John Cox

Blogs · @wyome

Tagged psychology · everything

www.upworthy.com

How do you know someone is smart?

The Dunning-Kruger effect causes less intelligent people to overestimate their abilities while highly intelligent people underestimate theirs, yet humans have evolved to judge others' intelligence reasonably well. Drawing on Reddit responses, the piece identifies eighteen behavioral markers of genuine intelligence, including intellectual humility (admitting what you don't know), adaptability (changing views with new evidence), clear communication tailored to your audience, and curiosity. Rather than displaying confidence or dominance, truly intelligent people tend to listen more than talk, ask thoughtful questions, and focus on getting things right rather than being right.

Permalink communicationpsychologyadviceeducation

www.gq.com

Lisa Feldman Barrett Says Your Brain Doesn't Work the Way You Think It Does

Lisa Feldman Barrett explains that the brain functions primarily as a prediction machine that constructs your reality rather than passively receiving it, drawing on past experiences to anticipate what will happen next—a process so rapid it enables feats like hitting a baseball but also shapes everything from how you perceive wetness to how you experience emotions. She argues that emotions aren't reactions to external events but are actively constructed by your brain based on learned concepts, and that understanding this gives you greater control over your future experiences and actions, since today's experiences become tomorrow's predictions. This framework has profound implications for how we understand responsibility, stress management, and the power of emotional granularity—having precise concepts for different feelings allows your brain to construct them more specifically and guide your actions more effectively.

Permalink psychologytagsbrain

www.cnbc.com

Want to sound and feel more confident? Ditch these 11 phrases from your vocabulary, say psychologists

The piece presents eleven negative self-talk phrases that undermine confidence and accomplishment, offering alternative reframes for each based on insights from behavioral scientists and psychologists. The core argument is that small linguistic shifts—from "I have to" to "I get to," from "I failed" to "this attempt didn't work," from passive to active language—can fundamentally change how we perceive challenges and our ability to overcome them. The reframes work by reducing the sense of obligation and finality in our internal dialogue, replacing fatalism with growth mindset and agency.

Permalink self-improvementcommunicationleadershippsychology

theconversation.com

The curious joy of being wrong – intellectual humility means being open to new information and willing to change your mind

A psychology professor draws on her own crisis of faith after her brother's sudden death to explore intellectual humility—the willingness to acknowledge the limits of one's beliefs and revise them under strong evidence, distinct from mere wishy-washiness or self-deprecation. She outlines its four components (open-minded, curious, realistic, teachable) and cites research linking it to tolerance, better relationships, and personal growth, while noting ongoing studies into how it can be deliberately cultivated.

Permalink philosophypsychology

medium.com

52 things I learned in 2020 - Magnetic Notes - Medium

This is Tom Whitwell's annual "52 things I learned" roundup, a grab-bag list of curious facts and findings gathered over the year rather than a single argument—covering everything from why municipal trees are planted male, to the hidden Fetal Bovine Serum in lab-grown meat, to attractive criminals getting lighter sentences, to Warsaw's clam-powered water safety system. It's worth keeping as a dense trivia stockpile with sourced links for each claim, useful for dinner-party facts, writing hooks, or spotting patterns across unrelated fields like tech, biology, economics, and history.

Permalink technologyculturehistoryenergy

gatherfor.medium.com

Could the Blackfoot Wisdom that Inspired Maslow Guide Us Now?

Revisiting research on Abraham Maslow's 1938 stay among the Siksika (Blackfoot) Nation, this piece traces how his encounter with a culture defined by generosity, restorative justice, permissive child-rearing, and near-universal self-actualization likely shaped—and was later flattened by—his famous hierarchy of needs. It draws on Blackfoot scholars Ryan Heavy Head and Narcisse Blood and psychologist Cindy Blackstock to argue that Western individualist models miss what the Blackfoot worldview centers: self-actualization as innate rather than earned, needs met communally rather than hierarchically, and wellbeing sustained across generations rather than individually. The author uses this contrast to critique the American "bootstraps" myth and current inequality, framing the pandemic as an opening to relearn interdependence from Indigenous traditions.

Permalink psychologycommunity

CNBC

Finland is home to the world's happiest people. Their No. 1 secret is this 500-year-old mindset, says psychology expert

A Finnish psychology researcher explains how "sisu"—an untranslatable cultural concept centered on grit and resilience—contributes to Finland's consistent ranking as the world's happiest country and can be developed by others. Drawing from her own 1,500-mile running expedition across New Zealand, she outlines three practices: connecting challenges to a purpose beyond yourself, building resilience through consistent training and preparation, and balancing determination with self-compassion and time in nature rather than relentless pushing.

