Imagine learning how to read and play music for the first time. It starts with a series of dots and lines thrown around on a piece of paper. Soon you learn how to interpret these so-called notes. You assign a letter name to each note, and then you figure out how to produce that note […]
Learning and Memory
What’s SpongeBob Squarepants’ claim to fame besides being an animated cheese-looking, blockhead sponge under-the-sea main character of a children’s cartoon with catchy song lyrics? Apparently, aside from the possible influence on decreased attention span in children, the creators of SpongeBob SquarePants weren’t too far off in their character portrayal of different sea creatures, including the […]
If you’re an educator, you’ve probably wondered how many of your students are paying attention as you deliver course content in class. Although most research on mind wandering has been conducted in the laboratory, understanding when and why students mind wander during class can have important implications for how we teach and design our learning […]
Psychologists have been fascinated with the effects of competition on performance for a long time. Way back in 1898, Triplett found that bike racers were faster when racing against each other versus against the clock and similar research continues to this day. A recent summary suggests that competition can be both beneficial and harmful, depending […]
Here’s a disconcerting thought: what if the baggage screener at the airport – not that many of us are spending much time in airports these days – got paid a bonus for confidently flagging bags for additional inspection? In an ideal world, they would just assess bags based on the perceptual information they have from […]
Everyone wants to be better at focusing, remembering, and problem-solving, right? The self-help market recognizes and exploits this and is teeming with brain games that promise a sharper mind. Many of these games are based on tasks that cognitive psychologists use to study working memory, the system involved in short-term processing and storage of information. Whether or […]
Do you sometimes hear words that are entirely different from what was said? And how about mishearing the lyrics to popular songs, as demonstrated in the video below? If you answered yes to these questions, you are not alone! False hearing is a common phenomenon that happens to people of all ages. For the record, […]
According to a report published by a task force on Women in Psychology through the American Psychological Association in 2006, about 47% of candidates receiving post-baccalaureate degrees (doctoral and masters) in cognitive psychology in 2004 were women (Table 6). And although 75% of the students in graduate psychology programs are women, many barriers continue to […]
“I am an island” (Simon & Garfunkel) Consider the lyrics from Simon & Garfunkel’s “I am a Rock,” A winter’s day In a deep and dark December I am alone Gazing from my window to the streets below On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow I am a rock I am an island I’ve built […]
Have you ever said hello to someone who looked familiar, but then realized that they are a complete stranger? It’s embarrassing, sure. But the cost of mistaking someone for another person is much greater if you made this error as an eyewitness to a crime. This type of error is made when an eyewitness identifies an […]