Psychological Theory Archives

Third Person Self-Talk Is An Effective Way To Reduce Anxiety And Regulate Emotions – Insights From The Construal Level Theory

July 24, 2019June 21, 2019 by Aditya Shukla

Third person self-talk is a powerful way to regulate emotions and reduce anxiety

Research shows that self-talk, when done in 3rd person, can be an effective method of emotional self-regulation which can reduce anxiety. It provides the necessary psychological distance between the self and anxiety-inducing contexts. This also helps when you are thinking about negative events and ruminating anxiety-ridden thoughts. This psychological distance allows a person to reflect …

The Beautiful Science of Ugliness Reveals Ugly Truths About How we Judge Others

October 15, 2019March 28, 2019 by Aditya Shukla

Am I ugly like gollum? The psychology of beauty ideals and standards

This is a long article with tonnes of research and explanations for factors related to the concept of ugly. I have detailed research insights on ugliness, beauty standards, our perception of beauty, and the concept of attractiveness. Oh, and I have a special message for you at the end. Scroll all the way to the …

Psychophysics: Sensory and Perceptual Limits. The Human Umwelt

July 24, 2019March 21, 2019 by Aditya Shukla

Human umwelt psychophysical limits of our reality

Psychophysics – Sounds cool right? It is. It really is cool. I am not overstating when I say that psychophysics is associated with our very existence. The human body has about 10 sensory systems which send in information to the central nervous system (brain and its neural extensions). Psychophysics deals with the very core of …

You Can Mentally Slow Down Time To Savor The Moment. Brain Time Dilation Is A Thing.

November 1, 2019March 6, 2019 by Aditya Shukla

How to slow down time to make a moment last longer

The brain experiences ‘time’ very differently compared to how it experiences information from other senses. It is actually possible to savor a moment deliberately and slow down time so you can enjoy it as much as you’d like. Time is a variable- not in a physical sense; not in a metaphysical sense – in a …

Cognitive Load Theory: Definition, Types, And Applications For Learning [Guest Post]

July 24, 2019February 24, 2019 by Guest Author

Humans are simple in a way: Information comes in through our senses, stuff happens in the brain, and then the information is used. When I say information, I really mean what you see, feel, hear, touch, taste, and think. This information is re-packaged in the brain. Repackaging takes resources. The quantity of resources the brain …

In What Form Is Memory Stored In The Brain & Mind? An Introduction

July 24, 2019January 31, 2019 by Aditya Shukla

It might seem that we have an answer. But, science is far from it. Let’s first look at how we can address this question. In what form is memory stored in the brain? Let me create some variations of this question. What happens in the brain biologically speaking? What happens in the brain from the …

The Importance Of Music: When and Why we listen to music

October 8, 2019January 14, 2019 by Aditya Shukla

There is no doubt that most humans spend a lot of time listening to music. Music is clearly important to us. Neilson (a global measurement company) says that Americans are listening to 4.5 hours of music a day; another one says it’s 2 hours. Many others like me spend between 2 and 4 hours listening …

Time Perception: What exactly is time for the human brain?

July 24, 2019December 23, 2018 by Aditya Shukla

Time perception: an introduction to how the brain represents time

There is one thing that baffles me. It is the idea of time. We are going to talk about Time Perception or how the brain experiences time. We look at clocks, we learn what an hour is. We look at the sun, we know what a day is. But do we? We can purposefully evaluate what time …

Code switching: Why people mix 2 languages together while speaking

July 25, 2019November 12, 2018 by Aditya Shukla

Code switching and code mixing is similar to how rail tracks cross over

When people mix two languages while speaking, we say that they are code switching. You can call each language a code. Depending on what one is talking about, code switching could be a very intuitive and normal aspect of talking. This can only happen if you know two or more language codes – complete languages, dialects, …

The Peter Principle OR Why Everyone Sucks At Their Job – tips to overcome incompetency in the work place

July 24, 2019August 24, 2018 by Aditya Shukla

Back in 1969, a guy called Laurence Peter made a shrewd observation and published a book on it – The Peter Principle. If you are someone’s boss, you probably know this. You can skip ahead to the part where I discuss how to counter the Peter Principle. I’m certain everyone has a friend who complains about …

10 psychology facts that’ll (NOT) blow your mind away

July 24, 2019July 28, 2018 by Aditya Shukla

Considering this is the era of fact sharing and how people like ‘quick bites’ of information, I thought I’ll compile some of the psychological facts that are almost never talked about. These are not psychology facts per se. These are robust research findings that are close to being facts. Truth be told, it’s hard to …

Memory Models in Psychology – understanding human memory

July 25, 2019June 21, 2018 by Aditya Shukla

Memory is perhaps the most alluring topic of research in psychology, cognitive science, and neuroscience. Through decades of trivial and breakthrough research insights, we know a little bit about memory. In fact, some of the aspects of memory have become common knowledge. You’ll see people say ‘my short term memory is bad but long-term memory …