In this episode of All Things Cognition, I interviewed Caitlin Sisk (pictured below). Caitlin took a break from wedding celebrations in Cape Cod to tell me about the research she and co-authors published recently in the Psychonomic Society journal, Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications (CRPI). To be clear, she was attending the wedding, not a star […]
Attention
We all know that multitasking while driving can have deadly consequences. In the U.S. alone, 3142 deaths and over 400,000 injuries were caused by distracted driving in 2020. In fact, texting while driving doubles your chances of being the cause of an accident. But is all driving-related multitasking this dangerous? A recent report by Mallory […]
Does Stanley Hudson, from The Office (US), sport a moustache? In an opener from the now-classic NBC sitcom, The Office (US), Dunder Mifflin staff members debate over whether their colleague has a moustache. The episode starts with the announcement that Stanley Hudson, a Black employee, is returning from his recent tonsillectomy, and his colleagues get […]
When was the last time you looked for a T among Ls? Unless you spend a lot of time in the lab, running in visual search experiments, your experience of visual search probably isn’t looking for Ts amongst Ls. Your experience of visual search in day to day life is probably more like “where’s my […]
Researchers have argued for centuries over two leading statistical approaches: Bayesian analysis and the Frequentist approach. Both holding their own complex (and convincing) reasoning, well-meaning researchers can all agree on the goal of their analyses: reaching conclusions with the least amount of bias and error. The war between Bayesians and Frequentists is likely far from […]
What does being in nature actually do for us? In the last couple of years, when we’ve all been in lockdown and had to work from home for prolonged periods, we’ve each probably thought “I should get out of the house and get some fresh air” – but does that help in more than the […]
When I was a kid, I had a pair of sunglasses that had little mirrors on the side of the lenses that allowed you to see what was happening behind you. I would walk around my neighborhood feeling so cool, like a bona fide Spy Kid. James Bond had nothing on me. I thought someday […]
One of life’s most difficult challenges is keeping information a secret, even when well-intentioned. Imagine you need to plan a surprise party for your dad. You send out the invitations, order a cake, and buy the decorations. When you’re talking over these details with your brother, he suddenly looks toward the door. Naturally, you look […]
Attention is a key part of cognition, and, therefore, it plays an important role across almost any context you can imagine. It’s critical for behaviors as diverse as air traffic control and keeping track of predators and influences outcomes with high relevance (such as academic performance). It is also sensitive to many factors such as […]
In cases where humans are tasked with jobs that have a lot of variability in workload, the aid of an automated system at the right times would undoubtedly come in handy. In this interview, Andrew Heathcote (pictured below) describes a recent paper by him and his co-authors published in the Psychonomic Society journal Cognitive Research: Principles […]