Using personal descriptions written for Internet dating profiles, Catalina Toma, Ph.D., a communication science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Jeffrey Hancock, Ph.D., a communication professor at Cornell University, have identified clues as to whether a person is being deceptive.

The researchers compared the actual height, weight, and age of 78 online daters to their profile information and photos on four matchmaking websites. A linguistic analysis then revealed patterns in the liars’ writing.

For example, the more deceptive a dater’s profile, the less likely they were to use the first-person pronoun “I.”

“Liars do this because they want to distance themselves from their deceptive statements,” Toma said. Liars employed negation, a flip of language that restates “happy” as “not sad” or “exciting” as “not boring.” They also tended to write shorter self-descriptions in their profiles — a hedge, Toma said, against weaving a more tangled web of deception.

“They don’t want to say too much,” Toma said. “Liars experience a lot of cognitive load. They have a lot to think about. The less they write, the fewer untrue things they may have to remember and support later.”

Those who lied about their age, height or weight also were more likely to talk about work or life achievements, rather than appearance, the researcher noted.

Once the researchers had these tools, they were able to identify the liars about 65 percent of the time, Toma said.

In a second phase of the study, Toma and Hancock asked volunteers to judge the person’s trustworthiness based solely on the written self-descriptions posted on their online profiles.

“As we expected, people are just bad at this,” Toma said. “They might as well have flipped a coin. They’re looking at the wrong things.”

About 80 percent of the 78 profiles in the study, which was supported by the National Science Foundation, strayed from the truth on some level, she adds. “Almost everybody lied about something, but the magnitude was often small,” Toma said.

Weight was the most frequent transgression, with women off by an average of 8.5 pounds and men by 1.5 pounds on average. Half lied about their height, and nearly 20 percent changed their age.

Toma says the findings are not out of line with what we know about liars in face-to-face situations.

“Online daters’ motivations to lie are pretty much the same as traditional daters’,” she said. “It’s not like a deceptive online profile is a new beast, and that helps us apply what we can learn to all manners of communication.”

Don’t go looking for a dating site that employs Toma’s linguistic analysis as a built-in lie detector.

“Someday there may be software to tell you how likely it is that the cute person whose profile you’re looking at is lying to you, or even that someone is being deceptive in an email,” Toma said. “But that may take a while.”

The study was published in the February issue of the Journal of Communication.

Source: University of Wisconsin-Madison

Results from the six-month program included less weight gain, improved body image, less consumption of fast food and more participation in family meals. The program included weekly peer meetings, consultations with primary care providers and separate meetings for parents.

Kaiser Permanente researchers have published their results online in the journal Pediatrics.

Experts say the study is the first to report long-term results from a weight management program designed specifically for teenage girls.

Most other programs have included younger children and interventions focused on the entire family. This program included separate meetings for parents with the rationale that teens are motivated more by peer acceptance than parental influence.

The study is also unique in that it was conducted in a primary-care setting, rather than an academic or specialty-care environment.

“Nearly one-third of teenage girls are overweight or obese, and many of them are likely to become obese adults,” said Lynn DeBar, Ph.D., M.P.H., lead author and senior investigator with the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research.

“Our study shows that intervention programs can help these girls achieve long-term success managing their weight and also learning new habits that will hopefully carry over into their adult life.”

“Many teenage girls are still growing taller, so for them, maintaining weight or slowing weight gain is an acceptable goal,” said Phil Wu, M.D., a pediatrician who leads Kaiser Permanente’s effort to prevent and treat childhood obesity and is also a co-author of the study.

“Girls in the program gained less weight than those who weren’t in the program, and they reduced their overall body mass index, improved their self-image and developed healthy lifestyle habits, so all of these are successes.”

Researchers followed 208 girls, ages 12-17. All of the girls were classified as overweight or obese, according to standards set by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention standards.

Half of the girls were assigned to the intervention group and half to usual care.

Girls in the intervention group met weekly with their peers and a behavioral counselor during the first three months, and then every other week during months four and six.

The girls were weighed and asked to keep a food and activity diary, which they discussed during each meeting. The program focused on decreasing portion size, limiting consumption of energy-rich foods, establishing regular meal patterns, substituting water for sugar-sweetened beverages, reducing fast food, increasing fruit and vegetable consumption, and having more family meals.

A significant exercise prescription was delivered with girls encouraged to exercise at least five days a week for 30-60 minutes. Moreover, screen time was to be limited to two hours a day.

Participants also received yoga instruction, and a physical-activity video game to use at home. Discussion topics included ways to avoid disordered eating, coping with family and peer teasing and developing strategies to combat negative self-talk.

