Experiencing a spike in anxiety connected with the election? You’re not alone. The American Psychological Association says that 52 percent of American adults are coping with high levels of stress brought on by the election, according to national Harris Poll survey data released last week. Therapists around the country said in interviews that patients are […]
More help via mindfulness, this time for elementary school kids in Watts: Mindfulness has been found beneficial for stress reduction, anxiety and depression, dietary challenges, addiction recovery, and many other conditions. Now it has found its way into a classroom where children as young as three are using its techniques to manage emotions and stay calm. Using
In case you missed it: Why Therapists Should Talk Politics (NYT): There comes a time when people can’t take it anymore, when too much is being demanded of them. How much blame can people tolerate directing at themselves? When do they turn it outward? My sense is that psychotherapists are playing a significant role in
Politics in Therapy Read More »
“Stop Googling. Let’s Talk” (NYT again) surveys the trouble-with-cell-phones research (distraction up, empathy down). This jumped out: Studies of conversation both in the laboratory and in natural settings show that when two people are talking, the mere presence of a phone on a table between them or in the periphery of their vision changes both
Research says nostalgia is good for you (NYT). One study: First, the experimenters induced nostalgia by playing hit songs from the past for some people and letting them read lyrics to their favorite songs. Afterward, these people were more likely than a control group to say that they felt “loved” and that “life is worth living.” Then
Nostalgia v. Angst Read More »
A survey of the latest in sleep science (and sleep science books) by Elizabeth Kolbert in the New Yorker. This is from The Slumbering Masses, by Matthew J. Wolf-Meyer: “Americans, like other people around the world, used to sleep in an unconsolidated fashion, that is, in two or more periods throughout the day.” They went to bed not long after the
The Science of Sleeplessness Read More »
In the New Yorker, Elizabeth Kolbert surveys a crop of “unparenting” books that take aim at parental overproviding and overprotecting: Madeline Levine, a psychologist who lives outside San Francisco, specializes in treating young adults. In “Teach Your Children Well: Parenting for Authentic Success” (HarperCollins), she argues that we do too much for our kids because we overestimate
Toward Unparenting Read More »
Science of the runner’s high and rats on running wheels in the New York Times: As the name suggests, endocannabinoids are chemicals that, like cannabis in marijuana, alter and lighten moods. But the body produces endocannabinoids naturally. In other studies, endocannabinoid levels have been shown to increase after prolonged running and cycling, leading many scientists to conclude
Runner’s High, Exerciser’s Brain Read More »
Couples living together out of convenience–“sliding, not deciding”–gets roughed up in the NYT by psychologist Meg Jay, author of The Defining Decade: Sliding into cohabitation wouldn’t be a problem if sliding out were as easy. But it isn’t. Too often, young adults enter into what they imagine will be low-cost, low-risk living situations only to find themselves
The Cohabitation Effect Read More »
Couples Therapy through the eyes of couples therapists in the New York Times. “For starters, there’s an ever-present risk of winning one spouse’s allegiance at the expense of the other spouse’s,” explains William J. Doherty, the University of Minnesota professor of family social science, in his groundbreaking 2002 article on the topic of awkward couples
Therapists on Couples Therapy Read More »