Search

Recent research in the field of embodied cognition has found that temperature can prime subjects' emotions concerning social inclusion, so that physical warmth and coldness trigger feelings of social warmth and rejection, respectively. The aim of this study (N = 90) was to determine whether brief tactile and visual stimuli, involving hot or cold temperatures, would affect subjects' self-reported levels of loneliness after they viewed a subsequent video clip depicting ostracism. A 2 x 3 between-subjects design (warm/cold prime x tactile/visual/ combined modalities) was used. The cold tactile, and cold combined (visual plus tactile), conditions were found to increase the subjects' reported loneliness, compared to warm tactile and warm combined conditions; the effect size was medium. Visual warmth versus cold had no significant effect on loneliness, however. These data replicate the finding by Bargh and Shalev (2012) that a warm stimulus can reduce loneliness, in accordance with the general theory of embodied cognition, but suggest that the stimulus must be tactile rather than visual. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a study which tests the idea that preparing participants with a positive example of a minority group reduces their implicit prejudice. It highlights the use of Implicit Association Test (IAT) to measure the implicit prejudice made known by most people towards other groups. The study revealed counterintuitive results which indicate an increase instead of reduction in their implicit racial prejudice.

The article presents a study which examines the performance of female undergraduates based on the D'Amore Test of elementary arithmetic and the Wonderlic intelligence quotient (IQ) Test. It notes that 67.5 percent among the test subject have failed in D'Amore Test while no effect was noted on math scores and no consistent correlation of D'Amore score with IQ scores was found. Moreover, it was found out the emotional or cognitive ability factors are not responsible for failures on D'Amore Test.

The article discusses the study that looked into the effects of suppression in verbal memory ensued by viewing of a series of pictorial stimuli such as concrete words, abstract works and nonsense syllables. It notes that the recall for concrete words were reduced by pro-active interference from various types of suppressed prior materials including pictures, shaded drawings and line drawings.

The article discusses a study that explores the accuracy of judgments of liquid volume as a function of the actual stimulus volume. The study is to determine the ability of subjects to estimate the volume of a liquid stimulus which they had drunk or poured. The analysis of variance showed that subjects overestimated volume when drinking, but underestimated volume in the pouring task. It further revealed that alcohol preloading nor weight cues had a substantial effect upon volume judgments.