Category: psychology

psychology1 Comment

Never mind the neuro b******s

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

You know you need this! Learning styles Left brain right brain male brain female brain brain training to stave off Alzheimer’s All of this pseudoscience is based on slivers of information blown up (usually with a picture of a brain in shot because that convinces us more than anything) and usually aimed at separating us from our money. Neuroenchantment anyone? Have a listen to Dr Ashok Jansari of Goldsmiths university London, entertainingly demolishing these myths, and expressing the occasional view about some of our politicians along the way. Continue reading Never mind the neuro b******s

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learning disabilities, psychology, terminal careLeave a comment

‘What does psychology have to offer at end of life?’ – an EAPC re-blog

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

In her well-articulated article, Dr Jenny Strachan, Clinical Psychologist, Marie Curie Hospice, Edinburgh, United Kingdom, talks about what it is that psychology has to offer when there is no mental health problem to treat: The ‘science of mind and behaviour’ has many branches. Developmental psychology explores how our minds and behaviours are shaped by our early years’ experiences. Cognitive neuropsychology investigates how they are determined by the structure and functions of the brain. Social psychology considers the influence of the groups, large and small, in which we belong. If psychologists in palliative care stick to a narrow, ‘clinical’ interpretation of the role, … Continue reading ‘What does psychology have to offer at end of life?’ – an EAPC re-blog

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academic, psychologyLeave a comment

An exploration of the value of computer-based virtual environments in the management of visible disfigurement

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

Summary We asked three participants to inhabit an avatar in Second Life, first without and then with an overlay mimicking a facial burn. We reviewed comments about the virtual world, the impact of the scar, and responses to facial disfigurement questionnaires. First published by Ether Books, October 2013.   Second Life We used Second Life (SL), a widely accessible online virtual environment (VE) (Au, 2008), the utility of which has been described elsewhere (Hall, Conboy-Hill, and Taylor 2011). The validity of VEs to model human behaviour is underpinned by extensive research by Bailenson and his team (see  Blascovich & Bailenson, … Continue reading An exploration of the value of computer-based virtual environments in the management of visible disfigurement

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marketing, psychologyLeave a comment

Selling your books – beware the anchoring effect

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

This article is from The Conversation; a news outlet funded by a number of universities, and it describes a psychological heuristic called the anchoring effect. I came across it as an undergraduate back in the last Ice Age and I’d forgotten about it but this reminder is timely. Exposure to a given top (or bottom) price makes us adjust our expectations as to what a fair price might be. In this example, seeing a ludicrously priced TV makes the next item on sale seem reasonable despite still being far greater than you might have considered acceptable without that first cognitive … Continue reading Selling your books – beware the anchoring effect

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psychology, short story, social realismLeave a comment

‘Lovely Girls’

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

From the re-cycler ; ‘Lovely Girls’ is a story about the life of a young woman in an institution for people with learning disabilities. Amy watches the door; that grimy, finger-stained, gobbed-on portal to fleeting respite from the chronic stink that makes her eyes water. First published by The Other Room Journal, it moved to Scribd when TORJ ceased operating. 1999 words.   Continue reading ‘Lovely Girls’

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Suarez and biting – a perspective

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

This is a Facebook post (mine) I feel compelled to give blog space. I have met people who bite and it has very rarely been a premeditated or vindictive act, it has been about extreme arousal leading to an uncontrolled primitive reaction. Here’s the post: I don’t do football and I’m not a fan of Suarez but I do know about biting behaviours like his. People are looking for explanations in terms of what provoked it but it’s most likely they’re looking in the wrong place because it isn’t rational. In the psychology business this is called hyper-arousal and whether positive … Continue reading Suarez and biting – a perspective

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academic, avatar, Facial disfigurement, psychology, Sussex University, virtual worldLeave a comment

Facial Disfigurement: a study using the virtual world, Second Life

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

We found differences among the coping styles identified by participants’ responses on the BICSI and their behaviours in-world. … The discrepancies between the BICSI scores and behaviours in-world suggest future research directions evaluating the longstanding problem of divergent expressed and reported attitudes.   This is a first for Ether Books: ‘Facial Disfigurement in Second Life‘ is a research paper detailing a study in which participants responded to the application of a facial scar to their avatar. A free download for smartphones. http://catalog.etherbooks.com/Products/3014 Related articles Facial disfigurement (slideshare.net)   Continue reading Facial Disfigurement: a study using the virtual world, Second Life

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psychology5 Comments

Some fact with your fiction

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

I used to think creativity and imagination had nothing to do with science until I heard that a significant number of NASA scientists had developed their interests through reading and watching science fiction. While Gene Roddenberry was boldly going, courtesy of fantastic warp drive technology, these chaps were figuring out how to build it. So now we have scanners Dr McCoy would find handy, information tablets that outclass the gizmos a red shirt would offer to the Captain for signature, and communication devices that can access the world, not just one contact point. There’s probably an app in development for … Continue reading Some fact with your fiction

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psychology, writers, writingLeave a comment

This ikigai stuff is dangerous!

Suzanne Conboy-Hill

There I was, ticking along with the bi-partite job bringing in the money and the sense of having a handle on things while I scratched away at snippets of fiction, then one sniff of ikigai and I’m thinking ‘novel’! How does that happen? How will it happen? I’m pretty familiar with project management and, way back in oooh-you-don’t-want-to-know, determined that my PhD was only going to take as long as I was being paid for so I’ve already got three years in my head. I’m conveniently ignoring the fact that I’m still working full time but I wonder if I should … Continue reading This ikigai stuff is dangerous!

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