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Archive for the ‘Psychology & Social Sciences’ Category

How different are we? The issue of whether the differences between men and women are real or imaginary has been a matter of much debate. Now a new study conducted by the University of Turin in Italy and published in the journal PLoS ONE claims to have uncovered evidence that large differences in personality exist between men and women. Previous research has lent little credence to the popular school of thought that men and women are so different that they may as well live on different planets. However, lead author Marco Del Giudice claims to have developed a more accurate method to measure and analyze what he says are significant personality differences between men and women. Under Del Giudice, investigators took personality measurements from more than 5,000 men and 5,000 women. They measured 15 different traits, including warmth and sensitivity. Unlike previous studies, Del Giudice’s project compared comprehensive personality profiles that considered many different traits, rather than focusing upon differences in the incidence of individual traits between the sexes. When the data is looked at this way, very large differences between men and women are seen. Del Giudice admits that these individual differences, taken separately, do appear much less significant. He contends, however, that previous researchers not only neglected to correct for measurement errors, but that their practice of looking at one trait at a time obscured the big picture. As a result, according to Del Giudice, previous investigators failed to recognize the full extent of personality differences between men and women. Related posts: Beautiful people convey personality traits better during first impressions Study Finds Surprising Gender Differences Related to Sexual Harassment Evidence Says Women Are Better Multitaskers Than Men [Study]

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Significant Personality Differences Between Men And Women Found [Study]

Forked Fungus Beetles Maybe they are your younger brother’s gang. Maybe they are the guys you hung out with in high school before you had your growth spurt and went off to college. Regardless of how you know them, chances are you can name a group of guys who live their lives like perpetual middle-schoolers, hanging out with each other but rarely dating and never really establishing long-term romantic relationships. A new study by evolutionary biologists from the University of Virginia’s College of Arts & Sciences takes a closer look at these males who live on the fringes of the social world in order to determine how social interactions shape and are shaped by natural selection. Like many other insects, forked fungus beetles live in complex societies. While most of them live highly engaged social lives, a surprising minority have a lot in common with the former members of your old garage band. You know; the ones who are always trying to get you to ditch the wife and kids and come hang out like you used to back in the good old days. These beetles spend most of their time in small groups composed solely of males. The biologists, led by Vince Formica and Butch Broody, could not help noticing what your wife remarked on from day one: The males in these groups were less likely to have encounters with females that lead to mating and reproduction. Formica and Brodie are interested in what happens in beetle societies because social interactions are inextricably intertwined with natural selection, which is Darwin’s term for the natural process that occurs when members of a species possess characteristics that help them survive and pass those beneficial characteristics on to their offspring. The flip side of the evolutionary coin is that characteristics that tend to get members of a species killed at an early age or that make them less likely to mate often die along with the childless individuals who possess them. Formica and Brodie, both from the University of Virginia’s College of Arts & Sciences, conducted their research on the evolution of social behavior by studying the society-in-miniature that is the milieu of the forked fungus beetle. Specifically, their team wondered whether a beetle’s social role had any connection to its chances of producing offspring. The results of their investigation were published in the Journal of Evolutionary Biology . Forked fungus beetles were chosen as subjects because in addition to their rich social life, they were readily available for the researchers to study in the wild and they can easily be captured, tagged and observed. Once the beetles were tagged for easy tracking, the researchers were able to observe and map their social activities. The research team noticed that the beetles with the most active social lives had large social circles and had a lot of sexual encounters, leading to a lot of reproduction on their part. The males with small social circles made up of just a few males rarely had social encounters with females and had little opportunity to pass their genes on to a new generation. According to Formica, learning how social networks operate is crucial to understanding the evolution of societies. “We’ve shown that the trait of sociability is under natural selection, but we don’t know yet if it’s heritable,” he said. “This is one of only a few studies that have shown that position in a social network is a trait that can experience natural selection and therefore has the potential to evolve. It is clear in this study that being central in a large social network is key to high reproductive success. If a trait – such as an individual’s position in a network – is related to reproductive success, you can say it is experiencing natural selection and has the potential to evolve.” Related posts: Social Network Analysis and the Dynamics of Web-Based Networking [Study]

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Want More Sex? Widen Your Social Network, Beetle Research Says

