January 2012
33 posts
Disruption of biological clocks causes... →
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The Psychology Behind Blushing →
psychology2010:
In this synopsis, I talk about what In this synopsis, I talk about what blushing is, the physiological causes, situations in which we might blush and theories on the adaptive values of blushing.
When was the last time that you blushed? Was it when you said something you felt like you shouldn’t have said? Was it when you got somebody winking at you? Or was it when someone...
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Grapheme-Color Synesthesia
Grapheme-color synesthesia is a peculiar neurological condition in which people involuntarily experience colors when thinking about letters, numbers or words.
They might, for instance, always see the color green along with the number four, or blue with the letter A.
Neuroscientists from the University of Oxford in England are trying to determine what exactly is different about the brains of...
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Metacognition:
Defined as: when you’re thinking about thinking.
And then there’s: The less than simple definition
“So avoid using the word ‘very’ because it’s lazy. A man is not very tired, he...”
– Dead Poets Society, 1989 (via 000111000111)
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Cognitive Distortions →
All or Nothing: Seeing things in black-and-white categories. If your performance falls short of perfect, you believe you are a total failure. If someone is unkind to you once, you believe they are always unkind to you. You think if you don’t have a fairytale life, you’ll be a street person (e.g., Because I’m 30 and I haven’t married, I will end up old and alone, living with cats who probably...
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The Moral Perspective: Molecule-based morality →
Neuroeconomist (yes, that’s a field of study) Paul Zak has been getting a lot of attention recently for his just-released TED talk, titled “Trust, morality, and oxytocin.” While you can watch the 16-minute lecture here, CNN has now published a short article by Zak that might be easier for you to digest. Here’s the intro:
The longest debate since humans have been having debates is whether we are...
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Watch
Neuroscientist Daniel Wolpert starts from a surprising premise: the brain evolved, not to think or feel, but to control movement. In this entertaining, data-rich talk he gives us a glimpse into how the brain creates the grace and agility of human motion.