Deric Bownds

LATEST ARTICLES ( 2685 )

• You Should Probably End a Conversation Sooner Than You Think.

  From Mastroianni et al.: Significance Social connection is essential to physical and psychological well-being, and conversation is the primary means by which... Read more

  Posted on 15 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Turn Your Living Room into a Neuro Lab for Marketing Research....

  MindBlog gets quite a few jaw-dropping emails. I'll spare you the email responding to a MindBlog post on a model of societal collapse that suggested I... Read more

  Posted on 12 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Changing Basic Personality Traits with a Smartphone App?

  A group of Swiss researchers has taken direct aim at trying to modify, in a digital intervention experiment with ~1,500 participants, the basic OCEAN personalit... Read more

  Posted on 11 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Evidence for an Influence of Meditation on Immune-related Pathways?

  I pass on the abstract, below, and also the entire text of a study by Chaix et al.:Highlights • We explored the methylome of trained meditators vs... Read more

  Posted on 10 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Echo Chamber Effect on Social Media

  From Cinelli et al.: Significance We explore the key differences between the main social media platforms and how they are likely to influence information... Read more

  Posted on 09 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Sexiest Birds on the Planet - Manakins Have the Best Moves

  

  Elizabeth Pennisi describes reports from a recent virtual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology on the genetic underpinnings of the... Read more

  Posted on 08 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Lifestyle and Mental Health Disruptions During COVID-19

  From Giuntella et al: Significance COVID-19 has affected daily life in unprecedented ways. Drawing on a longitudinal dataset of college students before and... Read more

  Posted on 05 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• A Graphic of the Coming Collapse of Our Marine Ecosystems.

  

  I've just done a slow read through a PNAS Perspective article authored by a collaborative of mainly European scientists on "The quiet crossing of ocean tipping... Read more

  Posted on 04 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Wellness Apps Can't Cure Our Digital Dehumanization

  Wortham describes the surge in the use of wellness Apps as we have shifted our entire lives indoors this past year and notes that they can't address the real... Read more

  Posted on 03 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Avoiding Psychological Biases That Trick Your Brain.

  The monthly Austin Rainbow Forum discussion group which I help organize meets on the first Sunday afternoon of each month, and I thought I would pass on... Read more

  Posted on 02 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Humans Are Animals - Get Over It. Let Go of 'the Purpose and Meaning of It All'

  Philosophy professor Crispin Sartwell does a piece discussing how relentlessly Western philosophy has strained to prove we are not squirrels: ... Read more

  Posted on 01 March 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Life Cycle of a New Social Network

  Kevin Roose does an interesting article on Clubhouse, the hot new audio social network, which has a nice chunk of writing I want to pass on: Every successful... Read more

  Posted on 26 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Train Yourself to Be Happy

  

  Walter Scott's series of cartoons in The New Yorker that puts my bloviating on similar topics to shame. Here is just one in his series of Read more

  Posted on 25 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Music and Medicine

  Amy McDermott does an open source article on how music is increasingly being employed as a medical therapy. Here are some clips from the article: ... Read more

  Posted on 24 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Real-time Talking with Dreamers During REM Sleep

  A fascinating new window for reserach on dreaming has been opened by four collaborating but independent laboratory groups. The summary of the open source articl... Read more

  Posted on 23 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• So...whatcha Gonna Offer Me for This Cell Phone I Stole from You?

  Macaque monkeys have learned how to drive a hard bargain.They have learned to barter for food with humans to return stolen possessions according to how highly a... Read more

  Posted on 22 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Why Cats Like Catnip...

  Interesting work from Uenoyama et al.: Domestic cats and other felids rub their faces and heads against catnip (Nepeta cataria) and silver vine (Actinidia... Read more

  Posted on 19 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• The Gut Microbiome Can Instruct Brain Cells to Fight Neuroinflammation.

  I perk up whenever I see a reference relevant to 'inflamaging,' the slow rise of cellular inflammation that accompanies - as I am too well aware in my own case ... Read more

  Posted on 16 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• Personal Experiences Bridge Moral and Political Divides Better Than Facts

  From Kubin et al. in PNAS: Significance All Americans are affected by rising political polarization, whether because of a gridlocked Congress or antagonistic... Read more

  Posted on 15 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE

• You've Gotta Watch This - A Billion Year Journey of Earth's Tectonic Plates

  

  The article by Andrews in the New York Times describes the history of tectonic plate theory and brings into vivid focus how us humans are just a transient eye... Read more

  Posted on 12 February 2021 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE