Posts Tagged ‘Children’
Do Children Beat Adults at the Game of Concentration?
If there’s a game that’s equally challenging for players of all ages, it would be Concentration. In case you’re not familiar, the game goes like this: lay all the cards in a deck face-down in a grid. Every turn, you get to flip over two cards. If they’re matching cards of the same color (e.g.,…
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Subtle Linguistic Cues Can Discourage Young Girls From an Interest in Science
The language we use to talk about gender makes a difference. Last year, for example, I wrote about a study showing that previously being exposed to gender-neutral language affects how likely people are to assume that a “specialist” is male. But a new study suggests that even seemingly innocuous language that doesn’t directly reference gender…
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Talking About Their Future Selves Improves Preschoolers’ Cognitive Skills
Conversations with adults are a key way that children build cognitive skills. And if you’re looking for something to talk about with the young children in your life, new research suggests a topic of conversation that seems to be especially helpful in developing cognitive skills: the future. In a recently published study, researchers from Harvard…
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Physical Punishment, Childhood Maltreatment Linked to Antisocial Behaviors in Adulthood
Problematic behaviors in adulthood often have roots in childhood, and a new study of over 36,000 adults in the United States adds more evidence for that idea. In the study, researchers from University of Manitoba looked at whether the type of childhood someone has can predict how likely they are as adults to have symptoms…
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Adverse Childhood Experiences Influence Life Satisfaction in Adulthood
We know that childhood experiences lay the foundation for mental health in adulthood. But is it possible to determine what consequences a single traumatic event in childhood might have for long-term psychological wellbeing? For an individual, the answer is no, at least for now. For groups of people, though, it’s possible to look at how…
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Spooky Science: The Psychology of Paranormal Beliefs
Long-time readers of this blog will know that I can take the fun out of almost any holiday. For Thanksgiving, I’ve written about the advantages of being ungrateful and the inner lives of Turkeys. On Valentines day, I covered loneliness. So, Happy Halloween! Let’s talk about ghosts. Why do people believe in ghosts? There are…
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