It is probably a pretty safe bet that you have found yourself yawning after seeing someone else yawn before you. Certainly math class can be boring and nightlong marathons of fragging strangers on Call of Duty can lead to a short night’s rest. Boredom and tiredness are typically the two most commonly accepted reasons we yawn for people that don’t study the mattter. For many years it was suspected that yawning, a reflexive action in which there is little control over, is the body’s way of restoring o2 levels and flushing the system of co2, though studies have indicated for years this likely isn’t the case.

The most recent and arguably the most logical explanation comes from Andrew C. Gallupa and Gordon G. Gallup Jr. of State University of New York in their 2007 study on yawning. The comprehensive study concluded that the act of yawning is the body’s way of cooling warm brains.  Increased brain temperature is associated with many effects, several of which mimic (or perhaps even cause) of the effects also associated with feeling tired (drowsiness, for example).  It seems that yawning is nothing more than temperature regulation. Fine. Easy enough. But what the heck does temperature regulation have to do with contagious yawning? Lets dig a little deeper. But first…

In just two short paragraphs of writing on the topic, I have yawned several times (Have you? Don’t lie).  Lets try an experiment. Watch this video of a cute kitten yawning and tell me you don’t yawn as well. Is this article making you yawn? Leave a comment below and tell us how many times you yawned.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bfoftiihn6s

Admit it, you yawned (or at least went “Awwwww”).

Who contagious yawns?

Watch out for those teeth! A Macaques monkey yawning.

Stumptail macaques yawn in responses to other macaques on video 
A 2006 study by Anika Paukner and James Anderson (University of Stirling) discovered that macaques demonstrate a significant increase  in yawning of after the chimps were shown videos of other chimpanzees yawning.

How they did it
22 macaques were shown videos of other macaques yawning and videos of other macaques making non-yawning facial expressions (control).

The results
The results showed an increase of nearly double (4.7 vs 10 yawns, on average) when macaques were shown the yawn videos demonstrating that contagious yawning is not environment-related (as the yawns were on video) but instead must something psychological.

What do The Animal Studies Tell Us?

Domestic dogs yawn in response to a human yawn and tortoises don’t respond to their own kind’s yawns.  Neither are primates but domestic dogs do demonstrate a very high level of social interaction with humans.  Could this be why dogs are likely to yawn in response to a human yawn?  It is widely accepted that dogs have co-evolved alongside humans.  Interestingly, wolves are not as socially responsive to humans as dogs are and this is likely because dogs and wolves have evolved separately for many thousands of years. It’s also worth pointing out that the video studies indicate that contagious yawning is not environmentally driven.  Therefore, contagious yawning is not merely an illusion caused by a warm room (which would cause several individuals to have warmer brains and need cooling via a yawn).

These facts indicate that the act of contagious yawning is a socially driven-response, but what social skill is at play here?

Empathy as an Explanation for Contagious Yawning

One of the few positives that can come from disorders of the brain is that they can give us insight into how a normal functioning brain works.  For example, brain lesion studies have been one of the most useful ways of studying brain functions.  Perhaps the most famous example of this is the story of Phineas Gage, who suffered a traumatic work accident in which a 4in diameter rod was forced through his skull.  The damage to his frontal cortex along with a dramatic change in his social inhibitions and odd behavior in the years following the accident resulted in some of the first and to this day most useful insights into the connection between the frontal cortex and human behavior.

In the same sense, we can look at human behavior disorders as a window to the psychological relationships behind related-behaviors.  In the case of contagious yawning, many studies are leading us down a road in which empathy appears to be the cause.  Some of the most insightful work to this end are studies related to childhood development and autism.

Autism and Empathy

Of the several symptoms of autism, the hallmarks are impaired non-verbal social interaction and a lack of social-awareness/empathy towards others. Given that this is a widely studied and overwhelmingly accepted fact, let us now explore contagious yawning among autistic patients.

Conclusions

One of the differences between humans and most other species is the advance social skills that develop in adults.  This development does take some time and it has been suggested that advance empathy does not begin to really take shape until the age of 6 or 7.  Additionally, it is well documented that autistic children lack basic empathetic skills.  These facts alongside the above contagious yawning studies seem to indicate that contagious yawning is directly related to empathy.  Since empathy is an advanced social skill, of which few animals in the kingdom have (that is both empathy and advance social skills), it is also not a surprise then that contagious yawning is lacking in the animal kingdom outside of a specific set of highly-advanced animals (humans included).

The only logical conclusion to draw at this time is that we yawn in response to other’s yawns simply because we are empathetic.  The reason that we are empathetic to other individuals yawns has yet to be explained but there are other behaviors that seem to also be contagious such as itching, smiling, and several other behaviors.  Empathy is an important skill for physically weak (relatively) highly social animals that rely on each other.  Without empathy, bad things can happen.

So, simply put, we are contagious to other people’s yawns because we are empathetic.  If your wife doesn’t yawn when you do, you’ve been warned.

