Behavior & Decisions Economists paid thousands of people to quit Facebook for a month, and the effects went beyond what anyone expected Oct 29 · 3 min read · American Economic Review
Mind & Brain Patients were told their pills were sugar pills with no medicine in them, and their symptoms still improved more than in people given nothing Oct 29 · 3 min read · PLOS ONE
Mind & Brain A smartphone study of 2,250 people found their minds were wandering almost half the time, and it made them less happy Oct 29 · 2 min read · Science
Well-being People who wrote down five things they were grateful for each week for 10 weeks felt more optimistic and exercised more Oct 29 · 3 min read · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
Relationships An analysis of 148 studies found that people with strong social ties had 50% better odds of survival, an effect on par with quitting smoking Oct 29 · 3 min read · PLOS Medicine
Behavior & Decisions The famous marshmallow test said kids who waited would do better in life, but a larger study found family background explained much of it Oct 29 · 3 min read · Developmental Psychology
Behavior & Decisions For years, psychologists believed willpower runs out like a battery, until a test across 23 labs found almost no effect Oct 29 · 3 min read · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
Behavior & Decisions A famous jam experiment suggested that too many choices stop people from buying anything, but later research complicated the story Oct 29 · 3 min read · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
Well-being A 90-minute walk in nature, but not along a busy road, quieted a brain region linked to brooding over negative thoughts Oct 29 · 2 min read · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Mind & Brain After one night without sleep, the brain’s emotional alarm center reacted 60% more strongly to upsetting images Oct 29 · 3 min read · Current Biology
Behavior & Decisions People in a pain experiment chose to repeat the longer, more painful trial, and it reveals how memory really judges experiences Oct 29 · 3 min read · Psychological Science
Relationships Commuters asked to talk to a stranger on the train had a more pleasant ride, even though most people predicted the opposite Oct 29 · 3 min read · Journal of Experimental Psychology: General
