Facts needed- Psychology

[yo yo ma]

I have been asked to come up with a list of facts relating to (positive) psychology; ie, research shows x... or study demonstrates y. If you have any that can would assist, please contribute. Also, include any links if you have them. Here's some examples:

• Within a few years, paraplegics wind up only slightly less happy on average than individuals who are not paralysed
• A study of 22 people who won major lotteries found that they reverted to their baseline level of happiness over time, winding up no happier than 22 matched controls
• Women who are active in sports and recreational activities as girls, feel greater confidence, self-esteem and pride in their physical and social selves, than those who were sedentary as kids.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_psychology

.

 

[Aaron Sice]

you should buy "the secret". it's amazing....lol

 

[craigb]

OK! If you hit your thumb with a hammer , it will hurt! if you don't you will be happier.
cheers, happy to help!

 

[RumpledElf]

My favourite psych fact (and I can't cite the study I'm afraid, I was dozing a little in the lecture theatre at uni .. yes, I have a psychology degree) is the one about lesbians and looks.

Gay men are most concerned about their appearance. They preen, they polish, they remove hair, they go to gyms, they are most interested in a really hawt guy to pick up at the club. They get very stressed over their appearance and can get serious body image issues.

Straight women are second most concerned about their appearance. I'm sure most doting husbands on this forum would back me up on this anecdotally. We all know how much the average woman obsesses about diets, cellulite etc and most women aren't happy with their looks.

Then come straight men. Those belching, farting, butt-scratching blokes we know and love. They don't care that much about their appearance, and are more likely to be happy with how they look than straight women or gay men. Straight men, when they do have body dissatisfaction, usually want to be bigger not smaller. Bigger biceps, bigger pecs etc.

Down the bottom of the list are the happy lesbians. Least concerned with their appearance and most likely to be happy with the way they currently look.

So if you want to be happy, you need to be a lesbian who won lotto 5 minutes ago and if paraplegic, must be paraplegic for quite some time

There's lots of books and websites devoted to the psychology of happiness btw, its a great subject - one of my favourites - and a bit of googling should turn up heaps.

 

[yo yo ma]

There's lots of books and websites devoted to the psychology of happiness btw, its a great subject - one of my favourites - and a bit of googling should turn up heaps.

Thanks for the input RE... all done now.

 

[Dazz]

I don't have any research Steve, but I'm quite fascinated with the lack of facial hair on modern men in Australia.

Apparently our former Treasurer - Eric Ripper, now the Opposition Leader, was told by his female spin doctor that the grand moustache he'd been wearing for 30 odd years was a negative influence for all of the women voters and most of the men voters ??

To my amazement, he took her advice and shaved it off. He said it felt weird and didn't like it, but would take her advice.....anything to secure more votes - especially the women's vote.

Of course, it didn't help him much. He was muchly loathed for hoarding the spoils and summarily got booted out of power. I wonder if he'll grow it back.


The reason I bring it up, I saw a cracker of a photo at Australia's federation with all of the premier's grouped together. I think there was 9 of them all up. About 6 had glorious beards, Sir Henry Parkes from NSW had the longest, followoed by Sir John Forrest from WA. Another 2 had whopping great moustaches and looked resplendent. One poor sod up the back was clean shaven and looked like a PW goose.

Anyway, the tide has turned 180 degrees.....wondered if anyone else noticed this trend ??

 

[sailor]

Power corrupts.
Absolute power, corrupts absolutely.

Money is not a motivator.
Money stops people from getting demotivated.
Ref: Herzberg.

 

[WinstonWolfe]

Increasingly, I turn to wiki as a first port of call.
Try this for guidance and references.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_psychology

 

[Mr. Fabulous]

OK! If you hit your thumb with a hammer , it will hurt! if you don't you will be happier.
cheers, happy to help!

Homer: Oh, I stepped on a nail. Fiddle dee dee, that is going to require a tetanus shot. I'm not going to swear, BUT I AM GOING TO KICK THIS DOG HOUSE DOWN!

Hahahahaha, yet another golden Simpsons moment.

