Hacker News with Generative AI: Psychology

The psychology behind why children are hooked on Minecraft (bbc.com)
Minecraft is the world's best-selling computer game and soon to be a Hollywood film. This is why children can't get enough of it.
Study: People select feedback to flatter others, except when they dislike them (phys.org)
People generally try to make other people feel good about themselves, but not when they dislike them. That's the finding of a new study by psychologists at the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) of the University of Pennsylvania investigating the extent to which people promote "positive self-views" for total strangers.
'Please leave feedback': how constant online reviews are changing our brains (theguardian.com)
We live under mutual surveillance, asked to leave public ratings for every purchase, meal, taxi ride or hair appointment. What is it doing to us?
The Child and the Shadow (1975) [pdf] (johnirons.com)
Body Doubling (wikipedia.org)
Body doubling or parallel working[1] is a strategy used to initiate and complete tasks, such as household chores or writing and other computer tasks.[2] It involves the physical presence, virtual presence through a phone call, videotelephony or social media presence,[2][3] of someone with whom one shares their goals, which makes it more likely to achieve them.[1]
The replication crisis may also be a theory crisis (2019) (arstechnica.com)
But methods are only part of the problem, as Michael Muthukrishna and Joseph Henrich argue in a paper in Nature Human Behaviour this week. It’s not just that individual puzzle pieces are low in quality; it’s also that there’s not enough effort to fit those pieces into a coherent picture. "Without an overarching theoretical framework,” write Muthukrishna and Henrich, “empirical programs spawn and grow from personal intuitions and culturally biased folk theories."
The surprisingly simple reason kids have imaginary friends (vox.com)
If your child starts talking to a can of tomato paste, don’t worry.
Patience is a coping strategy, not a virtue (bps.org.uk)
According to a well-known proverb, patience is a virtue. According to a recent study in the Personality and Social Psychology Review, though, it's actually a coping mechanism that we employ to stop everyday frustrations from getting on top of us.
De-Atomization is the Secret to Happiness (2022) (nateliason.com)
De-atomization is the secret to happiness.
Why Dictators Don't Have a Sense of Humor (slate.com)
Because laughter trumps fear every time.
People doing intense exercise experience time warp, study finds (theguardian.com)
If your sessions at the gym seem to drag on for hours, you are in good company. People who push themselves when working out report a form of time warp, making it feel as if they have been exercising for longer than they have, researchers say.
The Unbearable Loudness of Chewing (asteriskmag.com)
Why do some people find certain sounds intolerable? And why has it taken so long for scientists to get even a preliminary answer?
Preschoolers can reason better than we think, study suggests (phys.org)
Preschoolers can reason better than we think, study suggests
The Quantum Chaos of Literature (nybooks.com)
The Faustian bargain is a spiritual form of a conservation law: nothing good happens without something bad happening too. In the modern version, as depicted in books and movies, the message is that geniuses see far beyond their contemporaries, but often at the expense of lasting relationships and happy families. In our preoccupation with the image of the mad scientist, one can’t help but sense a bit of anti-intellectual schadenfreude lurking in the background—solace for all of us “normals.”
To Win Trust and Admiration, Fix Your Microphone (scientificamerican.com)
From job interviews to dating, we subconsciously judge one another based on sound quality when we interact digitally
Physical attractiveness far outweighs other traits in online dating success (psypost.org)
A new study published in Computers in Human Behavior Reports has found that when it comes to online dating, physical appearance overwhelmingly determines who gets matched.
The game designer playing through his own psyche (newyorker.com)
A little more than a decade ago, the video-game designer Davey Wreden experienced a crippling success.
"Infantile amnesia" occurs despite babies showing memory activity (arstechnica.com)
For many of us, memories of our childhood have become a bit hazy, if not vanishing entirely. But nobody really remembers much before the age of 4, because nearly all humans experience what's termed "infantile amnesia," in which memories that might have formed before that age seemingly vanish as we move through adolescence. And it's not just us; the phenomenon appears to occur in a number of our fellow mammals.
Adolescence reveals a terrifying truth: smartphones are poison for boys' minds (theguardian.com)
When a Netflix drama highlights how online influencers can turn a teenager into a killer, it’s time to rethink social media
Poor sleep may fuel conspiracy beliefs, research suggests (medicalxpress.com)
A new study from the University of Nottingham has revealed that poor sleep quality may increase susceptibility to conspiracy beliefs, with depression likely playing a key role in this relationship.
Can people be persuaded not to believe disinformation? (economist.com)
Anyone following American politics in recent months will have been treated to their fair share of bogus claims: USAID, the country’s main development agency, sent $50m worth of condoms to the Gaza Strip; tens of millions of deceased centenarians are continuing to receive social-security payments; disaster-relief funding was spent on housing migrants in luxury hotels in New York City.
Mindfulness mediates the association between chronotype and depressive symptoms (plos.org)
Morningness-eveningness (or diurnal preference) refers to an individual’s sleep-wake behaviour (preferred bed and wake times, and times preferred for peak cognitive/physical performance). Diurnal preference impacts mental health: studies have linked a tendency towards eveningness (late chronotype) to a higher risk of major depressive disorder (MDD) [1,2].
There's no emotion we ought to think harder about than anger (aeon.co)
There’s no emotion we ought to think harder and more clearly about than anger. Anger greets most of us every day – in our personal relationships, in the workplace, on the highway, on airline trips – and, often, in our political lives as well. Anger is both poisonous and popular.
Yhprum's Law (wikipedia.org)
Yhprum's law is the opposite of Murphy's law. The simple formula of Yhprum's law is: "Everything that can work, will work." "Yhprum" is "Murphy" spelled backwards.
How the language of job postings can attract rule-bending narcissists (arstechnica.com)
Looking to hire someone? Check your wording very carefully.
Police-Induced Confessions, 2.0: Risk Factors and Recommendations (psycnet.apa.org)
Excessive Criticism Is a Sign of Internal Conflict (kupajo.com)
Excessive criticism is a red flag that signals internal conflict.
All Placebos are not created equal (2021) (samstack.io)
All Placebos are not created equal
The Prehistoric Psychopath (worksinprogress.co)
Life in the state of nature was less violent than you might think. Most of our ancestors avoided conflict. But this made them vulnerable to a few psychopaths.
Ownership of High-Risk ("Vicious") Dogs as a Marker for Deviant Behaviors (researchgate.net)