Dating Formula Finds 'Worthless Gifts' Get the Girls
It's Friday so let's kick back and enjoy some geek psychology.Seeing the phrases 'human courtship' and 'mathematical modelling' in the same sentence means only one thing - a couple of maths PhDs had too much time on their hands. Dr Peter Sozou and Professor Rob Seymour of UCL created a model of human courtship that finds that essentially 'worthless gifts' like theatre tickets or meals out will get you the right girl.
The theory goes that if you buy her something that can be exchanged or refunded, she'll dump you and cash in the winnings. On the other hand, if you cleverly show you're not tight by paying for the meal, the message that you're a good provider is sent but you can't be ripped off - it's tricky for her to get a refund on a partly-digested meal.
Here's a few more problems for the geek psychologists to work on: calculating the optimum hairstyle for successful mating, including a formula that takes into account length, parting and 'product'. Also perhaps with the new mathematics of mating we can solve the Fermat's Last Theorem of dating: when on a date how much should you tip a waitress who, while delivering excellent service, kept flirting with you and making your date jealous?
New Scientist
Psychology of Magic
Light piece in The Guardian on the psychology of magic.
Bursting the magic bubble
"...not content with just enjoying the tricks, psychologists are now using their effects on the mind to work out how we handle the floods of sensory information coming into our brains and process it into a mental picture of the world around us. Magic is a deception, a disruption of that orderly mental picture where things seem to float in mid-air or coins and cards vanish in front of our eyes. Scientists now believe that, by mapping out how our brains are deceived, they could even help to unlock some of the mysteries of consciousness itself."The idea of magic unlocking the mysteries of consciousness is a bit far-fetched. Still, if there's a man for the job, it's Professor Richard Wiseman, who was the youngest member of The Magic Circle before becoming a professional psychologist.
Bursting the magic bubble
Look Into My Eyes
As the eyes are the window to the soul, psychologists' fascination with them is no surprise. In the first of two new studies, cognitive psychologists looked at whether there was a relationship between neuroticism and where people direct their visual attention. The study found that those higher in neuroticism - essentially pessimists - tend to pay more attention to the lower part of the visual field. On the other hand those lower in neuroticism - optimists - paid more attention to the upper part. Now whether this has anything to do with how people behave in the real world is a hotly argued point in psychology - here's a short description of ecological validity.
The final claim of the article that redirecting attention upwards might raise mood is highly speculative. Despite this, the BBC news story does the usual media job of generalising to the point of inanity.
On a more positive note for BBC News they do have a nice article about how parts of our brains 'switch off' when we blink. Researchers claim that this is why we don't tend to experience a mini-blackout while blinking. This was investigated by lighting up the eye from the inside so researchers could differentiate between an eye blink and a dark scene (see photo above). Clever huh?
Does "feeling down" mean seeing down? Depressive symptoms and vertical selective attention [Article abstract]Two distinct neural effects of blinking on human visual processing [Article abstract]
Daryl Atkins' Fate Hanging On His IQ
"The life of a convicted murderer is hanging in the balance while a US jury considers whether his intelligence has increased enough to allow him to be put to death.Incredible that anyone's life could rest on an outmoded measure like IQ.
...the intellectual stimulation the killer got by constant contact with lawyers in the case is thought to have raised his IQ above the threshold of 70, which puts him in line for the death penalty in Virginia."
BBC NewsWashington Post
Secrets of the Sexes: Attraction. Not Scientific. Not Popular. Not Attractive.
The BBC series, The Secrets of the Sexes, has gone from hero(ish) to zero in only one week. This week's show asked whether science can predict sexual attraction. It wasn't just the resounding answer of "No!" that sent my head into my hands.The previous show on 'Brain Sex' had used the individuals involved in the show to highlight and explain psychological theories. This show relegated the theories to onlookers in a race to see if a couple of singletons could get any dates.
By the end, the programme was desperate for any kind of success, no matter where it came from. Even though it had almost no bearing on the theories of attraction proposed by the psychologists, the producers obviously wanted one of the couples to get together as if this would validate the programme. No such luck.