Understanding Human Reaction to Sudden Tragedy

The unfortunate reality of most human tragedies is that in the chaos that they create is the predictability that is human nature. As much diversity in our behavior that our (massive) frontal cortex allows for, at the base of our brain is an ancient structure that we share with every vertebrate on the planet. The brainstem, not surprisingly, is thusly the center of our most simple behaviors and bodily functions.

Many (women) may argue that men are mostly “brainstem” for it is the simple things that are required for life that are controlled by the brainstem. The beating of your heart, the rhythmic breathing of your lungs, arousal, and our alertness are all functions of the brainstem (among others).

There is more than irony in Disney's personification of the animal stampede

Human Emotion in The Brain

Additionally, it has been hypothesized that our emotions are largely controlled by areas of the brainstem.  A PET study (conducted by Antonio R. Damasio, Thomas J. Grabowski, Antoine Bechara, Hanna Damasio, Laura L.B. Ponto, Josef Parvizi & Richard D. Hichwa) in 2000 demonstrated that when humans think of emotional historical events in their lives, activity in the regions of the brainstem increased, indicating that the brainstem plays an important role in the creation and reaction of emotional stimuli.

So what does it matter if the brainstem controls all of these simple functions?

The point is that although the rest of our brain has evolved significantly from our early ancestors, ultimately the very basic functions of our being are shared with the rest of the animal kingdom.  This is no more visible than in times of sudden and unexpected tragedy, specifically in large groups of people.

Human Reaction to Disaster

As natural as it seems to run from disaster, as can be seen in many clips of the earthquake it’s easy to take for granted the lack of control we actually have when the brainstem is in high gear.  Many refer to the brainstem as the brain’s “auto pilot” because the functions it is mostly responsible for are also the ones that we take without thought.  This is not by accident but rather by design.

If we were tasked to assess and react accordingly to every experience in our lives, our survival rate would be more similar to Layman Psych’s Call of Duty score.

Every time you slam on the brakes because of a car you didn’t see, every time you duck from a soccer-ball that grazes your head, and every time you see a mass of people running like a herd of cattle, the brainstem is at work.  The masses of people running from ground zero on 9/11 were not thinking about getting away, it was an automatic response.  And while many would likely tell you later “We were just trying to get out of there” the truth is that this was more likely something that they became conscious of after they had already started running.

How do we know this?

As mentioned previously, there have been many studies that point to evidence that suggests our brain stems play a significant role in emotional responses. Such suggestions are nice on their own, but how can we further make this claim concrete?  What if we studied an emotional disorder–the mental disorder–and examined the cause of that disorder–the physical or biological reason the disorder exists?

The Brainstem’s role in Panic Disorder

It just so happens that by studying panic disorders, we can begin to understand what part of the brain is responsible for eliciting this emotion.  A now outdated, but oft cited study from 1994 (by V J Knott, D Bakish, and J Barkley) found that stimulation of the brainstem elicits panic attacks.  Since then, a vast amount of scholarship has been written that supports these claims.  Additionally, a recent study found that not only is there a correlation to panic (and panic attacks) and regions of the brainstem, but an abnormally large area of brainstem is correlated with an increased chance of an individual having panic (attack) disorders.

The Take Home

Every vertebrate on the planet has a few things in common. They eat, they breath, they sleep, they panic, they have a brain stem.  While many animals lack the vast majority of structures and/or size of the human brain, we all share the ability to panic and react in auto mode.

Underneath the sadness of loss of human life is pure horror and animal-like reaction in the form of panic

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nNkuig1l8s

You and your friend rob a bank and make out like bandits with $10,000,000. Everything is going great, until you’re both caught. The police throw you and your friend into separate interrogation rooms and begin to berate you. They make you an offer you seemingly can’t refuse: rat out your friend in exchange for a lighter sentence. Hey, who hasn’t been there before?

Hopefully not you but if you’ve watched any crime show (real or fake) you’re familiar with the scenario. The premise is a fairly simple one: Two people caught in a pickle, forced to make a decision that results in the best outcome for themselves. The question is: which decision is in the individual’s best interest?

On one hand, you can tell the cops how your friend was behind everything in hopes that they only send you to jail for a few months instead of a few years. On the other hand, you can play it cool and give them nothing. It sounds pretty simple, if you rat them out then how does that not help you? Well, what’s going on in the other room? The cops are giving your friend the same offer. So what happens if you both rat each other out? What happens if you both play it cool? What happens if you play it cool and your friend rats you out? What happens if you rat your friend out who plays it cool? This is a classic “Prisoners Dilemma“.

Four possible outcomes with varying degrees of benefit for the individuals involved.

Human Nature of the Prisoners Dilemma

With all of this knowledge it seems easy to figure out what is best to do. But  when individuals don’t know how their decision will impact the end result, human nature fails us.  In fact, a recent study indicates that when presented with this general scenario (and it can be applied to literally anything, it does not always have to involve the law) humans only chose to cooperate 40% of the time.  This means that more than half the time the decisions made by the individual hurts the group.

