Often, the goal of science is to show that things are not what they seem to be. But now, in an article which will be published in an upcoming issue of Perspectives on Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, a veteran cognitive psychologist exhorts his colleagues in memory research to consult the truth of their own experience…

Praying about health issues dramatically increased among American adults over the past three decades, rising 36 percent between 1999 and 2007, according to a study published by the American Psychological Association…

Men who visit art galleries, museums, and the theatre regularly tend to enjoy better health and are more satisfied with life, reveals a study published online in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health…

If a gay or bisexual man seeks sex or dating online, the type of partner or relationship he wants is a good indicator of whether he’ll engage in safe sex, a new study suggests.

Often, the goal of science is to show that things are not what they seem to be. But now, in a new article, a veteran cognitive psychologist exhorts his colleagues in memory research to consult the truth of their own experience.

Sweden and the US are two countries in which increased leisure use of computers by children can lead to poorer reading ability, according to a new analysis.

Psychologists believe they are overturning the dominant theory of how children learn their first words, suggesting that it occurs more in moments of insight than gradually through repeated exposure.

Johns Hopkins University bioethicists say disaster-response planning has generally overlooked the special needs of people who suffer from pre-existing and serious mental conditions. Survivors already diagnosed with schizophrenia, dementia, addictions and bipolar disorder are vulnerable long before a disaster strikes, they point out…

The current research tests the hypothesis that face processing is attuned to high-status faces. Across three experiments, faces of high-status targets were better recognized than faces of low-status targets. In Experiment 2, this memory advantage for high-status targets also extended to an attentional bias toward high-status targets and to stronger sociospatial memory (identity–location link) for high-status targets. Finally, Experiment 3 finds that high-status faces received more expert-style holistic processing than did low-status faces. This suggests that high-status faces also benefit more from the strategic deployment of expert face processing resources than low-status faces. Taken together, these data indicate that perceivers strategically allocate face processing resources to targets perceived to be high in status.

Despite repeated trials,people consistently fail to learn the solution to the Monty Hall problem (MHP). This research examines the links between learning, counterfactual thinking, and memory for decision/outcome frequencies. Study 1 participants completed 60 MHP trials and listed their thoughts following losses. Results showed that participants tended to counterfactualize switch losses more than stick losses, adhered to the prescriptions of their counterfactuals more frequently following switch losses than any other decisions/outcomes, and were less likely to learn the solution as counterfactuals increased. Furthermore, memory for switch losses was significantly overestimated, and the relationship between counterfactuals and learning was mediated by misestimation of decision/outcome frequencies. In Study 2, counterfactual salience was manipulated. Learning was less likely to occur when counterfactual salience was high than when it was low, a relationship that was again mediated by memory of decision/outcome frequencies. Findings are discussed in light of their theoretical and applied implications.