MetaFilter posts tagged with behavior and psychology

"Want to play a chord? Try not to die."

zarq — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 09:46:28 -0800

Piano Stairs! (Not everyone thinks they're a good idea.) Also see "The Deepest Trash Can". Both videos are from Volkswagon Sweden, whose new English-language website, TheFunTheory is still under construction. But here's the Swedish-language version.

neuroscience and behavior videos

nickyskye — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 11:39:37 -0800

At Psychoanalyst TV, we aggregate psychology and neuroscience videos, and put them on our own TV channels. Its companion site, Neurological Correlates, A Neuroscience Tabloid of Dysfunctional Behavior - Mostly Psychopaths, Narcissists, Obesity and Addiction. Includes such gems as Visualizing Desire and Sadobabies - Runaways in San Francisco.

Now show me how to do the thing with the termites and the stick.

Eothele — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 10:12:00 -0800

It's official, humans are dumber than chimps. These guys show (at the NY Times level) that human kids will over-imitate every ritualized nuance modeled for them, whereas chimp kids just wanna get the damn cookie out of the box. Their website also describes more of their studies.

No more knuckle sandwiches in the cafeteria.

Gyan — Fri, 30 Sep 2005 20:55:21 -0800

Diet and behavior.

Monkey Business

Blue Stone — Mon, 22 Sep 2003 09:50:12 -0800

Monkeys down tools . - Demand fair pay for a fair day's work. " Researchers taught brown capuchin monkeys to swap tokens for food. Usually they were happy to exchange this "money" for cucumber. But if they saw another monkey getting a grape - a more-liked food - they took offence. Some refused to work, others took the food and refused to eat it. "

What would you do? Think again.

troutfishing — Mon, 17 Mar 2003 09:19:11 -0800

Becoming Evil: How Ordinary People Commit Genocide and Mass Killing : "To offer a psychological explanation for the atrocities committed by perpetrators is not to forgive, justify or condone their behavior. Instead, the explanation simply allows us to understand the conditions under which many of us could be transformed into killing machines." (James Waller) In a Salon interview about his widely acclaimed, pathbreaking book Waller states, "Most people don't understand how easy it is to develop us-them [mindsets]......In our climate of fear in response to terrorism, I think we could pretty easily turn on people who have been our neighbors."

fable — Tue, 08 Aug 2000 21:37:53 -0800

How Culture Molds Habits is a fascinating article. Read this article, tally another point for nurture. I've long thought this was true, but Nisbett's supposedly gathered rather a lot of data proving it is so. The article raises some interesting parts of the study, but I think the ramifications bear some considering. I'd be interested in reading the full study when it's published, but I haven't a clue where to get the Psychological Review. And can you imagine what the advertising execs will do with this stuff? Ads tailored to the way you think. Wheee. It does, of course, raise some fun questions about religion and politics.