You often hear about “the little people,” even when actual height is not discussed. Often times, it is people who converse with upcoming celebrities, telling them not to forget “the little people.” A research study from the authors of a new paper published in Psychological Science , a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, found that there is some psychological truth to these kinds of statements. Though non-celebrities are often normal heights, they may actually feel smaller then what they are when compared to a celebrity. The study suggests that people who feel powerful overestimate their size. Alternatively, people who feel weak, usually in a work setting, tend to feel physically smaller than what they actually are. One of the paper’s co-writers, Jack A. Goncalo of Cornell University, stated that there is physical experience that goes along with the study. He also went on to state that people who feel less powerful may actually see objects and other people larger than what they actually are. Alternatively, people who feel powerful may see things smaller than what they are. Of course, there is plenty of prior research that proves taller people generally make more money, are more likely to be promoted, and are viewed as more attractive, but this paper’s research proves the reverse to be true, that power makes people feel tall. One experiment had people come into the lab in pairs. Their height measurements were taken, and then they were given a leadership aptitude test. They were told that, based on their feedback, they would either be assigned to play the role of a manager or employee. The feedback the participants received was fake, and then they were assigned their roles. After they received their roles, they were asked to fill out a personal questionnaire, answering questions that involved their height, eye color, and other physical attributes. The participants who were given roles of manager, having complete power over crucial decision, stated that they were taller than the actual measurement. Alternatively, people who were given the role of employee answered that their height was either the same or less than the taken measurement. This could explain the psychology of people who wear high-heels to feel powerful or bosses who work in the top-floor office. Related posts: Breaking Rules of Social Behavior Makes You Appear Powerful Study shows why people read magazines featuring envy-inspiring models People Over 50 Prefer Negative Stories About Young People

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Powerful People Are Shorter Than They Think [Study]

Ambiguity has long been considered a problem in language. In almost every tongue, commonly used words often possess multiple meanings that are only made clear in a proper context. For those who fail to grasp the context of a message, ambiguous words often cause miscommunication and misunderstandings, leading some linguists to believe that language doesn’t function as the most effective means of communicating. In theory, the best method of communication would attach only one meaning to each word. However, a new study by MIT cognitive scientists argues that ambiguity may be the most efficient way to communicate after all. Instead of speakers having to invent new sounds for single-use words or memorize a large vocabulary, they can simply reuse small words that listeners can easily disambiguate through social or verbal cues. Ambiguity can get pretty messy, especially with words like “head.” Consider this: if you were in the military, you might be head (leader) of a platoon. On Fridays after work, you could head (travel) over to a local bar and sip the head (foam) off a beer. Soon you would have to empty your bladder in the nearest head (bathroom). If you drink too many beers, you might spend the next day nursing an aching head (upper part of the body). Yet for native speakers of English, sorting out these various uses of “head” poses virtually no problem. Each use of the word occurs in its own unique context, allowing listeners to immediately infer its meaning. Realizing that context can effectively reveal a word’s meaning, researchers decided to test the hypothesis that a language’s simplest and most commonly used words possess the most ambiguity. To do this, they analyzed samples from three languages—English, Dutch and German—noting the sounds and structure of each one and comparing various word properties to numbers of word meanings. What they discovered confirmed their hypothesis: the most frequently occurring words with the fewest syllables and easiest pronunciations had the greatest number of meanings in all three languages. As to why humans naturally turn to ambiguity, researchers say it’s a matter of efficiency. If every word in a language had only one specific meaning, speakers would spend a great deal of time trying to get their message across to listeners—not to mention the complexity of sounds they would have to utter to form so many unique words. In the end, it is “cognitively cheaper” for listeners to derive a word’s meaning from its context. And the cheapest option of all is to reuse a language’s simplest words. While ambiguity proves to be efficient and highly desirable in human communication, it holds challenging implications for computer scientists attempting to develop natural language processing (NLP), which is commonly used in automated customer service. NPL, a result of linguistics research, allows computers to understand and respond appropriately to human messages. Ambiguity hampers the process because programming a computer to possess the same “sophisticated cognitive mechanisms for disambiguating” through context “or even some sort of approximation” of them is nearly impossible, says the study’s lead author, Steven Piantadosi. However, the study allows scientists to better understand the evolutionary process of language, which may hold a key to unlocking its secrets. Related posts: Even in Tough Times, Language Remains Positive [Study] Ability to Gauge Emotion is Independent of Language, Study Says English Language Has Doubled In Size Over Last Century, Says New Study

