Showing posts with label psychology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label psychology. Show all posts
Fact - The color of a pill matters
If I'm going to talk about pills, you know what kind of reference I'm going to pull right?
Matrix.
So, Neo had to choose between the blue pill that would have put him back to sleep in the boring world of cubicles, and the red pill that would wake him up to the industrial womb factory world.
If you missed that, red pill wakes you up, blue pill makes you sleep!
Now, what colors are the sleeping pills? Yep, be it the package or the pill itself, all you see there is blue! And that's no coincidence; researchers have found that the color of a pill makes a difference in how it works.
In a study, patients were given the exact same sedative, but some received it in a blue pill and others in an orange one. The blue pill takers reported falling asleep 30 minutes faster and sleeping 30 minutes longer than the orange pill takers.
It's another weird manifestation of the placebo effect. How you perceive effectiveness, affects effectiveness.
In a different experiment, subjects were told they were going to get a sedative or a stimulant, when in fact they were getting placebos. Yet 66% of the subjects who took the blue pills reported feeling less alert compared to 26% of those who took pink pills.
And in another study, researchers put fake medicine packages in front of subjects, who picked certain color of boxes over others. It seems warm colors like brown and red were perceived as more potent; green and yellow on the other hand, might as well have been mentos as far as they were concerned.
So, this is why heart medicine are often red or brown, while skin medicines are yellow, sleeping pills blue or green, and painkillers are often white.
Wonder about that!
The looking glass
So, as a woman, I take pride in having a giant ass mirror in my room.
Maybe you guys who have to go to the bathroom to check your hair and don't care how the clothes you're wearing fit won't get this but, trust me, any woman would kill for a mirror like mine. It's practical and useful, for obvious reasons...Well, obvious for the feminine gender of course. Nonetheless I'll sum it up for you males. Clothes, hair, make-up and overall figure.
Anyways, this looking glass it's not only useful for these things. It has one more trick up its sleeve!
As you all probably have seen in movies, there's a cliche scene where the protagonist has a one-on-one pep talk with himself in the mirror, and usually happens when he's faced with an ethical decision or he needs to boost his confidence.
Yes, in reality, doing this would seem silly, but you have to admit you have done this at least once!
Okay, maybe you didn't talk, maybe you didn't point to the mirror pretending you have a gun, maybe you didn't say "Are you talking to me?"; maybe you just thought to yourself "I can do this!"
...Or maybe you did all of this. No judging here.
Studies have been conducted to determine how confrontation with our own reflections affects our morality. One, conducted on Halloween, gave kids the opportunity to grab candy out of unsupervised bowls. The bowls were exactly the same at separate houses, the only difference was that one bowl had a mirror behind it. As a result, the children were significantly less likely to steal candy when they had to look at their reflections, even though they were wearing costumes! and a similar test was done on adults at a news stand who paid for newspapers on the honor system. The results were nearly identical. We are more likely to act morally while confronted with our own faces.
So, it seems the looking glass is used as a moral compass...And if you know someone with spectrophobia (fear of mirror and one's own reflections), beware!
Wonder about that!
Maybe you guys who have to go to the bathroom to check your hair and don't care how the clothes you're wearing fit won't get this but, trust me, any woman would kill for a mirror like mine. It's practical and useful, for obvious reasons...Well, obvious for the feminine gender of course. Nonetheless I'll sum it up for you males. Clothes, hair, make-up and overall figure.
Anyways, this looking glass it's not only useful for these things. It has one more trick up its sleeve!
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| Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the fairest of them all? |
Yes, in reality, doing this would seem silly, but you have to admit you have done this at least once!
Okay, maybe you didn't talk, maybe you didn't point to the mirror pretending you have a gun, maybe you didn't say "Are you talking to me?"; maybe you just thought to yourself "I can do this!"
...Or maybe you did all of this. No judging here.
Studies have been conducted to determine how confrontation with our own reflections affects our morality. One, conducted on Halloween, gave kids the opportunity to grab candy out of unsupervised bowls. The bowls were exactly the same at separate houses, the only difference was that one bowl had a mirror behind it. As a result, the children were significantly less likely to steal candy when they had to look at their reflections, even though they were wearing costumes! and a similar test was done on adults at a news stand who paid for newspapers on the honor system. The results were nearly identical. We are more likely to act morally while confronted with our own faces.
So, it seems the looking glass is used as a moral compass...And if you know someone with spectrophobia (fear of mirror and one's own reflections), beware!
Wonder about that!
Fact - That friend that doesn't want to go out is NOT antisocial!
So according to popular believe, if your friend or whoever avoids social interaction, they're antisocial, 'cause if they don't want to do something social, they must be anti social!
Yeaaah...No.