Its crowning achievement was to get an eager-to-please politics lecturer to slather himself in extract of cucumber and liquorice to make him irresistible. Needless to say, it didn't work. This combined with the risible speed-dating efforts of 'The London Seduction Society' (yes, it's for real) made me wonder why any reputable psychologist would involve themselves - other than for money and fame of course.
As for the quality of the third and last programme in the series, your guess is as good as mine.
Secrets of the Sexes
Optimists Recover More Quickly After Bereavement
New research, published in Health Psychology, has found that optimists recover more quickly than pessimists after a death or the onset of severe illness in the family. This is the latest in a line of research supporting the idea that being optimistic is good for your health. Optimists have been found to live as much as 19% longer - perhaps because they have more friends, persist at healthy behaviours and have stronger immune systems.Participants in this research were assessed for optimism and pessimism using the Life Orientation Test (a not-so-scientific-but-fun version of this is here), while sick days were used in this research as an indication of health levels. The authors argue that this is more accurate than self-report methods of assessing health. These tend to be open to a variety of problems including people simply forgetting or misreporting when they were ill.
So, how is possible to stay positive when life is treating you like a punch-bag? Dr Raj Persaud in his book 'The Motivated Mind' reports research into the differing mental habits of optimists and pessimists showing it's all in how we interpret past successes and failures.
Half-Empty - When something bad happens to a pessimist, they assume it is representative of a pervasive problem. This can lead to 'catastrophising' - allowing a setback to have disastrous implications for the rest of your life. To compound the problem a pessimist will also assume that a problem encountered is permanent and personal.
Half-Full - When something bad happens to an optimist, they do the exact opposite. An optimist tends to restrict the event's implications, avoid taking it personally and assume it is only a temporary state of affairs.
What about if something good happens to an optimist and a pessimist? Reverse the patterns seen above. An optimist will let it spill over into other areas of their life as well as assuming it's personal and permanent.
And a pessimist doesn't.
Pessimists, of course, will claim that optimists suffer from 'False Hope Syndrome' - but that's just typical of their negative thinking!
Optimism and Pessimism as Predictors of Change in Health After Death or Onset of Severe Illness in Family [PDF]Press Release
Caffeine Study Finds No Performance Enhancement
A study published this month in Neuropsychobiology has found that sustained caffeine use has no significant enhancing effects on performance or mood and does not provide a restorative effect after poor sleep. So are the approximately 90% of us who feel we get a boost from caffeine, just deluding ourselves?Research into caffeine has produced mixed results. Previous studies have shown some associations between caffeine intake and increased alertness, vigilance and lower levels of fatigue - as we might expect. Even so, some researchers have found that the apparent benefits of caffeine are only seen in individuals who already use the drug. Those not already caffeine users show much smaller improvements. Other studies, however, have found different patterns.
This study differs from many previously carried out by controlling for the effects of caffeine withdrawal. What it suggests is that these types of apparent enhancements are more the result of the alleviation of caffeine withdrawal. Caffeine withdrawal has already been recognised as a kind of disorder causing certain predictable symptoms including drowsiness, headaches and negative mood. It is the association in our minds between the alleviation of caffeine withdrawal symptoms and our morning cup of coffee that keep us coming back for more.
What studies like this suggest is that, overall, our cognitive functions are no more highly tuned if we use drinks containing caffeine than if we abstain completely. In fact there was some evidence found here that caffeine might actually be undermining the restorative effects of sleep.
There has been evidence from epidemiological studies of the long-term benefits of caffeine consumption - such as protection from cancer - but these are, at best, fairly speculative. Equally, caffeine does raise blood pressure and increase the risk of coronary heart disease and strokes.
The findings of this study are a blow to the perception that caffeinated drinks provide a boost to mental performance. After all, most people don't drink tea or coffee for the long-term health benefits - they just want to wake up.
A word of warning to those inspired to give up: breaking a habit as ingrained as drinking tea or coffee can be difficult and it has been shown that a stepped approach is best. The symptoms of complete caffeine withdrawal can last up to 7 days and are not pleasant if experienced in one go. I know, I've tried it.
