PSYCHOLOGY OUTSIDE THE BOX

Merging minds and machines has become a reality. You can watch Pager the monkey playing ping pong with his mind by following the link below. It's quite impressive. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rXrGH52aoM The image below shows a Utah array which is currently the most popular chip used in brain computer interfaces. It is implanted using neurosurgery, often being placed near the motor cortex of the brain which controls movement of our limbs. The array has 100 densely packed microelectrodes that can read brain signals and send them to a variety of external devices. Using brain computer interfaces, people who are paralyzed can scan and select characters on the screen in order to compose speeches, surf the Internet, send e-mail and "speak" through a voice synthesizer. They can control robotic limbs, wheelchairs, and even virtual keyboards, restoring mobility and communication.  

Great news everybody. I just found out that my IQ test results came back negative! I guess I've been worried all week for nothing. Unfortunately, IQ test results are often misunderstood, misinterpreted, over-interpreted, and over-hyped by many people. So yes, IQ and intelligence are really, really complicated. Do IQ tests accurately measure intelligence? Can IQ tests tell you if you're a genius? Was Einstein's genius already there at birth? Are IQ tests missing any important traits or abilities?  Does intelligence contribute more to success than other factors?  Do people who are illiterate lack intelligence? In the past, why were women considered less intelligent than men? Which animals have the largest brain and should they rule the planet?  Do we inherit intelligence from our parents...is there an IQ gene?  Is intelligence the same as having lots of information or knowledge? Are online IQ tests accurate or just a scam? Are there many people today who have an IQ greater than 160?  Why will my Practically Perfect IQ Test NEVER EVER succeed? 

People probably warned you that marriage is tough, but you thought that yours would be different, that it wouldn't be so challenging. Although marriage can be an amazing part of life, it's not always an easy one. Apparently, marriage is the number one cause of divorce. Does that even make sense? Whether you've been married for 30 days or 30 years, even the best marriages can reach the point of no return. The divorce rate in Canada is about 40% and in the United States close to 50%. This might be a little scary to anyone considering making a lifetime commitment to one partner. Maybe you think that we learn from our mistakes. That divorce teaches you how to make better choices and all you need is a second chance at love. Well, think again.

Sleep is still a mysterious yet very important part of our lives. Are you unconscious when you sleep? Can you learn new languages or prepare for exams while asleep? Can you sleep with half of your brain while the other half is awake and alert? Do all of us have have an internal biological clock? Why is sleeping through the night like riding a roller coaster? Does the brain stop working while we sleep? Is resting or relaxing just as good as sleeping? How does 24/7 access to screen time affect sleep? Does everybody dream or just some people? What is sleep paralysis? Do newborn babies have dreams? Can shift work harm sleep and health and cause accidents?

It's absolutely true that women tend to have fewer and less satisfying orgasms than men. As shown in the 1989 romantic comedy When Harry Met Sally, most women at one time or another have faked it. Follow the link below to watch this famous scene.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNEX0fbGePg Most women have orgasms regularly from masturbation, but not so much from penis-vagina intercourse.  Paula England, a sociology professor at Stanford University, believes that "The orgasm gap is an inequity that's as serious as the pay gap…". Just like with wages, women get fewer rewards during sex, even though they're doing the same amont of work. Researcher Laurie Mintz, PhD argues that the primary reason for this form of gender inequality is due to "our cultural ignorance of the clitoris" and that it is commonplace to "mislabel women's genitals by the one part (the vagina) that gives men, but not women, reliable orgasms.  

Do you know anyone who has ADHD, autism, severe anxiety disorder, major depression, bipolar disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, or schizophrenia? The answer is almost certainly YES, that you have encountered one or likely more of these individuals. In some cases you may not have been aware of their underlying condition, but it was there. Perhaps you've wondered if these people were born with these disorders already in the genes or DNA that they inherited from their mom and dad. The answer in all these cases is a definite YES. To some degree they are all hereditary but the story is not so simple or clear-cut. Some people with bad genes will never get the disorder while others will, even within the same family. 

