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Do you find it hard to make d ecisions ? I don't.  I make them quickly.  But sometimes, I regret them. Now a new study says penny-wise, pound-foolish ones are explained by neurons' firing in our brains, according to newswise.com. Spending decisions are influenced by adaptation in neural circuits. Say what? It's all trying to say that the  study suggests that being penny wise and pound foolish is not so much a failure of judgment as it is a function of how our brains tally the value of objects that vary widely in worth. Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found that when monkeys are faced with a choice between two options, the firing of neurons activated in the brain adjusts to reflect the enormity of the decision. Such an approach would explain why the same person can see 20 cents as a lot one moment and $5,000 as a little the next, the researchers said. “Everybody recognizes this behavior, because everybody does ...

What's that great expression? You never get a second chance to make a first impression? Now a new study says, when judging other people, first impressions last. Vivian Zayas, professor of psychology at Cornell University, and her colleagues found that people continue to be influenced by another person’s appearance even after interacting with them face-to-face. First impressions formed simply from looking at a photograph predicted how people felt and thought about the person after a live interaction that took place one month to six months later, newswise.com reports. “Facial appearance colors how we feel about someone, and even how we think about who they are,” says Zayas, an expert in the cognitive and affective processes that regulate close relationships. “These facial cues are very powerful in shaping interactions, even in the presence of other information.” The researchers ran experiments in which 55 participants looked at photographs of four women who were s...

Why are we so afraid to leave our children alone ?  I know I'm guilty, though when my son was about 10, he wanted to be left home alone! But it's turning out that the moral judgments of parents affect perceptions of risk According to newswise.com, leaving a child unattended is considered taboo in today’s intensive parenting atmosphere, despite evidence that American children are safer than ever. "So why are parents denying their children the same freedom and independence that they themselves enjoyed as children? A new study by University of California, Irvine social scientists suggests that our fears of leaving children alone have become systematically exaggerated in recent decades – not because the practice has become more dangerous, but because it has become socially unacceptable." Think, Tiger Mom. When I was a kid, we rode bikes and hiked through the woods of our neighborhood all day and often into the night, hanging out at each other's homes wh...

OK.  So your nose is a little big.  And your chin's a little too soft.  You may feel self-conscious about these things.  You know your beauty is deep inside.  But there's a reason that that self-consciousness may persist. Children are less likely to trust ugly people. According to newswise.com, children think the uglier you are, the less trustworthy you are. In a study recently published in Frontiers in Psychology , researchers have found that as children, how we perceive someone's trustworthiness is linked to how attractive we find them. Our ability to make this trustworthiness judgment develops as we grow, becoming more consistent as we approach adulthood, and, girls are better at it than boys. Many psychology studies have proven the existence of the so-called "beauty stereotype". This describes the phenomenon whereby more attractive people are also considered to be smarter, more sociable and more successful. To be attractive is to be treated bet...

A new study has found that women see risk a lot more negatively than men. According to newswise.com, "Risky situations increase anxiety for women but not for men, leading women to perform worse under these circumstances." “On the surface, risky situations may not appear to be particularly disadvantageous to women, but these findings suggest otherwise,” the Web site quotes study author Susan R. Fisk, a doctoral candidate in sociology at Stanford University, who defines a risky situation as any setting with an uncertain outcome in which there can be both positive or negative results, depending on some combination of skill and chance. And it doesn't have to be whether it's only just when you consider jumping out of an airplane with only a parachute on your back.   According to Fisk, people often think of an extreme physical or financial risk when they think about a “risky situation.” Yet, in reality, people encounter risky situations all of the time. Fi...

I always thought I was a  pretty good writer.  I've won state writing contests since I was 12.  But lately I've been reading some novels and I realized, maybe I'm not all that. That's right in keeping with what a new study has found.  According to newswise.com,  it’s a natural reaction "because we have a hard time accurately evaluating our abilities." People often think they are good at their job or have a talent, such as singing, because of the feedback they receive from employers, family and friends, the Web site reports. "Too often that feedback is vague" and does not offer any suggestions for improvement, it quotes a study expert. "It is much easier to tell someone they are doing a good job instead of being honest and risk hurting their feelings." “This is one reason why we have barriers to self-insight, because oftentimes, even if we get feedback, it’s not accurate,”  Zlatan Krizan, an associate professor of psychology at Iowa ...

My son shocked me the other day when he said I don't trust most people.  I suppose he's right.  And maybe that means I'm not very intelligent. A new study has shown that intelligent people are more likely to trust, according to medicalnewstoday.com (MNT). They are also better judges of character. As the Web site reports, if you often put your trust in other people, that means you're, well, really smart. In the study,  participants' intelligence levels were measured through a 10-word vocabulary test and an assessment that determined how well participants understood the survey questions. "The researchers found that participants who scored highly on measures of intelligence were more likely to trust others, compared with those who had low scores on intelligence levels," according to MNT. Why? Since s marter individuals are better judges of character, "they tend to develop relationships with people who are less likely to betray them," says...