Come see PsySociety at its new home!

As many of you have likely realized by now…we’ve moved!

PsySociety has officially transitioned over to the new Scientific American MIND blog network. Launched just last month, the MIND network now features all of the brain- and psych-related blogs from the original Scientific American network, plus six brand new blogs — Scott Barry Kaufman at Beautiful Minds, Julie Hecht at Dog Spies, Stephen Macknik and Susana Martinez-Conde at Illusion Chasers, Adam Waytz and Jamil Zaki at The Moral Universe, Felicity Muth at Not Bad Science, and yours truly at the new PsySociety!

I hope you will update your RSS feeds and bookmarks so you can follow PsySociety at its new digs. In the meantime, I intend to use this site as a repository for links to posts at the new site (and anywhere else where my writing might appear), so people who would like to use the e-mail signup function on this page can still continue to do so!

Again, I do hope that you will continue to read, comment on, and enjoy PsySociety over at the new Scientific American MIND network: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/psysociety/

See you there!

London 2012: Psychology at the Olympic Games

I’ve provided links below to all eight PsySociety posts on the psychology of the Olympic games. Click on the links to learn more about what blind judoka can teach us about emotions, how to predict which record-breaking athletes will be accused of drug abuse, why it’s so bad to be in the last lane of the Olympic pool, and more!

#IAmScienceOnline2012

One of the most phenomenal movements going around the Twitter world right now is the hashtag ‘#IAmScience,” started by Kevin Zelnio as an attempt to get scientists to share their funny, emotional, and generally nontraditional paths towards becoming scientists and inspire the legions of burgeoning scientists out there who may feel discouraged by what they see as insurmountable obstacles.

As I still haven’t quite had a chance to write about my Science Online 2012 experience (a post that I have admittedly been procrastinating for the past 2 weeks), I realized that participating in the #IAmScience movement might actually be a perfect chance to discuss what exactly it was that I got out of Science Online.

Best Of PsySociety: 2011’s Most Popular Posts

Although I began my science blogging experience at IonPsych back in January (for a course on science writing for a general audience taught by Dan Simons), I didn’t start blogging at PsySociety until May. As a result, I don’t even have an entire year’s worth of posts on this blog! However, in the spirit of the year’s end, I thought I would list the 10 most popular posts from 2011 anyway (as determined by total pageviews).

I had a few guest posts on other blogs (like the SciAm guest blog and The Thoughtful Animal), for which I don’t know the pageview stats, and I’m not counting any of my 8 posts from IonPsych on this list (2 have been re-posted here, and the rest will be re-posted eventually). That all being said, here are the 10 “most viewed” posts from 2011, in descending order.

10. New York and Same-Sex Marriage: When Politics, Personalities, and Persuasion Tricks Collide.
9. Sex, Lies, and Power = Lies about Power and Sex.
8. Envying Evolution: What Can The X-Men Teach Us About Stereotypes?
7. If I Were A Well-Off White Man… I Might Not Understand Other People Very Well.
6. Weiner’s Wiener? Too Perfect To Be A Coincidence.
5. Beautiful People, Beautiful Products.
4. Who Runs The World? Not Girls.
3. Casey’s Case: What Psychology Says About Anthony’s Acquittal.
2. Why Jersey Shore Won’t Make You Dumber: The Importance of Responsible Science Journalism

And finally, the most popular post on PsySociety in 2011…

1. Sex and the Married Neurotic (which made it into Open Lab 2012!)

Thank you all for reading PsySociety and for supporting my blog during its first year of existence!

What Would You Like To See From PsySociety?

Hi everyone,

In the past 6 months that I’ve been blogging for PsySociety, my posts have seemed to fall into two different categories:

A. Research –> Pop Culture, where I start with a psychological research topic (or specific article) and then use pop culture/current events to illustrate the research. Examples: Sex and the Married Neurotic, With Pets Like These, Who Needs People?

B. Pop Culture –> Research, where I start with a pop culture phenomenon, current events topic, or news event, and then use psychological research to explain it. Examples: Casey’s Case: What Psychology Says about Anthony’s Acquittal, New York and Same-Sex Marriage.

I enjoy writing both types of posts, but I’d also like to make sure that my blog is doing the best job that it can of reaching out and writing about psychology in an interesting, accessible way (which is, really, my ultimate goal in this whole thing). So my question to you all is simple: Which type would you like to see more on PsySociety? Do you like them both equally? Is there another format you would rather see more often (weekly links, more short-form posts, more guest posts, etc.)? Please let me know in the poll below, on Twitter, or here in the comments! I’m open to any and all feedback.

 

Hello and welcome!

Hello and welcome to the inaugural post for my blog, PsySociety!

Who am I?

As a quick intro, I am Melanie Tannenbaum, psychology graduate student and amateur science blogger. During Spring 2011 I blogged at IonPsych, a collaborative blog started by Daniel Simons for a graduate course on general-audience writing. Since then, I have decided to branch out and start my own site (though I am still happily affiliated with IonPsych).

If you would like to know more about me, feel free to read the blurb on the About Me page, or visit my personal website.

Why PsySociety?

The logic behind the PsySociety name is twofold.

First, I enjoy connecting the research I read in journal articles to the world around me. I am an avid Daily-Show-and-Colbert-Report watcher, celebrity gossip maven, and history nerd with an unhealthy love for horrible television and an overactive anger response to many (ok, most) political issues. Naturally, this leads me to draw a lot of connections between the area I conduct research in for a living – social/personality psychology – and the world of pop culture and current events. The name PsySociety combines this focus on psychology with its applications to everyday society, much like the entries on this blog.

Secondly, it’s a play on the phrase “High Society,” which I think is cute. Hey, I didn’t say that both reasons were great.