Latest science news in Psychology & Sociology
Limited progress in climate talks in China
(AP) -- U.N. climate talks being held in China this week are making limited progress as rich and poor nations remain divided on key issues, negotiators said Wednesday.
Video: @BPGlobalPR Reveals His Identity
Shira Lazar interviews Josh Simpson, the face behind @bpglobalpr, a BP parody account with over 188,000 followers. He talks about how it got started, why he remained anonymous and...
Facebook Blurs Reality Online and Off
The Social Networking Revolution Is Happening so Fast, People May not Have Had a Chance to Catch Up with Privacy Implications
Researchers support new direction in science policy
The Colombian science community supports the current government’s science policy but asks for a more long-term, state approach.
How To Punk Memory: The Brainworks Of Misremembrance, False Memories, And Alternate Realities (Part Trois)
Okay, in the past two days we've seen that our memories are malleable. We can easily be made to misremember, and easily be made to adopt memories of things that...
Education scholar Gerald Lesser, 84
Gerald Lesser, Charles Bigelow Professor of Education and Developmental Psychology Emeritus at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), died on Sept. 23 at the age of 84. Lesser is perhaps most well-known...
Neuman elected to Human Rights Committee
Gerald Neuman ’80, the J. Sinclair Armstrong Professor of International, Foreign, and Comparative Law at Harvard Law School (HLS), has been elected to the Human Rights Committee, the premier treaty body in the...
Social Studies at 50
In the spring of 1968, Amy Gutmann ’71, Ph.D. ’76, changed her college major, in what proved to be a “life-changing decision.” “Majoring in math had lost its luster for me. It...
High marks for doctoral programs
Harvard University’s doctoral programs received exceptionally high evaluations in the National Research Council’s Assessment of Research Doctoral Programs, which was released on Tuesday (Sept. 28). The long-anticipated report, a significant study of doctoral education...
Challenge of finding a cure
Crowdsourcing, the act of contracting out problems to large groups rather than tapping individual experts, has solved puzzles in fields such as marketing, engineering, and computer software. But can the wisdom of crowds...
How to get happy
What makes Derek and Sissela Bok happy? Family tops the list. Sharing in each other’s work also ranks high. The former Harvard president and his wife, a current Harvard fellow, offered their perspectives...
Improving the classroom experience
Students in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) can look forward to less shuffling between classrooms, more books on the shelf at the Coop, and a better experience in section next...
Cause for concern
Radcliffe Fellow Erica Caple James, M.T.S. ’95, Ph.D. ’03, is a Harvard-trained medical and psychiatric anthropologist. In the mid-’90s, she was studying rehabilitation programs for post-conflict rape and torture victims in Haiti. Then...
Suicides Put Light on Pressures of Gay Teenagers
The case of Tyler Clementi, the Rutgers student who jumped off a bridge, is one of several recent suicides by young gay men who were harassed.
The Doomsday Lobby: How Hype And Panic Impact Science Funding
It's election season and the biggest schism in American culture come November voting won't be abortion or global warming, it will be the size and role of the U.S. government...
Pediatric field hospital in Haiti provides lessons in disaster planning and response
When a devastating earthquake hit Haiti earlier this year, physicians and health care workers were immediately deployed to the capital, Port-au-Prince. A study on the creation and evolution of a...
Frail Casualties in the War on Drugs
Nursing home patients have become unintended casualties in the war on drugs, doctors say.
To Brains, Even Common Gestures Unfamiliar
What's more universal in culture than a "thumbs up"? To our brains, whether we seem to have a cultural familiarity or not, it isn't familiar at all, says new research in Human...
POP Physics: The Free Nanotech Scientific Journal Article Generator
No, the following does not belong into the humor section, because I know of people who made a career with the method described below. This is serious! This is another...
How much of your pink donations turns into green?
It can be hard to know what good comes from buying products that promise profits to breast cancer causes. The American Institute of Philanthropy gives out grades to help clarify...
Side Effects May Include Lawsuits
Antipsychotic drugs are the top-selling pharmaceuticals in America. But with the surge in use has come an increase in questions — and lawsuits — about aggressive marketing and the scientific...
Tools to assess breast cancer risk level
Assessing a woman's odds of getting breast cancer is a tricky, imprecise and evolving business. Yet for all its imperfection, it is Step One in any decision a woman makes...
Posteromedial Cortex: Divide Between Narcissists And Psychopaths Narrow
Like many of history's greatest minds, narcissists spend a great deal of time deep in thought - but for narcissists it is thought about themselves. Neuroscientists recently found a correlation between...
India seeking to intercept BlackBerry messages
India is seeking to find an "appropriate" means to monitor messages and corporate emails sent through Blackberry smart phones, a top government official has said.
Video: Rutgers Mourns Bullied Student
Tyler Clemente's suicide, after his roommate streamed a video of Clemente and a male student engaged in sexual acts, has sparked greater focus on issues with bullying LGBT youth. ...
Video: Cat resorts to desperate measures to wake owner | GrrlScientist
This video depicts a hungry cat who resorts to increasingly desperate measures to wake its sleeping ownerIt's Caturday once again, time to relax and recover from a long work week,...
Punishment does not fit crimes with the most victims | Ben Goldacre
Empathy explains why Two Little Boys makes me cry yet two million Aids deaths a year never have the same effectLike all students of wrongness, I'm fascinated by research into irrational beliefs...
Rebels without applause: New study on peer victimization
Loners and antisocial kids who reject other children are often bullied at school -- an accepted form of punishment from peers as they establish social order. Such peer victimization may...