An important part of the problem included parental education on support for their daughters. This weekly meeting was not held in the presence of the daughters.

Health care providers received summaries of the girls’ current health habits, including meal and physical activity patterns. After receiving training in motivational techniques, the providers met with the girls at the beginning of the study to help them choose one or two behaviors to work on.

The providers had a second visit with the girls at the end of the six-month intervention to check their progress.

Girls assigned to the usual-care group received a packet of materials that included a list of online reading about lifestyle changes. They also met with their primary care provider at the beginning of the study, but the providers were not given health habit summaries for these girls.

Both groups had health assessments and lab tests at the beginning of the study, at six months, and then again at 12 months. The girls started out with an average weight in the 190 lb. range, and an average body mass index in the 97th percentile, which by CDC standards is considered to be obese.

At the end of the study, girls who participated in the program were in the 95th percentile, while girls in the usual-care group were in the 96th percentile.

Researchers say the weight changes were statistically significant but modest compared to some other weight loss interventions.

They point out that the girls were severely obese to begin with and possibly treatment-resistant due to previous involvement in other weight loss programs.

A salient feature of the program was a de-emphasis on calorie counting, focusing instead on lifestyle changes. However, researchers acknowledge that this approach may have produced more modest weight changes than they had expected.

This study is part of ongoing Kaiser Permanente research into weight loss. Previous studies include:

• A Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research study published in the International Journal of Obesity in 2011 found that people trying to lose at least 10 pounds were more likely to reach that goal if they had lower stress levels and slept more than six hours, but not more than eight hours, a night.
• Another Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research study published in 2010 found that the more people logged on to an interactive weight management website, the more weight they kept off.
• Researchers at the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research also reported in a 2008 study that keeping a food diary can double a person’s weight loss and that both personal contact and Web-based support can help with long-term weight management.

Source: Kaiser Permanente

Overweight teenager photo by shutterstock.

In an effort to understand how the motivation to exercise is linked to behavior, researchers examined college students’ intentions to be physically active as well as their actual activity levels.

“Many of us set New Year’s resolutions to be more physically active, and we expect these resolutions to be stable throughout the year,” said David Conroy, Ph.D., professor of kinesiology.

“One of the things we see in this study is that from week to week our motivation can change a lot, and these weekly changes in motivation can be destructive to our resolutions.”

Investigators recruited 33 college students and assessed over a 10-week period both the students’ weekly intentions to be physically active and their activity levels.

Participants were instructed to log on to a website and to rate their intentions to perform physical activity for the week ahead. To assess physical activity, participants were instructed to wear pedometers each day for the first four weeks.

Researchers discovered that for many of the participants, the motivation to exercise fluctuated on a weekly basis, and these fluctuations were linked to their behavior.

The findings from the study appear in the current issue of the Journal of Sport & Exercise Psychology.

“Our motivation to be physically active changes on a weekly basis because we have so many demands on our time,” said Conroy.

For most of us, the challenge to remain motivated to exercise in the weeks when we are maxed-out is problematic. “Maybe one week we’re sick or we have a work deadline — or, in the case of students, an upcoming exam.”

According to Conroy, the lapses in motivation really seem to be destructive.

“Our results suggest that people with consistently strong intentions to exercise have the best chance of actually following through on their intentions, while people with the greatest fluctuations in their motivation have the hardest time using that motivation to regulate their behavior.”

A solution for individuals with wavering motivation includes incorporating physical activity into their daily lives, said research assistant Amanda Hyde.

“Maybe the way to get these people to be more physical active isn’t necessarily by increasing their motivation,” she said, ” but rather by changing the way they do things in their lives so exercise automatically fits within their schedule, like walking to work rather than driving or taking the stairs rather than the elevator.”

Conroy added that consistency of intentions is not the only thing that matters in predicting whether or not a person will be active. It also matters if it is a weekday or the weekend.

“We saw that people who consistently reported stronger intentions to be active were more active during the week, but then on weekends the pattern flipped for them,” said Conroy. “If a person was really motivated during the week, then he or she crashed on the weekend.”

This finding may be unique to the student population as an opposite behavior – that of limited exercise during the week, then over-exercising on the weekend – is often displayed by the working professional a/k/a “weekend warrior.”

Conroy noted that people seem to have different systems that motivate their behavior during the week and on the weekend.

In the case of college students, “individuals may be exhausted from having regulated their behavior and managed their time so carefully during the week that on the weekends they need to recharge their batteries and throw their time management out of the window.”

Regarding New Year’s resolutions, Conroy advised that people should focus less on making broad commitments to becoming more active and instead come up with a plan for how they’re going to sustain their motivation from one week to the next.

