and predictable, and an expanding body of research shows that we do not like randomness and a lack of control over life’s outcomes (Kay, Gaucher, Napier, Callan, & Laurin, 2008; Lerner, 1980), our world and our social environment are far from perfectly orderly and controlled. Life in modern society...

House, M.D. and the science of psychogenic illness

In an episode of House, M.D. (“Airborne”) an illness spreads among passengers on a commercial airplane via ostensibly non-biological means, creating a mini-epidemic with purely psychological origins. Could something like this happen in real life? Does the mere conviction that one is becoming physically sick increase one’s chances of contracting genuine symptoms of illness? This article explores this issue and in the process evaluates the realism of the plot from “Airborne.” / more