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Are genetics destiny for psychiatric disorders?
Are genetics destiny? Simplistic thinkers may say so, but what scientists are learning is that, though many traits are heritable (e.g., height, extraversion, IQ), it is difficult to find a “gene” for the vast majority of traits. At the completion of the human genome project, there were high hopes that single genes could be located…
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Does stress make you sick? What we know about stress and the immune system
How does stress impact your health? That question has been studied intensely by psychoneuroimmunology researchers for over 30 years.
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Are you more of a conformist during flu season?
Looking back on social psychology’s greatest hits, my mind always drifts first to studies on conformity, largely because they make such good stories. Take Asch, for instance. Who would’ve thought that so many people would willingly follow the crowd in giving a blatantly wrong answer about line length? And then, of course, there’s Milgram. It…
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Childhood adversity and disease
Mounting evidence has demonstrated long-term negative physical and psychological health effects of stressors experienced in early childhood (Repetti, Taylor, & Seeman, 2002). But as health psychology researchers, what we’re interested in is why. How is it possible that something that happened in childhood could affect your health 50 or 60 years later? What are the…
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Two forms of alcoholism: One which warrants a chronic disease model, and college
When it comes to drug addiction, no matter how you look at it and which model you believe in, there are the transients and the ones with serious problems…