Dietary Caffeine, Performance and Mood: Enhancing and Restorative Effects after Controlling for Withdrawal Reversal [Article abstract]Belfast Telegraph [Journo write-up of research]The Pros and Cons of Caffeine [The Psychologist, PDF]
Psychological Treatments For Alcoholism Are Ineffective
Reanalysis of data collected from the most expensive research into the treatment of alcoholism has found little support for the use of psychological therapies. The research compared a number of psychosocial treatments (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Motivational Enhancement Therapy and Twelve Step Facilitation - based on the method used by Alcoholics Anonymous) and found that they accounted for only 3% of the variability in the patient's outcome. In other words, psychological therapies hardly had any beneficial effect in treating alcoholics.
The failure of current methods of treatment is particularly highlighted by the fact that this study found that, in clinical trials, untreated alcoholics showed significant improvements - almost as much as those who received treatment.
How is it that new therapies are often adopted before they have been properly tested? Part of the problem for psychology, despite the lip-service paid to the importance of the evidence base, is the relative ease of introducing new treatments. Unlike pharmaceutical treatments, psychological treatments are unlikely to have damaging side-effects. Combine this with the problem for much scientific research that negative results often go unreported, and the seeds are there for a proliferation of ineffective therapies.
Despite this seeming like bad news for psychological approaches to alcoholism, it shows the importance of the scientific method in psychology. The strength of any science is founded on its ability to admit when the evidence does not support the treatment methods currently used. And for alcoholism this evidence shows little support for psychological treatments.
This kind of evidence, however, does not show that psychological therapies are never going to be any use in the treatment of alcoholism, only that the correct method has not yet been found. Admitting failure is the first step towards finding a better way. This is why, sometimes a negative result is actually a positive one.
Are alcoholism treatments effective? The Project MATCH data. [Abstract + link to free PDF of study]Press release
Secrets of The Sexes: Psychological Sex Differences
The first programme in the BBC series 'Secrets of Sexes' looked at the idea of brain sex. It has come in for some criticism from Mind Hacks for simplifying a complicated area of psychology and for the using the idea of 'brain sex'.Any TV programme on a specialist subject like this is forced to simplify because too much heavy detail turns off viewers. This programme, however, generally did a good job of introducing some fascinating research and ideas about psychological sex differences.
On average, women have stronger verbal abilities. But what exactly does 'verbal ability' mean? Some of the tests that have been used are word fluency, use of grammar, spelling, reading, ability to understand, extend of vocabulary. In all of these areas women show an advantage over men. The only verbal area in which men sometimes show a small advantage is in the generation of analogies. It's possible to argue that these tests don't accurately represent 'verbal ability', but that's nitpicking.
The differences between men and women in mathematical ability are actually fairly small. Men show a slight advantage in geometry, probability and statistics. On the other hand, women are slightly better at arithmetical calculations. Where there is a big gap is at the extremes of ability. Of the most able mathematicians (top 6%), there are 13 males for every female.
Men's main advantage is in visuo-spatial abilities - although they only show a major advantage in one particular area: mental rotation tasks (you can see an example here). Men also show some advantage over women in other visuo-spatial tests such as judging the orientation of a line and visualising objects spatially, although these differences are not great. Men are also able to tell left from right under pressure more accurately than women.
There are some other less well-known physiological areas in which men and women differ. For example women's sense of smell is much stronger than men, as is their sense of touch.
A number of caveats need to be applied to all this research. The most important is that on most of these tests there is a considerable overlap between the performance of men and women. In other words the differences are not that huge - it is best to think of an overlapping continuum for both men and women on which the average is slightly different for some abilities. Men and women have more similarities than differences.
There are two more programmes in this series and I would recommend you tune in.
[Big thanks to Ernie Govier for a gripping lecture (I'm not joking) on psychological sex differences - of which this post is a summary.]
Update: Programme 2: Attraction. Not Scientific. Not Popular. Not Attractive.
Related from PsyBlog: Teaching boys and girls differently and the political implications of psychological sex differences.
Secrets of the Sexes - BBC One
Interesting programme on BBC 1 tonight at 9pm looking at psychological sex differences:
Update: Review of the first programme now available here.
