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Ep 168: Reliability – the Foundation of Any Good Personality Test

Posted on: by Michael 2 Comments
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Can you tell your personality from what flavor ice cream you like? There are lots and lots of so called Personality tests on the web. How do you know when you’ve come across a good one? For example, are the inner workings of your personality revealed in the playlists you have on your smartphone or mp3 device?

In this episode we take a look at the first thing you should demand from any test – reliability. If you’re interested in psychology you are going to learn A LOT about the different kinds of reliability.

Types of Test Reliability

  • Test-Retest reliability: people should get about the same score every time they take your test. You can’t score highly on an introversion scale one week and then low the next week (well, you could, but then we’d know that the test is no good).

  • Split-Half reliability: if your test had 20 questions (and was measuring just one concept, like shyness) and we correlated the odd questions with the even ones we should get a high positive correlation.

  • Alternate Form reliability: in this scenario, psychologists create two questionnaires, both of which measure the same concept (again, such as shyness). We give you one form one week and the other form a week (or month) later. You should score about the same on both forms.

Resources on Personality and Reliability

Here’s the video of the crow having fun (?):

Ep 167: The Fat Trap – How Not to Get Discouraged About the Difficulty of Losing Weight

Posted on: by Michael 2 Comments

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Guess What? Bad news: if you’ve ever been overweight and you’re trying to lose weight it’s even harder than you think. Yikes. Pretty de-motivating. However, let’s see what motivational psychologists would have to say about this. How to keep from throwing up your hands at the whole effort.

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Resources on the Challenges of Losing Weight

  • The Fat Trap by Tara Parker-Pope, New York Times, December 28, 2011.

  • Episode 126 (video): SuperNormal Stimuli: Is This Why We’re Overweight? There are many reasons why it is difficult to lose weight, but have you considered how supernormal stimuli might be one of them? In this episode I discuss some of the ideas in the books Waistland and Supernormal Stimuli by Dierdre Barrett. Is it possible that the old saying Everything in Moderation might just be wrong?

  • Episode 57: Expectancy Theory, Goal Setting and Getting in Shape

    • . Trying to get in shape and lose weight? What’s the psychology behind getting in shape? Well, first forget the psychobabble. I examine two established theories of human motivation – goal setting and expectancy theory. Join me for a different perspective on weight loss, exercise and fitness.

Ep: 166: The Secret Life of Pronouns – an Interview with James Pennebaker

Posted on: by Michael 2 Comments

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What do you reveal about yourself in the way you use the smallest and seemingly most insignificant words you use every minute? That’s the focus of Dr. James Pennebaker‘s fascinating book and one of the most interesting psychology books of 2011: The Secret Life of Pronouns. If you’re fascinated by language then you’ll find this episode especially interesting.

When we’re trying to find out what people are thinking and feeling we usually focus on what Pennebaker refers to as “content words”, examples of which are nouns, verbs and adjectives. Do you say that you’re “happy” or “sad” or “angry”?

But what about the tiny words you use in between these content words? What do they reveal about you and others? What does the way you use function words:

  • pronouns: I, me, you, he, she

  • prepositions (to, for, of)

  • negations: no, not, never

  • articles: a, and, the

reveal about how you feel and how you think about the world?

Function words make up a small percent of our vocabulary, but we use them at a very, very high rate. How could you speak without them?

In this fascinating interview with Dr. Pennebaker he discusses some of what you’ll find in The Secret Life of Pronouns: the differences between men and women, our emotional states, indeed our very personalities are revealed in our use of these seemingly insignificant words.

James Pennebaker and The Secret Life of Pronouns

Ep 165 (video): Psychological Research Under Fire: What Can We Do About It?

Posted on: by Michael 6 Comments
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What’s going on with Psychology? There have been a number of reports about poorly conducted or completely fraudulent research in the field such as this one that appeared in the New York Times. Well, there’s bad research in all fields, but psychology, which has through its history struggled for scientific credibility, is particularly sensitive to this issue and many psychologists have come out with strong recommendations to make sure that our research is of the highest quality.

In this episode I look at how research can be conducted poorly and what to watch out for when you either conduct or read about the results of research.
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Ep 164: What’s So Disgusting About Poop?

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Just about everyone finds poop disgusting right? So who finds it not so disgusting? Would you believe women in their 20s who are in the middle of their menstrual cycle, and who have motherhood as one of their goals in life? Disgust has become quite a popular topic in psychology lately. Join me as I discuss one of the more interesting studies that looks at how the intensity of our emotions can be affected by our nonconscious goals. More interesting than you might think really. And certainly not to be poo-pooed at…

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Ep 163: Psych Files Brief #4: Animals Smiling, Yogurt De-Stressing, and the Psychology of Success

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Do animals smile? Do they feel emotions and if so how many kinds of feelings do they share with us? In this episode we also take a look at the probiotics in yogurt – how do they affect your thinking and do they might help protect you from stress. It turns out that these probiotics increase the production of the neurotransmitter GABA which helps quiet down your neurons. I also talk about the work of female psychologists: Carol Dweck on the psychology of success, and and a tribute to Evelyn Hooker whose research helped in removing homosexuality from the DSM in 1973.

Mindset: The New Psychology of Success List Price: $16.00 Price: $5.99 Read Reviews Buy Now

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Ep 162: How to Spend Your Money and Truly Make Yourself Happy – Part 2

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In episode 160 I discussed the first 2 ideas on how to spend your money wisely. In this episode I’ll talk about 4 more great ideas on how to get the most from your money and 2 things you have to be careful about. Get the latest findings from positive psychology researchers like Elizabeth Dunn, Tim Wilson and Dan Gilbert on this episode of The Psych Files.

Stumbling on Happiness List Price: $15.95 Price: $8.09 Read Reviews Buy Now

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EP 161: Self Help You Can Believe In: Interview with Dr. Tim Wilson, Author of Redirect

Posted on: by Michael 5 Comments

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Looking for a self-help book with some meat? One that won’t insult your intelligence with flowery words and hyped up promises and pseudoscience? Take a look at the book Redirect by psychologist and author Tim Wilson. Redirect will give you a lot to think about and some new insights into human nature.

Redirect: The Surprising New Science of Psychological Change List Price: $25.99 Price: $12.94 Read Reviews Buy Now


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Ep 160: How to Spend Your Money and Truly Make Yourself Happy

Posted on: by Michael 2 Comments
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Why aren’t rich people happier than those with less money?

We think money will bring happiness, but research in the area of positive psychology has consistently found that having more money does NOT make us happier. Find out how to spend your money the right way so that it really can bring happiness into your life.
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