L&B Special Issue: Interview with Stephen Lea Part 2

My interview with Professor Stephen Lea continues. If you missed Part 1, go here before proceeding. My interview with Professor Stephen Lea continues. Transcription Intro Persaud: You’re listening to All Things Cognition, a Psychonomic Society podcast. Now, here is your host, Laura Mickes. Preface Mickes: Welcome back to my interview with Professor Stephen Lea. If you haven’t listened […]

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Perfecting the profane: Finding the recipe to the best bad words

Warning: Some of the words in this post may be considered offensive. One beauty of the English language is the seemingly infinite possibilities when it comes to making new words. People seem to get especially creative when they’re coming up with new phrases for insults and curse words—the type of language that tends to be […]

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L&B Special Issue: Interview with Stephen Lea Part 1

I met with Stephen Lea to interview him about the Special Issue in his honor in the Psychonomic Society journal Learning & Behavior. The interview episode has two parts and could have had so many more. He has a fascinating career and is very interesting. The beginning of the episode features a brief interview with Lisa […]

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You are not yourself when you’re hungry: Hunger impacts decisions for food and non-food items

Each year around Thanksgiving I am faced with the same dilemma: nibble on a small amount of snacks as the food is being prepared, or delay gratification for the glorious full plate of edible treasures. Although this may seem trivial, allow me to set the stage: Imagine that it’s the morning of Thanksgiving. Your refrigerator […]

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Being mindful about memory: Mindfulness can boost memory performance

Have you paid any mind to the growing popularity of mindfulness? It seems everywhere I look there is a new promotion or app touting the benefits of this meditative practice. But what exactly is mindfulness and how might it benefit us? Mindfulness is a state of being that is characterized by a nonreactive awareness of […]

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Why we don’t serve “cheese and macaroni”: Investigating directionality of relationships between words

We have become experts at remembering pieces of information that share no natural relationships. For example, your friend may have just started a new job, and it is easy for you to remember where she works because the company’s logo and her favorite color are both red. When thinking about remembering two pieces of information, […]

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Is that you? Detecting low occurring fake IDs

Dawn Weatherford (pictured on the right) recently published a paper about detecting fake IDs with co-authors William Blake Erickson, Jasmine Thomas, Mary Walker, and Barret Schein. The paper is called “You shall not pass: how facial variability and feedback affect the detection of low prevalence fake IDs” and appears in the Psychonomic Society journal Cognitive Research: Principles and […]

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White bears are hard to forget, but sometimes we should

In many professions, evaluations can be rough; one negative comment can negate all of the positive comments. Oftentimes, that negative comment takes on the “white bear” or thought suppression phenomenon identified by Daniel Wegner in 1987. Reportedly influenced by the following line from Fyodor Dostoevsky’s “Winter Notes on Summer Impressions” Try to pose for yourself […]

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To deceive or not to deceive: Influence of deception suspicion on behavioral patterns

Kim and Drew want to go out for the evening. Kim wants to attend a symphonic orchestra, but Drew wants to attend a gymnastics competition. While they do not agree on what event to attend, both prefer to do something together rather than alone. The situation constitutes an example of an experimental game, a set […]

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What do dodgeball and chess have in common? Introducing two new digital team members

I’m delighted to welcome Jonathan Caballero and Travis Seale-Carlisle to the digital team as our newest Digital Associate Editors. Jonathan is currently a Postdoctoral Researcher at McGill University. His main research interest involves the influences of perception on social interactions. He is currently investigating how communication impairments associated with Parkinson’s disease impacts social interactions. The […]

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