As human beings, we are, in fact, creatures. Like any other living organism, energy conservation is of highest priority to our vibrant being, whether we are consciously aware of that fact and its influence over our behavior or not. So, how does that affect our decisions in life? In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke discuss two great minds in psychology, and the founders of Behavioral Economics, Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky.
psychology
Does Money Really Make You Happy?
The idea that money doesn’t make you happy is easy to get behind if you have it, but if you don’t it can be a hard concept to buy into (pun intended). Yet the correlation between money and happiness is more complicated then one might think. In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke explain the relationship between money, security, opportunity, memory, and happiness.
Why We Crave Sugar
Why is it hard to have just one of those delicious slices of pound cake over the holidays? Well, it turns out it has less to do with the creamy butter and more to do with the way our brains react to those sweet white grains of sugar.
In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke discuss the ways our brains respond to sugar by releasing dopamine. While we may think this dopamine is supposed to make us feel good, what the chemicals in our brains are trying to do is to teach us that this sugar is a good thing and that we want more of it for our survival. This might have been beneficial to us 150,000 years ago, but with sweets in every candy dish, gas station, and coffee shop, craving sugar has its consequences.
How To Make Effective Changes in The New Year
It’s that time of the year when we resolve to drink less, exercise more, save money, etc. It may feel really good to intend to do “better” in the new year, but as Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke explain in this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, real change takes planning and hard work. Why is that? It turns out we have no idea why we do most of the things we do on a daily basis. And as long as our behaviors are driven by factors that operate below our conscious awareness, we may not know how to change. As the Two Guys point out, effective change can happen when we start from the outside in. When we look at our environments first we can make space and cultivate relationships that help us become best selves.
Why Attractive People Get More Opportunities
When it comes to what humans find attractive, many factors play a role. Evolutionarily speaking, we tend to be attracted to symmetry and markers that indicate health and wellness. In social terms it has more to do with what’s in fashion at a given moment. But it’s when we begin to react to attractiveness that things get tricky.
Why Creative Minds Think Alike
The part of our brains that is responsible for generating creativity evolved throughout human existence to serve a problem-solving function. If you lived in the great, wild, open world as a primitive human, and your problems were things like predators, or food security sources, or a need for shelter, what would your brain do? Your brain would concoct creative strategies to solve those problems, and that’s what our minds have built a capacity to do as we’ve evolved – create solutions. Drs. Art Markman and Bob Duke give you more of the details.
Protecting Your Brain as You Age
Whether we like it or not, time marches on. And as it does, we age. One of the most challenging realities for everyone to face in life is that we are all, inevitably, destined to grow old (if we’re lucky, that is). Aging correlates to a steady decline of functional abilities, both physical and mental. Memory and cognition peak in our early twenties, and we begin a very slow, steady decline of those functions as we near our senior years. After age 80, many bodily functions – including brain function – seem to have reached the average limit of their operation. So what can we do to preserve our brains for as long as possible?
We Can Choose Our Delusions
Merriam-Webster defines delusion as “a belief that is not true; a false idea.” But who’s to decide what is true? Being tagged as delusional carries a negative, unpleasant connotation – calling to mind straight jackets, or maybe some scenes from “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” But thanks to our powers of perception – and Drs. Bob Duke and Art Markman – you can choose to change your definition of delusion. When you get down to it, much of human existence is delusional. We use our imaginations to fill in meaning, value, expectations and definitions around a small sliver of what we can actually observe in our surroundings. Our mental state – essentially our level of happiness or unhappiness – is based on how we choose to define and perceive our circumstances.
The Psychological Dynamics of Thanksgiving Dinner
For many of us, Thanksgiving means spending time with our families, carrying out traditions that we’ve practiced for years. While it can be very stressful, messy, and challenging to spend time with family members you don’t see very often, it can also be a beautiful time of recentering. Traditions serve a psychological function. By repeating the same traditional activity with the same group of people over the years, we construct a chronological record of who we’ve been before – and who we are now. It’s a hidden way of staying in touch with the consistent elements of our identities, and it allows us to track ourselves as we develop and change.
V&B: The Psychology of Fear
Franz Kafka said, “My ‘fear’ is my substance, and probably the best part of me.” Where as Franklin Roosevelt said, “The only thing to fear is fear itself.” People relate differently to fear across the board. As much as fear can be paralyzing it can also be motivating and mobilizing. So what is fear and what is going on in our brains when we experience fear? Join us as KUT’s Rebecca McInroy hosts Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke to discuss fear and the brain.
V&B: Spaces, Stuff and Ourselves
We take a look at our spaces, our stuff and ourselves with KUT’s Rebecca McInroy, UT Professor Sam Gosling Author of “Snoop: What your stuff says about you”, and architect Christopher Travis. What is the psychological functions our homes can serve? How do people shape the spaces around them? And what we can learn about behavior from things?
V&B: Creativity and Depression
Depression and creativity, how to look at both concepts from various perspectives. KUT’s Rebecca McInroy hosts musician, artist and author of An Ocean of Despair, Thor Harris; Professor of English, and Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Texas at Austin and author of Depression: A Public Feeling-Dr. Ann Cvetkovich; Psychology Teacher, Kay Lynn Fenn; and psychoanalyst and author of The Creativity Cure: A Do-It-Yourself Prescription for Happiness, Dr. Carrie Barron.