Psychology news

• Make a much shorter to-do list! 15 quick, simple ways to avoid overwhelm

  01-01-2025 12:00
  
  From weightlifting to woodland walks, Guardian readers and health experts share their tried-and-tested ways to keep burnout at bayOverwhelm can come from multiple worries going round and round in our heads like a washing machine, which can deplete our energy. A helpful strategy is to set aside 10 to 15 minutes each day for “constructive worrying”, where you write down your concerns. You can then apply cognitive strategies such as “if, then” planning (“if X happ
  
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• Losing my ‘haunted’, mouldy flat was awful. I swore I’d get it back – and I did | Claire Jackson

  04-01-2025 09:00
  
  Some people long for a storybook house, but I found sanctuary in a home in the woods, where saucepans were said to move by themselvesIn our end of year series, writers and public figures remember the place or time when they felt most at homeWe’re playing with a Playmobil house. Well, my friend’s son is playing with it. I’m moving my plastic familiar unsurely around what is, proportionately speaking, a cavernous room, awaiting his next instruction. The child scoops up a selectio
  
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• Study Suggests That Sleep Prevents Unwanted Memories From Intruding

  04-01-2025 06:14 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: Science Daily - Top HealthSleep problems play an important role in the onset and maintenance of many mental health problems, but the reason for this link has been elusive. A new study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, offers fresh insight into the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying the connection between sleep and mental health. The study suggests that poor sleep may create deficits in brain regions which keep unwanted thoughts out of...
  
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• Psychological Tips From Conflict Zones to Deal With Incivility

  04-01-2025 06:14 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: APA MonitorIncivility is surging across the United States, seeping into workplaces and online spaces. Researchers who focus on psychology within conflict zones and fractured societies have science-backed methods to help challenge misconceptions, focus on shared values, and increase social connections in a way that promotes civility. Here's what the latest research says about how incivility starts and what you can do to alleviate it.
  
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• How Artificial Intelligence Is Impacting the Field of Psychology

  04-01-2025 06:14 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: APA MonitorAs artificial intelligence is driving what some call the fourth industrial revolution, its power and potential have wrought excitement and fear across nearly every sector of society, from finance to education to psychology. In response, psychologists have begun developing, testing, and integrating AI tools into the discipline and beyond, and in August of 2024, APA released a policy statement entitled "Artificial Intelligence and the Field of...
  
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• Instructors Are Adapting to the Use of Artificial Intelligence

  04-01-2025 06:13 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: APA MonitorGenerative artificial intelligence promises to touch nearly every part of our lives, and education is one of the first sectors grappling with this fast-moving technology. Even though AI has been used in classrooms for years—quietly powering learning management tools such as Google Classroom, Canvas, and Turnitin—the recent spread of generative AI tools such as ChatGPT is providing new challenges and opportunities for students and educators alike.
  
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• Revisited: a new approach to quitting smoking; how to stop people-pleasing; and why do we have the dreams we do? – podcast

  04-01-2025 06:00
  
  Chris Godfrey spent a decade trying to quit smoking, then he tried hypnotherapy and it changed his life. ‘They’re probably not thinking about you’: Oliver Burkeman on how to liberate yourself and stop people-pleasing. And ‘one night I’m a murderer, the next my husband’s having an affair’. Why do we have the dreams that we do? Continue reading...
  
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• ‘Godfather’ of artificial intelligence has a surprising blindspot | Letters

  03-01-2025 18:28
  
  Rachel Withers says people need to get real about their non-mastery of all they survey, and George Burt discusses slavery, political oppression and AI Prof Geoffrey Hinton, the “godfather  of artificial intelligence”, states that he struggles to find examples of “more intelligent thing[s] being controlled by … less intelligent thing[s]”; the mother-baby relationship is the only example he can cite (‘Godfather of AI’ shortens odds of the technology
  
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• Central California Psychedelic Summit

  03-01-2025 16:46 via pr.com
  
  The Central California Psychedelic Summit 2025: Building Bridges in Psychedelic Science and Community Wellness The Central California Psychedelic Summit (CCPS) 2025 is set to return to Fresno, uniting researchers, clinicians, community leaders, and advocates to explore the transformative potential of psychedelics in mental health, wellness, and harm reduction. This event will take place in the heart of the Central Valley, [PR.com]
  
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• Using AI to Understand What Animals Are Saying to Each Other

  03-01-2025 14:41 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: Google News - HealthResearchers are building an AI system they hope will allow humans to understand the many languages that animals use to communicate with one another. Knowing what animals are saying could not only aid human knowledge of the world but might provide a compelling case for giving animals broader legal rights. Created by Earth Species Project, NatureLM has already shown potential in identifying the dialogue of species that the system has never...
  