The Bachelor Pad

ABC managed to produce a surprisingly riveting finale to what can only be described as a vastly interesting commentary on human nature in The Bachelor Pad. For those that don’t already know, the series threw a group of single men and women into a house together and let them live. In essence, that was the show, with the exception that based on nothing at all (such as an academic or athletic competition), each week a man and a woman was voted off the show by their gender counterparts.  It became advantageous for the individuals to align themselves with someone of the opposite sex so that person could fight for them at the end of each show in trying to get their peers to not vote their mate off the show.   At the end of the tunnel? $250,000 to the last one standing.

The final two (which was designed to be a man and a woman, and therefore a couple) were voted into position by the peers (the cast of the show) but only one could win the prize, so they thought.

The final two contestants Natalie and Dave, learned that the strength of their relationship would ultimately determine who won the money.   They were presented with a classic “prisoners dilemma” and sent into separate rooms to make their final decision.

In the end both decided to share the money, in contrast to typical human behavior. One flaw in the design of ABC’s ending was that the contestants knew the outcome, often not the case in a typical prisoners dilemma. Furthermore, it is possible that the two did in fact have a relationship that helped guide their decision, or perhaps they merely fell under the 40% of humans who chose to cooperate.  In any case, they both walked away with a cool $125,000

A final interesting caviet to the human nature of the Prisoner’s Dilemma

The setup of The Bachelor Pad’s Prisoners Dilemma was unique in that the contestants were privy to the ramifications of the wrong decision. As previously mentioned, this often isn’t how the Dilemma is designed, which helps fuel the natural human tendency for greed.  Ultimately, whatever an individuals decision in such a scenario, it is based purely on greed: The best possible outcome for me.

We know that 60% of humans will make chose to not cooperate with their partner, thus 60% of the time they both lose.  But what happens if you individuals to replay the dilemma over and over but not specifically tell them how they can win?  This can be setup in a game that rewards each player with points for their decision and playing the game an unknown or random number of times.  What we discover in such scenarios is that humans learn to work together to maximize their points.

The silver lining in the human nature of the Prisoner’s Dilemma

The ultimate goal in these scenarios is always driven by greed.  The Dilemma is set up to work on that greed so that each individual loses. The proof of this comes from the study of the topic: More often than not, individuals do not chose to cooperate with their counterpart because on the surface it seems the most likely way to win.  Since the odds are that each individual will not cooperate, the most common outcome is that both individuals lose.  Thus, human nature (greed) is used against the individual so that they inevitably fail.

The silver lining in this though is that humans can learn through experience.  Typically, with enough experience, both individuals learn to work together to maximize their gains.

This basic concept is known as the Nash Equilibrium, named after John Nash, the mathematician made famous (to non-math nerds) by the biographical movie A Beautiful Mind (depicting the schizophrenic academic’s life).

In short, an individual or entity (such as a nation, or business) can maximize returns (monetary or otherwise) by making the best decision for thyself but accounting for the decision of thy counterpart.

Most likely what happened on last night’s Bacheler Pad was that Natalie and Dave, being privy to the likelihood that they could walk away with nothing after otherwise winning the game, accounted for each others decision and ultimately chose wisely by sharing the money so that they each won.

As much as it pains LaymanPsych to say this, ABC managed to create a fascinating, albeit somewhat trashy, case study of human nature. And that is that.

More Reading

Preference, Belief, and Similarity: Selected Writings
Play out the prisoner dilemma with the computer

The prevalence of text message usage has increased dramatically in the last decade.

I’m not sure if you noticed but there are a lot of people using cell phones these days. In fact, today’s cell phone is probably inaccurately named.  Cell phones do still make phone calls of course but they are  increasingly becoming more like portable computers than merely phones.  This dramatically improved functionality of cell phones has not necessarily made texting more prevalent per se but it has opened the door to less costly plans and more text-friendly telephones.  As a result, the prevalence of text message usage has increased dramatically in the last decade.

What started as a novelty nearly 20 years ago has since grown into somewhat of a cultural fixture.  With all of the texting lingo, it is easy to understand why there is debate about whether or not texting is harming today’s children. It seems a little unlikely that the new linguistic patterns found in texting is negatively impacting today’s youth but one has to wonder: What exactly are kids saying?  More directly, what types of things are today’s youth using text messages for?

Who Are They

Crispin Thurlow and Alex Brown of the University of Washington-Department of Communication

What They Did

Thurlow and Brown utilized 159 first year college students from Cardiff University (Wales, UK) and analyzed 544 individual text messages for 1.) Message Length 2.) Main linguistic content, such as actual text (like this), or emoticons  ( :-p ), and abbreviations (Laymanpsych is Gr8).

What They Found

As is perhaps expected, Thurlow’s findings seem to indicate that users are often brief.  The technology limits the length of the messages to (typically) 160 characters, most users used around 65 characters (though there was a lot of variation; some used much more, some used less).   This size limit seems to explain the need for abbreviations; the findings reveal that of the 544 examples, there were 1401 abbreviations (or about 3 per message). Interestingly, this only accounts for roughly 20% of the content.

