Category: Health/Psychology

Like a page out of the Magick 101 textbook, researchers are now saying that the best cure for lonliness may be an imaginary friend.

New research at the University of Chicago finds evidence for a clever way that people manage to alleviate the pain of loneliness: They create people in their surroundings to keep them company.

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Nicholas Epley, Assistant Professor of Behavioral Science,
Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago.

“Biological reproduction is not a very efficient way to alleviate one’s loneliness, but you can make up people when you’re motivated to do so,” said Nicholas Epley, Assistant Professor of Behavioral Science at the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business. “When people lack a sense of connection with other people, they are more likely to see their pets, gadgets or gods as human-like.”

A survey from the Society for Women's Health Research gauges doctors’ opinions on depression risk factors, symptoms and life stages when women may be more vulnerable to depression.

Women and men doctors have some divergent views about women and depression, according to a recent survey conducted by the Society for Women’s Health Research, a Washington, D.C., based advocacy organization.

Women doctors are more likely than their male counterparts to believe that women are specifically susceptible to depression during two key times of hormonal transition in a woman’s life: puberty (67.5 percent to 48.2 percent) and perimonpause (92.8 percent to 67.5 percent). There was no difference in the beliefs of male and female doctors about the risk of depression in the postpartum or post menopause periods.

Lack of light is often blamed for seasonal affective disorder (SAD), but just how darker days cause depression in SAD sufferers is still in question, reports the January 2008 issue of the Harvard Health Letter.

People troubled by depression usually experience their dark moods in an on-again, off-again fashion. In that respect, seasonal affective disorder (SAD) differs only in that the oscillations follow a seasonal schedule, with the depression usually starting in the fall and lasting through the spring. Lack of light is often blamed for SAD, but just how darker days cause depression in SAD sufferers is still in question, reports the January 2008 issue of the Harvard Health Letter.

Anthony Ong, Cornell University assistant professor of human development, studies positive psychology, believing that people can willfully choose to focus on their positive emotions, which may lead to promoting healing and easing pain.

When strangers ask Anthony Ong, assistant professor of human development, what he does for a living, he replies he is a psychologist.

Researchers at Miami and Ohio State universities are investigating the impact of Tibetan meditation on victims of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with a test group in Columbus, Ohio. The project will continue for two years.

Miami and Ohio State university researchers are using an ancient technique to address a modern problem. With a $98,000 grant from the Ohio Department of Mental Health, Deborah Akers, Miami visiting assistant professor of anthropology, is working with co-researchers from Ohio State on a project titled "Treatment of Trauma Survivors: Effects of Meditation Practice on Clients' Mental Health Outcomes."

New research out of the University of Toronto says that how people view their abilities in the workplace impacts how they respond to success.

New research shows that how people view their abilities in the workplace impacts how they respond to success. Dr. Jason Plaks, a social psychologist at the University of Toronto and Kristin Stecher, a research scientist at the University of Washington, found that those who thought of their capabilities as fixed were more likely to become anxious and disoriented when faced with dramatic success, causing their subsequent performance to plummet, compared to those who thought of their abilities as changeable.

In a recent research project, participants were more critical of couples when the female partner was dominating. When the roles were switched, even though having the exact same conversation, participants reported that they liked the couple.

Silence may be more golden for women, suggests a new study at Green Mountain College in Poultney, Vermont, which found that couples were judged to be less likeable when the woman was more verbally assertive.

When you understand what your Emotional Body is and how to use it you can really help yourself and other people with their physical problems.

When you step into your emotional body and use Reiki to get in touch with the alignment of your head and spine, what does it remind you of? Think back to an earlier time in your life (but only if you want). Were there times in your life you remember when these parts of your body were key players in specific events? If you can pinpoint these events - then you can send loving Reiki in order to heal your past timelines. When those events are healed within your emotional body (use all 3 level 2 symbols), it is likely the pain in those physical body parts that hold those painful emotions will also smooth and release. It is like erasing the effects of the pain while still being fully capable of keeping the memories for your soul growth and wisdom with how you can live your life now when the fears over those events no longer have any power over you on any level. Start to realize (manifest) the freedom of your Radiant indwelling light.

Patience is a neglected virtue characterized by the encouragement of others to take the time to successfully complete tasks and goals.

While fidgety children may be told that “patience is a virtue,” a University of Arkansas philosopher has found patience to be much more profound than simple, passive waiting. Rather, patience is “the living heart of ethics.”

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Irene McMullin

A new study has found that, on average, European-Americans claim to be happy in general – more happy than Asian-Americans or Koreans or Japanese – but are more easily made less happy by negative events, and recover at a slower rate from negative events, than their counterparts in Asia or with an Asian ancestry.

Are you happy? Well don't try to be happier; you might become less happy. That is the gist of a multi-cultural study published this month in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.