Psychology News

These research articles involve many aspects of psychology such as cognitive psychology, depression studies, mental health, stress, happiness and neuropsychology, Scroll below for more specific categories.

Objective circumstances and behaviors like wealth and health affect happiness as much as subjective psychological traits, according to a recent study. Researchers found that surveys of happiness and life satisfaction overstate the importance of psychological traits because they are measured similarly, and a methodological change — simply asking someone how they're doing — enables a fairer comparison.
An international team of scientists has identified a gene in the brain responsible for anxiety symptoms and found that modifying the gene can reduce anxiety levels, offering a novel drug target for anxiety disorders. The discovery highlights a new amygdala miR483-5p/Pgap2 pathway that regulates the brain's response to stress and provides a potential therapeutic approach for anxiety disorders.
Researchers studied the brain activity of healthy participants under the influence of nitrous oxide, comparing it to data from studies with ketamine and LSD to see whether the neurobiology of the psychedelic experience was similar. They found that the patterns of activity associated with the different substances overlapped, indicating common underlying biology, which could inform future research on the therapeutic use of psychedelics.
A new study suggests that to debunk false beliefs, it may be more effective to target a person's system of beliefs rather than trying to change the false belief itself. The study found that people have a system of interrelated beliefs that depend on each other and may anchor their system, making it difficult to change beliefs even with evidence against them.
Researchers have discovered that deadlines may not be as stressful as previously believed. The study found that high sympathetic activation, which indicates how much people are "on the tips of their toes" and leads to stress, remains about the same with or without deadlines. The study also discovered that factors such as extensive smartphone use and prolific reading and writing can exacerbate sympathetic activation.
A new study finds that chimpanzees with more aggressive personalities and less conscientiousness are more successful at climbing the social ladder and siring offspring than their more passive counterparts. However, the researchers also find it puzzling that not every chimpanzee has the same personality traits, suggesting that there may be other factors at play that determine the diversity of personalities in chimpanzees.
In a study of people from different countries and cultural backgrounds, researchers found people tend to ask for assistance with small tasks on average every two minutes. Across cultures, people tend to positively respond to the requests of others more often than they deny assistance. The findings suggest all cultures may have more similar cooperative behaviors than prior research has established.
According to research, problems with the brain's ability to prune itself of unnecessary connections may be behind a wide range of mental health disorders that begin during adolescence. This could explain why people are often affected by more than one disorder. The discovery of a characteristic pattern of brain activity called the "neuropsychopathological factor" (NP factor) could help identify those at greatest risk of mental health problems and facilitate earlier interventions to reduce the risk.