Tom Stafford's Blog, page 162

Mindful of Langer

[image error]The Boston Globe has an excellent profile of psychologist Ellen Langer, responsible for some of the most influential studies in psychology and a champion of 'mindfulness' as an approach to a happier life.

Needless to say, she's become a doyenne of the positive psychology movement, and, as the article notes, occasionally comes across as slightly guru-like.

Her research remains impressive, however, and when reading through the article I found myself saying "I never knew that was one of Langer's s...

Love amid chaos

[image error]Swansea Love Story is a gritty, tragic and surprisingly funny documentary about heroin users in a struggling South Wales town.

It follows a number of addicts as they score, skip meetings with drugs counsellors, philosophise about their predicament and go about their chaotic daily lives.

The piece is, in parts, desolate, particularly as we hear about the lives of those now relying on heroin, but there are also some outrageously funny moments as the protagonists relate their intense experiences w...

Quito bound

[image error]Due to the complexities of the Colombian visa system, I am off to the beautiful city of Quito, Ecuador, for a week to organise the paperwork. I'm not sure how internet access will work out, so apologies if updates are a little less frequent than usual.

If anyone knows any good mind and brain things to see while I'm there, do let me know.

Already on the list is Hospital San Lazaro, one of the oldest psychiatric hospitals in Latin America. It's considered part of Ecuador's national heritage but I...

Shimmering madness

[image error]There is an amazing blog, called either ru_medart or something I don't understand in Russian, that collects artistic depictions of the mad from the history of art.

It's a wonderful collection of images, and, as you might expect, many of the pictures depict the sort of 'raving madness' that was the stereotype of centuries past.

However, it also has portraits of famous people throughout history who have been mad or have been claimed as mad, as well as some more contemporary paintings and some...

2010-02-19 Spike activity

Quick links from the past week in mind and brain news:

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Neuro-linguistic programming: Cargo cult psychology? An excellent piece debunking NLP from the Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education appears online as a pdf. It always struck me as Scientology without the aliens.

PsyBlog has an excellent round-up of 10 influencers of conformity. Fuck me I will do what you tell me.

The US crime rate has been consistently falling, so why do the US public tend to think it's on the rise? The Boston...

Teenagers: hyper-mortals

[image error]A common belief about teenagers is that they implicitly assume that they are invincible or immortal and think little about their own deaths. A new study just published in the Journal of Adolescent Health shows this to be a myth, however, as they vastly over-estimate their chances of dying within the next year.

By the mid-teens, our ability to judge the likelihood of uncertain events is usually equal to that of adults, so we might expect that adolescents can judge the chance of death as...

Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies

[image error]Flattery can work it's magic, even when we know it's insincere. The Boston Globe covers a new study that found that even when we realise the compliments we're hearing are an attempt to butter us up, they can still have a persuasive effect.

Insincere flattery gets a bad rap. Sure, it sounds cheesy or even awkward. But new research suggests that one's initial conscious reaction - discounting the flattery as a self-serving ploy - may mask a more durable implicit positive emotional association...

A crime, criminality and forensic psychology blog

[image error]Forensic psychology and psychiatry attempt to understand criminality and legal reasoning and are among the most interesting areas of cognitive science, but, sadly, there are few good blogs on the internet which tackle the area. The In The News blog is an exception, however, and regularly has in-depth coverage of the psychological issues behind big legal news stories.

Like forensic psychology itself, it's not the most instantly appealing of destinations, but the writing is fantastic. The...

State of the art in cave painting

[image error]France has some of the world's most spectacular cave paintings that depict wild animals in vivid outline surrounded by what were thought to be purely decorative markings.

These markings have been all but ignored until recent research, covered in a fascinating New Scientist article, gathered examples from 146 cave sites and found they shared core symbols and were arranged in meaningful patterns.

While some scholars like Clottes had recorded the presence of cave signs at individual sites...

Human brain electrodes capture the twilight zone

[image error]Sleep is a nightmare for neuroscientists but a new study using electrodes implanted deep within the brains of people going about their daily lives has revealed that the brain falls asleep from the inside out, contrary to what was expected.

Most neuropsychology studies require people to complete tasks while the brain is being monitored and the technologies that allow passive recording either only measure activity on the brain surface (EEG, MEG) or are too uncomfortable to measure realistic...