"Are men and women's brains wired differently? A new BBC One series delves into our minds to find out how we think and fall in love."Judgement reserved until after the first programme airs.
Update: Review of the first programme now available here.
Ministers Reject Concerns Over Mental Health Law
The Guardian reports that:
And:Guardian Mental Health Section
"The government today vowed to press ahead with its controversial overhaul of mental health legislation, against the advice of MPs and peers."The draft Mental Health Bill is set to introduce 'draconian measures' that could seriously erode the civil liberties of those suffering from mental ill health.
And:
"Mental health campaigners said they were "disappointed and angry" at the government's decision yesterday to press ahead with legislation to allow the compulsory treatment of people who might not benefit from it."Further:
"Services for the mentally ill are in danger of becoming "clogged up with people who cannot be treated and should not be there", if the latest proposals in the mental health bill become law, they warned."
Guardian Mental Health Section
ADHD and Working Memory: Computer Training Shows Benefit
A recent study reported in Scientific American points the way towards a possible new treatment for ADHD. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder or ADHD is a widely misunderstood condition which severely affects as many as one in a 100 children. For a good summary of the facts, have a look at the BBC Health website.Many studies have already shown the benefits of medication - specifically Ritalin - in treating the condition. This is a stimulant that can improve ADHD dramatically, although exactly how it works remains a mystery.
One theory is that the problems associated with ADHD are partly a result of an impairment of working memory. This new research examines the possibility that a computer programme can be used to train working memory.
The outcomes from this study showed a significant benefit after training as rated by the children's parents. To its detriment though, no benefit was seen by the children's teachers. As ever, with brand new treatment methods, it remains to be seen whether these results can be replicated, and also whether teacher ratings will show an improvement.
Scientific American Attention Research Update provides a summary of the research.
Labels: Memory
Teaching Girls and Boys Differently
While the debate continues on psychological sex differences (discussed on PsyBlog here and here), a doctor and psychologist, Leonard Sax, argues that boys and girls should be educated differently.Diagnoses of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) are on the rise, most notably amongst boys - something Dr Sax partly ascribes to an approach to child-rearing that is 'gender-neutral'. Perhaps by wilfully ignoring the differences between boys and girls we are not educating them as well as we could be.
There is gathering evidence that, on average, boys and girls process all sorts of stimuli in quite different ways. There is evidence for hemispheric differences, with male brains being more compartmentalised, female brains better integrated.
Perhaps as a result, girls are better at interpreting facial expressions and talking about emotions. Boys, on the other hand, take more risks, are more likely to over-estimate their own ability and are generally more attracted to violence and conflict.
Apart from that, boys and girls' learning styles are different, with girls tending to ask for help while boys use the teacher as a last resort. Similarly, the two sexes respond to different motivational techniques - boys responding much better to time-constrained tasks and pressure situations than girls.
Dr Sax also points out that attributing the differences between boys and girls to the idea that girls mature quicker than boys is too simplistic. Certainly linguistic abilities develop more quickly in girls, but it is the spatial abilities that develop more quickly in boys.
This not a strong enough argument for single-sex education (not something it seems Dr Sax is advocating), but certainly these are differences that need to be understood by educators. Acceptance of these findings is particularly important in a society where to talk about the average psychological differences between boys and girls can be extremely controversial.
Zenit (Article on Dr Sax)Dr Leonard Sax's website
London Bombings: Profile of a Terrorist
People talk as though terrorists are 'other' than us, and while their actions are certainly 'other', experts on terrorists have discovered their backgrounds are often very normal. Terrorists are only human -- too human -- and that can be even more frightening. Attempts to create a profile of an average terrorist have proved extremely difficult - as difficult as creating a profile of an average 'normal' person. Research into the personality traits of terrorists reveals they have nothing particular in common. Terrorists share the same range of personality traits as might be found in any average office.
The stereotype that terrorists are psychopaths, or are mentally unstable in some way, is a controversial point. The psychologist Jerrold Post has suggested that terrorists are impelled to commit these acts by deep psychological problems. The weight of evidence, however supports the view that terrorists, while they often have very strong religious or ideological beliefs, are generally quite sane.
