Show Notes
Have you ever found yourself wondering if someone you're interested in feels the same way about you? If they laugh at your jokes, recent research suggests that it might be a sign that they're into you. In this episode, Under the Cortex hosts Norman Li and Kenneth Tan from Singapore Management University about their new paper in Psychological Science titled “The role of humor production and perception in the daily life of couples: An interest-indicator perspective.” APS’s Özge G. Fischer-Baum kicks off the discussion by asking questions about how humor plays a part in building and keeping relationships alive. Li and Tan illuminate how the mutual creation and enjoyment of humor serve as crucial markers of relational well-being. If you want to know more about this research, visit psychologicalscience.org.
More from Under the Cortex
From the earliest months of life, we rely on faces to help us navigate the world. They tell us who’s safe, who’s familiar, and whether they’re paying attention to us. But do our responses to faces develop gradually as our brains mature? Or are we born prewired to lock onto the human face. In this episode of Under the Cortex, cognitive scientists Rebecca Saxe of MIT and Heather Kosakowski of Harvard University join host Scott Sleek to discuss their groundbreaking findings, published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, about the development of the brain’s face-processing network. If you're interested in learning more about this research, visit psychologicalscience.org. Send us your thoughts and questions at [email protected]. Under the Cortex is going on hiatus and won’t be recording new episodes for the foreseeable future. Explore our archive of 150 episodes filled with scientific insights, stories from editors and researchers, and conversations worth revisiting again and again!
Why do we avoid retracing our steps—even when it helps us reach our goals faster? In this episode of Under the Cortex, host Özge Gürcanlı Fischer-Baum speaks with Kristine Cho and Clayton Critcher from the University of California, Berkeley about their latest research on doubling-back aversion: the tendency to resist more efficient paths if they require undoing prior effort.
Why do familiar experiences sometimes feel like they happened longer ago than they actually did? In this episode of Under the Cortex, host Özge Gürcanlı Fischer-Baum speaks with Brynn Sherman from the University of Pennsylvania about her recent study published in Psychological Science, the flagship journal of the Association for Psychological Science. Sherman's research uncovers a surprising illusion: repeated experiences, which are more vividly remembered, are often perceived as having occurred further in the past than they did. Through a series of experiments, Sherman and her colleague Yousif demonstrate that this distortion in time perception is both robust and consistent, shedding light on how our memories can mislead us about the timing of events. Tune in to explore the mechanisms behind this illusion and its implications for our understanding of memory and time. If you're interested in learning more about this research, visit psychologicalscience.org. Send us your thoughts and questions at [email protected].
How does your brain keep track of the people in your life—not just who they are, but where they are in relation to you and to each other? In this episode of Under the Cortex, Özge Gürcanlı Fischer-Baum talks with Robert Chavez from the University of Oregon about his new findings published in Psychological Science, the flagship journal of the Association for Psychological Science. His research shows that our brains rely on two separate systems to encode person-knowledge: one that maps others in the broader world (allocentric), and another that maps them in relation to ourselves (egocentric). Together, these systems help us organize social memory and navigate our relationships with others. Tune in to learn how the brain structures our social world—and why it matters. If you're interested in learning more about this research, visit psychologicalscience.org. Send us your thoughts and questions at [email protected].
How do the roles of researcher and editor inform each other? What can this intersection tell us about the future of psychological science?