Mark

 

[Mr. Fabulous]

Increasingly, I turn to wiki as a first port of call.
Try this for guidance and references.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_psychology

He has the same link in his first post, dude. You need some new eyeballs, old man.

Mark

 

[yo yo ma]

Increasingly, I turn to wiki as a first port of call.
Try this for guidance and references.

Thanks WW... I have been using wiki too. I even included the same link in the first post

I have finished it now, so thanks all.

 

[MarkB]

Interesting thread, but I kinda wonder how you determine what is and what isn't a fact when you're dealing with human emotions.

The following are "facts" presented in this thread:

- Money doesn't motivate
- Paraplegics are only slightly less happy than able-bodied persons
- Lesbians have little regard for their personal appearance

I've known people motivated by money, unhappy paraplegics, and lesbians who are concerned with their looks. I very much doubt I am alone.

So, what is "fact" in pyschology?

(It's a serious question, I'm interested in perspectives from anyone who cares to share)

 

[Aaron Sice]

if someone quotes a dictionary definition for psychology i'll .... _insert horrible thing here_

fact i guess would be those little electrical impulses moving between nodes, or lack thereof. everything else is interpretation.

 

[redlake2]

Success = Positive Self Talk

To have positive psychology will depend on your upbringing a lot. If you have had lots of negative input from external influences then you will tend to think in this manner. If positive input then you are totally unaware of so many negative issues.

For me the winners success theory is to be able to self-speak in a positive manner despite your upbringing. That is, if you are having a down day, or down moment, you are immediately able to talk yourself through the moment and not let it drag you down for the rest of the day. I have been studying successful people and this for me seemed to be the biggest difference between them and others.

 

[RumpledElf]

So, what is "fact" in pyschology?

Psychology isn't a science, it just tries to be one with the way they set up studies and stuff to get these 'facts'. And they are not really facts. They are trends, correlations, causalities, you just need to look at the way they are expressed. I was being a bit silly in my post, but it should really have read something like 'in general, lesbians aren't as concerned with their appearance as gay men', or 'in general, straight women are dissatisified with their weight', which by no means means that ALL straight women are dissatisfied with their weight, just more of them than some other group of people. You get the same thing with medical studies that gets twisted and misreported by the media - 'Smoking gives you lung cancer'. No, smoking increases the chances you'll get lung cancer, it won't give it to you. Or rather there is quite a high correlation between smoking and getting lung cancer, and also a causality. There's plenty of smokers who make it to 100 having smoked a pack a day for 80 years and never get cancer, and there's plenty of non-smokers who croak at 45 of lung cancer. That smoking is generally a cause of cancer has also been shown, but something like having grey hair on the other hand is merely correlated with having cancer and is not a cause on its own, they are just both things that tend to happen more as you get older.

As to causality vs correlation, one of the more recent studies that has been on TV lately is the correlation between paracetemol use and diabetes. Yes, there is a correlation between the two - they have definitely shown that kids who have used lots of paracetemol have a higher rate of diabetes, but they can't show causality. Kids with diabetes might just be really sickly and their parents give them paracetemol. Or something else entirely that links the two that the study didn't pick up.

Basically psychology is all about statistics and things you notice when dealing with really, really large groups of people. So for one of those psych 'facts' like men are better at parking than women, what you've got is a funky distribution chart of how good people are at parking, and the female one has the median (the top of the curve) lower than the male one. Which basically means that if you grab a random man and a random woman, the chances that he parks better than her are slightly better than her parking better than him. Not that ALL women are worse parkers than ALL men, which is where people usually get confused.

 

[Bill.L]

Hi all,

Fact and Psychology in the same sentence?? What, there is a correlation?? WTF?? It's all new to me.

RumpledE, have you got a secret camera in my house....

Those belching, farting, butt-scratching blokes we know and love. They don't care that much about their appearance,

bye

 

[WinstonWolfe]

Thanks WW... I have been using wiki too. I even included the same link in the first post

I have finished it now, so thanks all.

doh.....sorry Yo.....was trying to get out the door in a hurry