Category: psychology
-
(Preventing) Manipulation Through Irrationality
Through the theories discussed in Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational (and largely based on the excerpts in Chris Yeh’s outline of the book), two articles have emerged on different sides of one topic: our irrational decision-making in terms of products and purchases. One on how to take advantage of our irrationality when marketing products, and another…
-
Influencing Behaviour Online
Ignoring, for a moment, the rather unsound and outmoded neuroscience propounded in the introduction, these tips for extending influence online and persuading your visitors are worth a few minutes: Show ratings and reviews by other users (for action through social validation). Provide instant gratification and a quick fix. Put the most important action to be…
-
Calorie Counts Don’t Affect Food Decisions
After New York City passed a law requiring many chain restaurants to post the calorific value of all food they sold on their menus (in the same size and font as the price), researchers started looking at how the posting of calorie counts affect consumer decision making and food consumption. The study’s findings, as summarised…
-
Food Advertising Causes Unconscious Snacking
Food advertising does much more than influence our brand preferences; it also ‘primes’ automatic eating behaviours, contributing to overall and longer-term weight gain. This is the conclusion of a recent study into whether food advertising (of both the healthy and non-healthy kind) can trigger unconscious snacking by leading our thoughts toward hunger and food. Children…
-
Ability to Inhibit Prejudices Diminishes with Age
As we age we become less able to inhibit prejudiced inferences, relying more on ethnic and sexist stereotypes to interpret situations, research into the science of prejudice suggests. There are a lot of clichés thrown around about the elderly, but one that seems to be true—or at least is backed up by research—is the belief…
-
Resources on the Psychology of Security and Risk
Professor of Security Engineering at the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, Ross Anderson, has compiled a comprehensive resource page on the psychology of risk and security. The resources themselves are divided into seven section, to wit: Introductory Papers Deception Security and Usability Social Attitudes to Risk Behavioural Economics of Security Miscellaneous Papers Other (Conferences, Websites/Blogs,…
-
The Psychology of Terrorism
Alienation, a belief that membership of a movement offers social and psychological rewards (e.g. adventure, camaraderie, a heightened sense of identity) and the need to take action rather than just talk: three psychological traits that together create part of the profile of those most “open to terrorist recruitment and radicalization”. In addition to profiles like…
-
Female Orgasm as Mate Screening
Whereas Robinson suggests the evolutionary underpinnings of orgasm lie in the ‘Yes!’ factor of gene continuation, in How Women Got Their Curves and Other Just-So Stories: Evolutionary Enigmas David Barash and Judith Lipton believe it could be, at least for the potentially multi-orgasmic female, an “anti-infanticide insurance policy” that spurred women to mate successively with…
-
Sex Without Orgasm Could Lead to Healthier Relationships
One solution to the “widespread disharmony in intimate relationships” is to “change the way you make love”, promotes Marnia Robinson, suggesting that through ‘conventional sex’ we keep our dopamine and prolactin levels “uncomfortably high or uncomfortably low”. Instead, to ensure a stable relationship (through a more stable neurochemistry), we should practice ‘conventional orgasm’-free sex with…
-
How Congestion Pricing and Traffic Jams Help the Environment
When us laymen think of ways to solve traffic congestion we typically think of two ways: congestion pricing to force those who are most price sensitive off the roads and on to public transport (which should be improved using the funds gained through said pricing), and adding capacity to the roads. But do these solutions…