IB Psychology Crane

Social identity and physical health

Brené Brown studies human connection - our ability to empathize, belong, love. In a poignant, funny talk, she shares a deep insight from her research, one that sent her on a personal quest to know herself as well as to understand humanity

How the "outside" affects the "inside" is at the heart of many of the deepest psychological questions. In this fast-paced survey of research on how culture shapes cognition, Nalini Ambady examines the neural evidence for socio-cultural influences on thinking, judgment, and behavior. She does this by giving us numerous examples of group differences in core human capacities that are shaped by how "one's people" engage socially. I'm pleased to be able to share this piece with members of APS.

Psychology is a relatively new science which gained popularity in the early 20th century with Wilhelm Wundt. In the zeal to learn about the human thought process and behavior, many early psychiatrists went too far with their experimentations, leading to stringent ethics codes and standards. Though these are highly unethical experiments, it should be mentioned that they did pave the way to induct our current ethical standards of experiments, and that should be seen as a positive

Why do teenagers seem so much more impulsive, so much less self-aware than grown-ups? Cognitive neuroscientist Sarah-Jayne Blakemore compares the prefrontal cortex in adolescents to that of adults, to show us how typically "teenage" behavior is caused by the growing and developing brain

We studied the patient JP who has exceptional abilities to draw complex geometrical images by hand and a form of acquired synesthesia for mathematical formulas and objects, which he perceives as geometrical figures. JP sees all smooth curvatures as discrete lines, similarly regardless of scale. We carried out two preliminary investigations to establish the perceptual nature of synesthetic experience and to investigate the neural basis of this phenomenon. In a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study, image-inducing formulas produced larger fMRI responses than non-image inducing formulas in the left temporal, parietal and frontal lobes. Thus our main finding is that the activation associated with his experience of complex geometrical images emerging from mathematical formulas is restricted to the left hemisphere.

A generation of UK men born in the 1960s and 1970s may be more likely to take their own lives because of attitudes around the role of men at the time, Samaritans researchers have said.

David Spiegelhalter's background is in medical statistics, particularly the use of Bayesian methods in clinical trials, health technology assessment and drug safety. In his post as Winton Professor for the Public Understanding of Risk he leads a small team (UnderstandingUncertainty.org) that attempts to improve the way in which the quantitative aspects of risk and uncertainty are discussed in society. He gives many presentations to schools and others, advises organisations on risk communication, and is a regular newspaper columnist on current risk issues. He has also appeared on Winter Wipeout. He was elected FRS in 2005 and awarded an OBE in 2006 for services to medical statistics

A team of researchers who found that people think they are more attractive when drinking alcohol, have scooped an Ig Nobel prize for their work.

It's not the morphine, it's the size of the cage: Rat Park experiment upturns conventional wisdom about addiction