Mindfully Healing

These five character traits are more attractive than your education or genetics. Playfulness is one of the more attractive personality traits, psychologists have found. Playful people are also particularly keen for their partners to be playful. The playful prefer someone who is funny, laidback and creative. The most five most attractive personality traits, though, are: kindness and understanding, intelligence, sense of humour, being fun loving, and having an exciting personality. The signal that playfulness sends Playful people enjoy teasing, wordplay, improvising and taking challenges in a lighthearted way. They enjoy

Certain words can reduce both social pain and physical pain. Swearing can help to relieve hurt feelings and an aching heart, new research has found. Swearing aloud helps to quickly reduce various types of ‘social distress’ such as being socially excluded. The experiment was carried out to test ‘Pain Overlap Theory’. This is the idea that physical pain is processed in a similar way by the brain as social pain, the kind you get from being rejected or embarrassed. Dr Michael Philipp, the study’s first author, explained the results: “The

Why anxious people are agreeable, the supplement that reduces anxiety, dangers of anxiety drugs, the benefits of optimistic thinking and more… Ten new psychology studies reveal why some people are anxious, how to reduce anxiety and much more. 1. Why anxious people are too agreeable Disagreeing with others activates areas of the brain linked to anxiety in some people, new research finds. This helps to explain why some choose to agree all the time — it spares them psychological discomfort. Dr Juan Dominguez, one of the study’s authors, explained: “People

This is the closest PsyBlog gets to toilet humour. Do you hang your toilet roll with the end of the paper hanging ‘over’ or with the end hanging ‘under’? According to a survey by Dr Gilda Carle, ‘over’ people are more assertive. Assertive people are more likely to be in leadership roles and to have a take-charge attitude, says Dr Carle. Those hanging the roll ‘under’ are more likely to be submissive. Submissive people tend to be more agreeable, flexible and empathetic, says Dr Carle. To create the toilet paper

A walk around the park will work, but this could be more fun! A form of rock climbing called ‘bouldering’ is an effective treatment for depression symptoms, new research finds. Bouldering involves climbing walls or rocks to a moderate height with no ropes or harnesses. The study was inspired by German hospitals, some of which have started using climbing as a treatment for depression. People in the study — most of whom were new to rock climbing — were split into two groups. Those in the rock climbing group did

How to help people lose weight using this simple message. Women who receive messages of acceptance about their weight from their family and loved ones do best at maintaining or even losing weight, a new study finds. Those who received little reassurance about their weight from those that matter, though, put on an average of 4.5 pounds over three months. Professor Christine Logel, who led the study, said: “When we feel bad about our bodies, we often turn to loved ones — families, friends and romantic partners — for support

People who are particularly neurotic may benefit from this group of common foods — plus exercise. People who eat more fermented foods have lower social anxiety, a new study finds. The benefit is particularly noticeable amongst people who are highly neurotic. Neurotic people are prone to anxiety. Fermented foods that are a regular part of the Western diet include milk, cheese, yoghurt and bread. They typically contain probiotics, which are likely behind the benefit. Professor Matthew Hilimire, one of the study’s authors, said: “It is likely that the probiotics in

Study tested the effects of poor sleep on two consecutive nights. Beauty sleep is a real thing, new research finds. Just two consecutive nights of poor sleep makes you appear less attractive, new research finds. Not only that, but others will actually avoid you as a consequence. It could be partly down to poor sleep giving you a whiter face and making you look less healthy and attractive, the researchers think. (Bear in mind the study was conducted in Sweden — so all the participants were Caucasian, very Caucasian, and

There is a popular notion that men and women are very different in their cognitive abilities. The evidence for this may be weaker than you expect. Janet Hyde advances what she calls the ‘gender similarities hypothesis‘, ‘which holds that males and females are similar on most, but not all, psychological variables’. In a 2016 review she states: According to meta-analyses, however, among both children and adults, females perform equally to males on mathematics assessments. The gender difference in verbal skills is small and varies depending on the type of skill

Every week almost one-quarter of Americans use this drug. Acetaminophen — commonly known as Tylenol in the US and paracetamol elsewhere — reduces people’s empathy for the pain of others, new research finds. Acetaminophen is an ingredient in over 600 different medications, including being the main constituent of Tylenol. The ubiquitous painkiller does not just kill pain, it also kills our fellow-feeling. Dr Dominik Mischkowski, the study’s first author, said: “These findings suggest other people’s pain doesn’t seem as big of a deal to you when you’ve taken acetaminophen. Acetaminophen