Heskin (1984) has studied members of the Irish Repulican Army (the IRA), Rasch (1979) a group of West Germany terrorists and Becker (1984), members of the Baader-Meinhoff Gang. All of these found little evidence of psychopathology.
Apart from that it makes sense for terrorist leaders to avoid recruiting psychopaths to their cause: the mentally unstable would prove themselves liabilities to the organisation.
If anything, then, terrorists are notable for their normality, for their ability to blend into the background and remain unnoticed. Those recruited tend to be of average appearance, normal in behaviour in the situation they are in, fairly young - between 20 and 25 - and reasonably well educated, often to university level.
The sociology and psychology of terrorism: who becomes a terrorist and why? [Summary of research, PDF file]More on London bombings: Psychology of Terrorism, Why We Are Glued To The TV and Guardian Journos Disorientated
London Bombings: Guardian Journos Disorientated
There was a contradictory and confusing article in The Guardian yesterday about the psychological after-effects on the survivors of the London bombings. We are encouraged to provide support but Dr Reddy tells us that counselling is probably not necessary as:
The Guardian
More on London bombings: Profile of a Terrorist, Why We Are Glued To The TV and The Psychology of Terrorism
"...less than 5% of survivors and witnesses of the tube and bus bombings were likely to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)."While on the other hand Dr Thompson says,
"...one would predict that 40% will find their reactions haven't returned to normal in the next few weeks."In which case:
"They will probably feel anxious, depressed, suffer nightmares or flashbacks and generally be much more fearful - making it very difficult to carry on with the normal things in life."And the article finishes with the information that:
"Dr Stephen Joseph, reader in health psychology at the University of Warwick, sounded a positive note for the longer-term. The psychologist said between 30 and 70% of survivors of traumatic events reported positive after-effects."Well that's all alright then isn't it? I may have just witnessed a horrific bomb blast but at least there's a fair chance that my life will improve over the long-term.
The GuardianMore on London bombings: Profile of a Terrorist, Why We Are Glued To The TV and The Psychology of Terrorism
London Bombings: Why We Are Glued To The TV
Since the terrorist attacks in London yesterday, we have all been glued to the TV for the latest news. The images and stories of blood splattered survivors and long shots of those less fortunate have shocked and saddened us. And yet we can't look away, despite the fact that research suggests that watching may cause Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Why do we seek out images and reports that are likely to be upsetting and perhaps disturbing? Keinan, Sadeh and Rosen (2003) outline three psychological theories that help to explain this strange desire. Information seeking theory suggests that uncertainty causes conflict and increases arousal, so finding out what is going on reduces uncertainty and therefore reduces arousal. Safety signal theory places the emphasis on delineating safe from unsafe periods of time. We are continually asking ourselves whether the storm has blown over yet, whether it is safe to go outside or enter the danger zone. A final theory suggests that information gives us a sense of control over an event, even though it is essentially beyond our control.
Whichever theory is true, there is a lot more to our grim fascination with this type of event than simple voyeurism.
Attitudes and Reactions to Media Coverage of Terrorist Acts (Abstract)More on London bombings: Profile of a Terrorist, Psychology of Terrorism and Guardian Journos Disorientated
London Bombings: Psychology of Terrorism
As the dust settles on the terrorist bombings that hit London yesterday, and people begin to take stock of what has happened, thoughts will doubtless turn to how such atrocities can be avoided.To understand that, it is useful to examine how a single person could be brought to carry out such an extreme act of violence. Professor Fathali M. Moghaddam discussed the psychological processes that lead up to a terrorist act in an article published in early 2005 in the American Psychologist. This article analyses how an ordinary person might become a terrorist:
1. Members of a population feel they have suffered injustice and unfairness and are frustrated by normal channels of decision-making.
2. Aggression about that injustice is displaced onto a perceived 'enemy' - this will often be as a result of influence by a leader.
3. Engagement with a terrorist organisation - this encourages greater identification and integration of the terrorist's morality.
4. Actual recruitment by a terrorist organisation. Once within this group there is an acceleration in 'us-versus-them' thinking.
5. Training of specific individuals by the terrorist organisation to carry out a terrorist act. This includes the sidestepping of the psychological mechanisms that will stop a person killing others or themselves.