Each message was then categorized by content (of the 544 examples, 121 were eligible for categorization) into one of eight categories as follows:

*Informational-Practical: Exchanges of practical details or requests (14%)

*Informational-Relational: Exchanges for requests or personal favors (8%)

*Practical Arrangement: Plans to meet (15%)

*Social Arrangement: Plans for recreational meetings (9%)

* Salutary: Greetings. Often very brief and non-specific (17%)

*Friendship Maintenance: Apologies, support, thanks, etc. (23%)

*Romantic: Maintenance of romantic relationships (9%)

*Sexual: Explicitly sexual overtones. (3%)

*Chain Messages: Long messages passed from user to user (2%)

Separating these eight categories into two groups, “low-intimacy, high transactional” and “High intimacy, high relational”, further reveals that the majority of text messages were to set up or maintain relationships (roughly 61%).

Other themes of note were a large level of humor and general “joy” as well as what Thurlow has described as “Hyper-coordination” in which users updated others with information about looming plans. For example: M25 “C u in 5 min x” or M27 “Where r u? We r by the bar at the back on the left”.  Lastly, texts were frequently used to have separate personal conversations between individuals while within a larger group.  Many, for example, were texts to fellow classmates about the lecture at hand, or about individuals within the group.

What does it all mean?

The study at hand is rather simplistic and on a certain level, one could argue, somewhat foreseeable.  This study seems to make it clear that text messaging has become an imperative communication tool for younger individuals. In the context of a hyper-active world in which people are often running in many directions at once, text messaging appears to be a viable way for people to not just remain in touch with each other but actually increase their social productivity.   Although one could argue that the content of these messages is an abomination to the English language, it’s also a possibility that there is simply a new communication paradigm that has formed.  In areas where speed is not an overly important aspect of the interaction, whether it’s on a term paper or even on Facebook, language appears to remain in tact.

Perhaps for a new form of communication (text messaging), for it to be as efficient as possible for its intended use, requires a new language of its own.  It seems likely that English remains safe and text messaging will continue to facilitate an ever-busy society that still has a strong urge to remain in touch.

Further Reading

Generation Txt? The sociolinguistics of young people’s text-messaging (link to article)

The Psychology of Twitter, Facebook, and Other Social Networking Devices

Although the findings are not firm, it seems likely that violent video games lead to more successful in-game advertising.

The Real World Example

For those who play video games, a completely new world has opened up over the last decade as these gamers (and their games) become increasingly connected to the internet.  No longer are gamers stuck with playing against the computer, no longer are sports rosters outdated, no longer is the game you purchase the final version of the game.  Many video games are played strictly on the internet.

Beyond the entertainment value of incorporating the internet into gaming, there is a monetary value.  In-game advertising is certainly nothing new. However, the addition of the internet to in-game advertising allows for a dynamic experience. The ability to use the internet to target and change in-game advertisements has created a completely new opportunity to capitalize on ads in ways that has never before allowed.  And with this comes an increased desire to spend money on in-game advertising, which will certainly lead to more of it.

This seems harmless to all but the gaming purests whom are bothered by advertisements fudging with their gaming experience.  This begs to question whether or not an in-game advertisement can even be effective if the individual who is suppose to see the ad is too busy killing Nazi’s.  One must also consider whether or not an advertisement in a game where you kill Nazi’s is going to be as effective as say, Sonic the Hedgehog.  It turns out, that such questions are beginning to be answered by researchers.

Who Are They?

Andre Melzer, Brad Bushman and Ulrich Hoffman, The University of Michigan The University of Amsterdam and University of Luebeck

What They Did

Melzer, Bushman and Hoffman developed a 3D driving simulator that allows for researchers to manipulate the scenery (specifically, though not exclusively, billboards) in the game.

Users were split into two groups. The first group played a non-violent version of the game in which they were rewarded for running over geometric shapes.  A second group played the violent version of the game. The only change in the game was that users were rewarded for running over innocent pedestrians (it may be worth noting that when an individual ran over a pedestrian, a loud screaming sound reinforced the act).

Throughout the game billboards were placed in the scenery which displayed 64 corporate brands which were proven (through prior testing) to be well-recognized brands by the general public. Following completion of the simulation, users were given a surprise memory (consisting of two parts) test as well as a questionnaire.

The Memory Test

The first aspect of the memory test presented users with blurred versions of real brands, some of which were in the game, and some were not.  The second aspect was a “free recall” test in which users listed as many of the brands they saw while playing the game as they could.

The Questionnaire

The questionnaire served a few purposes but the most significant question asked the user whether or not the game was violent.

The Results

As expected, most users correctly identified whether or not their version of the game was violent (as per the questionnaire).  There was no difference in the amount of brands that were recalled by users in either version of the game (that is to say that on average, non-violent game players recalled an equal amount of brands as the violent game players). Interestingly though, users who played the violent version of the game were quicker to identify which brands were actually in the game compared to the non-violent game players.

What Does It Mean?

Truthfully, the study is somewhat lacking, and this is recognized by the researchers who intend on further developing the study.  For example, they set up an eye-tracking system in the game but unfortunately it malfunctioned for most of the trials.  Having said that, it appears that violent video games may lead to an increase in awareness of advertisements presented in-game.  When the users played the violent game they appeared more ready to identify brands that they saw while playing the game.

