Casual Fridays
dmunger | June 13, 2008Last weekend Nora and I went on a hike in the Smoky Mountains. Whenever we go hiking, we make trail mix -- usually just cashews and raisins. This time, however, we had some mixed nuts left over from a party so we decided to use those instead.
But there's a problem with mixed nuts: invariably there are too many of the nuts you don't like, and not enough of the ones you do like. Since we had plenty of time to think as we hiked along, Nora and I wondered if it was even possible to create a mixture of nuts that would satisfy everyone. Do the nut manufacturers attempt to do this? Or do they just…
dmunger | May 30, 2008A few weeks ago, Greta got a new iPod. I was, naturally, interested to see how it worked since it was supposed to be the latest technology, but Greta would hardly let me touch it: "It's mine, and I want to learn how to use it before you do," she told me.
This was surprising to me, since I generally let people try out my new toys right away -- I'd even say it's part of my own enjoyment of them. It got me to thinking whether there was some pattern to who lets others use their gadgets and who doesn't.
So of course, we did something about it. Two weeks ago, we posted a quick survey that we hoped…
dmunger | May 16, 2008Greta and I have very different approaches to technology. I like to read all the latest technology news and learn about new products; she just buys the products she needs. That's not to say she doesn't like technology: she has a lab full of computers and uses them extensively in her research. We've also found that we have different quirks about how we use technology, like how we organize our desks and who we'll let use our stuff.
That got us wondering if there are any patterns to people's technology quirks. Are technophiles less likely to let other people play with their toys, for example? So…
dmunger | May 10, 2008Things got a little crazy yesterday, with Greta headed off to VSS and the kids needing to be at three different places at once, so I'm presenting this week's Casual Friday results on Saturday.
Last week we asked our readers who their most important mentors were. We didn't mention it at the time, but the survey was inspired by the headlines that week about Barack Obama's pastor's seemingly unpatriotic sermons, and how those sermons reflected on Obama. Do pastors really have a huge influence on people's lives? Can we actually evaluate a presidential candidate based on something his pastor says…
dmunger | May 2, 2008This week's Casual Friday is about mentors. We're curious who constitutes the most important influence on our readers, and whether we can identify any patterns in the results. So we've created a brief study that we hope will answer our questions. Simple as that.
Click here to participate
There are just a few questions, so the survey should only take a couple minutes to complete. There is no limit on the number of respondents. You have until Thursday, May 8 to respond. Then don't forget to check back on Friday, May 9 for the results!
dmunger | April 25, 2008Last week's Casual Friday study was all about money. The basic question was simply what it means to be rich -- how much income and net worth does it take before you consider someone to be wealthy? We received over 1,000 responses. Perhaps our most interesting finding was simply the diversity of opinions about what "rich" is. Here's how the responses broke down:
While most responses fell between $100 thousand per year and $500 thousand per year, 95 people said an income of below $100 thousand was still "rich," and 75 people said it would take $1 million or more per year to be wealthy!…
dmunger | April 18, 2008After spending all last weekend preparing our income tax return, I must have money on my mind. So this week's Casual Fridays study is about money. I don't want to tell you much more about it before you participate in the survey because it may affect the results, so just go ahead and click.
Click here to participate
There are just a few questions, so the survey should only take a couple minutes to complete. There is no limit on the number of respondents. You have until Thursday, April 24 to respond. Then don't forget to check back on Friday, April 25 for the results!
I'm not going to close…
dmunger | April 4, 2008Do you recognize this man? If so, you're not alone: over three-quarters of our readers were able to spot Richard Dawkins as he flashed by in a QuickTime video. So does this mean that the gatekeepers at Expelled who ejected the much-less-famous PZ Myers but not Dawkins two weeks ago are a bunch of incompetent oafs?
Not necessarily.
Many of those participating in the study came via Greg Laden's post on the subject, which included jumbo-sized pictures of both Dawkins and Myers. Maybe they had an unfair advantage over the harried gatekeepers for Expelled, who didn't have photos as a reference --…
dmunger | March 21, 2008Everyone on ScienceBlogs seems to be talking about the latest Intelligent Design debacle. Apparently the extremely famous blogger PZ Myers attempted to attend a free screening of Expelled, a Ben Stein screed against "Darwinists." The security folks at the screening had been alerted that he would be there, and refused him admission. Yet the even more famous writer and anti-religion activist Richard Dawkins was allowed in.
Oh, the embarrassment! How could the ID movement neglect to ID one of its greatest enemies? Are they really that stupid?