I get how people think that if someone who is reluctant to participate in social situations is categorized as antisocial. However, in fact, these people, the antisocial ones I mean, are often pro social, even unusually so!
Antisocial Personality Disorder is diagnosed in adults (18 years or more) who consistently disregard and ignore the rights, are impulsive, irresponsible, lie, or generally act recklessly with no concern for the safety of themselves or others. They are often extroverted and very much the opposite of the type of people who are so often called antisocial, who care about other people's feelings. These people are usually just shy or have social anxiety disorder or maybe avoidant personality disorder.
Fact – You emotionally bond with people you sing with!
Yep. Scientists have discovered that when we perform synchronized activities such as singing songs, reciting chants or even just walking together, we end up feeling more connected to the people we're performing these activities with. Although, it turns out it's not exactly what you're saying or singing that matters, it's just the fact that you're performing these activities in unison with other people.
Researchers at Stanford University found that when volunteers were instructed to walk around campus together, the simple difference between letting them walk normally versus instructing them to walk in step with each other increased the volunteers willingness to cooperate with each other afterward.
Even more surprisingly, how harmonious the participants felt had nothing to do with any positive emotions created by the synchronized activities themselves. Whether or not they enjoyed performing the activities, they simply became more cooperative with each other!
The researchers concluded that "synchronized rituals" may therefore have evolved as a way for societies to get individuals to work together and be willing to make personal sacrifices for the benefit of the group.
Wonder about that!
The self-esteem glitch
The self-esteem thing has been hammered into our brains for decades, based on the belief that high self-esteem types achieve more in school, make and keep more friends and, in general, function better as a member of society.
And why is this pure bullsh*t? Well, this seems to be one of those deals where they've confused correlation and causation.
So, rather than thinking "Maybe kids with high self-esteem feel good about themselves because they get good grades in school and have lots of friends", they decided to flip that thing around! For some reason, they think that they succeed because they have self-esteem. So they tried to teach people to feel good about themselves for no other reason than pure entitlement, figuring that the actual reasons for feeling good about themselves would follow at some point later.
This results in some kids having too much self-esteem, a breed of human that scientists classify as douchebags and bitches. Yes, for the purpose of this post, those are technical terms.
And stop laughing. Well, stop chuckling or sniggering then! I'm not kidding!
Research shows that kids who have an inflated sense of self-worth become aggressive when their sense of superiority is called into question, leading to a more damaging fall when they realize what a loser they are.
I'm certainly not an expert, but it would seem like the solution would be to teach the stuff that leads to success, you know, like social and communication skills, better strategies at dealing with stress, etc.; and just let that lead naturally to success and thus self-esteem, rather than just bypassing all that and going right for the self-esteem part.
Wonder about that!
You don’t want to know the truth; you just want to be right
Think about the last time you had a spout with a coworker, family member, or friend.
You have? Well let's continue then.
So when they were shown proof that their conspiracy theory or imagination of a plot against him/her, or any other irrational reason to be arguing, was wrong; did they back down? Did they get this look of realization on their face and said "Wow…If this is untrue, then maybe the other ‘facts’ upon which I've based my fringe beliefs also aren't true. Thank you for helping me rethink my statements!"? …Well?
Yeah, that's right. That has literally never happen in the history of human conversation. Whether it's a politician whose point has been refuted, or a conspiracy theorist that has been definitively proven insane, or that friend you're thinking of while reading this; they will immediately shift to the next talking point, or conspiracy theory, or foolish argument that backs up their side, not even skipping a beat. They'll keep fighting to defend their position even after is factually shown to be untrue.
But, apparently, that's the entire reason human invented arguing.
This is called the argumentative theory of reasoning, and it says that humans didn't learn to ask questions and offer answers in order to find universal truths. We did it as a way to gain authority over others.
Yep, they think that reason itself evolved to help us bully people into getting what we want. As it seems, these cognitive flaws are adaptations to a system that's working perfectly fine. Our evolutionary compulsion is to triumph, even if it means being totally and illogically proudly wrong.
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| Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level, and beat you with experience |
Therefore, during your next argument, remember that you do this. If you're a human being, what you (some more than others) do best is ignore facts in favor of advancing your side. Selective attention/memory, some call it.
So, next time you find yourself being reasoned by more than one person, stop. See if you can put the brakes on and actually say "Wait a second. If the things I'm saying in order to bolster my argument are consistently wrong, then maybe my argument is also wrong."
Yes, it's going to be hard. Admitting you are wrong to the person you are debating with it's the hardest thing to do for some people. Notwithstanding, one of these days, being able to admit you're wrong will be the greatest skill you can develop if you want to stay in a relationship with whomever.
Wonder about that!
The right thing to do
You've always hear people talk about how cathartic it is to let your anger out, or how much better they feel after, and you've probably heard, at least once, things like "if you keep your anger bottled up, one day you'll just snap!"