Professor Moghaddam points out that, in the past, efforts to fight terrorism have been focussed on the individuals who have already reached the fifth stage and become terrorists. This 'hunt the terrorist' approach is clearly not effective. Governments should be encouraged to adopt policies that are effective at the lowest level to reduce the number of people likely to rise through the stages. In other words: address the cause, not just the symptoms.
The staircase to terrorism: a psychological exploration (Article Abstract)More on London bombings: Profile of a Terrorist, Why We Are Glued To The TV and Guardian Journos Disorientated
No Physiological Basis For Male Bisexuality in New Study
A new study with the potential for considerable controversy, finds little physiological evidence for bisexuality in men. Psychological investigations into bisexuality in the past have mostly been based on self-report measures - this is one of the first to directly measure physiological arousal. In this study a sensor was attached to the penis and participants were shown erotic films, some involving just men and some involving just women. Having been asked about their sexuality before the experiment, patterns of arousal were compared with the stated preferences. Arousal was as expected for those identifying themselves as heterosexual and homosexual,
"But the men in the study who described themselves as bisexual did not have patterns of arousal that were consistent with their stated attraction to men and to women. Instead, about three-quarters of the group had arousal patterns identical to those of gay men; the rest were indistinguishable from heterosexuals."
The researchers are, quite rightly, extremely cautious about the implications of their study which is based on a fairly small sample (101). It is unclear what the relationship is between physiological arousal and emotional and cognitive factors.
Certainly Freud believed that humans were naturally bisexual and the sex researcher, Alfred Kinsey, found evidence from the thousands of interviews he conducted that most people had at least some attraction to both sexes. This kind of research flies in the face of conventional thinking on the subject - part of the reason it's so interesting.
As for bisexual women, the NY Times goes on to report that, unlike bisexual men, other research has shown that those women identifying themselves as bisexuals have shown physiological arousal to both men and women. From this evidence the physiological case for bisexuality looks stronger in women than in men.
NY Times (Free registration required)
Women Experience Pain Differently From Men
BBC News reports a study showing that women, on average, experience more pain than men as well as dealing with pain in a different way. This is certainly an interesting study but the opening line of the BBC report is completely beyond me,
BBC News
"Women are bigger wimps than men when it comes to pain."If women experience more pain and react to it at a lower threshold then clearly, their experience is worse. How does this make them wimps? Saying that women are wimps for having a more intense experience of pain is like blaming a diabetic for not being able to eat five mars bars.
BBC News
Brian Blackwell and Narcissistic Personality Disorder
This week the teenager who received a life sentence for murdering his parents, turned media attention to a little known psychiatric diagnosis called narcissistic personality disorder. One of the most shocking things about the case seems to be that Blackwell had no trace of a 'troubled background', and the media were left searching for reasons for an unreasonable act. In The Times Minette Marin wondered whether Blackwell was at the mercy of his genes. Ultimately this is a question of free will - do we really have the power to make our own decisions or do we simply carry out the bidding of our genes and environment?
It's easy and very common to set up this 'either', 'or' question, despite the fact it doesn't help work out what is going on here. A more useful thought is to imagine a sliding scale of free will, where perhaps some people have more free will than others.
Along similar lines, The Observer discussed how parents may feel they have little control over how their children turn out. This, however, is something that psychologists have recognised already - finding that it is a child's peers who have the largest effect on personality development.
The Telegraph pointed out that narcissistic personality disorder is more of an American construct than a British one - along with the suggestion everyone is narcissistic to a certain extent.
This point brings out the most important problem with so-called personality disorders and their diagnosis. The categories are often fairly arbitrary, culturally defined and not widely agreed upon. Personality disorders are sliding scales, not on or off categories, and many of the categories themselves have very fuzzy boundaries.
In addition, most of the personality disorders recognised by psychiatrists in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders show high levels of comorbidity. In other words if you're diagnosed with one, then you're likely to be diagnosed with others as well. It all comes down to the convenience of giving someone a label.
Bear that in mind as you read BBC News' description of narcissistic personality disorder.
BBC News