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Ambiguity Makes Language More Efficient, Say Scientists

Jasmine closes her eyes, takes a breath, and begins belting out Carrie Underwood’s “Before He Cheats,” in front of three judges. Jasmine had spent 12 hours out in the cold waiting for her chance at becoming an overnight success, but the judges tell her this will be the end of the road. Her dreams shattered, she sulks away in disbelief. This story is not unique to Jasmine, she is among the 100,000 who try out for American Idol every year. These kids all believe that they are destined to have their name in shining lights, but it is not until an awakening like Jasmine’s that dreams of fame become nothing but a dim memory. Jasmine is a member of Generation Y — a generation who earned not only a birth from their mothers, but a second birth on the internet. Each of their identities has been designed so that the world can be constantly apprised to every minute detail of their lives, as if anyone cared. They believe everyone wants to hear what they think, do, and see at any given moment, so their stream of consciousness is on display in Facebook and Twitter and you can find their video responses to Kanye West’s new video on YouTube. They have become masters of self-promotion, even before they developed a sense-of-self. Generation Y members — also known as Generation Me, millennials, and echoboomers — were born between 1982 and 2002, and are seen by many as over self-entitled whiners who believe they deserve at least a B for showing up to class, and a trophy for simply participating in events. Hara Estroff Marano, editor of Psychology Today , calls them “a nation of wimps.” In the previous generation, celebrities were famous for actually doing things. The names that made the paper were Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, Bruce Springsteen, songwriter, and many others who built something valuable from the ground up. Today, with shows like, Survivor , no-talent celebrities like Paris Hilton, and opportunists like the Balloon Boy parents, viewers learn to associate fame with people who do absolutely nothing of value. Mike is a 20 year old “man” who spends his time playing poker on the internet. He is subscribed to 13 different get-rich-quick blogs and he believes he will make his first million by 25. Mike is no different than most other guys his age. Just like Jasmine, they represent the entitlement generation. A generation that was told they could have it all. They were told to expect big things, because they deserved it. Their parents told them so. As did their teachers. As did the media. Meals are microwavable, blogs are books, music is free, and software is customized to their needs. Even relationships are only a click away. Big breasts, Asian, teen, it’s up to them and their mouse. With all this at their fingertips, they believe they have the control, whatever they want is theirs. So what will happen when they inevitably find out they have so very little? Jasmine and Mike will soon be graduating college and they believe — no, they know — they will “find a job that’s not just a job, but an expression of their identity, a form of self-fulfillment,” as Jeffrey Jensen Arnett, a Professor of Psychology at Clark University puts it in his book, Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road From the Late Teens Through the Twenties . But Jasmine and Mike will soon enter into a world where they will quickly learn that they are not the center of the universe, that they are not entitled to all they thought they were promised, and that they are not as important as they were told. They will walk into job interviews expecting big salaries and an office overlooking the city. But what is more likely, is that they will move back in with their parents while they spend a year trying to find a job that isn’t much more than an internship. These same kids, who were too good to work at Starbucks a year ago, will be fighting for pennies in a down economy, struggling to understand how they can be so under-appreciated. Even the financial crisis we find ourselves in is partially a result of the overvaluing of self-worth among people today. Research psychologists, Jean Twenge and W. Keith Campbell, detail in their book, The Narcissism Epidemic , a growing rise in clinical narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) among Americans in their 20s. In fact, one in 16 Americans have experienced the symptoms at some time in their life. In an interview with US News and World Report , Twenge noted, “Narcissism contributed to the economic crisis. Many people had narcissistic overconfidence [when they said], ‘Yeah, I can afford that million-dollar house,’ and lenders said, ‘Sure, I know you’ll pay off that loan.’” Overconfidence is making it increasingly difficult to distinguish dreams from reality, and the results are catastrophic. In 2009, a study found that the top three career aspirations of children were to be a sportsman, a popstar, or an actor. So what, you say? Kids have always wanted fame and fortune. This is actually not true. The study compared the results to the ambitions of pre-teens from 25 years ago as well. During that generation, the top three career aspirations were teaching, banking/finance, and medicine. There is a survey that has been asking kids since the 1950s, “Am I important?” Back in 1950, 12% of teenagers answered “yes.” Today, that number is 80%. And of course they feel that way. After all, the recent development of the commercial tween market has shown that the children are the actually the consumers, not the parents. Tweens dictate, and over-indulgent, baby boomer parents, follow orders. And as our kids get louder, fatter, and more demanding, so do their egos, sense of entitlement, and sense of importance. So, where are the parents, their supposed role models? If you thought “me, me, me” social networking was just an infatuation with youth, think again. It turns out that the over-25 crowd is the fastest-growing demographic of Facebook users, and people over 35 make up more than half of MySpace’s 110 million users. Parents have fallen for this “reality” of the world as well. While magazines like Newsweek and Time have seen their circulation decline, magazines like People and Us Weekly have been on the rise. It is all about the frivolous details of peoples lives — not what they do of worth — but what they wear, what they buy, who they know. Celebrity voyeurism. If parents are too preoccupied with Perez Hilton’s latest post, then who is going to teach our children the counter-lessons of celebrity culture: that fame should not be born of self-humiliation, and that self-respect is NOT earned by 15 minutes of empty self-esteem. Once the culture bomb does its final damage on these youth and the personal post-traumatic-stress-disorder passes, they will have to learn to pick up the pieces of their sorry selves, and build something of value. Michael Kimmel is a sociologist and author who has written a book, Guyland , devoted to discussing the male sense of entitlement. Kimmel describes how rage takes control once a person feels their entitlement is threatened. Kimmel gives an example of a group who are consistently stripped of their entitlement: bullies. He points to research by William Coleman, who is a Professor of Pediatrics at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine. Coleman says that bullies are a prime example of a privileged group in school, but once they leave this arena, they become shocked at how much they overestimated their prestige. And this overestimation typically leads to substance abuse and violent crime. Generation Y’s focus on self has brought collateral damage on others as well. Another recent survey found that empathy among students is nowhere the figure it used to be. In fact, researchers found that the ability to empathize has dropped almost 40% since 1980, with the biggest drop occuring after 2000. Our society is overly selfish, and like Bengel’s wide receiver, Terrell Owens, once said at a press conference, he is fine with that. We are inconsiderate. A bunch of assholes and douchebags, as we so like to call each other. We have inflated our expectations. The media and society in general offered us false dreams. They said we could be stars. Among the 500 TV stations, we thought there was surely a place for us. But we are not as important as we thought we were. Tyler Durden said it best, “You are not a beautiful or unique snowflake, you are the same organic decaying matter as everything else.” The only question is, what now? It starts with not updating our Facebook status at dinner. It starts with reading a news story rather than Lohan’s latest tweet. It starts with asking someone how their day is going. And it ends when…well a recovering Generation Y’er can dream, right? Written by Chase Fleming . Follow Chase on Twitter @chasefleming . No related posts.

