Category: Studies

  • Relationships Better with Age

    At PsychCentral:  Relationships Grow, Improve with Age. “Older adults report better marriages, more supportive friendships and less conflict with children and siblings.” So…time to start aging.

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  • Stress and Relapse

    Ignored stress brings cravings, then relapse, says study. Researchers supplied Palm Pilots to 55 college students who were in recovery from substance abuse ranging from alcohol to cocaine and club drugs. The students were asked to record the their daily cravings for alcohol and other drugs, as well as the intensity of negative social experiences…

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  • Vacation Science

    The Boston Globe looks at the science of taking a good vacation. For psychologists and behavioral economists, vacations are a window into the still only dimly understood mystery of human pleasure, a field known as hedonic psychology. Their research, along with other work on prototypically pleasant (and unpleasant) experiences, has begun to yield a portrait…

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  • Benefits of Caretaking

    Taking care of a spouse who is ill can increase anxiety and depression, however… [A study] found that when spouses were engaged in active caring tasks they had an increase in positive emotions, while time spent in passive care tended to provoke more negative emotions.  Spouses who viewed themselves as sharing a mutually close relationship with their…

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  • Blame the Brain

    PsychCentral:  Personality Reflects Size of Respective Brain Area. For example, conscientious people tend to have a bigger lateral prefrontal cortex, a region of the brain involved in planning and controlling behavior…  

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