Violence sells but many fear it may negatively impact those who partake in watching violent movies, television shows, and especially video games.  It seems plausible that if violence in fact increases brand awareness when combined with video games that we will see more violent video games capitalizing on in-game advertisement.
Is this a bad thing? That is for you to decide.

More Reading

When Items Become Victims: Brand Memory in Violent and Nonviolent Games (link to article)

Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill : A Call to Action Against TV, Movie and Video Game Violence

Danny from the Biggest Loser lost an incredible 239 pounds

The Real Life Example

Here is a task for you:  Go to Wal-Mart and look around.   America. Is. Fat.  In fact, America is only getting fatter.  There are, of course, many reasons for this and you’ve heard them all before so we shall spare you that story.  As America gets fatter, nighttime television is consumed by the latest and greatest weight loss schemes.  They do not work of course, which is (perhaps) one of the reasons the industry continues to grow.

The reality is that obesity is costing America a fortune while at the same time Washington debates healthcare reform.  An easy solution to both the obesity and health-care problem would be to lose weight. Simple as it sounds, most know that losing weight is far from it.  But why?  As you might imagine, psychologists are on the front lines in trying to find out why.   Recently the winner of a popular reality show lost 239 pounds in less than a year.  Turns out he also won $250,000.  As you might expect, it seems money is one of the best motivators to for weight loss.

Who Are They

Kevin G. Volpp, MD, PhD; Leslie K. John, MS; Andrea B. Troxel, ScD; Laurie Norton, MA; Jennifer Fassbender, MS; George Loewenstein, PhD

What They Did

Volpp et. al. gathered 57 overweight (though otherwise healthy) individuals between the ages of 30 and 70 years old.  The participants were then randomly placed in one of three different groups.  The first group was placed in a lottery system where those who met or exceeded weight-loss goals would have a chance at winning money.  The second group was part of a “deposit-contract arrangement” in which they pooled together their own money.  The money in this group was then split up among the top weight losers within the group.  The final group was given no cash incentive to lose weight.
The groups were all given 16 weeks to lose weight with a goal of losing one pound per week.

What They Found

Volp et al. discovered that those individuals who were given a cash incentive to lose weight performed significantly better than those given no incentive other than their good health.  By the numbers:  53% of the “lotto” group met or exceeded the 16 pound weight-loss goal, 47% of the deposit-contract group met or exceeded the 16 pound goal, and only 11% of the group with no cash incentive met or exceeded the 16 pound goal.  A follow up study revealed that not only did the weight loss end as soon as the cash incentives did for most of the participants, but the weight actually begin to come back.

What it Means

Unfortunately it looks like a random group of American’s isn’t very intrinsically motivated to be healthy.  In fact, by and large it required cold hard cash for individuals to lose weight. Sadly, once that extrinsic incentive was taken away, so was the motivation to lose weight.  What’s scary is that other findings about financial based incentives may mean that those who once lost weight as a result of a cash incentive, may now have even less motivation to be healthier on their own accord.

So is money the answer to a healthier America?  Early indications suggest not, at least not for the long term.  There is some hope, however, in that it is possible to motivate otherwise unmotivated people to do something with a little bit of money.  But for those of us who work every day, this isn’t news at all.  Volpp et. al. do wonder if a longer-term incentive program would begin to actually change the way the participants think by suggesting that a 12-18 month program would result in such drastic weight loss that the extrinsic motivation of cash would begin subside to an intrinsic desire to remain healthy.  Perhaps we should follow up with Danny in a few months to see how he’s doing…

Layman Psych Definitions

Intrinsic Motivation: Intrinsic motivation can be thought of as the internal desire to accomplish something for the sake of accomplishing it.  Intrinsically motivated tasks are still accomplished due to a reward but the reward exists within the task itself.  An example is listening to a song because an individual likes how the song sounds.

Extrinsic Motivation: Extrinsic motivation refers to “external” motivation to drive us to finishing something.  With extrinsically motivated tasks, the desire to complete the task has less to do with the rewards within the task itself and more to do with the rewards that come as a result of the completion of the task.  For example, you go to work to get paid. The work is the task, the motivation is the money you get from the job (this is, of course, unless you love your work).

Further Reading

Financial Incentive–Based Approaches for Weight Loss (link to study)

The Real World Example

We have all been there; the night before the final and you haven’t dedicated a minute to that class on “Maple Syrup” that you took as an elective and thought would be an easy A.  After all, you’ve had far more important things to worry about, like a Madden franchise or perhaps some actual studying on your Intro to Marketing class.  So before you call it a night you dedicate 2 hours to the fine science of Maple Sugaring. You remind yourself that,  “Below-freezing nights and sunny, warm (40 degrees F) days provide optimal conditions for sap to start moving up the tree.”  For the remainder of your night, you cram everything you were suppose to have already known about the fine art of making Maple Syrup into that sponge-like brain of yours in preparation of that test you have at 9:30am the following morning.

Inevitably, you manage a C+, which strikes you as odd.  On one hand, you did procrastinate a little bit but on the other hand you spent 2 solid hours just the night before studying the art and the best you can manage is a 78%.  At least you didn’t fail, right?  But why the heck isn’t 2 hours of study the day before a test about maple syrup enough to get at least a B?  Turns out that it’s not because you’re stupid, it’s just how our brain works.

