Psychology

Domestic homicide is one of the most common and frequent types of murder in the U.S. but murderers who kill intimate partners and family members have a significantly different psychological and forensic profile from murderers who kill people they don't know. One-third of all women murdered in the U.S. are killed by their male partners including husbands, ex-husbands, boyfriends and ex-boyfriends. An estimated 25 percent of women will be victims of severe domestic violence by an intimate partner in their lifetimes, according to a new paper which which examined the demographics, psychiatric…

Should doctors recommend homeopathy? Sometimes placebos work, that is why placebo has an Effect named after it and, because they are inert, they can't do any harm. But when patients or taxpayers are coughing up money for it, the issue is more murky. Peter Fisher, Director of Research at the Royal London Hospital for Integrated Medicine, says that of all the major forms of complementary medicine, homeopathy is the most misunderstood. He says how regular medicine reviews homeopathy is. For example, in a recent report by the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council which stated…

More Americans than ever before are supporting their local food markets, but it's not just because they believe the food is fresher or tastes better. Instead, people are shopping at farmers markets and joining food co-ops in record numbers because these so-called "locavores" are driven to eat locally grown produce by desire to feel a part of something greater than themselves; part of a community that shares their passion for a healthy lifestyle and a sustainable environment.  For these self-identifying enthusiasts, supporting the local food movement is a sort of civic duty, an act to…

Before gluten sensitivity was a running joke in popular culture, medical marijuana held the preeminent position as easy humor fodder. The reason was simple: It did nothing for glaucoma, beyond the placebo range, and though the vast majority of clinical pain patients were women, 75 percent of the "medical marijuana" cardholders were men.  Medical marijuana – a controversial topic in recent years – is now legal in 23 US states, the District of Columbia, and has been legal in the state of California since 1996. Because it was legal, California led the way in fake claims to smoke it legally…

While past research on the question has found otherwise, a new study by Defense and Veterans Affairs researchers suggests that women in the military are at no greater risk than men for developing posttraumatic stress disorder, given similar experiences--including combat. The study involved active-duty troops and veterans who are part of the Millennium Cohort Study. That effort has more than 200,000 participants in all and the new PTSD study included more than 2,300 pairs of men and women who were matched based on an array of variables--including combat exposure--and followed about seven…

As is typical of our time, over the past few months, many newscasters have used the words apocalypse or apocalyptic to evoke the negative implications of events as diverse as the threat of Grexit, music streaming wars, an asteroid threat, the American housing market, the migrant crisis, the continuing war in Syria and the negative state of the world more generally. Not to mention the flurry of posts which have appeared about upcoming instalment in the highly successful X-Men franchise, X Men: Apocalypse or our obsession with zombies. We have reached a point where apocalyptic vocabulary…

Does watching the news make you lose faith in a higher purpose? Does taking out an army of terrorists alone without so much as a scratch make you feel like you must have a divine gift? An analysis of cellphone data shows that spiritual awareness does vary based on activity, rather than being constant, according to sociologists at the American Sociological Association meeting who say that people had the highest levels of spiritual awareness in the morning and while engaged in activities such as praying, worship, and meditation. Spiritual awareness also was high when people listened to music,…

A new psychology paper finds that people with high levels of autistic traits are more likely to produce unusually creative ideas. The authors examined the relationship between autistic-like traits and creativity. While they found that people with high autistic traits produced fewer responses when generating alternative solutions to a problem - known as 'divergent thinking' - the responses they did produce were more original and creative. They say they are the first paper to claim a link between autistic traits and the creative thinking processes. The authors looked at people who may not have…

Rapid eye movements (REMs) during sleep may contribute to the visual part of our dreams by acting as a switch from image to image, researchers have found. The study, which measured the activity of individual cells in the brain in both awake and sleeping participants, is important because it is the first of its kind and provides a great starting point for uncovering the deeper secrets of human consciousness. Consciousness can roughly be summed up as our awareness of the environment and our ability to respond to it. However, Sigmund Freud and his followers have described dreams as deep-seated,…

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has effectively ended any chance of same-sex marriage in this term of parliament. Public opinion in Australia is in clear support of same-sex marriage. So how have opponents had so much success in blocking change? Prominent arguments against same-sex marriage have been based on history, tradition, human rights, and social scientific research into health and welfare. The role of religion in opposition has been less explicit. Religion, history and tradition The influence of religion on sexual politics in Australia is central to the current marriage debate. This…