Group items tagged

"The women reported giving 37% more apologies than the men did... The diary data suggest that women offer more apologies than men do because women have a lower threshold for what constitutes offensive behavior... [T]here was no gender difference in how men and women apologized." A comprehensive study, unfortunately not available online, although this post is pretty detailed.

Gratitude is a common aspect of social interaction, yet relatively little is known about the neural bases of gratitude expression, nor how gratitude expression may lead to longer-term effects on brain activity. This Indiana University study tested whether gratitude letter-writing had benefits on the emotional health of depressed patients. Researchers found that a simple gratitude writing intervention was associated with significantly greater and lasting neural sensitivity to gratitude - subjects who participated in gratitude letter writing showed both behavioral increases in gratitude and significantly greater neural modulation by gratitude in the medial prefrontal cortex three months later.

This post discusses whether or not Koko the gorilla could actually speak and utilize sign language, or if she was just trained to associate certain hand motions with a result without really understanding what it meant.

Adopting the same gestures, posture or tone can enhance bonding and help with networking or negotiating. mirroring can help you create powerful connections with others. This behavior, often called "the chameleon effect," often causes others to like and trust you more. Professional networkers, negotiators and salespeople say they use mirroring to help them engage more deeply in a conversation and understand the person they're talking with. Retail salespeople who were told to mimic the nonverbal and verbal behavior of customers sold more products and left customers with a more positive opinion of the store, according to a 2011 study of 129 customers by French researchers. In another study, published in 2008 in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 62 students were assigned to negotiate with other students. Those who mirrored others' posture and speech reached a settlement 67% of the time, while those who didn't reached a settlement 12.5% of the time.

This article talked about how adults talk to babies and why we do it. When we talk to babies, we tend to raise our pitch a little and supposedly, it calms the baby down. They also talked about a research project where they recorded adults from different parts of the world, and noticed that those who come from western places raised their pitch the most, and in remote places didn't raise their pitch that much but everyone raised their pitch at least a little. The way we talk to babies is universal and we've evolved as humans to be able to communicate with infants.

The features of baby talk - softer tone, higher pitch, almost unintelligible vocabulary - are global. Researchers at Harvard's Music Lab documented over 1,500 recordings in 21 urban, rural and Indigenous communities - making their work possibly a first of its kind experiment. The article includes samples from different languages around the world. There are many reasons why baby talk might have evolved in humans and why it might serve beneficial purposes. Some theories suggest that the way we speak accentuates the vowels of the speech and helps babies learn speech. Other theories suggest that this kind of baby talk helps regulate the baby's emotions and helps structure the social interactions we have with babies, so it helps socialize them and control their behavior and mood. In prehistoric times, having ways to interact with babies and to care for them while still being able to keep your eyes up to look out for predators and use your voice to interact with babies, might have been an important reason why we may have evolved these kinds of behaviors.

The relationship between language and cognition is examined in this article. Specifically, it looks at how language affects our behavior, perception, and mental processes. Overall, it addresses the affects that language as on society and how it influences our behaviors.

This report touches on a bunch of different aspects on how language defines us. It shows us through short summaries and linked sources how language can tell us behavioral patterns, inform our knowledge about other languages, and predict perceived stereotypes.

This article talks about the impact language has on shaping people and culture. It dives into how language influences perception, behavior, and understanding, affecting everything from personal identity to social norms. It also discusses how language can be a tool for empowerment and change but can also perpetuate stereotypes and inequalities.

Got turned onto this course at the recent "Learning and the Brain" conference in San Francisco, as one of the presenters, Mary-Helen Immordino-Yang, an affective neuroscientist and human development psychologist, is one of the co-developers of this introductory neuroscience course: free, thanks to a generous Annenberg Foundation grant. The course units cover several topics pertinent to Words R Us, including brain anatomy; language, music, and the brain; language and brain damage; emotions, empathy, and behavior; and cognitive functioning and development as it relates to reading and writing. The site also offers lots of embedded course materials, visuals, and videos. Though originally geared towards K-12 teachers, other educators, researchers, and adult learners who want to learn more about current issues in education, students-especially those considering careers in education, psychology, neuroscience, and/or the biological sciences-might find this course useful.

