Got a kid with anger issues? What to do, what to do? Step one: Look in the mirror. You won’t see your DNA in there, but you might remember that you, too, have a bit of a temper. Social aggression arises from a combination of low self-control, and low people-pleasing, or agreeability. Both are normal [...]
You might think that’s redundant, that if a person is autistic everybody already knows about it. Not so. Autism has been a laundry basket into which psychologists toss certain behaviors. It has never never enjoyed a strict, standardized description. This is a problem with many psychological conditions. For instance, how do you decide who has [...]
Oh, it’s not just me! This insanely hot summer has had a very real effect on my domestic productivity. I think I quit vacuuming for a whole month. Now magnify that by an entire nation of hot people. The Gross Domestic Product tanks. Climate change brings a slower rate of work. We in the temperate [...]
I used to think I was the world’s worst reporter, because I was too shy to ask questions. Slowly it dawned on me that when I was supposed to be extracting words from people I was really busy gathering a different kind of information. A recent study has found that this is a common feature [...]
Chimps and bonobos are practically the same species of ape. But their behavior is so different that, depending on the IQ test you give them, either one can look like a genius — or a dummy. Chimps are the more pragmatic of the two. They use tools as a matter of routine. Although they’re social [...]
The whole point of defining your territory is that it saves you from fighting the same fight every day. You mark the boundary with a fence or a door, then you leave your neighbor alone and he leaves you alone. But does it really save on fighting? For many animals, it does. It’s so common [...]
If you’re a male in a conquered society, your genetic future is not looking bright. That’s the message from a new study of how mating proceeded after the European invasion of Columbia. The native women reproduced. The native men… Going back a few centuries, the human female was pretty much guaranteed to reproduce. If she [...]
He was born a poor Black child … Nah. He singlehandedly took down the worst herbicide on earth… Nah. He’s quite possibly off his nut… Not quite right. He’s a killer scientists but he also has a wicked mouth on him. I tuned into the Tyrone Hayes Channel about ten years ago when he published [...]
Every high school student learns about the annual flooding of the Nile. Every summer the thing swelled up and covered the land. When it shrank back to size, farmers found a fresh layer of fertile earth on their fields. Yay! Well, the same thing happens in the Indus River of Pakistan. But… boooo! It’s the [...]
They’ll kill you! Just with their criticism and dissatisfaction, they’ll gnaw at your heart and your brain. For a healthier cardiovascular system and a balanced brain, stick with the people who don’t stress you out. It may seem obvious, if you come from a family where people are nice to each other: Spending time with [...]
