Science of the SpiritS


Eye 2

Psychopaths feign emotion in order to take advantage of others - Study

Kimberly M. Aquilina
PsyPost
Sun, 10 May 2015 13:46 UTC
Psychopath
Psychopaths are more convincing when demonstrating fear or remorse, because they have to practice the outward signs of the emotion, like facial expressions.
"The surface of the psychopath... shows up as equal to or better than normal and gives no hint at all of a disorder within. Nothing about him suggests oddness, inadequacy, or moral frailty," psychiatrist Hervey M. Cleckley wrote in his 1941 seminal work, The Mask of Sanity.

Psychopathy is a personality disorder characterized by impulsivity, manipulative behavior, and a lack of empathy, fear and remorse. However, new psychology research suggests that while psychopathic individuals don't feel these emotions as strongly as others, they can do a better job of pretending to display them than the average person.


Comment: A true psychopath won't feel empathy or remorse at all - that's what makes them psychopaths.


Comment: Also see:
  • Psychopathy: An important forensic concept for the 21st century
  • The hidden cost of smiling: Smiles brighten our lives, but what's lost in the glare?
  • How psychopaths see sex, and why


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2 + 2 = 4

We don't need no education: Seven sins of compulsory schooling

Peter Gray, Ph.D.
Waking Times
Sat, 09 May 2015 23:31 UTC
schoolkids
© unknown
In my last post I took a step that, I must admit, made me feel uncomfortable. I said, several times: "School is prison." I felt uncomfortable saying that because school is so much a part of my life and the lives of almost everyone I know. I, like most people I know, went through the full 12 years of public schooling. My mother taught in a public school for several years. My beloved half-sister is a public schoolteacher. I have many dear friends and cousins who are public schoolteachers. How can I say that these good people - who love children and have poured themselves passionately into the task of trying to help children - are involved in a system of imprisoning children? The comments on my last post showed that my references to school as prison made some other people feel uncomfortable also.

Sometimes I find, no matter how uncomfortable it makes me and others feel, I have to speak the truth. We can use all the euphemisms we want, but the literal truth is that schools, as they generally exist in the United States and other modern countries, are prisons. Human beings within a certain age range (most commonly 6 to 16) are required by law to spend a good portion of their time there, and while there they are told what they must do, and the orders are generally enforced. They have no or very little voice in forming the rules they must follow. A prison - according to the common, general definition - is any place of involuntary confinement and restriction of liberty.

Comment: The Untold History of Modern U.S. Education
"In our dreams, people yield themselves with perfect docility to our molding hands. The present education conventions of intellectual and character education fade from their minds and unhampered by tradition we work our own good will upon a grateful and responsive folk. We shall not try to make these people or any of their children into men of learning or philosophers, or men of science. We have not to raise up from them authors, educators, poets or men of letters, great artists, painters, musicians, nor lawyers, doctors, statesmen, politicians, creatures of whom we have ample supply. The task is simple. We will organize children and teach them in a perfect way the things their fathers and mothers are doing in an imperfect way.

~ First mission statement of the J.D. Rockefeller-endowed General Education Board in 1906


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Bulb

Scientists reconcile three unrelated theories of schizophrenia

Duke University
PsyPost
Mon, 04 May 2015 03:12 UTC
brain schizophrenia
© Alan Ajifo (Creative Commons)
A new Duke University study in mice links three previous and, until now, apparently unrelated hypotheses about the causes of schizophrenia, a debilitating mental disorder appearing in late adolescence that affects how people think, act and perceive reality.

The brains of people with the schizophrenia show various abnormalities, including faulty neural connections or an imbalance of certain brain chemicals. However, it has been unclear whether such brain-based observations could be related to one another or could describe different types of schizophrenia.

Published May 4, 2015, in Nature Neuroscience, the new findings may eventually lead to treatment strategies targeted for the underlying causes of schizophrenia and related disorders, said the study's corresponding author Scott Soderling, an associate professor of cell biology and neurobiology in the Duke School of Medicine.
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Hearts

How Dads influence teens' happiness

Scientific American
Paul Raeburn
Thu, 01 May 2014 16:59 UTC
The influence of fathers on their teenage children has long been overlooked. Now researchers are finding surprising ways in which dads make a difference

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In 2011 administrators at Frayser High School in Memphis, Tenn., came to a disturbing realization. About one in five of its female students was either pregnant or had recently given birth. City officials disputed the exact figures, but they admitted that Frayser had a problem. The president of a local nonprofit aimed at helping girls blamed the disturbing rate of teen pregnancy on television.

She pointed to the MTV shows 16 and Pregnant and Teen Mom. "So much of our society is sexually oriented," she said, arguing that the fixation on sex was enticing girls to have unprotected sex earlier and more often. A lot of us might say the same thing. We know that teenagers are impressionable, and the idea that they would be swayed by MTV makes sense.
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Hearts

Oxytocin: Why the love hormone is good for you

David R. Hamilton, Ph.D.
Huffington Post
Wed, 06 May 2015 00:03 UTC
Image
© Getty images
I've written quite a lot about oxytocin, which also goes by the name of "love hormone," "cuddle chemical," "molecule of kindness," or any other affectionate term that implies something about bonding and connecting.

If you ever wondered about those names, it's because we produce oxytocin when we're feeling love or connection (with a human, animal, tree, spiritual diety) and also when we hug.

