Sarcasm, a type of irony, is inescapably embedded in the internet today, with ironic language of some kind being ubiquitous on Facebook, Twitter, in blogs, in news articles, and more. Computers, unlike people, often fail to detect sarcasm, which has the notable quality of often meaning nearly the opposite of what was written. For example, […]
Toxic. Justice. Misinformation. These three words garnered much attention in 2018. For example, there was a 45% increase in the number of times that the word “toxic” was looked up and a 75% increase in the number of times that the word “justice” was looked up on online dictionaries. The increase in interest in these […]
I sometimes wish I had perfect memory. No more missed appointments! I’d never misplace my phone (it’s always on my bedroom dresser). And I’d always remember the name of that actress (whats-her-name, in that thing!), or my colleague (sorry….), or my friend (really??). Yep, life would be pretty sweet. Despite these fantasies, individuals with highly-superior […]
Suppose you own Montana’s only candle-holder shop. Business is going well and you want to inspire your two employees, Fred and Giselle, to work even harder so you can open a franchise in Idaho. You decide to offer a performance bonus to your best employee, defined as the person who is most courteous to customers […]
Going to the market at the beginning of the day produces many options, most of which are of high quality and plentiful. Unfortunately, by the end of the day, the options are no longer bountiful or beautiful. The same principle applies to sub-human species including our close cousins, the primates. Many foragers live by learning how […]
Have you ever met anyone who dislikes magic tricks? No, me neither. Magicians and magic tricks seem to be universally appreciated in western culture. Whether it is at corporate events, kids’ birthday parties, or simply at the pub down the road, magic is fun and attracts an appreciative audience of all ages. One question that […]
The following guidelines were adopted in 2012 and were updated in 2019 by Alexander Etz, Stephan Lewandowsky, and Richard Morey. The guidelines have a permanent home here, but they are provided as a blogpost here to enable interested members to comment. The Psychonomic Society’s Publications Committee and Ethics Committee and the Editors-in-Chief of the Society’s […]
When you think of creativity what do you imagine? There are a lot of examples to choose from, like cooking up a new take on a traditional dish, working with a team to reason through a difficult business problem, writing short stories, trouble-shooting an engineering problem that had everyone else stumped, or coming up with […]
It is rare that we can do two things at once—if someone asks you to rub your stomach and pat your head, odds are that you’ll rub your head. A better strategy for a lot of different cognitive tasks is to switch between them. Switching typically comes at a cost, however. Switching can even negatively […]
Statistical graphs are so ubiquitous and part of our daily work that we may forget how powerful they are. Since their invention by William Playfair a little over 200 years ago, graphs have become indispensable tools not just in science and business, but also in politics. Indeed, one of Playfair’s contributions was to draw attention […]