“It is important to pay attention to how we can sustain a high level of motivation and not just let that motivation degrade in response to all the external demands we face,” said Conroy.

Source: Penn State

In a paper presented during the American Academy of Neurology’s Annual meeting, researchers report that consumption of between 2,100 and 6,000 calories per day may double the risk of mild cognitive impairment (MCI), among people age 70 and older.

The finding is significant as MCI is the stage between normal memory loss that comes with aging and early Alzheimer’s disease.

Mayo Clinic investigators discovered the more calories consumed each day, the higher the risk of MCI.

“We observed a dose-response pattern,” said study author Yonas E. Geda, M.D., M.Sc., with the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Researchers followed 1,233 people between the ages of 70 and 89 and free of dementia residing in Olmsted County, Minn. Of those, 163 had MCI. Participants reported the amount of calories they ate or drank in a food questionnaire and were divided into three equal groups based on their daily caloric consumption.

The natural experiment resulted in a group that consumed between 600 and 1,526 calories per day; another group with caloric intake between 1,526 and 2,143 per day; and a third group that devoured between 2,143 and 6,000 calories per day.

Investigators discovered the odds of having MCI more than doubled for those in the highest calorie-consuming group compared to those in the lowest calorie-consuming group.

Researchers found the risk remained after adjusting for history of stroke, diabetes, amount of education, and other factors that can affect risk of memory loss.

There was no significant difference in risk for the middle group.

“Cutting calories and eating foods that make up a healthy diet may be a simpler way to prevent memory loss as we age,” said Geda.

Source: American Academy of Neurology

Researchers from New York University and Université Paris Descartes, have published their findings in the journal Psychological Science.

In the study, researchers used questions about gambling, where information about probabilities is given explicitly in numerical form. For instance, in experiments, participants may be asked, “Would you rather have a 50:50 chance of winning $100 or otherwise $0, or would you rather just take $40?”

The consensus in the field is that decision makers, confronted with such possibilities, make poor decisions. They do not maximize their possible winnings, and sometimes their choices are logically inconsistent with one another.

However, investigators realized that in our everyday life we are rarely given explicit estimates of probability. Therefore, what probability information people have is based primarily on their own past experience.

In fact, researchers in several laboratories have conjectured that, when information about probability is learned through experience, people make better decisions.

The researchers at NYU and Université Paris Descartes wanted to test this claim. In the Psychological Science study, participants first played a video game that included firing computerized bullets at different-sized rectangles on the screen. The game was set up so the bullets took a zig-zagging trajectory and, as a result, often missed their target.

This meant the chances of hitting a rectangle increased with its size—it was simply easier to strike a bigger target, and participants gradually learned the link between rectangle size and probability.

Following training, the researchers compared performance in two different decision tasks.

The first was a “classical” decision task where participants chose between alternatives with the probabilities of different outcomes clearly presented. The participant always chose between a larger probability of getting $1 and a smaller probability of getting $2.

In the second (decision from experience), though, they saw two rectangle targets differing in size. They were told that the larger target was worth $1 if they hit it while the smaller—and harder to hit—target was worth $2.

The experimenters adjusted the size of the larger rectangle so that the participant’s probability of hitting it was matched to the larger probability in the “classical” task.

They adjusted the size of the smaller rectangle so that the participant’s probability of hitting it was identical to the smaller probability in the “classical” task. As a result, the motor and classical decision tasks were mathematically identical.

Despite hundreds of trials of training, participants were still markedly sub-optimal in the decision-from-experience task. They showed the same kind of misuse of probability as found in typical decision tasks with probabilities explicitly presented in numerical form.

In summary, practice alone isn’t enough to get people to make good decisions based on risk, said Dr. Laurence Maloney, a professor in NYU’s Center for Neural Science and Department of Psychology, one of the study’s co-authors.

“You could imagine taking someone and saying, well, let’s practice them over and over and over again until they’re experts and maybe their decision-making will be perfect,” he said, adding that’s not what happened in his experiment.

“Basically, the key idea is that people have a distorted appreciation of probability, and it doesn’t go away even when you become one of the world’s experts at shooting rectangles.”

Source: New York University

If you have a positive memory of the schooling, and feel reasonably comfortable with numbers, you are probably better at making informed decisions on a plethora of numerological topics including health risks, investment alternatives, calories, etc.

A new study reviews how people with strong numerical literacy — that is, individual who understand numbers better and process information differently — ultimately make more informed decisions.

The article, published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, explores how people who are numerate feel comfortable thinking about numbers and are less influenced by other information, said Ellen Peters, Ph.D., of Ohio State University, the author of the new paper.