Here's a little summary of some of the healthy things that happen in our bodies when we produce oxytocin.

Comment: For more information about Oxytocin - a hormone released by the pituitary gland that affects both the body and the brain, read the following articles:

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2 + 2 = 4

The six faces of maternal narcissism

Karyl McBride Ph.D
Psychology Today
Mon, 14 Mar 2011 21:35 UTC
What does the empty mirror reflect for you?

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The disorder of narcissistic parenting creates significant emotional damage to children. If not understood, children raised by narcissistic parents grow up in a state of denial, thinking it is their fault and they are simply not good enough. If good enough, they would have been loved by that parent. While this is a cognitive distortion about self, the myriad of internal messages gleaned from childhood have a haunting effect on adult children of narcissistic parents. "Will I ever be good enough?" "Am I lovable?" "Am I only valued for what I do and how I look?" "Can I trust my own feelings?" Sound familiar?

The word "narcissism" is becoming more of a household term, but is usually used in disparaging others. It is not funny, sometimes not understood, and often used to describe a haughty or arrogant person. The reality is, true narcissism is a serious disorder that harms children. I don't find the humor. Narcissists are truly all about themselves and cannot show genuine empathy. They have a limited capacity for giving unconditional love to their children. The alarming effects are cause for concern.
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Info

Scientists closer to understanding the brain, teleportation

Tanya Lewis
Live Science
Thu, 30 Apr 2015 17:06 UTC
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© Arvid GuterstamWhile participants lay in a brain scanner, they experienced the illusion that they were being "teleported" to different locations around the room.
What happens in the brain when a person has an out-of-body experience? A team of scientists may now have an answer.

In a new study, researchers using a brain scanner and some fancy camera work gave study participants the illusion that their bodies were located in a part of a room other than where they really were. Then, the researchers examined the participants' brain activity, to find out which brain regions were involved in the participants' perceptions about where their body was.

The findings showed that the conscious experience of where one's body is located arises from activity in brain areas involved in feelings of body ownership, as well as regions that contain cells known to be involved in spatial orientation, the researchers said. Earlier work done in animals had showed these cells, dubbed "GPS cells," have a key role in navigation and memory.

Comment: Interesting research in how our brain works.

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Info

The difference between procrastination and laziness

Neel Burton, M.D.
Psychology Today
Tue, 05 May 2015 16:22 UTC
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© WikicommonsProblems with procrastination or just a 'lazybones'?
We are being lazy if we are able to carry out some activity that we ought to carry out, but are disinclined to do so on account of the effort involved. Instead, we remain idle, carry out the activity perfunctorily, or engage in some other less strenuous or boring activity. In short, we are being lazy if our motivation to spare ourselves effort trumps our motivation to do the right or best or expected thing.

Synonyms for laziness include indolence and sloth. Indolence derives from the Latin indolentia, 'without pain' or 'without taking trouble'.

Sloth has more moral and spiritual overtones than either laziness or indolence. In the Christian tradition, sloth is one of the seven deadly sins because it undermines society and God's plan and invites all manner of sin. The Bible inveighs against slothfulness, notably in the Book of Ecclesiastes: 'By much slothfulness the building decayeth; and through idleness of the hands the house droppeth through. A feast is made for laughter, and wine maketh merry: but money answereth all things.'

Comment: For more on willpower, procrastination, and getting things done, check out:
  • New trick could help overcome procrastination
  • Willpower alone is not enough: Unconscious motivation plays a substantial role in how we respond to challenges
  • Use the power of check lists!


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Info

Guys like helping attractive female avatars more than ugly ones

Brett Smith
RedOrbit
Tue, 05 May 2015 16:22 UTC
Female Avatars
© Thinkstock
It may seem like men are always willing to lend an attractive women a hand, and a new study has found this bias extends into virtual worlds.

Published in the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, the new study looked at how men and women interact with each other in an online game. Researchers saw that women were offered less help in the game when they selected an unattractive female avatar, as opposed to an attractive female or male virtual representative.

"It doesn't matter if you have an ugly avatar or not, if you're a man, you'll still receive about the same amount of help," said study author Franklin Waddell, a doctoral candidate in mass communications at Penn State. "However, if you are a woman and operate an unattractive avatar, you will receive significantly less help."

Waddell said the study's result with respect to virtual attractiveness mirrors what other studies found in the real world.

"Overall, many of the same gender and sexual stereotypes seem to permeate the online worlds," Waddell said. "The study supports the idea that our responses to stereotypes and norms follow us from real life into virtual environments."
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Info

New trick could help overcome procrastination

Chuck Bednar
RedOrbit
Sat, 02 May 2015 18:21 UTC
Procrastination
© Thinkstock "I got so much procrastinating done today!"
Researchers from the University of Southern California say that they've come up with a sure-fire way for people to overcome procrastination and get to work on accomplishing their goals.

The trick, they explain in the journal Psychological Science, is to change the way that you think about the future. Future goals have to feel as though they're important now.

"The simplified message that we learned in these studies is if the future doesn't feel imminent, then, even if it's important, people won't start working on their goals," said Oyserman, who was assisted on the research by co-author Neil Lewis Jr. of the University of Michigan.

In a series of experiments, the duo presented study participants with different scenarios and found that those individuals looked at the future as something that was far more imminent when they evaluated goals and deadlines in terms of days rather than months or years.
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