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Vertebrates are predisposed to act to gain rewards, and to lay low to avoid punishment. Try to teach chickens to back away from food in order to obtain it, and you'll fail, as researchers did in 1986. But (some) humans are better thinkers than chickens...

Working on a team is always a challenge, but a new study highlights a particular challenge to women: how much they credit themselves in a joint success. Women will devalue their contributions when working with men but not with other women, according to the new research. The study suggests yet another reason why women still tend to be under-represented at the highest echelons of many organizations...

Some memory problems common to older adults may stem from an inability to segment daily life into discrete experiences, according to a new study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science...

Vertebrates are predisposed to act to gain rewards, and to lay low to avoid punishment. Try to teach chickens to back away from food in order to obtain it, and you'll fail, as researchers did in 1986. But (some) humans are better thinkers than chickens...

To improve patient safety, hospitals should randomly test physicians for drug and alcohol use in much the same way other major industries in the United States do to protect their customers. The recommendation comes from two Johns Hopkins physicians and patient safety experts in a commentary published online recently in The Journal of the American Medical Association...

Media reports about substances that are supposedly hazardous to health may cause suggestible people to develop symptoms of a disease even though there is no objective reason for doing so. This is the conclusion of a study of the phenomenon known as electromagnetic hypersensitivity...

A study published in the May 2013 issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry found that mental health resources provided by schools are significantly associated with whether adolescents with mental disorders receive needed mental health services...

Just over a month ago, a young high school student from Halifax committed suicide after photos of her being raped were posted on the Internet. Her story wasn't just about bullying. It was also about the complex feelings her friends and family faced with her decision to take her own life. Such a reaction is common to cultures around the word...

Mothers who have experienced childhood abuse, neglect or other traumatic experiences show an unwillingness to talk with their children about the child's emotional experiences, a new study from the University of Notre Dame shows...

Community-based treatment programs help teens and young adults achieve positive outcomes in behavioral and emotional health, daily life skills, employment, and education, according to a new report by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA)...

In a safety-obsessed culture, why do some people throw caution to the wind and pursue sports where a wrong move often means instant death? Clues come from a series of interviews conducted with a group of 15 extreme sport participants (aged 30 to 70; 10 men) about their relationship with fear, including BASE jumpers (who launch themselves off high buildings), big wave surfers and waterfall kayakers.

Eric Brymer and Robert Schweitzer transcribed the interviews and looked for emerging themes. Contrary to traditional accounts of extreme sports enthusiasts as thrill seekers with a death wish, the interviewees described fear as an aversive, bodily sensation that the rest of us can recognise. A "gut-wrenching, terrible experience" was how one BASE jumper put it. "If you want a true slogan for these sports," he added, "it is Oh please don't let me die!". However, the interviewees also described how they face their fears and "push past" them.

Also contrary to some of the "devil may care" stereotypes that have dominated scientific and media portrayals of this group, the interviewees spoke of the importance of fear as a "healthy emotion" that "keeps you alive". Indeed, another of the themes related to "managing fear", with several participants describing their "fascination" with controlling their fear so as to avoid panic. "Fear is both a primal emotion and an experience to be savoured, confronted or broken through" the researchers said, "rather than as a stimulus for retreat."

The last theme on "self-transformation" was the most intriguing. The participants described how experiencing, controlling and pushing past intense fear left them positively changed and better equipped to deal with the tribulations of everyday life. A mountain climber described dealing with fear as "empowering" and "feeling very at peace" afterwards. A BASE jumper described the pursuit as "the ultimate metaphor for jumping into life rather than standing on the edge quivering". She also captured poetically the sense many of the interviewees had of becoming one with nature at the moment of most intense danger, as if "just a leaf in the wind: you're totally vulnerable and totally part of the environment at the same time. It's about accepting that you're mortal ... very vulnerable ... like a piece of dust ... in the wind." Another participant talked about a transformational "aura" that stayed with him "for as long as you care to remember."

According to Brymer and Schweitzer, these accounts "provide a critique of fear" as it is usually understood in conventional psychology, as always associated with dread. For the extreme sports enthusiast, fear is a useful emotion that aids survival but which ultimately can be transcended leading to personal growth and change. "By facing our greatest 'true' fears," said Brymer and Schweitzer "whether they be death, uncertainty or something else and taking action despite these fears, we transcend our own limitations and invite new possibilities into our lives."

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Brymer, E., and Schweitzer, R. (2013). Extreme sports are good for your health: A phenomenological understanding of fear and anxiety in extreme sport. Journal of Health Psychology, 18 (4), 477-487 DOI: 10.1177/1359105312446770

Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.

People who gain weight are more likely to give in to temptations but also are more thoughtful about their actions, according to a new study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science...

Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have reported successful preclinical tests of a new vaccine against heroin. The vaccine targets heroin and its psychoactive breakdown products in the bloodstream, preventing them from reaching the brain...

As schools around the country look for ways to reduce violence and bullying, they may want to consider encouraging students to participate in team sports, according to a study presented at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Washington, DC...

Step into a class of 30 high school students and look around. Five of them have been victims of electronic bullying in the past year...

Not only are women who have experienced violence from their partner (intimate partner violence) at higher risk of becoming depressed, but women who are depressed may also be at increased risk of experiencing intimate partner violence, according to a study by international researchers published in this week's PLOS Medicine...

A stress hormone undermines the production of new brain cells, contributing to the development of depression - blocking this effect should be the target of new antidepressant medications, researchers from King's College London wrote in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)...

Newspaper articles, TV shows and books are filled with horror stories of children placed in foster care. A new study bucks that trend by showing out-of-home placements can improve the emotional health of some youths who have been maltreated by a parent...

Teen smokers who rationalize their use of cigarettes by saying, "At least, I'm not doing drugs," may not always be able to use that line. New research presented at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Washington, DC, supports the theory that cigarettes are a gateway drug to marijuana...

Pediatric leaders and researchers tackled the complex and often politically charged subject of gun violence during a special symposium on at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Washington, DC...