For example, in one of Peters’s studies, students were asked to rate undergraduates who received what looked like different test scores.

Numerate people were more likely to see a person who got 74  percent correct and a person who got 26 percent incorrect as equivalent, while people who were less numerate thought people were doing better if their score was given in terms of a percent correct.

Investigators say this type of analysis is necessary for many forms of decision-making.

For example, “A lot of people take medications,” Peters says. Every drug has benefits and potential risks, and those can be presented in different ways. “You can talk about the 10 percent of the population that gets the side effect or the 90 percent that does not.”

For individuals who are less numerate, the method by which the information is presented is critical.

Other research has shown that only less numerate people respond differently to something that has a 1 in 100 chance of happening than something that has a 1 percent chance of happening. The less numerate see more risk in the 1 in 100 chance — even though these numbers are exactly the same.

Researchers believe the findings have implications for how policy makers and others should communicate about the risks of medicines, earthquakes, climate change, and the stock market.

“Numbers are really just abstract symbols, and we have to bring meaning to them somehow,” Peters said. “In general, people who are numerate are better able to bring consistent meaning to numbers and to make better decisions.

“It suggests that courses in math and statistics may be the educational gift that keeps on giving.”

Source: Association for Psychological Science

Boy with numbers photo by shutterstock.

The Brigham Young University study found that 16- to 18-year-olds perform better academically when they sleep for 7 hours.

“We’re not talking about sleep deprivation,” said study author Eric Eide. “The data simply says that seven hours is optimal at that age.”

The new study by Eide and fellow BYU economics professor Mark Showalter is the first in a series of studies where they examine sleep and its impact on health and education.

Current federal guidelines are based on studies where teens were simply told to keep sleeping until they felt satisfied.

“If you used that same approach for a guideline on how much people should eat, you would put them in a well-stocked pantry and just watch how much they ate until they felt satisfied,” Showalter said.

“Somehow that doesn’t seem right.”

BYU investigators attempted to devise a scientific study that matched the amount of sleep to academic performance or productivity.

Analyzing data from a representative sample of 1,724 primary and secondary school students across the country, they found a strong relationship between the amount of sleep youths got and how they fared on standardized tests.

But more sleep isn’t always better. As they report in the Eastern Economics Journal, the right amount of sleep decreases with age:

• The optimal for 10-year-olds is 9 – 9.5 hours;
• The optimal for 12-year-olds is 8 – 8.5 hours;
• The optimal for 16-year-olds is 7 hours.

“We don’t look at it just from a ‘your kid might be sleeping too much’ perspective,” Eide said.

“From the other end, if a kid is only getting 5.5 hours of sleep a night because he’s overscheduled, he would perform better if he got 90 minutes more each night.”

The size of the effect on test scores depends on a number of factors, but an 80-minute shift toward the optimum is comparable to the child’s parents completing about one more year of schooling.

“Most of our students at BYU, especially those that took early-morning seminary classes in high school, are going to realize that 9 hours of sleep isn’t what the top students do,” Showalter said.

Source: Brigham Young University

Sleeping teenager photo by shutterstock.

Experts say attention to these phenomena is important given the prevalence of hurricanes, tornados and earthquakes.

The study on how cognitive performance can decline after earthquakes is published by New Zealand researchers in the journal Human Factors.

In the report, University of Canterbury’s William S. Helton and James Head discuss how prior studies have found that more traffic accidents and accident-related fatalities occur following human-made disasters such as the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Experts believe the mishaps are due to increased cognitive impairment that can lead to higher stress levels and an increase in intrusive thoughts. However, until this time, no research has been conducted on the effects of natural disasters on cognitive performance.

The authors were unexpectedly presented with a unique opportunity to investigate the impact of the devastating 2010 earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand, as they were performing a human performance study with community members at the time of the quake.

“We were conducting a [different] study on human performance requiring two sessions,” said Helton.

“In the midst of the study, between the two sessions, we had a substantial local earthquake, which resulted in the rare opportunity to do a before/after study. We were quick to seize the opportunity.”

Investigators measured participants’ cognitive control by asking them to either press a button corresponding to numbers presented on a video screen or to withhold a response to a preselected number presented on the same screen.

Normally, participant performance would improve during the second session, but the authors found an increase in errors of omission following the earthquake.

Helton and Head also noted distinct differences in pre- and post-earthquake findings depending on self-reported responses to the disaster: If the participants reported being anxious following the quake, their response times sped up and they made more errors of commission, whereas those who reported depression logged slower response times.

