dmunger | October 4, 2007
Rocket-Powered 21-Foot-Long X-Wing Model Actually Flies
I would have killed for one of these in 1977!
New anesthesia method blocks pain without numbness or paralysis
This painkiller targets just pain detectors, and leaves other sensory nerves intact
Do Infants Have an Innate Spider Detection Mechanism? And if Not, Shouldn't They?
Doctors repress their responses to their patients' pain
Accupuncturists respond identically to poking someone in the mouth with a needle and prodding them with a harmless cotton swab
dmunger | October 4, 2007Here's a fascinating video featuring split-brain researcher Michael Gazzaniga. The patient had his corpus callosum severed as a treatment for severe epilepsy. The treatment terminated nearly all communication between his brain's right and left hemispheres.
Since language is primarily processed in the left hemisphere, the patient can't name items on the left side of his field of vision (remember, the brain is "flipped" relative to the body parts it senses and controls). But he can draw pictures of them, and then he can look at the pictures and name them. (via Issues in the Philosophy of…
dmunger | October 3, 2007
A study doesn't have to be brand-new to be interesting. Consider the situation in 1992: It was known that adults are much better at distinguishing between sounds used in their own language compared to other languages. Take the R and L sounds in English. In Japanese, both of these sounds belong in the same category of sounds: both sounds have the same meaning, which is why it's difficult for native Japanese speakers to learn the difference between the sounds in English. In 1992, it was thought that this linguistic specialization occurred at about the age of 1, when infants learn their first…
dmunger | October 3, 2007
Challenging the conclusions drawn from Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment
A great idea, from BPS Research Digest's ongoing series of the best experiments that will never be conducted
Imaginative, Yet Literal? Fewer False Memories Among Children Than Adults
Misleading Reporting of Alzheimer's and Conscientiousness Research
Does being "conscientious" really prevent Alzheimer's?
Are Women Being Scared Away From Math, Science, And Engineering Fields?
Interesting attempt at a controlled study
dmunger | October 3, 2007Like many who follow the technology scene, I was excited about the prospect of a "$100 laptop" (now called the XO), one that could be used by kids in developing countries as a substitute for textbooks, school supplies, and perhaps even teachers.
If the software was all open-source, then the only cost would be a one-time purchase of the computer itself. A whole classroom could be equipped with all the educational supplies it needs for less than the cost of furniture. Now the computer is ready, but promises from nations to actually buy the machines have fallen through. Was the entire project a…
dmunger | October 2, 2007Uriel Klieger has begun work revising the BPR3 icon. He's got a couple different versions up at BPR3.org:
This is the large version of the icon that will replace our icon for posts in the Research category -- those that discuss peer-reviewed research. But now all bloggers will be able to use the icon whenever they are blogging about peer-reviewed research rather than just linking to a press release or media commentary.
The icon on the top left is how he submitted it to win the contest; the two on the top center and top right are proposed revisions.
Please feel free to make your own comments…
dmunger | October 2, 2007The name sounds so benign: what could be better than friendship? Why, friendship with benefits, of course!
But when a friendship moves from platonic to sexual, even if both partners claim they're not "romantic," doesn't the dynamic of that relationship necessarily change? It's a puzzle that's often discussed in locker rooms, chat rooms, and online forums, but according to the New York Times, hasn't been the subject of much formal study.
An article in the Times discusses one recent study on the subject, conducted by communications researchers Melissa Bisson and Timothy Levine:
[They] surveyed…
dmunger | October 1, 2007
If you're a parent, you're probably familiar with the notes (or emails) home from school asking for help leading a field trip, or classroom supplies, or donations to the PTA. But if you're reading this blog, it's likely your kids are in a school that's already getting plenty of help from parents. What about those other schools -- the ones where 70 percent or more qualify for free lunches, where classes don't get taught because teachers don't have textbooks, where parents are so poor they can't afford to donate, and so busy working to make ends meet they don't have time to help out?
We think…
dmunger | October 1, 2007To me, few things are more annoying than someone who nitpicks about grammar. Grammar is important, to be sure, but how much does it really matter if your sentences are grammatically "correct," as long as your message is communicated clearly?
Michael Bach recently emailed me lamenting that often reviewers comment that "the English could be improved" in his papers. That comment could be made about at least 99 percent of all papers published, but what does it help? If a reviewer can't point to a specific instance where the language is unclear, why make the observation in the first place?
But…
dmunger | September 28, 2007The U.S. Department of Immigration unveiled its new U.S. citizenship test today. Whenever these tests come out, news organizations inevitably send reporters out to find out if actual U.S. citizens know the answers we expect immigrants to know. The results, as you might expect, are generally not impressive.