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The Age of Self-Importance

Deaf people who communicate through sign language are better than their hearing counterparts who don’t understand sign language at spotting and reading body language, according to a new study from the University of California. The study, which was published in the journal Cognition , was funded by the National Science Foundation, along with the National Institutes of Health. The results may mean that people who are deaf and rely upon visually-based communication are especially good at observing small cues in movement or expressions that people who tend to rely upon their ears for communication often overlook. This heightened ability to read non-verbal cues could be a distinct plus for people who work at certain jobs, such as airport screeners. According to David Corina, a professor at UC Davis who led the study, the new research lends credence to what many people have been saying for years. Both deaf and hearing participants were shown video clips of people using American Sign Language or making non-verbal gestures that were not signs. The investigators were not surprised that the deaf participants were quicker than the hearing participants at interpreting the sign language they saw in the clips. However, the deaf participants also picked up on the non-verbal gestures that appeared in the clips significantly faster than hearing participants. Corina concluded from his research that human communication can be just as effective in other forms besides speech. Because signers express themselves through non-verbal gestures and receive communication through visual means, they become more adept at recognizing body language and gestures, as well. Further, Corina believes the new study adds support to the theory that sign language uses a modification of the same system that all humans use to interpret non-verbal communication. Older theories had explored whether communication through signs worked through a completely different system. Related posts: The Role of Nonverbal Communication in Virtual Environments and Real Life Scenarios [Study] Politicians’ Hand Gestures Reveal Their Good and Bad Thoughts Sign languages help us understand the nature of metaphors

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Signers Identify Non-Verbal Cues More Quickly, Study Reveals