Researchers believe the study substantiates the phenomenon many people report experiencing after a major event like an earthquake.
“People would find themselves zoning out and making more errors than usual after the quake.”

Investigators believe future research is needed to explore this phenomenon further, but the scientists’’ findings may point to potentially serious complications arising from post-disaster performance in daily life and work tasks.

These findings also suggest that police, emergency responders, and others working in the aftermath of the disaster may also experience cognitive disruption, which can interfere with their ability to perform rescue-related tasks.

“Presumably people are under increased cognitive load after a major disaster,” Helton continued.

“Processing a disaster during tasks is perhaps similar to dual-tasking, like driving and having a cell phone conversation at the same time, and this can have consequences.”

Source: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society

Natural disasters photo by shutterstock.

A dearth of data about online dating in later life prompted two Bowling Green State University gerontologists to look into the phenomenon.

In their research, Drs. Wendy K. Watson and Charlie Stelle aim to increase the quantity and improve the quality of information available about dating in later life, and in this case, online dating.

Although the research is in the early stage, Watson and Stelle are finding that older adults appear to market themselves differently on online dating sites than younger adults.

Most notable is the absence of physical appearance (looks) and status. Evidence suggests the senior population appears to be more interested in honest self-representation, compatibility and companionship rather than discussing areas such as sexual prowess and nightlife.

The researchers found traditional online coding terms used to describe younger generations seem to “miss some key elements relevant for ads placed by older adults.”

Watson and Stelle suggest online sites geared at those over 60 might want to consider adding personal characteristics such as affection, intelligence, independence, purpose and goals, religion and spirituality, political beliefs, health and status.

Interestingly, the language of seniors’ online ads was different when describing themselves and what they were looking for in a relationship. Terms such as “young at heart” and “active” were used to show physical fitness and good health.

In previous research on dating in later life, Watson and Stelle found that older women had specific expectations regarding dating.

Watson said women don’t have a need that has to be filled. “Instead their philosophy is: ‘Please don’t waste my time,’” she said.

“They are less likely to play games,” Stelle said. “They want to make a decision quickly and cut their losses, because they have learned life is too short for dating games.”

In the future, Watson and Stelle will continue their research and expand the analysis within the match.com and ourtime.com dating sites.

The experts say their findings show that the desire to find love and a companion to share life with has no expiration date.

Source: Bowling Green State University

Eledrly lady on a computer photo by shutterstock.

In an exercise study conducted by researchers at the Oregon Research Institute, tai chi training resulted in improved postural stability and walking ability, as well as reduced falls in the participants.

“These results are clinically significant because they suggest that Tai Chi, a low-to-moderate impact exercise, may be used as an add-on to current physical therapies, to address some of the key clinical problems in Parkinson’s disease, such as postural and gait instability,” said Fuzhong Li, Ph.D.

“Since many training features in the program are functionally oriented, the improvements in the balance and gait measures that we demonstrated highlight the potential of tai chi-based movements in rehabilitating patients with these types of problems and, consequently, easing cardinal symptoms of Parkinson’s disease and improving mobility, flexibility, balance, and range of motion.”

In the four-year project funded by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, researchers randomly assigned 195 patients to one of three exercise groups: tai chi, resistance training, or stretching. The patients participated in 60-minute exercise sessions twice a week for 24 weeks.

The results of the study showed that the tai chi group performed consistently better than the stretching group in how far they could lean in any direction without losing balance, as well as demonstrating better levels of directional control of the body and walking ability, such as longer stride length. tai chi participants also outperformed those in the resistance training group on the balance and stride length measures.

Finally, tai chi training was shown to significantly lower the incidence of falls compared to stretching, and was as equally effective as resistance training in reducing falls.

As Parkinson’s disease progresses, patients lose stability and have trouble walking, difficulty managing activities required of daily living, and experience frequent falls. Exercise is an important part of the management of Parkinson’s disease because physical activity has been shown to retard the deterioration of motor function and to prolong functional independence. However, research on alternative forms of exercise, such as tai chi, that could improve balance, gait, and function in patients with Parkinson’s disease is scarce, the researcher notes.

The program developed by Li consisted of six tai chi movements integrated into a routine that focused on weight-shifting, controlled-displacement of the center of gravity over the base of support, ankle sway, and front-to-back and sideways stepping. Natural breathing was integrated into the training routine.

“There are a number of practical advantages to using tai chi to improve motor dysfunction of Parkinson’s disease,” he said. “It is a low-cost activity that does not require equipment, it can be done anywhere, at any time, and the movements can be easily learned. It can also be incorporated into a rehabilitation setting as part of existing treatment. Similarly, because of its simplicity, certain aspects of this tai chi program can also be prescribed to patients as a self-care/home activity.”

