Research:
Category: Research
How does our visual system decide if something is a face? Some automated face-detecting software uses color as one cue that something is a face. For example Apple's iPhoto has no trouble determining that there are two faces in this...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 3:43 PM • 4 Comments •
Category: Research
Who's more "sociable," men or women? Common sense says it's women, right? And many research studies back this impression up: Women are more interpersonal, more connected, more interdependent than men. Women are more likely to share intimate information with each...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 5:28 PM • 26 Comments •
Category: Research
When we were getting ready to have our first child, I decided that I would quit my job, work out of home as a freelancer, and take care of our baby while Greta finished graduate school. That worked well for...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 5:31 PM • 18 Comments •
Category: Research
Take a look at this video from last night's episode of Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show." If you'd like, you can skip past all the political snark to the 4:47 mark to watch Jon bring cognitive psychology into prime time...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 5:09 PM • 4 Comments •
Category: Research
Greta and I did our undergraduate studies at the University of Chicago, or as a commonly-sold T-shirt on campus put it, "where fun goes to die." To say that Chicago didn't emphasize academics over a social life is to deny...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 4:20 PM • 10 Comments •
Category: Research
One of my favorite cartoons as a child was "Speed Racer." It featured an all-American boy (first name, "Speed," last name, "Racer") engaging in that most American of pastimes: driving fast cars. Except that "Speed Racer" wasn't really American; it...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 2:34 PM • 39 Comments •
Category: Research
Take a look at this face: Does it look more angry or fearful? It may be rather difficult to tell: About fifty percent of adults say faces like this are angry and fifty percent say it's fearful. However, for children,...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 3:53 PM • 3 Comments •
Category: Research
Product placements in movies and TV shows are becoming so commonplace that my kids now cynically take note of them whenever they appear. It wasn't always that way. In 1982 when I first saw E.T. I had no idea that...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 5:18 PM • 15 Comments •
Category: Research
When Jim and Nora were in elementary school, both Greta and I worked challenging jobs, so we did whatever we could to save time. Instead of bringing lunches made by their parents, the kids bought hot meals at school. The...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 4:15 PM • 18 Comments •
Category: Research
Recently we took our hybrid car into the shop for its annual emissions test. In our state, the test is conducted while the car is idling. A hybrid doesn't actually idle -- it shuts the engine off completely. So our...
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Posted by Dave Munger at 4:46 PM • 15 Comments •