Who Are They?
Murray Glanzer and Anita R. Cunitz of New York University for The Institute for Behavioral Research, Silver Spring, Maryland, USA in 1966.

Some Background in Memory

Glanzer and Cunitz worked off the assumption that humans have “two” memories. A “working memory” and a “long-term memory”. Working memory, they surmised, is a short-termed memory system that is only in use while you are “working” on something.  Think of working memory as your brain’s post-it note.  Long-term memory is what most of us think of as memory. If something is in long-term memory, we can remember it on demand.  Most people know, for example, that the leader of Nazi Germany was Hitler. In short, long-term memory is the goal in school.  If you are able to store everything you need to know for a test in long-term memory, chances are good that you’ll get an A.

The mistake that many students make is that they think the path to long-term memory is a short one.  In truth, it requires a little bit of effort.  Glanzer and Cunitz’s work begins to explain why.

What They Did

Glanzer and Cunitz designed two studies both relying on an often used model in which the presentation of a list of words to subjects who were then asked to recall as many of those words as possible immediately following the presentation of the list (this procedure is known as free recall). Glanzer and Cunitz knew that the subjects would, in general, be able to recall more words from the beginning and end of the list than the middle based on the work of Hermann Ebbinghaus.  Glanzer and Cunitz tweaked this common methodology two ways.

In the first experiment, they varied the presentation rate of the words.  In some trials, they lengthened the duration between words, and in some they shortened it.

In the second experiment, they varied the delay with which words were presented and when the subject was asked to recall the words. In some trials there was a small duration between the reading of the list and the recall of the list. In others, this duration was lengthened.

What They Found

As expected, Glanzer and Cunitz found a common U-shaped “Serial Position Curve” which displays better recall of the first and last sections of the list but a severe inability to recall words in the middle of the list.  This was expected due to two known effects: the primacy effect (which explains why the begining of the list is remembered more easily) and the recency effect (which explains why the end of the list is remembered more easily).

What they also predicted was that the rate at which words were presented would effect the begining of the curve (the primacy effect).  If words were presented more slowly, more words were remembered early in the curve.

Lastly, they predicted that the duration of time between presentation and recall would effect the end of the curve.  If there was more time between the presentation and recall, less words at the end were remembered.  If there was less time, more words were remembered.

The Serial Position Curve

Explaining What’s Going On

The reason that words in the begining of the list are remembered more is because as the subject is read the words, they have the ability to commit those words to memory, typically by internally repeating them in their head until there is too much information to process. If there is more time to do this, by slowing the pace at which the words are read, for example, you will remember more words.  At this point, near the middle of the list, the brain is relying more on it’s short-term working memory.  This is why recency of the list matters.  Things are only stored in our working-memory for brief periods of time.  Thus, if there is more time between the presentation of the list and recall of the list, there is more of a chance that these words escape our working-memory.

What This Means

I hope that you can make the connection between cramming for a test and this free-recall experiment.  When you are “craming”, you are essentially reading a list of facts to yourself and trying to commit them to memory.  Unfortunately most of these things won’t actually be committed to memory and will be forgotten in a few hours.  This is not to say that you won’t remember anything.  Chances are good that come test time, the things you studied at the beginning of your “cram” session will be recalled, and some of the things at the end of the “cram” session will be recalled.  The majority though, will be lost among many other post-it notes in your brain.

So what can you do? Here are 5 cramming tips:

1. Avoid cramming.  You are better off spending 20-30 minutes a night for the duration of a month or more trying to focus on a small portion of facts

2. If you have to cram, try and study the more important parts of the test at the beginning of your cram session, the next most important things at the end, and the least important things in the middle

3. If cramming is a must, try and reduce the amount of material you study.  If there is a smaller list of things to try and remember, you’ll likely remember more of them.

4. Cramming is about prioritizing.  If you have gotten to this point you are already in trouble.  Focus on the most important material.  You simply can’t remember everything so if you can weed out the trivial stuff then you can dedicate more memory to the important stuff.

5. Did I mention that you should avoid cramming?

(5 points to anyone who see’s what I did with that list)

More Reading

Two Storage Mechanisms in Free Recall (the study)

The Psychology of Learning: Why Context Matters (a laymanpsych article)

The Real World Example

In my early days of college, I would often spend my time studying with music blasting in my ears.  In my later years in school, I was more likely found in a quiet room.  Not surprisingly, perhaps, my grades were better in my later years of school. It’s possible that learning material with something as distracting as music on is simply difficult but it is possible, and perhaps likely, that something else is work here. How do we know this? Because it’s been studied, of course.

Who Are They?

D. R. Godden and A. D. Baddeley of The University of Stirling in 1975.

What They Did?

Godden and Baddeley designed a simple experiment that required deep sea divers (and they were all deep sea divers) to learn material while either on land or while under water.  They were then asked to recall this information in the form of a quiz.