Source: Oregon Research Institute

Elderly man performing tai chi photo by shutterstock.

Needless to say, a pessimistic assessment goes hand in hand with an increased risk of illness or death. It can be assumed that on average people who rate their health as poor have an unhealthier lifestyle, are often in a fragile state of health or are already sick.

However, earlier studies that only monitored the participants for a few years after the survey reveal that the correlation persists even if these factors are taken into account.

In the new study by researchers at the University of Zurich, investigators demonstrated that self-rated health is also linked to the probability of survival or death over a long period of more than thirty years.

In the study, which was conducted in Switzerland, men who rated their health as “very poor” were 3.3 times more likely to die than men of the same age who rated their health as “excellent”, and the risk of death was 1.9 times higher in women who rated their health as “very poor” than for those who rated it as “excellent”.

Here, the risk increased steadily from an optimistic to a pessimistic rating: people in “excellent” health had better chances of survival than those in “good” health, the latter better chances than those in a “fair” state of health, and so on.

“The steady increase in risk and the long time of over thirty years between the self-rating and the end of the observation period render it practically impossible for medical history or a dark foreboding to be main causes of the correlation observed,” explains head of the study Matthias Bopp.

When investigators statistically removed confounding variables, such as education levels, marital status, tobacco-related strains, medical history, the use of medication, blood pressure and blood glucose into account, the correlation between self-rated health and mortality only remained strong.

The difference in the risk of death between the best and the worst rating was still 1:2.9 in men and 1:1.5 in women.

“Our results indicate that people who rate their state of health as excellent have attributes that improve and sustain their health,” concludes specialist in preventive medicine David Fäh.

“These might include a positive attitude, an optimistic outlook and a fundamental level of satisfaction with one’s own life.”

The results of the study support the broad concept of health advocated by the World Health Organization not as the absence of disease, but rather as complete physical, mental and social wellbeing.

In the future, investigators hope that an individual’s uncertain view of health will trigger positive holistic strategies to improve an individual’s outlook on life.

“Good doctors should therefore not just look for the presence of risk factors or diseases, but also check which health resources their patients have and boost and consolidate them if need be,” says David Fäh.

Source: University of Zurich

Elwely woman and doctor looking out window photo by shutterstock.

Dr. Anthony McCaffrey, a cognitive psychologist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, admits that although the “aha moments” are rare, his Obscure Features Hypothesis (OFH) has led to the first systematic, step-by-step approach to devising innovation-enhancing techniques.

McCaffrey recently won a two-year, $170,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to turn his technique into software with a user-friendly graphical interface.

McCaffrey reviewed more than 100 significant modern and 1,000 historical inventions and analyzed how successful inventors overcame various cognitive obstacles to uncover the key obscure information needed to solve problems.

He found that almost all innovative solutions follow two steps: Noticing an infrequently seen, obscure feature and second, building a solution based on that feature.

“I detected a pattern suggesting that something everyone else had overlooked often became the basis of an inventive solution,” he says. This revelation led McCaffrey to study aspects of human perception and cognition that inhibit our noticing obscure features.

“I felt that if I could understand why people overlook certain things, then develop techniques for them to notice much more readily what they were overlooking, I might have a chance to improve creativity.”

Psychologists use the term “functional fixedness” to describe the first mental obstacle McCaffrey investigated. It explains, for example, how one person finding burrs stuck to his sweater will typically say, “Ugh, a burr,” while another might say, “Hmmm, two things lightly fastened together. I think I’ll invent Velcro!”

The first view is clouded by focusing on an object’s typical function. To overcome functional fixedness, McCaffrey sought a way to teach people to reinterpret known information about common objects.

For each part of an object, the “generic parts technique” (GPT) asks users to list function-free descriptions, including its material, shape and size. Using this, the prongs of an electrical plug can be described in a function-free way to reveal that they might be used as a screwdriver, for example.

“The trick is how to unconceal the features relevant to your purposes,” McCaffrey points out.

The result of creating the function-free parts list is a tree diagram in which the description of each part does not imply a use, helping subjects see beyond common functions of any object and its parts.

McCaffrey designed an experiment to test whether GPT improved problem=solving in a group of 14 undergraduates trained in GPT compared to a control group of 14 who were not. Both groups were given insight problems commonly used in psychological testing, plus new ones designed by McCaffrey’s colleagues.

Overall, the GPT group solved 67.4 percent more problems than the control group, a dramatic and statistically significant improvement in performance. In a follow-up study asking subjects to list features for the same objects (independent of a problem), GPT-trained subjects listed the key obscure feature required for the solution 75 percent of the time compared to 27 percent for controls.

