In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week’s term is self-verification theory. Self-verification theory comes from social psychology, and it says that we want other people to see us the way we see ourselves. That might seem self-obvious, but what’s interesting is that this applies even when […]
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In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week’s term is critical thinking. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy says that, while there are various different definitions, the basic underlying idea is “careful thinking directed to a goal.” Wikipedia describes critical thinking as “the analysis of facts to form
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In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week, we’re taking a bit of a detour to look at neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity is the brain’s ability to make changes to itself in response to conditions and experiences, including forming new neuronal connections. This ability is maintained in adulthood, although it’s
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When a fellow blogger asked what the science/psychology behind music and its positive effects on motivation and mood might be, and of course, my virtual ears perked up, and I decided to do some exploring. Music can activate several brain structures, including the amygdala, which is involved in trauma responses. Processing music is complex and
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Mental illness often affects what we think about, but it can also affect how we think, including the speed of our thought process. This, in turn, can impact how well we’re able to function. Effects of different illness processes Mania Mania is an obvious example of speeding things up, and this may show up outwardly
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In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week’s term isn’t so much a term as a category. We’re going to look at psychological effects that impact the process of reading. Missing Letter Effect If someone is asked to identify each occurrence of a particular letter in a
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In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week’s term is cognitive remediation. Cognitive remediation (CR) aims to improve psychosocial functioning by addressing several areas of neurocognitive functioning, such as attention, working memory, and executive functioning. CR is used mostly in schizophrenia and traumatic brain injury. It’s also
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In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week’s term is rumination. According to the response styles theory, rumination involves the passive, repetitive focus on the nature of one’s own distress and its causes and potential consequences. It’s self-referential, meaning it’s focused on one’s own thoughts and feeling, rather
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Fellow blogger Skinny Hobbit recently mentioned a technique I hadn’t heard of before, the worry tree, so I wanted to look into it a little more. Worry is related to but not the same as anxiety. Worry is a thinking process that is focused around problems that may arise in the future, which can then
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Get Out of Your Mind & Into Your Life by Steven C. Hayes explains how concepts from acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) can get you unstuck from your thoughts so you’re free to actually start living. The book takes a brief look at relational frame theory, on which ACT is based, but doesn’t get bogged
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