There were four groups of subjects. One group learned material under water, and took the quiz under water.  Another group learned the material on land and recalled the information on land.  Another group learned the material under water and recalled it on land. The final group learned the material on land and recalled it under water.

What They Found?

The point of the quiz was to determine an individuals ability to learn the material. Obviously, if someone performs better on the quiz, we can assume that they learned it better. So what did they find?

When an individual learned the material on land and recalled it on land, they performed fairly well on the quiz.  When an individual learned the material under water and recalled it under water, they too did fairly well (though, slightly less than the former group).  But here is the kicker.  Those who learned under water and took the quiz on land, or learned on land and took the quiz under water, performed significantly worse than the other two groups.  Furthermore, they performed about as equally as bad, despite the fact that those who learned and tested on land were better than any other group.

What This Means?

The takehome here is your ability to recall something in a particular context is directly correlated with the context of where you learned that information in the first place.  So what does this mean for you? If you have a test where the teacher blasts Metallica while you take the test, then by all means, you should listen to Metallica while you study.  When you begin studying for something, ask yourself “How much does this room remind me of my lecture hall” or wherever you are going to be taking your test.

But it’s important to realize that whether you’re wet or dry isn’t the only thing that matters. Many other studies have confirmed the notion that context-dependent learning is real.  This means that the looks and sound and even the smells around you have an impact on your ability to remember things.  Try this, study with a Jolly Rancher in your mouth and then take a test with a Jolly Rancher in your mouth.  The effect is likely going to be small but you never know when the sweetness of a watermelon Jolly Rancher reminds you who the lead the British Expeditionary Force into the 1st Battle of Ypres in 1914 (it was Sir John French, for those of you wondering)

More Reading

Context-Dependent Memory in Two Natural Environments: On Land and Underwater (the article)

The Psychology of Learning: Cramming and why it doesn’t work (A laymanpsych article)

Swat teams, Oakland Raiders fans, The Wicked Witch of The West, the Russian MIGs in Top Gun, ninjas, and L.L. Cool Jay in Any Given Sunday all have two things in common; they all wear black and they are all pretty intimidating.

Our association with Black and Evil is pretty well known and interestingly it does not seem to be attached to a single culture but is instead accepted across many cultures.   Why we associate black with evil is as much (if not more) historical than it is psychological. But what are the psychological implications of this association?  It turns out that this has been studied quite a bit, perhaps most interestingly by a team of researchers from Cornell in 1988.

Who Are They?

Mark G. Frank and Thomas Gilovich of Cornell University in 1988.

What They Did?

Frank and Gilovich wondered what wearing the color black might do to ones aggressiveness on sports teams.  So they designed 4 studies that investigated what wearing black uniforms in athletics did to perceived and actual aggressiveness of the participants involved.

What They Did: Study 1–Semantic Interpretations of Team Uniforms

Frank and Gilovich found 25 subjects who knew nothing of the NFL or NHL and nothing about the corresponding sports (football and hockey, respectively).  The subjects were shown various team jerseys and were asked to rate them on 5 aspects (good or bad, timid or aggressive, nice or mean, active or passive, and weak or strong).

A uniform was considered black if 50% of it was black.  In the NFL this included the Steelers, Saints, Raiders, Bengals and Bears (although the Chicago Bears uniform is technically a deep blue, a pre-experimental test showed that most perceived it to be black and in fact much of the football world refers to their uniforms as being black).  In the NHL this included Vanvouver, Philadelphia, Boston, Pittsburgh and Chicago.

What They Found

Despite the fact that jersey’s were shown out of context and without an athlete wearing them, the three scales relating to aggressiveness (good or bad, nice or mean, timid or aggressive) correlated to each other in a way that allowed for the researchers to combine them into a single score that demonstrated an overall aggressiveness level when combined (in other words, subjects who picked “good”, for example, tended to pick the same for the rest of the areas).  What they found was that teams with black uniforms were consistently rated as being more aggressive than their counterparts. Again, the interesting thing about this is that the subjects knew nothing of what these jersey’s represented, only what it looked like.

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Obviously a jersey that looks aggressive doesn’t automatically equate to a team that acts more aggressive.  So they sought to find out what the facts actually said of the teams that wore black uniforms.

What They Did: Study2–NFL and NHL Penalty Records

Frank and Gilovich went to the NFL and NHL and requested official penalty records for all teams from 1970 through 1985(NHL) and 1986(NFL).  Because in football, more aggressive penalties (such as roughing the passer, pass interference, or unnecessary roughness) equate to larger yardage losses, the aggressiveness of a given team was based on the amount of yards it was penalized in a given data set. If a team was assessed more penalty yards, it was viewed as playing more aggressively.  In hockey, a player who commits a foul is given a time penalty.  More aggressive penalties equate to more time. Therefore, a hockey team’s aggressiveness was based on its total penalty time in a given data set. If a team had more penalty time, it was viewed as being more aggressive.

What They Found

As they expected, the top 5 most penalized teams in the NFL over the duration of the data set were also the 5 teams that had black uniforms.  The same held true with the NHL teams in terms of penalty minutes with the exception of one team that came in 4th. Coincidentally, it was the New Jersey Devils.