This suggests it is not mere exposure to problems but rather the GPT that leads to uncovering the key obscure feature more often.

McCaffrey believes his philosophy background helps him think about problems from a broad perspective. In Nietzsche, McCaffrey found his broad definition of “feature” that doesn’t limit a theory of creativity. From Heidegger, he borrowed the notion of “unconcealment,” the idea that any object can have an unlimited number of features that are gradually unconcealed within an endless array of contexts.

McCaffrey’s goal is to help people to notice things consciously that they might not otherwise see, and remain open to the possibilities.

“Noticing is one thing, and building on it or connecting it to other things is the next step,” he said. ”Some of this can be learned, and we now have a discipline for it.”

He plans to publish a series of innovation-enhancing techniques to address as many as two dozen distinct creativity blocks caused by the normal function of our perceptual and cognitive systems.

His findings appear now in an early online issue of Psychological Science.

Source: UMass Amherst

Man with light bulb over his head by shutterstock.

Researchers say the connection allows each partner an opportunity to relieve stress and anxiety and helps to improve relationship satisfaction.

The findings stem from research by Kansas State University psychologist Dr. Brenda McDaniel as she studied conflict and conflict recovery in young dating couples. McDaniel reviewed self-reported questionnaires, documented physiological markers of stress and videotaped emotional reactions.

She also has looked at factors that relate to positive dating relationships or problematic relationships.

In the current study, McDaniel and her team worked with more than 50 couples ages 18 to 20 who had been dating for a least six months but were not engaged, married or living together.

“These relationships are, by nature, unstable to begin with,” McDaniel said. “They are early dating relationships. Sometimes it is hard to even get the couples to engage in conflict. Conflict does exist but, because the relationship is so new to them, they don’t want to cause a break-up.”

To observe stress hormone levels, researchers had participants spend 20 minutes talking about a topic that continually causes relationship tension. Often, conflict occurred when one partner treated the other differently in front of family, did not introduce the other to parents and friends, or was flirting with someone else.

“Typically, the couple is not going to come to a resolution regarding the reoccurring conflict within the 20 minute discussion,” McDaniel said. “But we want to get the stress response to see how couples recover from that relationship stress.”

As part of the research design, the stressful discussion was followed by a 20 minutes discussion of a positive shared time during their relationship. These conversations often included reminiscing about their first date, remembering their first kiss or a vacation together.

The researchers tracked physiological markers of stress and videotaped emotional reaction before, during and after both the conflict discussion and the happier discussion.

“Whenever you get into a fight and you get amped up, it is typically more adaptive to let that go after the fight,” McDaniel said. “If you ruminate and keep that anger, it can have negative mental and physical consequences. It’s better to have a nice downward recovery after conflict.”

To see if a downward recovery occurred in couples, researchers examined levels of the stress hormone cortisol before the conflict discussion, after the conflict discussion and after the “happy times” discussion.

Specifically, researchers discovered that if the cortisol levels resembled an inverted V shape — low before the conflict discussion, high after the conflict discussion, and low again after the happier discussion — the person often reported higher relationship satisfaction and higher relationship closeness. Participants whose cortisol levels stayed high instead of coming back down after the happier discussion reported lower relationship satisfaction and less relationship closeness.

Positive relationships were also associated with smooth conversational flow. “Those individuals whose stress hormone levels remained high didn’t enter into that state of flow.”

Flow is like being “in the zone,” McDaniel said. People might be in a state of flow if they are so engaged they lose track of time, or get a sense of enjoyment or creativity from an experience. Flow is often used to describe an athlete who is “hot” during a basketball game or a painter during the creation of a painting.

“A majority of the literature focuses on experiencing flow in a job or activity,” McDaniel said. “But our study examined how couples might experience flow during conversation.”

Investigators discovered that staying or engaging in the flow is often associated with positive characteristics of relationships. However, researchers found that the flow could be one-sided, that is, a person who was happy and in a positive mood could engage in flow even if his or her partner was not “in the zone.”

McDaniel said this disconnect in flow may be because of the nature of late adolescent relationships — 18- to 20-year-olds are still more focused on themselves than on others.

Among this age group, each party may focus only on how they feel about the relationship and what they are getting out of it — rather than a mutual process that includes how the other person feels about the relationship.

“While more research needs to be done, this positive rewarding state of flow during conversation may be one of the factors that create enduring marital relationships,” McDaniel said. “Hence, these early relationships may serve as practice for later long-term relationship.”

McDaniel also has a recommendation for young dating couples who want to improve their relationship.