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• Too Few Women or Too Many Men? Framing Makes a Difference

  03-01-2025 06:03 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: Science Daily - Top SocietyTo many people, Vice President Kamala Harris's loss in the 2024 presidential election highlighted the under-representation of women in leadership positions. A new study has found, however, that framing the gender gap as "men's overrepresentation"—rather than "women's underrepresentation"—elicits more anger among women and increased perceptions that the gap is unjust. Moreover, the results suggest that anger at the disparity leads women to...
  
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• New York Fining Fossil Fuel Companies $75 Billion Under New Climate Law

  03-01-2025 06:03 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: Google News - HealthNew York state will fine fossil fuel companies a total of $75 billion over the next 25 years to pay for damage caused to the climate under a bill signed into law on Thursday. The law is intended to shift some of the costs of climate change from individual taxpayers to oil, gas, and coal companies. For example, funds will be spent on mitigating climate change impacts by adapting roads, transit, water, and sewage systems, buildings, and other...
  
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• Butterfly Wellness Launches Shammah

  02-01-2025 15:39 via pr.com
  
  Butterfly Wellness has launched a chatbot to support individuals with chronic skin conditions manage their mental health better.This AI-driven chatbot's innovative approach will offers comfort to users globally. [PR.com]
  
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• Xavier Mulenga on how to know when to quit alcohol – podcast

  31-12-2024 15:00
  
  Thinking of breaking up with the booze?Addiction specialist and psychiatrist Xavier Mulenga tells Bridie Jabour the common reasons people think they can’t quit and the steps you can take to reduce your alcohol intakeYou can support the Guardian at theguardian.com/fullstorysupportYou can subscribe for free to Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast Full Story on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.Read more: Continue reading...
  
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• Rise in talk about killing in films raises health concerns, researchers say

  30-12-2024 17:00
  
  Study finds small but significant increase in characters talking about murder or killing over past 50 yearsTalk of homicide is on the rise in films, researchers have found, in a trend they say could pose a health concern for adults and children.A study found that over the past 50 years there had been a small but significant increase in movie characters talking about murdering or killing. Continue reading...
  
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• Daniel Kahneman remembered by Daniel J Levitin

  30-12-2024 15:00
  
  5 March 1934 – 27 March 2024
  The neuroscientist celebrates the Nobel-winning author of Thinking, Fast and Slow – a psychologist whose elegance of thought helped reveal the foibles of human reasoningRead the Observer’s obituaries of 2024 in fullDaniel Kahneman was a brilliant scientist who marvelled at his own errors in thinking. “The essence of intuitive heuristics: when faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the s
  
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• Is it true that up to half of people have no inner monologue? I investigated | Arwa Mahdawi

  30-12-2024 12:00
  
  Our brains are miraculous and weird things, and it turns out everyone has different ways of processing the worldSometimes I like to start a column by asking myself: should this really be a column that will live on the internet forever, for all and sundry to see? Or is this really an airing of my many neuroses that is better shared privately, with a therapist?Not infrequently the answer is the latter. But therapy is expensive and comment is free, so I’m afraid, dear reader, that you’r
  
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• Colin Robson obituary

  29-12-2024 17:34
  
  My husband, Colin Robson, who has died aged 89, pioneered the degree of behavioural sciences, combining psychology and sociology, in the 1970s. The fifth edition of his textbook Real World Research, originally published in 1993, came out earlier this year.Born in the village of Almondbury, near Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, the only child of Mary (nee Addy) and Raymond Robson, a clerk in the council rates office, he attended King James’s grammar school in the village, remaining loyal to hi
  
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• Does life feel like it’s speeding up? How to slow down time in 2025

  29-12-2024 11:00
  Time flies when you’re… in a boring routine, according to research, which shows that new experiences, from foreign travel to a walk in nature, can alter our perception of timeIt’s the time of the year for endless cliches. From “tis the season” and “the gift that keeps on giving” to “new year, new you”, there’s nowhere to hide from tired old phrases. One of my favourites is “Christmas comes around quicker each year” –
  
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• How owls helped me conquer my fear of the dark

  28-12-2024 16:00
  
  With the aid of the birds I was able to learn to love the nightAs a child I was afraid of the dark, as so many children are. Not the dark in and of itself, but what I was certain it contained: bad spirits, bad people, monsters with ill intent. The dark hid creatures with talons and teeth, or men with weapons who would use them to sneak up on an unsuspecting child and do them harm. The dark let curses slip out of buildings or hedges and attach to a child walking past. I kept myself bounded within
  
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• Sound advice from John Cage | Letters