Even more interesting, perhaps, are the findings of two of the NHL teams, Pittsburgh and Vancouver, who actually switched to black uniforms (from non-black uniforms) at one point in the data set. Further analysis revealed that the teams in fact had more penalty minutes post-black uniforms than pre-black uniforms, one of these changes (Pittsburgh) even happened in the same season, and therefore on the same team!

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At this point we have found two things. First of all, people seem to think that individuals dressed in black are inherently more aggressive (study 1). Second, we discovered that in two professional sports, teams wearing black uniforms are in fact the most aggressive teams in their respective sports (study 2).  This leaves us with an obvious question though: If people view individuals who wear black as being more aggressive, isn’t it possible that the people calling penalties are simply more prone to calling them on teams in black?

What They Did: Study 3–Bias in Calling Penalties on Individuals in Black or White Uniforms.

To address the above question, Frank and Gilovich decided to directly investigate whether or not people would call penalties more on individuals wearing black than some other color. To be a experimentally sound investigation, the plays needed to be the exact same for those wearing the  black uniform and those not wearing black.  To overcome this dilemma, Frank and Gilovich videotaped two plays.

The two videos showed the exact same play with the exact same penalty likely occurring. The only difference in the two films was that for one, the defense wore black while the offense wore white and in the other, the defense wore white and the offense wore black.  Aside from this, the videos were designed to be as close to each other as possible.

Frank and Gilovich utilized a group of college students and a group of referees who would assess whether or not they felt a penalty had occurred. Every subject viewed the exact same plays. However, the referees and college students were each split into two groups (thus forming four groups).  The first group watched the videos in color, allowing them to plainly see that one team was wearing a black jersey.  The second group watched the video in black and white, and therefore they couldn’t tell if the darker jersey was black or another color like blue, red, or pink.

What They Found

The results showed that black jerseys tended to get penalties called on them more than white jerseys.    This held true for both plays, from both college students and professional referees, despite the fact that they were shot identically.  In other words, if you felt that the offense made a penalty in video 1, you should have felt the offense made a penalty in video two, regardless of the change in jersey color.  This is not what was found. Instead, more referees and college students felt that the black jersey teams made a foul than the white jersey teams.

Furthermore, the college students and professional referees who viewed the black and white films (the groups viewing the “non-black jerseys”) made no significant change in the way they called the play.  If they felt it was the offense in video 1, they felt it was the offense in video 2.

In other words, when the subjects knew that the team was wearing black, they felt they made more penalties, regardless of what side of the ball they were on. But when the color of the dark jersey was unclear, there was no bias in how they called the play.

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This leaves us with one final question.  We obvioulsy perceive people wearing black as being more aggressive, even when they may not be (study 3).  So if we perceive others who wear black as more aggressive, what do we think of ourselves when we’re in black?  This question leads us to Frank and Gilovich’s final study.  For their final study, Frank and Gilovich sought to discover if people became more aggressive simply by wearing black uniforms.

What They Did: Study 4–Inducing Aggression by the Wearing of Black Uniforms

Subjects were put into groups of 3.  Each group was informed that they would be competing against each other in a series of 5 activities from a list of 12 possibilities.  Prior to being grouped each subject was asked individually what their 5 favorite activities were.  The list of activities ranged in aggressiveness.  Since some sports are inherently more aggressive than others, the choices they made indicated their level of aggressiveness.  For example, golf is a rather un-aggressive sport, while basketball is somewhat aggressive, and football is inherently aggressive. To determine actual ratings for aggressiveness of the activities, prior to the study a separate group of 30 individuals ranked the aggressiveness of 20 activities and the 12 most consistent results were averaged together to form a scale for the study.

Once the groups were together they were asked to then collaborate with each other on which sports they wanted to participate in.  The teams were either issued white uniforms, or black uniforms.  While making the decision on what activities they wanted to participate in, they did not see their opponents.

The study was looking for two things: 1). Would a team wearing black become more aggressive than they had been as individuals and 2). Would the teams wearing black chose more aggressive sports than the white uniformed teams.

There are therefore 4 groups to look at.

Individuals who would eventually be on a black uniform team
The black uniform teams
Individuals who would eventually be on a white uniform team
The white uniform teams

What they found

Not surprisingly, the results were conclusive.  As individuals, levels of aggression between groups was about the same.   However, once individuals were put on a team with a black uniform, the group then became significantly more aggressive in their choice of activities.   Not only were the group of black uniformed teams significantly more aggressive than the individuals as a whole but they were also more aggressive than their white teamed counterparts.  Furthermore, the white uniform teams aggression hardly changed at all from what they had chosen as individuals!

What does all of this mean?

The 4 experiments above outline some pretty interesting facts on human aggression.  The first alarming finding is that we make quick judgments  about people and what they are wearing.  We automatically assume that individuals wearing black are inherently more aggressive than individuals not wearing black.  But, as it turns out, we may be doing this for good reason because when individuals are wearing black seem to feel, and certainly seem to act, more aggressive.

The only advice I have for you; watch what you say to your buss boy!

Interesting stuff…

More Reading
Black Uniforms and Aggression (full article)