TV & Sex

Research studied the effects of exposure to sexual content on television by genre on adolescents' sex-related views and behaviors. Overall exposure to sexual content was not related to teens' engagement in sexual intercourse the following year. By genre, however, exposure to sexual content in comedies increased chances of sex the next year and sexual content in dramas had a negative effect.

Almost too Good to be True

Some things just seem to good to be true. Research suggests if you're selling such a product, make sure to say something bad about it as well.

Research shows that sometimes people will behave more favorably to a product when a small amount of negative information is added to an otherwise positive description. The effect increases when the information is easily processed and when negative information follows positive information.

Distrust Increases Creativity

It would seem that distrust and creativity are incompatible. When you are distrustful, you are less likely to share information, something crucial for creativity to emerge in social settings.

Research, however, reveals that distrust seems to foster thinking about non-obvious alternatives to potentially deceptive outcomes, i.e. distrust may foster creativity. While distrust harmed public creativity, distrust enhanced private creativity and researchers feel enhanced cognitive flexibility is the mechanism by which this occurs.

Sound During Sleep Improves Learning

Research finds that sleeping after learning helped retain new information, especially if sound cues related to the information were played during sleep.

Subjects learned the positions of 50 objects on a computer screen - each picture paired with a unique sound. During sleep, scientists played the sound cues for half the images presented during the memory test. Subjects were better at placing the objects for which sound was played during sleep, even though none reported hearing anything.

Good Sprinters Have Long Toes, Better Achilles

A study finds that successful sprinters have longer toes and Achilles tendons which produce less leverage than non-athletes of similar height. But why?

Longer toe length allows sprinters to maintain maximum contact with the ground while pushing off the starting block. Achilles tendons having less leverage allows leg muscles to produce greater force.

Clean Smell Promotes Morality

A study finds that people sprayed with citrus-scented cleanser were fairer and more generous than otherwise. Scientists first evaluated fairness and discovered clean-smelling room subjects offered twice as much cash with a stranger in another room. In the second test, clean-smelling room participants were significantly more interested in volunteering and almost three times more likely to donate money.

Katie Liljenquist, lead author of the study, notes, "There is a strong link between moral and physical purity that people associate at a core level."

Parents Regularly Lie to Kids

Research finds that to influence behavior, parents regularly lie to children - even those who stress speaking the truth. Compared to European American parents, Asian American parents held a more favourable view of lying to children for behavior modification.

Injured? Best be Drunk!

Being drunk makes you more accident prone, but trauma patients are more likely to survive if they were drunk at the time of their injury. Studies found that 7% who came in sober died of their injuries vs. 1% of drunk victims. Drunk victims were discharged sooner as well. Scientists cannot explain why this occurs, but they - and the sane - recommend not getting drunk in the first place to avoid the ensuring injury.

Fizz has Taste

Scientists have discovered that carbonation actually has a flavor and gene manipulation can render an animal "blind" to the taste of carbonation. Scientists think our CO2 sensor evolved to help us avoid food that’s spoiled but we still enjoy fizz that tickles our tongue.