Archive for the ‘Social Psychology’ Category

Can humour be learned?

Monday, March 8th, 2010

How many therapists does it take to change a lightbulb? Only one, but it takes six months and the bulb has to want to change!
Humour has a potentially valuable place in therapy; a large number of papers argue for the benefits of it in a therapeutic setting. There is also a lot [...]

Is love really blind? Positive illusions in relationships

Thursday, February 18th, 2010

One of the more interesting of our (many) cognitive biases are positive illusions – a tendency to be view ourselves more positively than others, be optimistic about the future, and exaggerate our perceptions of control.  Positive illusions are typically self-enhancing, but if you’ve ever seen a madly in love couple, or been a part of one, you [...]

Online dating and Valentine’s

Wednesday, February 17th, 2010

Around February, we get suddenly bombarded by the Valentine’s day promotional activities. Conversation topics move to relationships, Valentine’s cards, and potential secret admirers. You might make the prediction, that all this in-your-face love might make the average single person more likely to step up their efforts to find that special someone, perhaps even [...]

Love on the brain

Tuesday, February 16th, 2010

I had to write a piece on love as part of my positive psychology course, and as a die-hard bachelor, I wasn’t particularly looking forward to it. But, as I looked into the research on love, I found it to be a fascinating area of research. Maybe, deep down, I’m just an old [...]

Sternberg’s triangular theory of love

Monday, February 15th, 2010

Bob Sternberg is a pretty prolific guy in psychology. Among many other topics, he’s studied intelligence, thinking styles, leadership, and he currently holds 10 honorary doctorates. Below I present a quick overview of Sternberg’s triangular theory of love.
In Sternberg’s theory, there are three main facets of love:

Passion – this includes sexual excitement, [...]

Subliminal Advertising: Should we be worried?

Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009

In 1957, a gentleman by the name of James Vicary created a new concept: Subliminal advertising. He flashed the words “Eat Popcorn” and “Drink Coca-Cola” for a fraction of a second during a film, and claimed increases in sales of these products of 18% and 57% respectively.
But, there’s one other thing that bugged me [...]

Do you hate the sound of your voice?

Thursday, September 3rd, 2009

Have you ever heard a recording of your voice, and thought “Holy crap!  Is that what I sound like?”  Everyone else’s voice sounds fine when recorded, but yours sounds strange, different.  I remember hearing once that our voices echoes in our skulls, and therefore they sound different to us than they do to others.  So [...]

Your social skills are better than you think they are!

Saturday, August 29th, 2009

I just put a post up over at Scientific Blogging (which is a really great site, by the way), discussing some of the research into our perceptions of our own social skills.
It appears that people, especially people with higher levels of social anxiety, tend to overestimate how nervous they seem to other people.  In a [...]

How to make people “get with the program”

Thursday, August 20th, 2009

You know those loyalty stamp cards you get in coffee shops?  Ever wondered why you get a few stamps free when you get them?  It’s because of something called the endowed progress effect -  you’re more likely to keep working towards a goal if you think you’ve already made some progress towards it.  So you’re [...]

6 simple ways to get more tips as a server

Monday, August 17th, 2009

Being a waiter or waitress is hard work!  You’re on your feet all day, watching other people eat, laugh and have fun, and often the pay isn’t all that great; particularly in the US.  But, you have one ace in the hole – tips.  It is pretty much the norm these days to tip, even [...]