“Try to engage in as much conversation as you can with potential romantic partners,” McDaniel said. “The partners that provide you with the most rewarding experience during those conversations are likely the ones to pursue.”

Source: Kansas State University

Two new studies, presented at the 2012 Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS), suggest understanding an individual’s mental health status is an important factor for achieving the best outcome after surgery.

The knowledge is meaningful for obtaining improved clinical and generic (patient-satisfaction) outcomes — two measures that will influence future reimbursement schedules for surgeons.

One paper, derived from a study of 97 men and women who received minimally invasive total knee replacement (TKR) surgery, suggested men with anxiety traits — defined as a high level of anxiety unrelated to a stressful event — had higher post-operative pain ratings resulting in longer hospital stays. Women were found to generally report higher post-operative pain levels than men, and women were consistently less satisfied with pain control.

However, researchers found that some old presumptions did not hold up to the new findings. Specifically, postoperative pain or pain medication use in either men or women was not linked to reports of anxiety or even “catastrophizing” (an extreme response to stress).

In the next paper, reporting on a study of 1,657 patients receiving hip replacement surgery, researchers discovered patients taking antidepressants up to three years prior to undergoing a total hip replacement (THR) were more likely to report greater pain before and after surgery and less satisfaction with their procedure.

Approximately 215 patients were using antidepressants three years before the surgery.

In this study, patients were surveyed before and one year after the THR. The investigators found that a patient’s mental health status, assessed by the use of antidepressants before surgery, was a significant factor in predicting outcomes, as well as gender (men are more likely to report lower outcomes), advanced age and co-morbidity (other joint diseases or conditions which affect walking).

In summary, researchers believe a patient’s mental health status should be assessed prior to surgery and taken into consideration during post-operative care.

Source: American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons

Knee in brace photo by shutterstock.

Penn State investigators determined people who are more physically active report greater levels of excitement and enthusiasm than people who are less physically active.

Researchers determined people also are more likely to report feelings of excitement and enthusiasm on days when they are more physically active than usual.

This discovery conceptually dates back to ancient times when the Greeks believed physical and mental well-being were inseparable.

“You don’t have to be the fittest person who is exercising every day to receive the feel-good benefits of exercise,” said David Conroy, Ph.D., professor of kinesiology.

“It’s a matter of taking it one day at a time, of trying to get your activity in, and then there’s this feel-good reward afterwards.”

Conroy believes a common fault is the focus on long-term rather than short-term exercise goals.

“When people set New Year’s resolutions, they set them up to include the entire upcoming year, but that can be really overwhelming,” he said.

“Taking it one day at a time and savoring that feel-good effect at the end of the day might be one step to break it down and get those daily rewards for activity. Doing this could help people be a little more encouraged to stay active and keep up the program they started.”

In the study, researchers asked 190 university students to keep daily diaries of their lived experiences, including free-time physical activity and sleep quantity and quality, as well as their mental states, including perceived stress and feeling states.

Participants were instructed to record only those episodes of physical activity that occurred for at least 15 minutes and to note whether the physical activity was mild, moderate or vigorous. Participants returned their diaries to the researchers at the end of each day for a total of eight days.

Investigators then separated the participants’ feeling states into four categories: pleasant-activated feelings exemplified by excitement and enthusiasm, pleasant-deactivated feelings exemplified by satisfaction and relaxation, unpleasant-activated feelings exemplified by anxiety and anger, and unpleasant-deactivated feelings exemplified by depression and sadness.

“We found that people who are more physically active have more pleasant-activated feelings than people who are less active, and we also found that people have more pleasant-activated feelings on days when they are more physically active than usual,” said co-author and doctoral student Amanda Hyde, who noted that the team was able to rule out alternative explanations for the pleasant-activated feelings, such as quality of sleep.

“Our results suggest that not only are there chronic benefits of physical activity, but there are discrete benefits as well. Doing more exercise than you typically do can give you a burst of pleasant-activated feelings. So today, if you want a boost, go do some moderate-to-vigorous intensity exercise.”

The researchers say that this is one of the first studies to acknowledge a benefit of physical activity is activation of positive feelings and energy.

“Knowing that moderate and vigorous physical activity generates a pleasant-activated feeling, rather than just a pleasant feeling, might help to explain why physical activity is so much more effective for treating depression rather than anxiety,” Conroy said.

“People dealing with anxious symptoms don’t need an increase in activation. If anything, they might want to bring it down some. In the future, we plan to look more closely at the effects of physical activity on mental health symptoms.”

The results of the study may be found in the current issue of the Journal of Sport & Exercise Psychology.

Source: Penn State

Young man running photo by shutterstock.