Note: this article was a part of another, larger article composed in December of 2015. I honestly don’t even know where to begin on the data I’ve looked at over the last week or so. There are so many conversations about homicide, suicide, and guns you could have that any number of different arguments are…
Category: Study
Stop Saying Exercise Cures Depression
Saw this on my news-feed tonight. If I ever take myself out, it’s going to be in a jogging suit in one of these asshole’s offices. Exercise is good for many reasons, and from what I’ve gleaned, we honestly know very little about why it’s good. If you want a good textbook on the science,…
Risk-Taking and Religion Part 4
Part 1 here. Part 2 here. Part 3 here. Study 4: “We used a more targeted measure assessing the dimension of belief that we predicted to be relevant to the current effect—attachment security. Individuals who are more securely attached to God perceive God as a better source of security and protection (Kirkpatrick & Shaver, 1992)….
Risk-Taking and Religion Part 3
Part 1 here. Part 2 here. Study 3: “Across five studies, priming God increased people’s willingness to take nonmoral risks. In Study 3, we tested our hypothesis that this effect occurs because reminders of God lead individuals to perceive themselves as protected—that is, that the risks present less danger.” For this experiment they went back…
Risk-Taking and Religion Part 2
Part 1 here. “Study 2 was a field experiment in which we posted ads to a social-networking Web site and recorded click-through rates…. We launched six advertisements for 1 day each on a social-networking Web site in a 2 (God vs. no God) × 3 (immoral risk vs. nonmoral risk vs. no risk) design. The…
Psychology’s Reproduciblity and Media Obliviousness
“Remember that study that found that most psychology studies were wrong?” asks Slate writer Rachel Gross. Not even, “did you hear”, but “do you remember”. There is now no longer a question as to if this matter needs explained first. It’s already common knowledge. Everybody’s read this study. If you haven’t, you’re behind. Just play…
Scientific Literacy & Optimism on the Political Spectrum
The U.S. General Social Survey is fairly substantial data trawl that looks for a variety of demographic and opinion data from US residents. Science literacy and political views–or at least proxies for these–are among the pieces of information sought out. There is a general stereotype that liberals tend to be more scientifically literate and more…
No Evidence that the Holocaust is Heritable
What makes a man? This is the perennial question of mankind. In recent years, advancements in biology and medicine have given us a thousand new ways to ponder that question. We may have stopped looking for a literal soul, but the line between nature and nurture is a fun one to skim. Our genetic code,…
Is HR Biased Against Fat People?
The Germans say “yes”, although their study leaves much to be desired. This article was brought to my attention by a friend, so let the record show I take requests. “Stigmatization of obese individuals by human resource professionals: an experimental study” You can skip the part under “Abstract”. That’s just the teaser. The paper itself…
Science Has Not Proven People Who Swear Have a Bigger Vocabulary
“People who curse a lot have better vocabularies than those who don’t, study finds“. If you don’t want to read the whole thing, what they did find was that people don’t have a huge repertoire of swear-words, but if you put a classroom together, pretty much every single person is going to have a swear…