Please Don't Sneak Up On Me!

Sometimes I wonder, "Who thought up the idea to study this, and why?" Consider research done by Dimitri Bayle and associates, reported in the online publication, http://www.plosone.org/, published by the Public Library of Science.

Maybe as a small child Dimitri was scared by his big brother trying to sneak up on him. I have no reason to doubt his findings, I am just not sure what to do with it now that I know it. I guess that some things just need to be filed under, "That's interesting."

Dimitri scanned participants' brains using magnetoencephalography (MEG) while showing them faces either straight ahead or in the periphery (out of the "corner" of the eye), and measured how quickly they determined if a face was scary. Their findings?

A "peripherally presented fearful face was followed by increased activation in the right anterior fronto-medial region - including the famous amygdala - within just 130ms. By contrast, a fearful face presented straight on triggered activity in these emotional-processing centres only after 210ms."

Researchers suggest the reason for this ability to more quickly process a scary face seen in the periphery lies in the basic need to survive. Potential predators don't usually come at us straight on. They sneak up on us. The more quickly we recogize the threat, the greater our odds of escaping it.

I do know that a few months ago I stumbled upon a spider the size of Aragog (see Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets if that doesn't mean anything to you). He was right in front of me but my brain's right anteior fronto-medial region fired in just 130ms!

I Don't Mean to Brag, But...

Here is the conundrum: how do I let you know what I am capable of without being a bragadocious bore? Nobody likes a show-off.

Nurit Tal-Or (now THAT is a great name! Sounds like an all-natural power bar) doesn't want to brag, but he thinks he knows. He reported his research, done in the United Kingdom, in the journal, Social Influence.

100 undergraduate students were asked to rate the character of a speaker in two senarios. In the first, the speaker brought up the subject in the conversation and told the listener what grade he got. In the second, the listener brought up the subject and asked the speaker what grade he got.

The speaker in senario two, who shared only when asked, was rated higher than the speaker who just offered the information.

Tal-Or concluded, "To pull off a successful boast, it must be appropirate to the conversation. Context is everything... If your friend, colleague, or date raises the topic you can go ahead and pull in a relevant boast in safety... (but if you) turn the conversation onto the required topic, then you must succeed in provoking a question from your conversation partner. If there's no question and you raised the topic then any boast you make will leave you looking like a big-head."

So, on a date? In a job interview? Make sure that your sharing of your "good points" is appropriate to the flow of the conversation, and the person has actually indicated whether or not they care about it. Otherwise, you will come off as a pompous bore, or, to use Tal-Or's word, a "big-head."

A New Insult

Psychology class ought to be at least good for new ways to insult people.

I'm getting ready for tomorrow's lectures and just glanced at my Gen Psyc notes. We're going to talk about synaptic gaps.

How about this for an insult? "Dude, your synaptic gaps are too wide."

The synaptic gap is the space between one brain cell's axon and another neuron's dendrites. They don't actually touch, so the neuron's electrical message has to be converted to a chemical, called a neurotransmitter, to travel between the neurons.

The wider the gap, the more the message is slowed down.

Really wide synaptic gaps = a really "slow" person.

Add, Fold, Cut, Toss, Repeat

"Add this column of numbers. Fold the piece of paper into quarters. Cut it into three pieces. Throw them away. Repeat until told to stop."

How long do you think someone would do that in a psychology lab simply because the researcher said to before he left the room?

That was the question Martin Orne had as he began to wonder, "Do people act differently in a psychology lab than they do in real life?" He was studying Demand Characteristics: the cues in a lab environment that tell a participant how they are expected to act. In experimental research, if Demand Characteristics are high then External Validity is low.

What that means is, you can't say that people will do in real life what they did in the lab.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch (lab), Orne's people are still adding, folding, cutting, tossing, repeating. How long did they do it?

Six hours. Six hours! They added, folded, cut, and tossed for six hours, until Orne had to return and TELL them to stop! Why? They were in a psychology lab and that is what they were expected to do.

Would they do that in real life? Shake your head no. Of course, recent research shows that teens today spend an average of 7.5 hours per day using electronic devices (TV, computer, cell phone, etc.). And they're not even in a psychology lab!

Bedlam

Bedlam may be what we in Oklahoma call the intrastate rivalry between the University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University but it did not have its origin there.

Bedlam is defined as "chaos; a state of extreme confusion and disorder." Its etimology is found in the history of the mentally ill.

Bedlam was the name of what is considered to be the world's first institution to specialize in the mentally ill. It is now called the Bethlem Royal Hospital of London.

The confusion and disorder found within its walls, produced by the mentally ill, became synonymous with its name.

Now that I think about it, some the fans at the Bedlam events do act a little crazy.