On the other hand, maybe it's not so easy to identify…
dmunger | March 14, 2008Music has been associated with drug use for decades -- from the flower children smoking weed at Woodstock to jazz great Charlie Parker getting hooked on heroin, it seems that every type of music has a drug that we associate with it. Last month we discussed a study where college students were asked what type of substances they thought music fans of 14 different genres of music were likely to use. Here are the results:
But are these stereotypes accurate? Rentfrow and Gosling ran into an ethical barrier when they tried to confirm whether the stereotypes they found were true: They didn't want…
dmunger | March 7, 2008A couple weeks back we discussed a study examining stereotypes about music fans and how they related to actual fans' real preferences. Unfortunately, the researchers couldn't test one of the most intriguing stereotypes about music fans: the types of drugs and alcohol preferred by fans of particular genres.
So while we know the stereotype of rock fans is that they prefer beer and marijuana to wine and cocktails, the Rentfrow and Gosling study can't tell us whether the stereotype is true. Today's study addresses that limitation.
We're also addressing (in a limited way) the complaint that the…
dmunger | February 29, 2008[I've been sick the past couple days, so I'm not going to be able to post a new Casual Friday today. But here's an old one that many of our readers probably haven't seen.]
Last week's Casual Friday survey asked readers to describe how they expect other drivers to behave when merging onto the freeway. Now that the survey has been completed, I can let you in on a bit more of the observations that motivated the survey. I live in North Carolina, and I like to visit the big cities on the East coast, especially Washington and New York. This means I've done a lot of driving through Virginia, and I…
dmunger | February 22, 2008Last week we asked readers how they used their calendars: we were curious if the way people used their calendars said anything about how busy their lives were. We found out an awful lot about how readers use calendars, but we also found that there may not be much of a pattern to how calendars are used.
First, the basics: what type of calendars do CogDaily readers use?
It was a little surprising for me to see that over a third of our tech-savvy readers still rely on printed calendars -- 208 out of 612 respondents. Even if readers said they used one or the other type of calendar, we allowed…
dmunger | February 15, 2008Just a few months ago, I finally convinced Greta to convert her old paper appointment calendar to an electronic version. Now instead of writing her appointments down in a little book, she enters it in her computer or her PDA. It's now possible for me to see her schedule on my computer, and vice versa.
But even though we're both computerized, we use our calendars differently. I need an alarm to remind me of any event, but Greta simply checks her calendar every day to remind herself of her plans for the day. This leads to endless possibilities for confusion. She might enter an item on the…
dmunger | February 8, 2008Last week's Casual Fridays study elicited quite a few confused reactions. Listeners heard short music clips and then were asked to indicate which color they associated with each piece from a list of 13 colors.
So were we able to come up with consistent results? Yes. For some of the clips, our 377 listeners were more likely to associate particular colors with that clip. Consider this clip:
Here are the survey responses:
Significantly more listeners picked "yellow" than any other color, and half of all listeners picked yellow or pink. Practically no one chose beige, brown, or any dark color…
dmunger | February 1, 2008A while back we did a little non-scientific study on whether people experience different colors based on their emotions, and indeed found a very small effect.
For this week's study, we thought we'd see if we could extend those results to music. All we're asking you to do is listen to eight short audio clips, then say what color you associate the clips with.
Click here to participate
As usual, the study is short, with just 8 questions. The 8 clips range from 10 seconds to 70 seconds long. Most are shorter than one minute, so the whole thing should take less than 10 minutes to complete. You…
dmunger | January 25, 2008Last week we asked readers how often they eat at buffet-style restaurants, where diners serve themselves unlimited portions of food from heated serving tables. The question was inspired by a post by ScienceBlogs editor Virginia Hughes, which was inspired by an innocuous comment I made as we were heading to our hotel restaurant table: "People in North Carolina are really into buffets." So, is North Carolina the champion state for buffets?
Nope.
In fact, North Carolina ranked 20th on our list. The number one state for buffets was Kansas, averaging 6 visits per month. Second on the list was New…
dmunger | January 18, 2008I'm at the North Carolina Science Blogging Conference this weekend, and I wasn't planning on doing a Casual Friday this week. But Virginia Hughes gave me an idea for a really quick one. What state boasts the most-frequent buffet-style restaurant diners?
Click here to respond
This survey has a mere two questions, and you have until Thursday, January 24, to respond.
dmunger | January 11, 2008Last week we asked our readers about New Years' resolutions. We said we wanted to know whether resolutions made on New Years' Day were any more effective than commitments made at other times of the year. We are interested in that question, but we didn't tell you about the question that interested us the most: How many different resolutions should you make?
Our son Jim made so many resolutions this year that he actually organized them into subcategories. This struck us as not a very good idea -- if you make lots and lots of resolutions, then you may not be as committed to each one. At the time…
dmunger | January 4, 2008This year Greta and I rang in the new year with a couple of good friends, some good wine, and not a lot of fuss or formality. We quietly noted when the clock struck midnight and went on with whatever we were talking about at the time.
Our son Jim marked the occasion much more seriously, with several resolutions directed at improving his fitness, eating habits, and school work.
It got us to wondering: what kind of people are most likely to make New Years' resolutions? Are New Years' resolutions any more successful than pledges for personal improvement made at other times of the year? And what…