First the good news. I checked Google and there are 1000 sites that will tell you how to lose weight fast and easy. So, do you want the BAD news now or later? Maybe you too have had this experience when looking in a full length mirror. Mirror mirror glistening glass...tell me this is not my ass. If you think it's hard to lose weight and keep it off, you are not alone — and you are also 100% correct. Long-term weight loss is really difficult to achieve. It's not just about willpower, exercise, or diet. Our bodies are programmed by evolution to store fat and hold on it to it as long as possible.  

Have you ever tried high-risk activities such as skydiving, rock climbing, big wave surfing, bungee jumping, or cliff diving? If you have tried any extreme sports, they don't even come close to the most dangerous experience of your life.  We have to travel back in time to the few weeks just before mom found out for sure that she was pregnant. It turns out these two weeks are, by far, the most hazardous time of our lives. The good news is that we all survived this risky period. As the rock group Queen said in their famous song - We Are the Champions.  

I have used temper tantrums several times, but not when I was a kid. It was just a few years ago when my wife and I were waiting in the checkout line at the grocery store. I was bored and so very hungry. Low blood sugar makes me do crazy things. Temper tantrums range from whining and crying to screaming, kicking, hitting, and breath holding. They're equally common in boys and girls. Some kids may have tantrums often, and others have them rarely. To some degree, they are a normal part of child development. Because toddlers can't always say what they want, feel, or need, a frustrating experience may cause a blowup. As language skills improve over time, tantrums tend to decrease. But not always. There are many different reasons why tantrums happen. But the great majority of meltdowns result from one simple thing: not getting what they want. So what are the best ways to respond to your child's outbursts?

The world reputation rankings for 2023 were announced in February 2024. The most respected universities in the world are Harvard, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, University of Oxford, and University of Cambridge. Harvard University has been at the very top for quite a few years. The U.S. News & World Report published in September 2023 identified the top ranking schools across the United States: (1) Princeton University (2) Massachusetts Institute of Technology (3) Harvard University (4) Stanford University (5) Yale University. So how does Howard maintain its stellar reputation and stay at the top of school rankings? Is there really ANY DIFFERENCE between Harvard and other schools?  

How good are you at recognizing when someone is lying?  Do you recall the TV show called Lie to Me that was popular a few years ago? The show followed the work of Dr. Cal Lightman (played by Tim Roth) and his colleagues. Apparently they had devised ways to detect when someone was lying or telling the truth by analyzing facial expressions, body movements, and changes in voice and speech. In other words, the show was based on the idea that people, even very good liars, display some small and uncontrollable expressions that can be detected by someone trained to identify them. These beliefs are widespread across the general population and also among law-enforcement professionals. But they are completely WRONG!

If you had a hidden talent just waiting to be released, what would you want it to be (only one choice)?  Usually, a genius is born that way so most of us already missed that opportunity. But sometimes a person who isn't born with special abilities, can develop them later in life following brain trauma, an illness, or head injury.  Could you imagine being hit in the head and waking up to find yourself a sudden musical star? Excuse me for a few seconds while I go bang my head against a brick wall.  It sounds like something from a movie but in fact such things have happened to DOZENS of people in the world that we know of. 

What is the difference between a dream, a hallucination, and the real world? Sometimes there is no difference at all. They may be exactly the same as far as your brain is concerned. The nature of reality has been debated by philosophers and scientists for thousands of years. I am not trying to settle the nature of reality issue today. My goal is to expand your ideas and thinking in this area just a little bit. I say just a little bit because I don't want to overload your brain and have it explode. Strangely enough, there is a condition called exploding head syndrome. It sounds like something out of a horror movie but it's actually a real thing. 

