Podcast Episodes

Hungry, Hungry Hippocampus

Anyone who's tried (and failed) to follow a diet knows that food is more than fuel. This week, we dig into the psychology behind what we eat, what we spit out, and when we come back for more.

Hosted …

Published on 7 years, 6 months ago

When Everything Clicks

There can be a lot of psychological noise involved in teaching. But what if we replaced all that mental chit chat....with a click? This week, we explore an innovative idea about how we learn. It will…

Published on 7 years, 6 months ago

Kinder-Gardening

Many parents think they can shape their child into a particular kind of adult. Psychologist Alison Gopnik says the science suggests otherwise. This week, we revisit our December 2017 conversation wit…

Published on 7 years, 7 months ago

Rewinding & Rewriting

All of us are time travelers. We go back in history to turning points in our lives, and imagine how things could have turned out differently. Psychologists refer to this as "counterfactual thinking."…

Published on 7 years, 7 months ago

Radio Replay: This Is Your Brain On Ads

How many ads have you encountered today? On this week's radio replay, we discuss the insidiousness of advertising in American media. We begin with new reporting about the effects cereal commercials h…

Published on 7 years, 7 months ago

Baby Talk

Babies are speaking to us all the time, but most of us have no clue what they're saying. To researchers, though, the babbling of babies is knowable, predictable, and best of all, teachable to us non-…

Published on 7 years, 7 months ago

Rap on Trial

Olutosin Oduwole was an aspiring rapper and college student when he was arrested in 2007. He was charged with "attempting to make a terrorist threat." Prosecutors used his writings — which he maintai…

Published on 7 years, 7 months ago

The Fox and the Hedgehog

The Greek poet Archilochus wrote that "the fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing." This week, we'll use the metaphor of the fox and the hedgehog as a way to understand the diffe…

Published on 7 years, 8 months ago

Emma, Carrie, Vivian

In 1924, a 17-year-old girl was admitted to the Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded. The superintendent of the colony classified her as "feeble-minded of the lowest grade, moron cla…

Published on 7 years, 8 months ago

Radio Replay: The Weight of Our Words

Political correctness. Free speech. Terrorism. On this week's Radio Replay, we look at the language we use around race and religion, and what that language says about the culture in which we live. Th…

Published on 7 years, 8 months ago