Your eyes play tricks. And your brain makes it worse. Both teenagers and adults misjudge how much they pour into glasses. They will pour more into short wide glasses than into tall slender glasses, but perceive the opposite to be true. The delusion of shape even influences experienced bartenders, though to a lesser degree, a researcher at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has found.

How shape can alter a person’s notion of size has been widely investigated. For instance, trian

“I never saw a woman worth thinking twice about after the anchor was a-peak – on shore it is another thing; and I will laugh, sing, dance, and make love, if they like it, with twenty girls.” — Clement Cleveland, in Walter Scott’s “The Pirate”

For long-term relationships, women like dads – men who are kind, compassionate and monogamous. But for short-term relationships, women prefer cads – the classic Romantic dark heroes who are dominant, promiscuous and daring.

That’s acc

A group of German researchers, headed by Gudrun Schneider (University of Munster) explored the characteristics of psychological well-being in an elderly population in an article published in the Nov-Dec 2003 issue of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics.

Recent gerontological research shows a high variability in the elderly population. The aim of the present study is to investigate by means of cluster analysis, as to whether different ’ageing styles’ can be identified in a sample of cognitivel

Impatience and hostility–two hallmarks of the “type A” behavior pattern–increase young adults’ long-term risk of developing high blood pressure, according to a study funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), part of the National Institutes of Health. Further, the more intense the behaviors, the greater the risk.

However, other psychological and social factors, such as competitiveness, depression, and anxiety, did not increase hypertension risk. The research appe

The largest known biomarker study for prostate cancer patients treated with radiation therapy shows that the presence Ki-67 may be a significant predictor of patient outcome for men with prostate cancer treated with both radiation and hormones. The study was sponsored by the Radiation Therapy Oncology Group and was presented today by Alan Pollack, M.D., Ph.D., chairman of radiation oncology at Fox Chase Cancer Center, at the 45th annual meeting of the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and On

Married heterosexual couples can learn a great deal from gay and lesbian couples, far more than the stereotypical images presented by the television show “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy,” according to the first published observational studies of homosexual relationships.

“Gay and lesbian couples are a lot more mature, more considerate in trying to improve a relationship and have a greater awareness of equality in a relationship than straight couples,” said John Gottman, a University of Wash

Even proficient bilingual speakers always have both languages on the tips of their tongues, according to Penn State researchers. “What appears amazing, is that people do not make extensive mistakes,” says Dr. Judith F. Kroll, professor of psychology and applied linguistics. “We have an exquisite cognitive control system that monitors the code switching between one language and another.” While no one knows exactly how the control system allows even people of limited bilingual ability to speak in a se

People who offer love, listening and help to others may be rewarded with better mental health themselves, according to a new study of churchgoers in the September/October issue of Psychosomatic Medicine.

The study is one of the first to track the positive health benefits of altruistic behavior, say Carolyn Schwartz, Sc.D., of the University of Massachusetts Medical School and colleagues.

“The findings really emphasize how helping others can help oneself,” Schwartz says.

First use of disordered nanowires, organic molecules as programmable memory

Chemists at Rice University have demonstrated that disordered assemblies of gold nanowires and conductive organic molecules can function as non-volatile memory, one of the key components of computer chips.

“A large part of the cost associated with creating integrated circuits comes from the painstaking precision required to ensure that each of the millions of circuits on the chip are placed in exactl

Short people may be short-changed when it comes to salary, status and respect, according to a University of Florida study that found tall people earn considerably more money throughout their lives.

“Height matters for career success,” said Timothy Judge, a UF management professor whose research is scheduled to be published in the spring issue of the Journal of Applied Psychology. “These findings are troubling in that, with a few exceptions such as professional basketball, no one cou

A cellular sensor of dietary fats slows the development of lesions that lead to heart disease, a Salk Institute study has found.

The study, which appears in the Oct. 17 edition of Science and is posted on the journal’s web site, uncovers a unique pathway that significantly curbs the development of atherosclerosis – the accumulation of fatty deposits on arterial walls. The pathway could be used to develop drugs to treat heart disease, currently the number one killer of Americans.

Adding to the paradox of prion diseases, Dartmouth Medical School researchers have discovered that RNA plays a role in converting a normal prion protein into a mutant that leads to mad cow disease and other fatal brain illnesses.

Their study, reported in the Oct. 16 issue of Nature, provides important clues to understanding the role of prions, unorthodox infectious agents whose ability to transmit disease has confounded physicians and scientists. The work, by Dr. Surachai Supattapone, assis

Zero-G flying is just like throwing a football through the air, explains test pilot Captain Gilles Le Barzic as he briefs an audience about to leave gravity behind: “Except instead of a ball we have an aircraft.”

Le Barzic is one of three expert pilots on ESA’s A-300 ’Zero-G’ Airbus, billed by its operator Novespace as ’the plane that removes gravity’. The aircraft has been specially strengthened to fly parabolic arcs enabling researchers to carry out experiments in weightlessness without

The citizens of Kuwait became more supportive of democracy during the mid- to late-1990s, but that did not include a desire for closer ties with the United States and other Western countries, a new study found.

A survey of 1,500 Kuwaiti citizens conducted in 1994, 1996, and 1998 found that the citizens became less interested in trade alliances with the West and less likely to pay attention to Western media over that time period.

The long-term survey is one of the first in the Arab

Almost two out of three children with severe asthma are boys. But women account for more than two out of three adults with severe asthma. And no one really knows why. Those are some of the most striking results of a cross-sectional study of severe asthma by researchers from National Jewish Medical and Research Center being published in the October issue of the journal Chest. The research team, led by Joseph Spahn, M.D., also found that children with severe asthma had surprisingly good airflow in and

In 1905, American astronomer Percival Lowell predicted the existence of a new planet he called Planet X. Lowell proved that this new planet existed even though no one had been able to see it in the sky. Twenty-five years later, astronomer Clyde Tombaugh stumbled on images of X photographed from the Flagstaff Observatory in Arizona. Today, that planet is known as Pluto.

While it took twenty-five years for astronomers to go from theory to confirmation of Pluto’s existence, it took genome sci