Since the 1950s, California's Disneyland has been known as "The Happiest Place On Earth". It's the only place where everyone can feel that childhood happiness. There is just one problem with Disneyland. You can't apply for citizenship to live there forever. If you could, it would quickly become the most crowded place on Earth.  But if you are looking for a place to live where you can stay longer than two weeks, the World Happiness Report that came out in March 2024 may be able to help. We find year after year that life satisfaction is highest in the social democracies of northern Europe, the so-called Nordic countries: Finland, Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. The Nordic winter tends to be long, dark, and cold but this does not seem to reduce their level of happiness. It certainly appears that the Nordic nations are doing something right.

Movies tell us that there are many threats to humanity's existence. And just as we know that EVERYTHING on the internet is TRUE, we can also be pretty sure that movies know exactly what they're talking about. It could be an alien invasion from outer space, a zombie apocalypse, or destruction by artificial intelligence that we have created.  I can't solve all of these problems in one podcast, so today I will focus on the zombie apocalypse. For decades now, the idea of zombies has been popular in movies and television shows. While the idea of the undead may seem far-fetched, zombies can actually provide a better insight into the human brain. But in the event of a zombie apocalypse, you must also know and understand your enemy if you are to have any chance of survival. So I will help you do that. Be sure to take notes. I don't wanna have to repeat myself.

You would probably be offended if someone said your pain was all in your head. But guess what - that is actually true. Pain is constructed entirely in the brain. Just because pain is in your head does'nt make it less real. In fact it's your brain that literally creates what your body feels.  For example, if you accidentally hit your finger with a hammer, it might seem that you feel the pain immediately in your hand. But that is wrong. In reality, there is a very short delay that allows pain messages to be sent from nerve endings in your finger up your arm to your spinal cord and then to the correct area of the brain. Only when the signals arrive at the brain do you feel the pain and then you say "Ouch", or some other four-letter word like feck or fack.

You can live with just one kidney or a single lung, but whoever thought you could live a normal life with only half a brain? Most of us can't even live without our cellphone for more than a few hours.   A human brain contains about 86 billion neurons or brain cells. A single brain cell isn't very smart by itself. But when they are connected in vast networks they produce intelligence, personality, memories, emotions, language, movement, and consciousness. But what happens when we lose HALF of all our brain cells? Are we paralyzed and confined in a wheelchair? Can we see and hear and touch and feel? Can we still talk or think or do we just stare blankly into space? Are we conscious and aware or stuck in a neverending coma or vegetative state?  It sounds scary, but losing half a brain usually has a very happy ending.

I might as well give you the bad news right now. Referring to people as INTROVERTS or EXTROVERTS is wrong. It is a false dichotomy. Ambiverts who combine elements of both personality styles are far more common. If you read something that mentions introverts and extroverts, but not ambiverts, you are missing approximately 70% of people in the middle category. So anyone who refers to introversion and extroversion as a SIMPLE dichotomy, is just SIMPLE-MINDED, and is SIMPLY wrong. It's as SIMPLE as that. In reality, MOST of us are ambiverts MOST of the time. And really, the ambivert's ability to adjust his or her style to suit the situation makes a lot of sense.

Almost all North American adults, adolescents, and many children own a cellphone of some kind. The widespread use of cellphones makes it very important to identify any harmful effects. Several years ago, there was a viral video claiming that cellphone radiation can cook popcorn. OMG that's nuts! We are cooking our brains! We are all in danger! Run away...run for your lives, but leave your phone behind! Your phone is a killer! The popcorn video is cute and entertaining but that's never going to happen.  If phones emitted that much energy, your fingers would heat up and it would hurt like crazy. You would have to wear oven mitts to protect yourself. Very difficult to text your friends wearing oven mitts…I DARE you to try it. 

