Tag: Psychology

  • Science & Tech

    Figuring out fairness

    A new Harvard study suggests that children as young as 3 consider merit — a key part of more-advanced ideas of fairness — when distributing resources.

  • Health

    Bringing the psych lab online

    A team of researchers from Harvard and Wellesley College shows that data gathered from online volunteers can be just as good as data collected in the lab.

  • Health

    A story that doesn’t hold up

    A study conducted by Professor of Psychology Richard J. McNally and colleagues from the University of Groningen and the University of Amsterdam is casting doubt on the “amnesia barrier” that has long been a hallmark of multiple personality disorder, now called dissociative identity disorder, by demonstrating that patients have knowledge of their other identities.

  • Health

    A fresh look at mental illness

    In a paper published in Neuron, Joshua Buckholtz and co-author Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg identify a biological reason for why many mental disorders share similar symptoms, a situation that makes diagnosis challenging.

  • Science & Tech

    Decision, decisions

    Two of Harvard’s leading social scientists discussed the way that humans make decisions, and whether having more choices really makes us happier.

  • Science & Tech

    Circumstances that color our perception

    Dozens of Harvard faculty and students gathered at Emerson Hall on Feb. 23 to ponder the nature of perception with Ned Block, the Silver Professor of Philosophy, Psychology and Neural Science at New York University (NYU) and one of the country’s leading thinkers on consciousness. Block’s lecture, “How Empirical Facts about Attention Transform Traditional Philosophical…

  • Science & Tech

    Right choice, but not the intuitive one

    When faced with a tough choice, we already have the cognitive tools we need to make the right decision, Daniel Gilbert, professor of psychology, told a Harvard Law School audience on Feb. 16. The hard part is overcoming the tricks our minds play on us that render rational decision-making nearly impossible.

  • Arts & Culture

    On the side of the angels

    In his latest book, psychologist and linguist Steven Pinker cites data to show that the world is becoming far more peaceful than you might have thought.

  • Science & Tech

    Reinforcement Theory

    Mahzarin R. Banaji Richard Clarke Cabot Professor of Social Ethics, Faculty of Arts and Sciences

  • Science & Tech

    The Cognitive Revolution

    Steven Pinker Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology Harvard College Professor

  • Campus & Community

    Three named MacArthur Fellows

    Three Harvard faculty members — Roland Fryer Jr., Robert M. Beren Professor of Economics; Markus Greiner, associate professor of physics; and Matthew K. Nock, professor of psychology — are among the recipients of this year’s MacArthur Foundation fellowships, also know as “genius” grants.

  • Arts & Culture

    The Aging Intellect

    In this important book, Douglas H. Powell, a clinical instructor in psychology, discusses lifestyle habits and attitudes linked to cognitive aging, and provides evidence-based strategies to minimize mental decline.

  • Campus & Community

    “The Young Ones” nominated for BAFTA

    “The Young Ones,” a BBC series filmed with Harvard Professor of Psychology Ellen Langer, which replicates her Counterclockwise study using British celebrities, has been nominated for a British Academy of Film and Television Arts Award.

  • Science & Tech

    Learning to love the irrational mind

    Just how much should we allow “human nature” to guide our politics — and our everyday decision making? Columnist David Brooks and a trio of Harvard analysts debated new findings on the unconscious mind during a panel discussion.

  • Campus & Community

    Harvard Thinks Big 2: “Beyond Point-and-Shoot Morality” – Joshua Greene

    Joshua Greene, Assistant Professor of Psychology

  • Health

    Child prodigies, maybe

    Study suggests our assumptions about natural talent can influence our judgments, overlooking and undervaluing the impact of hard work.

  • Health

    Harnessing your creative brain

    Shelley Carson, a researcher in the Psychology Department and lecturer at the Extension School, has penned a how-to book on harnessing your untapped abilities.

  • Arts & Culture

    What Is Mental Illness?

    Richard McNally, a professor of psychology, explores the many contemporary attempts to define what mental disorder really is, and offers questions for patients and professionals alike to help understand and cope with the sorrows and psychopathologies of everyday life.

  • Science & Tech

    Big thinkers

    Psychologists at Harvard University have found that infants younger than a year old understand social dominance and use relative size to predict who will prevail when two individuals’ goals conflict.

  • Campus & Community

    NARSAD awards $720,000 to Harvard researchers

    Twelve from Harvard are among 214 researchers named NARSAD Young Investigators.

  • Health

    The face looks familiar

    People’s ability to recognize and remember faces peaks at ages 30 to 34, about a decade later than most other mental abilities, a new study says.

  • Science & Tech

    Of two minds

    We resolve to exercise more and eat healthy, and then reach for a cupcake at the office holiday party. We pledge to put money away for retirement, but end up maxing out credit cards that charge 14 percent interest. According to Professor David Laibson, the reason for these struggles is that human beings are of…

  • Health

    Early marijuana use a bigger problem

    Researchers at Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital have shown that those who start using marijuana at a young age are more impaired on tests of cognitive function than those who start smoking at a later age.

  • Health

    Wandering mind not a happy mind

    People spend 46.9 percent of their waking hours thinking about something other than what they’re doing, and this mind wandering typically makes them unhappy, according to research by Harvard psychologists Matthew A. Killingsworth and Daniel T. Gilbert.

  • Arts & Culture

    How to Unspoil Your Child Fast: A Speedy, Complete Guide to Contented Children and Happy Parents

    Nearly 95 percent of parents think their own children are overindulged; now Bromfield, a clinical instructor in psychology in the Department of Psychology, lays down rules — “take back the power!” — to parenting, the hardest job in the world.

  • Campus & Community

    Brendan Arnold Maher

    At a Meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on April 6, 2010, the Minute honoring the life and service of the late Brendan Arnold Maher, Edward C. Henderson Professor of the Psychology of Personality, Emeritus, was placed upon the records. Maher’s scholarship centered on the complex theoretical and empirical problems surrounding human psychopathology.

  • Health

    Figuring out suicidal behavior

    Matthew Nock is a new professor of psychology at Harvard who uses scientific research to try to determine which medical treatments help to prevent suicide.

  • Arts & Culture

    How to get happy

    Former Harvard President Derek Bok and his wife Sissela, a Harvard fellow, discussed their recent books on happiness in a discussion at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

  • Campus & Community

    NARSAD awards professors for breakthrough schizophrenia research

    Associate Professor of Psychiatry Marc J. Kaufman and Associate Professor of Psychology Dara Manoach, both of Harvard Medical School, are among 42 innovative researchers awarded NARSAD 2010 Independent Investigator grants for schizophrenia research.