You are at work reading a report that one of your colleagues has written and you realize that you’ve just read the same sentence about three times. Instead of thinking about what you were reading, your mind wandered. Mind wandering is similar to, but not the same thing as daydreaming. Psychologists use daydreaming to refer…
Category Archives: brain
100 Things You Should Know About People: #29 – Brand Names Talk To Our “Old” Brains
You are planning on buying a new TV. Will you buy a brand you recognize? Or will you go for the unfamiliar “no name” brand that is less expensive? What if you are buying luggage? Talking to the “old brain” – In my book, Neuro Web Design: What makes them click? I write about the…
100 Things You Should Know About People: #26 — Culture shapes our brains
My entire career I’ve been worried about the fact that most psychology research is conducted on 18-24 year old college students. What if the way 18-24 year old college students react, think, and behave is not the same as everyone else? We are drawing conclusions about PEOPLE in general, but only collecting data from a…
100 Things You Should Know About People: #24 — You Are Most Affected By Brands and Logos When You Are Sad Or Scared
Here’s Scenario 1: You get together with your friends to watch your home team play a game on TV. They win! After an afternoon of fun and friendship you stop at a grocery store on your way home. You are in a good mood. Are you more or less likely to buy the usual cereal…
10 Best Posts of 2009
It’s that time of year — so here is my list of the 10 best posts from my blog in 2009. I chose the 10 that I believe have had the greatest impact/most thought provoking/most interest from my readers. #1: Dopamine Makes You Addicted to Seeking Information — I thought this was an interesting post…
Book Review: John Medina’s Brain Rules
Here’s a quick review of John Medina’s book, Brain Rules. First the video, and then below that I have a short text review.
100 Things You Should Know About People: #20 — Your Attention Is Riveted By Pictures Of People
Second only to movement (animation, video), pictures of a human face capture attention in any medium, including websites. Pictures of a human face not only capture attention, but keep the attention on that part of the screen even when the picture goes away. We start young — With some creative experiments it has been proven…
100 Things You Should Know About People: #17 — Your Unconscious Knows 1st
You are shopping for a new computer and the salesperson you are talking to is offering you what seems to be a good deal. And yet there is a part of you that feels uncomfortable and isn’t sure if this is the right computer, or the right deal, or the right store for you. If…
100 Things You Should Know About People: #16 — The Ability To Delay Gratification Or Not Starts Young
You want to buy that Kindle, but you are thinking maybe you should wait for a while. Maybe you should see if the price comes down after the holiday shopping season, or maybe you should make sure that you have enough cash to pay all of your credit card bills before you spend money on…