But these reporters generally aren't tackling the issue in a very scientific manner: typically they just ask random people in a train station or on the street, then report the most amusing answers.
We thought we'd be a little more systematic about it. This week, our casual study asks our…
dmunger | September 28, 2007You've seen this illusion before, right?
The "grid" defining the light gray squares on the left side of this figure seems to get lighter where the lines intersect. The graph on the right shows that the actual reflectance (or brightness when depicted on a computer screen) of the figure does not change along the path marked by the blue line. But perceived brightness (indicated in red on the graph) does change.
But what's really interesting about this graph is that the thing doing the perceiving isn't a human. It's an artificial neural network. Auntie Em has the details:
The brain in question…
dmunger | September 27, 2007
Yesterday, we discussed sex differences at the highest levels of achievement and found that there are some significant differences between males and females. But despite these observations, it's still unclear why the disparity exists, and what can or should be done about it.
Sex differences in brain structure
One possibility is that the physical structure of the brain is different for males and females. MRI imaging shows that males do have larger brains than females on average. But women have a higher proportion of "gray matter" -- the part of the brain where most cognitive activity is…
dmunger | September 27, 2007A New York Times article makes the claim that men are now happier than women:
Since the 1960s, men have gradually cut back on activities they find unpleasant. They now work less and relax more.
Over the same span, women have replaced housework with paid work -- and, as a result, are spending almost as much time doing things they don't enjoy as in the past. Forty years ago, a typical woman spent about 23 hours a week in an activity considered unpleasant, or 40 more minutes than a typical man. Today, with men working less, the gap is 90 minutes.
John Grohol read the article and became…
dmunger | September 26, 2007In yesterday's post, we discussed sex differences in achievement and ability. Few were identified. For the most part, however, this research discussed average differences. The problem with only discussing averages is that people engaged in science and math careers are far from "average" when it comes to math and science ability. Math and science professors often score in the top 1 percent -- or higher -- on standardized math tests.
It's entirely possible that the top 1 percent looks very different from the average results for the population. Consider this graph of test scores from two…
dmunger | September 25, 2007When Lawrence Summers suggested that the reason there aren't more women in the top academic positions in math and science is that they don't have the aptitude for it, a firestorm was created that may have cost him his job as president of Harvard University. Sometimes lost in the hullabaloo surrounding the incident is the science surrounding that bit of speculation.
The entire August 2007 issue of Psychological Science in the Public Interest was devoted to the "science of sex differences in science and mathematics," and Cognitive Daily will spend the remainder of this week discussing that…
dmunger | September 25, 2007The robots in H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds may have been terrifying, but they also had a feature notably lacking in a lot of today's robots: the inherent stability of a tripod. But film realizations of the tripod robots have always suggested they moved in a sort of inefficient shuffle: if you were a tripod creature, how would you walk? Three-legged locomotion doesn't make sense.
But researchers at Virginia Tech have begun development on a robot that looks like a tripod but has a simple and elegant gait. Check out this short movie clip showing how it works:
Clever, no? An article in New…
dmunger | September 24, 2007Pain is an extremely difficult subject to study, because individuals experience pain differently -- some people have a much greater tolerance for pain than others, and some people just seem to complain more. Doctors typically handle the problem with assessing pain by asking patients to rate the pain they are feeling on a scale of 1 to 10. This gets around some of the issues of measuring pain because the individual's subjective experience is accounted for by the rating scale.
But the 1 to 10 scale might also be problematic. People might exaggerate their pain just to get access to stronger…
dmunger | September 22, 2007There's a short interview with me at the Scranton Times-Tribune -- it's their Saturday "Five Questions" feature so it's supposed to be funny rather than serious.
dmunger | September 22, 2007Just a quick reminder: The voting on the BPR3 icon contest closes on Monday, September 24. If you haven't voted yet, head on over to BPR3 or this CogDaily post and make sure your voice is heard.
dmunger | September 21, 2007You might have thought we'd have a new study for you to participate in this week. You're half right. If you've read CogDaily, Terra Sigillata, Uncertain Principles, or Chaotic Utopia in the past two weeks, you've actually been participating in today's non-scientific study.
ScienceBloggers have a private forum where we can discuss technical issues with the blogs, talk about our latest successes or failures, and even coordinate super-secret studies of our readers. Many of us have observed that a blogger can spend 5 minutes posting a YouTube link or a cartoon, and somehow that will be their most…