They are certainly bundles of joy but so much more. No moment is more life altering than when your first child is born. Gone are the days of thinking only of yourself. Or a semblance of free time. And forget about having a neat and tidy house. Ask any parent, and they'll acknowledge that having kids is expensive and exhausting.  Sixty or 70 years ago all couples were expected to have children and this was considered necessary for personal fulfillment. Today's situation is VERY different. We're in no danger of running out of people, so the notion that you've got some kind of "responsibility" to have children went out the window. THERE IS NO LONGER A RIGHT OR WRONG ANSWER. So which choice would you regret more: having children or NOT having children?

Mi siento muy… excited about this topic. I was born in a galaxy far, far away. I WISH…but actually it was Italy. My family moved to North America when I was five. My name is FIORE which means "flower" in Italian, but I am a MALE. In many parts of the world, being bilingual is common-place and not something unusual. Any young child can become bilingual as long as she receives plenty of exposure and guidance in BOTH languages. A couple of hours experience a week in the second language is not enough. Many adults also learn second and third languages, so age is no excuse for failing to learn a new language. Here is a start to learning Italian which is one of the languages of love or AMORE. I love you with all my heart...ti amo con tutto il mio cuore.  

Love at first sight can happen any day, anywhere, and any time. It's the feeling you get when you don't want the moment to end because you feel a connection with another person that you haven't felt before. TV, movies, magazines, music—like to promote the notion of love at first sight. We've been trained to expect love to strike like lightning quick and hot.  A 2017 survey of over 5,000 single adults found that four in 10 of them have had a love at first sight experience. So we can accept that the experience of love at first sight really and truly happens, to men and women everywhere. Less clear is exactly what it means. So is love at first sight real or is it all just fairy tale and fantasy? Is it really LOVE at first sight or just LUST?      

Sharks represent an example of a common fear that is wildly exaggerated. More people are killed by cows or horses each year than by sharks.  The availability bias is when we believe examples of things that come easily to mind are far more likely to occur than is actually the case. Media coverage on the Internet or TV makes a big difference. Even movies such as "Jaws" can change our perceptions. When rare events occur, they become very visible to us as they receive heavy coverage by the media. This means we are more likely to recall these events. If something is more easily recalled in memory, we may conclude that it will occur with a higher probability.  

Sometimes even the parents of identical twins can't tell the difference. In 2023, a mother of identical twins in Argentina confessed she felt forced to take her 6-week old infants to the local police station for fingerprint comparison because she couldn't tell them apart.  Mom had placed a blue ribbon around the wrist of one of the twins but cut it off — and then lost track of their identities when the twins got sick one night. But the police were unable to identify the children and doctors couldn't help either. After several days of confusion, the problem was solved thanks to Argentina's National Registry of Persons.  The mother's Twitter thread went viral after explaining her dilemma, and joking that she won the Best Mom of the Year Award. Her tweet collected over 350,000 likes and over 24,000 retweets. As well, a huge number of other parents admitted having problems trying to identify their own twins. So if even parents can have difficulty recognizing their own identical twins, will the police and justice system face a similar nightmare during crime investigations?

I recently saw this headline in one edition of Readers Digest. My fitbit heart rate alarm started buzzing like I was having a panic attack.  Smarter than Albert Einstein? I DON'T THINK SO: Impossible, absolutely not, no chance, no freeakin way, not in a million years. Not in this universe or anywhere else in the multiverse. In other words, WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. No one messes with my hero and gets away with it, not even Readers Digest. And so my lovely listeners, it's payback time and it's going to get really messy. So bring plenty of protection.    

YES THIS IS PSYCHOLOGY. These tricks might seem extremely difficult to teach, but with the right treats and a bit of patience, it's something you can definitely do. You will need a cat or dog that is reasonably smart. And we must also assume that you are at least as smart as your pet, and preferably smarter. If you can teach a dog how to skateboard, then you can also teach young children proper behavior and discipline. So you can practice on your cat or dog and then try the technique with your children. Follow these video links to watch the skateboarding bulldog, cats that pee and poo in the toilet and a goldfish that drives an aquarium on wheels. Awesome stuff.