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Mind-Blowing Psychological Facts: Here are some psychological facts that will surely blow your minds!
Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behavior. Psychologists are actively involved in studying and understanding mental processes, brain functions, and behavior.
The human psyche is immensely complicated. New research is being published every day that helps to explain why we are the way we are. While some psychological research corroborates pretty mundane psychological realities, others are extremely insightful.
- Everything your mind says has an equivalent reaction from the cells in your body.
It is the reason why amounts of negativity eventually take your immune system down and make you feel sick.
- Sarcasm is a sign of a healthy brain.
People who could instantly use sarcasm in response to a trivial question have healthy minds. Moreover, those who could understand cynicism well are also good at reading people’s minds.
- ‘Catching a yawn’ shows empathy.
Yawning upon seeing someone else yawn is a common occurrence, despite not feeling tired nor sleepy. One theory on its contagiousness is that people ‘catch’ it to show empathy.
Hence, toddlers and young people with autism are less likely to have the symptoms as they have yet to learn compassion.
- Tears indicate the reason for one’s crying.
If the first teardrop came from the right eye, the person is crying tears of joy. Otherwise, the person is crying tears of pain.
Image Source: https://www.medicinenet.com/does_a_dying_person_know_they_are_dying/article.html- A person still has 7 minutes of brain activity upon dying.
In those moments, they see their memories in a dream-like sequence.
- The length of your tongue tells something about your sexual curiosity.
If you could lick your elbows, then it means that you are more willing and open to trying new experiences.
- The way you dress has a connection with your mood.
It is not just in the color that you choose to wear. Dressing well could also help in keeping you stable and happy.
- A single negative thing could only be outweighed by at least five positive things.
- Your brain remembers bad over good; an effect of this thing called ‘negativity bias. It is also the reason why you keep dwelling on how a coworker insulted your outfit despite hearing a compliment from your client.
In order to have a balance, a 5:1 ratio of positive to negative is a must.
Image Source: https://www.youngisthan.in/humour/behaviours-of-a-person-who-loves-cooking/9599- Food made by someone else tastes better than your own cooking, despite having the same recipe.
A study found that making a meal requires you to stand around it so long that it already feels less appealing by eating time. Hence, your satisfaction decreases subsequently.
- You tend to believe only what you want to believe, unintentionally.
The human brain is also captive to ‘confirmation bias’ which makes people render facts to somewhat confirm what they already believe. For instance, your grandpa changing his political opinions has little to no chances despite your swaying attempts.
It is just one of the psychological facts that you could not change and just have to accept.
- Your memories are easy to manipulate.
In a span of 3 hours, you could be wrongly convinced that you committed a crime in your teenage years.
- Thinking in another language makes your decision sound more rational.
You tend to be less discerning about money in your native tongue. In other words, the language you use affects your decisions.
- Asking ‘Will I?’ is more motivating than saying ‘I Will.’
A study from the University of Illinois suggested that asking goal-related questions to yourself could motivate you more than declaring it to be true.
Image Source: https://www.dreamstime.com/illustration/rules.html- A rule too strict would only get you to break more.
Psychologists found how this ‘reactance’ phenomenon affects people’s perception of rules. Not only would they want to break a certain rule that takes certain freedom away; they would also break more aside from that.
This might be part of the psychology facts that a teenager who is not allowed to use a phone in class would even chew gum in the act of doing so.
- Your dreams are more meaningful than your conscious thoughts.
Among all of the dreams you have had, 70% of it contains secret messages. It means that they bear more importance and worth than the things you think in your conscience.
- Having a plan B would only make plan A less likely to work.
The University of Pennsylvania held a series of experiments that revealed that volunteers who prepared a backup plan before starting a task did worse than those who did not. Team Plan B realized that having options made their motivation to succeed the first time drop.
While it is good to think ahead, keeping those plans vague first could make you be more successful.
- Fear is an actually good feeling if you are not really in danger.
There are people who love scary movies and there are those who do not, and the difference might be in their hormones. Such activities give you adrenaline, dopamine, and endorphins from a fight-or-flight response.
However, your brain knows that you are not in real danger, so you still get that natural high despite how scared you feel.
- You tend to care more about a single person rather than about massive tragedies.
Another one from the University of Pennsylvania, this study had one group learn about a starving little girl, another group learn about starving millions and a third group who learned about both situations. The results showed that people who heard about the little girl donated more than twice the amount than when they heard the statistics.
Psychologists believe that although you would willingly help a person, you would conclude that your little part could not do much when a problem seems too big.
Image Source: https://www.theosthinktank.co.uk/comment/2018/01/18/what-does-a-thinking-person-look-like- You would prefer anticipating something bad over not knowing what to expect.
Researchers found that something negative that is about to happen is less stressful to grasp than not knowing how things will end up.
The consequences-predicting part of your brain becomes more active when you have no idea what to expect.
- Returning a favor is in your nature.
Good manners could not take credit over the ‘rule of reciprocity.’ This brain command programs you to want to help someone who helped you.
It might have developed with the goal of keeping the smooth flow of society.
- Being tested on things helps you remember them better.
Some psychology facts for the kids: testing is an efficient tool for learning. A study discovered that information could last longer in the memory of a person tested for it than when only studied without the need to remember immediately.
- You obsess over things which you feel you lack.
Take money for example. The human brain is scarcity-sensitive; it constantly feels that you are missing things that you need.
Farmers, for instance, come up with better plans when the cash flow is good than when money is tight.
- You are in a constant search for human faces in inanimate objects.
This sensation is called ‘pareidolia’ which scientists think came from the notion that face recognition is an important part of social life. It entails how your brain tends to find a face where there is none rather than missing a real one.
- You always find a problem.
It is psychologically normal for you to find another problem upon resolving one. One research demonstrated that volunteers who are asked to select computer-generated faces that look threatening eventually resorted to faces that do not.
It turns out that as the volunteers ran out of threatening-looking faces, they started turning to faces that they would usually call harmless.
Source: https://facts.net/lifestyle/health/psychology-facts/
Aren’t these psychological facts incredible? Although there are still many unknowns regarding how the brain functions, researchers have discovered a number of facts about the human brain.
Psychology provides a wealth of knowledge not only about our own minds and behaviors, but also about the thoughts and actions of people around us.
(Mind-Blowing Psychological Facts, September 2021)
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