After matching students based on their pre-college voting behaviors, the researchers found that students who had taken a political science class became more likely to register to vote. Photo credit: Lakshmiprasad/Depositphotos In the online news outlet called The Conversation, researchers write summaries of their own research studies for a general audience. Here's an example from …
Continue reading Taking Poli Sci predicts likelihood of voting
What do the studies suggest about why people procrastinate? Photo credit: Timothy Hodgkinson/Shutterstock The BBC magazine, Science Focus, collected a set of studies on procrastination that might help students at the beginning of a new school year. The journalist opens with a couple of simple frequency claims. [If you procrastinate,] you’re not alone: an estimated …
Photo credit: nito103/Deposit Photos Press outlets have been covering a report by the Williams Institute (based at UCLA), a research organization collecting data on demographic information on sexual orientation and gender identity. The quotes in this post come from this summary from PBS. The new study has estimated the number of LGBTQ adults in …
Continue reading Estimating how many U.S. adults identify as nonbinary
Do the studies really support cause and effect? And are those effects "huge"? Photo: Julia_Tim/Deposit Photos This Buzzfeed headline is eyecatching and dramatic: Instagram Has Some Pretty Huge Effects On Our Psychology. Here's Everything We Know So Far. I see two important issues to interrogate in this headline. First, it's a causal claim ("Instagram has …
Macadamia nuts are in the same evolutionary family as peaches. (or are they?) Credit: gresey/Deposit photos People's tendency to believe, share, and act upon disinformation (fake news) is a serious threat to civic engagement. Psychologists are studying what makes people more or less likely to believe false claims. Here are some excerpts from a brief …
Strength training seems to improve both depression and anxiety, according to two meta-analyses. Photo credit: romanchazov27/Deposit Photos Many of us start the new year resolved to improve our exercise habits. Exercise, of course, is great for our physical health, and we also know that aerobic exercise (i.e., "cardio") can improve mood. The benefits of aerobic …
Continue reading Meta-analyses: Strength training treats depression and anxiety
If a lot of us send virtue signals, it can communicate to others that norms are changing. Credit: SEEphotos7171/Shutterstock" Among people fighting for racial justice, "virtue signaling" may sometimes be derided as empty action. "Virtue signals" are public messages of support for a social justice cause. They could take the form of a yard sign, …
A recent study found that in psychology, the authors, participants, topics, and editors of empirical journal articles are mostly White. Photo credit: Africa Studio/Shutterstock Is science fair? You learned in Chapter 2 that empirical journals are the primary place where psychological scientists make their research public. Each empirical journal has an editorial board-- a group …
Continue reading Racial bias in psychological science journals
Photo credit: Alissa Eckert, MS; Dan Higgins, MAMS/CDC Here's a good example of a bad study. It's related to the COVID pandemic. In this story by NPR journalist Vanessa Romo, you can read about a doctor in Texas who claims to be conducting research on the drug hydroxychloroquine, using COVID patients in a nursing home …
Continue reading Testing a COVID drug: Design flaws and ethical lapses
The effect of screen time on well-being is likely to depend on moderators such as what's on the screen, when it's used, and who's using it. Photo: Eric Nathan / Alamy Stock Photo I can't promise this is the last article on screen time research that I will blog about. But this long-form piece by …