You have, haven't you?
Well, things like squeezing stress dolls, screaming into a pillow or hitting a punching bag are examples that we've seen offered as healthy alternatives to walking up to the object of your anger, and beat the hell out of it.
The thing is that expressing your anger, even against inanimate objects, doesn't make you less angry at all. In fact, it actually makes you want to get pissed off. You see, we have these things called habits. When we do something, and it makes us feel good, we want to do it again. The rush of anger is addictive, and letting yourself lash out as a means to control your anger is just like drinking to control your urge to drink.
So yes, I agree that letting your anger out is not a solution. BUT, you just simply can't keep bottling things up, because you are not angry at first, you're just bothered by something. The thing is that if you don't talk about that, you start bottling all those little things that bother you, and that will indeed make you angry or very, very annoyed or upset.
And then you snap, and do something stupid like overreact over something insignificant.
So what’s the right thing to do at this point?
Well, some people choose to keep overreacting like they have any reason to do so. They choose to let things take exaggerated proportions because they don't have the balls to admit that they've made a mistake. But I'm afraid to tell you that this is not the right thing to do.
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| know the difference |
Oh no. Even if you think your twisted logic is right, you need to talk with the other person. You need to explain yourself. You need to show them that you, at least, valued your relationship more than you value your insufflated ego, and you need to deal with whatever consequences this may come with.
Wonder about that! ...and grow some balls, 'cause I'll bloody wait.
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| it's never the wrong time to do the right thing |
The magic of the slow clap
So we all have seen in some movie the slow clap. It has the power to sway the opinion of an entire crowd.
Yep, somehow, that one dude who starts clapping is capable of convincing everyone else that what has been said is incredible awesome. So that single sound gradually swells into a massive applause.
Yeah I know, as a concept, the slow clap seems absurd. I mean, how could an entire crowd be convinced that they like something just by hearing one person clap? How?! – You may ask – HOW?!!
Well, apparently, even the most opinionated and judgmental people in the world are susceptible to the power of group mentality (as said in a previous post).
Gustave Le Bon suggested that when people come together in crowds, they start to identify with the group at large instead of as an individual. The opinions of the crowd become the opinions of each person like a mass hypnosis.
So, every change in the crowd has a ripple effect on the collective conscious and can determine the thoughts and opinions of the rest of the group.
You usually see this effect in riots. The slow clap is basically the same thing…You know, without the acts of violence and all that.
A single person clapping in a crowd can immediately trigger the same response from everyone else because they are subconsciously serving the interest of the group, until finally, everyone is in agreement that they love whatever just happened.
Wonder about that!
Asch and the conformity experiment (1953)
Solomon Asch wanted to run a series of studies that would document the power of conformity, for the purpose of depressing everyone who would ever read the results.
So the experiment consisted in telling the subjects that they would be taking part in a vision test, along with a handful of people. The participants were then shown pictures, and individually asked to answer very simple and obvious questions.
The catch was that everybody else in the room other than the subject was in on it, and they were told to give obviously wrong answers.
So would the subject go against the crowd, even when the crowd was clearly and retardedly wrong?
All they had to do was say which line on the right matched the one on the left.
As you can see, Asch wasn't exactly asking these people to design the next space station. Really, the only way you could get the answer honestly wrong is if you took two doses of LSD that morning and rubbed them directly on your eyeballs.
Yet, sadly, 32% of subjects would answer incorrectly if they saw that three others in the classroom gave the same wrong answer. Even when the line was plainly off by a few inches, it didn't matter. One in three would follow the group right off the proverbial cliff.
So the experiment consisted in telling the subjects that they would be taking part in a vision test, along with a handful of people. The participants were then shown pictures, and individually asked to answer very simple and obvious questions.
The catch was that everybody else in the room other than the subject was in on it, and they were told to give obviously wrong answers.
So would the subject go against the crowd, even when the crowd was clearly and retardedly wrong?
All they had to do was say which line on the right matched the one on the left.As you can see, Asch wasn't exactly asking these people to design the next space station. Really, the only way you could get the answer honestly wrong is if you took two doses of LSD that morning and rubbed them directly on your eyeballs.
Yet, sadly, 32% of subjects would answer incorrectly if they saw that three others in the classroom gave the same wrong answer. Even when the line was plainly off by a few inches, it didn't matter. One in three would follow the group right off the proverbial cliff.
Now imagine how much that 32% figure inflates when the answers are less black and white. We all tend to laugh with the group even when we didn't get the joke, or doubt our opinion we realize ours is unpopular among our group.
So much for those lectures you got about peer pressure and 'being brave enough to be yourself.'
Wonder about that!
So much for those lectures you got about peer pressure and 'being brave enough to be yourself.'
Wonder about that!