Permalink wellnesspsychologymental health

Esquire

Sex and the Married Man: Portrait of a Serial Adulterer

This 1994 Esquire profile presents an extended interview with a 47-year-old married Manhattan executive who has systematically conducted affairs throughout his twenty-year marriage, discussing his philosophy of seduction, his evolution from carefree philanderer to would-be romantic, and his current paralysis over whether to leave his wife for a younger woman he claims to genuinely love. The author uses the subject's own words and rationalizations to examine how adultery functions as both a mirror of cultural values and a psychological escape, ultimately suggesting that the man's self-deception and inability to change may be so fundamental to his nature that genuine transformation—and therefore genuine love—may be impossible for him.

Permalink culturerelationshipspsychology1990s

The Conversation

Tiredness of life: the growing phenomenon in western society

Researchers across Europe are studying "tiredness of life"—a distinct form of despair affecting some healthy older people who feel their existence has lost all meaning and yearn to die. Unlike existential suffering tied to terminal illness or other life crises, this phenomenon is characterized by the conviction that one's life journey is complete and dragging on pointlessly, rooted in factors like profound loneliness, loss of social relevance, fear of dependency, and the cumulative erosion of identity. The piece suggests that this suffering may reflect how Western medicine and society have extended biological survival while neglecting quality of life and social purpose for elders, contrasting with cultures like Japan where aging is viewed as a period of continued growth and meaning.

Permalink healthphilosophypsychologymental health

mrporter.com

Health In Mind : 33 Ways To Be More Selfless And Experience Greater Happiness

This article presents 33 practical strategies for cultivating selflessness—ranging from everyday actions like putting your phone away and smiling more, to volunteering time and donating to charity—arguing that these acts of generosity are scientifically proven to boost the giver's own happiness and wellbeing. The piece draws on psychological research, expert quotes from therapists and life coaches, and real-world examples to support the counterintuitive idea that being selfless is ultimately self-serving in the best way: it creates a positive feedback loop where generosity leads to greater contentment and stronger relationships.

Permalink wellnesslifestylepsychologymental health

Harvard Business Review

When You Feel Powerful You Talk Too Much, and Your Subordinates Perform Poorly - Andrew O’Connell - Harvard Business Review

Feeling powerful makes leaders more likely to dominate conversations and appear closed-minded, which undermines team performance—a simulation of a Mount Everest expedition found teams with dominant leaders achieved 59% of their goals versus 76% for teams with more restrained leaders. The researchers suggest organizations can counteract this tendency through egalitarian cultures, reminding leaders of their teams' value, and empowering employees to challenge overly dominant behavior.

Permalink communicationleadershippsychologyresearch

Fast Company

10 Paradoxical Traits Of Creative People | Fast Company | Business + Innovation

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's research on 91 eminent creative people reveals that they are defined by complexity—embodying ten seemingly contradictory traits simultaneously, such as being energetic yet restful, smart yet naive, playful yet disciplined, and humble yet proud. Rather than following a single formula, creative individuals succeed through resourcefulness and an ability to adapt to any situation while maintaining passion for their work itself. The defining characteristic across all creative people is their capacity to enjoy the creative process for its own sake, which sustains them through difficulty when external rewards alone would not.

Permalink leadershippsychologycreativityentrepreneurship

Marginal REVOLUTION

Is Creativity more like IQ or Expertise? — Marginal Revolution

Robert Baer argues that creativity is domain-specific rather than a general ability like IQ, pointing to evidence that even Torrance's own creativity tests showed near-zero correlation between verbal and visual versions, suggesting they measure different skills entirely. This matters because schools have widely used supposedly domain-general creativity tests to select students for gifted programs and teach generic divergent-thinking exercises that fail to develop actual creative capacity, which requires deep engagement within specific domains. Baer contends that fostering creativity requires either breadth across many domains or focused training within a single domain—but not the content-free approach currently dominant in education.

Permalink psychologycreativityeducation

The Emotion Machine

An Extreme Fear of Disapproval | The Emotion Machine

Fear of disapproval, rooted in our evolutionary need for tribal acceptance and reinforced by childhood social conditioning, can paradoxically prevent people from building the relationships they desperately need—creating a self-fulfilling prophecy where anxiety-driven withdrawal makes them invisible rather than accepted. The piece explains how social anxiety causes people to perceive normal judgment as existential threat and argues that gradual exposure to social situations, starting small and working up to more challenging interactions, allows the brain to rewire its threat response and weaken the anxiety over time.

Permalink philosophypsychologymental healthadvice