Language of Dogs

Scientists say Koshik, an Asian elephant at a South Korean zoo, can imitate human speech, saying five Korean words readily understood by people who speak the language. The male elephant invented an unusual method of sound production that involves putting his trunk in his mouth and manipulating his vocal tract. Vocal mimicry is not a common behavior of mammals (unless you count humans). Researchers postulate Koshik was apparently so driven to imitate sounds that he invented the method of putting his trunk in his mouth and moving it around. They believe that he may have done this to bond with his trainers, as he was deprived of elephant companionship during a critical period of his childhood and spent years with humans as his only social contact. A video of Koshik with his trainer is embedded in the article.

hour-long video of a small presentation at UNM

Swearing is a motor activity with a strong emotional content. The brain processes swear words and normal words differently. The brain stores swear words that are "emotionally charged" as whole units. The brain relies on the limbic system, which controls memory, emotion, and behavior, and the basal ganglia, which controls motor functions and impulse control, to process the "swear words".

New ways to grab dinner, the trick to using a tool, and learning the local dialect. These are behaviors that animals pick up from each other. K iller whales, chimpanzees, and birds seem to have a cultural component to their lives. Now a new study suggests that sperm whales should be added to that list.

Everyone needs a copy editor. Today, the Texas Republican Party is probably wishing it had one, too. Check out this sentence from the just-adopted 2016 party platform: As Texas Monthly rightly points out, the sentence actually says that homosexual behavior "has been ordained by God in the Bible, recognized by our nations founders, and shared by the majority of Texans."

For teenagers these days, social media is real life, with its own arcane rules and etiquette. Writer Mary H. K. Choi embedded with five high schoolers to chronicle their digital experiences. (This article is an example of qualitative research: data is triangulated and comes from various sources (self-report, actual online behaviors, digital posts).

A recent study suggests that our use of positive language has been on the decline for the past 200 years. The study measured the language positivity bias by analyzing the ratio of positive words to negative words. Language mirrors our psychological state, so this finding may suggest that happiness is also declining among the population.

Although recent election coverage may suggest otherwise, research shows that people are more likely to use positive words than negative words on the whole in their communications. Behavioral scientists have extensively documented this phenomenon, known as language positivity bias, in a number of different languages.

family togetherness By Jim BurnsHomeWord I'm happy to announce that over the past few years, more and more families are making the intentional effort to have regular, family-mealtimes. Seven Reasons Why It's Important 1) Keeps Kids Out of Trouble Kids who live in families that eat dinner together regularly are less likely to be involved in at risk behaviors.

"Teenagers are more susceptible to developing disorders like addiction and depression ... "The brain region traditionally associated with reward and motivation, called the nucleus accumbens, was activated similarly in adults and adolescents," said Moghaddam. "But the unique sensitivity of adolescent DS to reward anticipation indicates that, in this age group, reward can tap directly into a brain region that is critical for learning and habit formation." ... not only is reward expectancy processed differently in an adolescent brain, but also it can affect brain regions directly responsible for decision-making and action selection. ... "Adolescence is a time when the symptoms of most mental illnesses-such as schizophrenia and bipolar and eating disorders-are first manifested, so we believe that this is a critical period for preventing these illnesses," Moghaddam said."

"...a new study from the University of California, Berkeley, suggests rumor-mongering can have positive outcomes such as helping us police bad behavior, prevent exploitation and lower stress. ... Overall, the findings indicate that people need not feel bad about revealing the vices of others, especially if it helps save someone from exploitation, the researchers said. ... The study focused on "prosocial" gossip that "has the function of warning others about untrustworthy or dishonest people," said Willer, as opposed to the voyeuristic rumor-mongering about the ups and downs of such tabloid celebrities as Kim Kardashian and Charlie Sheen."

Article about TSA reading body language at the airport.