Psychology
- Planetary Science
Preparing for disaster, celebrating success
Science cannot prevent all disasters or solve all the problems they spawn, but it can point to the best ways to prepare, making disasters less damaging than they might otherwise be
By Eva Emerson - Psychology
Right questions could help spot devious air passengers
Training airport security agents to ask detail-oriented questions of travelers may help unmask liars.
By Bruce Bower - Psychology
Rigors of Mars trip make teamwork a priority
It’s going to take a different kind of mental approach to travel to Mars and back: less individuality, more collaboration and adaptability. Astronauts are being tested to prepare for such a mission.
By Bruce Bower - Psychology
With a tap on the back, researchers create ghostly sensation
Experimentally induced illusion probes supernatural experiences, hallucinations.
By Bruce Bower - Psychology
Mastering the art of self-control
Walter Mischel, the psychologist behind the marshmallow test, discusses his new book on self-control and willpower.
By Bruce Bower - Psychology
Rip-off victims prefer compensation to retribution
But those acting on behalf of victims favor a punishment that fits the crime.
By Bruce Bower - Psychology
Majority doesn’t always rule in teen booze use
Having one abstainer as a friend cuts teens’ odds of getting drunk and binge drinking, a study finds.
By Bruce Bower -
- Health & Medicine
The sour side of artificial sweeteners
A new study found that saccharin alters the gut microbiome of mice and produces insulin resistance, but it’s not the first to show the sour side of diet drinks.
- Psychology
Balancing the excitation and inhibition tightrope in depression
A new study looks at how a balance of positive and negative inputs in the lateral habenula might relate to disappointment and depression.
- Planetary Science
Feedback
Readers discuss sources of stress in everyday life and tell us what they think about NASA's plan to nab an asteroid.
- Anthropology
Strategy, not habitat loss, leads chimps to kill rivals
Human impacts on chimpanzees have not increased their violence.
By Bruce Bower