  27-12-2024 18:11
  
  Readers offer their views on getting rid of earworms using the composer’s 4’33”In her letter (Want to get rid of a earworm? Try John Cage, 22 December), Joan Friend says she has listened to different versions of 4’33’’ and that “they all sound the same”. This is impossible, because the whole point of the piece is that during it we hear the sounds all around us.Composed after Cage had experienced an anechoic chamber, a room without echoes where
  
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• Canadian researchers trial nature trick to boost mood in winter

  25-12-2024 17:00
  
  Volunteers asked to go about normal routine while paying more attention to natural worldThe start of a new year: a time for optimism, ambitious plans to improve the world, and the grim suspicion that the first couple of months may well be a miserable slog through the deepest of winter’s gloom.But for those who fear the cold and dark ahead, help is on the horizon. Researchers in Canada are investigating a simple trick they hope will boost flagging spirits even when the days are short and fr
  
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• Middle children are more cooperative than their siblings, study suggests

  23-12-2024 21:00
  After decades of debate, one of largest ever studies on birth order suggests it does actually make a differenceThe debate has raged for more than a century: does birth order help to shape personality, or are conscientious firstborns and creative youngest children flawed stereotypes based on flimsy evidence?After decades of contested claims, a handful of recent studies found there was little evidence for meaningful differences. But in a study published on Monday, psychologists have pushed back an
  
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• Cut sentences in half to tackle prisons crisis | Letters

  23-12-2024 18:15
  
  Paul Collins on how to improve the criminal justice system, and Ellie Dwight on an understaffed and ineffective probation serviceIn the 1990s, judges attending Judicial Studies Board seminars would hear the late David Faulkner, a humane and immensely knowledgable Home Office star, explain how German prison sentences were so much shorter than ours, with no corresponding increase in offending. Politicians, terrified of being pilloried for being soft on crime, have never taken any notice. The probl
  
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• Paul Gordon obituary

  22-12-2024 18:47
  
  My colleague and friend, the psychotherapist, author and campaigner Paul Gordon, has died aged 70. While eschewing the limelight, Paul was an influential figure and unique voice in the world of psychotherapy. His political commitment and determination to improve people’s lives led him to train as a psychotherapist at the Institute of Psychotherapy and Social Studies in London in the late 80s, and later at the Philadelphia Association, founded in 1965 by RD Laing and colleagues in order to
  
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• Want to get rid of a earworm? Try John Cage | Letters

  22-12-2024 18:02
  
  Readers respond to an article by Elle Hunt on the science of unshakeable tunes I have suffered from constant tinnitus for 30 years, and when it was joined by earworms it became almost unbearable (Tortured by an earworm? How to get it out of your head, 16 December). I read of the “cure” of listening to something else, but all that did was to replace it with something perhaps more irritating.Then I got to wondering: what would happen if I listened to silence? It wasn’t music
  
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• Canada to Hold Antisemitism Forum Following Recent Incidents

  22-12-2024 07:52 via socialpsychology.org
  Source: Canadian Broadcasting Company - Top Stories NewsCanada will hold a forum on combatting antisemitism in February—news that comes as police investigate a fire at a Montreal synagogue and gunshots aimed at a Toronto Jewish girls school. Before these incidents, the U.S. ambassador to Canada said in an interview his "impression is that antisemitism as a problem is worse in Canada than the United States." In 2023, there were 900 police-reported hate crimes against Jewish people in Canada
  
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• Belief in a lottery curse is comforting, but winning lots of money does make you happy | Martha Gill

  21-12-2024 18:30
  
  The notion that vast windfalls inevitably bring misery is based on a handful of sad casesDoes winning the lottery wreck your life? When it was revealed earlier this week that an anonymous Briton had won £177m in the November EuroMillions draw – making them the third biggest national lottery winner ever – the Mail Online announced it with all the impartiality of a bad fairy at a christening: “Other big winners”, the second half of the headline ran, “have faced
  
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• The joy of trivia: ‘We wrote our book together to intrigue each other’

  21-12-2024 16:00
  
  After midlife burnout came a rediscovered curiosity for two friends and writersIt was the early 2000s, we were in our 20s and had both started as assistants at the same company. We bonded over excruciating induction sessions, where we had to reveal things like which cartoon character we most identified with (B: Danger Mouse; E: Marcie from Peanuts). We laughed a lot, but we also worked really hard – and pushed each other to do new things. Twenty years later, with six children between us as
  
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• Arno Rabinowitz obituary

  20-12-2024 20:41
  
  My father, Arno Rabinowitz, who has died aged 90, was a pioneering educational psychologist and a widely admired mentor, counsellor and confidant. His existence was down to a confluence of luck: his mother, Tilly, was one of three siblings evacuated from eastern Europe in the early 1920s during the pogroms against Jews. These three were “Ochberg Orphans”, fortunate recipients of the philanthropy of another émigré, the industrialist Isaac Ochberg, who enabled Jewish orph
  
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