The Influence of Gender and Facial Appearance on Voting Practices

Women’s faces tend to naturally retain more neonate features than men. These features, such as a greater eye height, a smaller nose area, and a wider smile, would cause women to have more immature faces than males. Interestingly, women who have these facial features are often perceived as more attractive than women with mature facial features. These findings imply that women would be judged less competent than men, and that immature-faced women would be perceived as less competent and more attractive than mature-faced females. Given the direction of political leadership in our country, this has interesting implications for females that are vying for leadership positions. Thus, our study examined the effects of both candidate gender and facial features on voting likelihood, and perceptions of attractiveness and competence, by pairing pictures with neutral party platforms.

Differences in the Effects of Social Context on Emotional Responding

This study compares the effects of social cues on emotional experiences of men and women. Literature suggests that emotional responses are influenced by the presence and expressiveness of other individuals (Hess, Banse, & Kappas, 1995; Jacobs, Manstead, & Fischer, 2001; Fridlund, 1991). We examined whether social cues influence the experience of emotions differently for men and women. Research on gender differences in self-construal (Cross & Madson, 1997) led us to expect that women’s own emotional reactions would be more sensitive to emotional cues from other individuals than men’s.

A Meeting of East and West: Can Eastern-Influenced Therapies be Effective in the Treatment of Stress and Mood Disorders?

Given that the human brain is plastic and that structural alterations have been seen in monks who meditate on a regular basis, the question arises of whether these two facts are actually related. Furthermore, if this is in fact the case, would it be possible to apply these findings to the public? In this paper I will present the different conditions that induce neuroplasticity as well as give an overview of meditation and the ways that it is practiced nowadays. To this end I will argue that if monks are able to alter the structure of their brains and the brain is naturally inclined to heal itself then incorporating eastern practices, such as mindfulness and imagery, into western therapies could benefit patients suffering from mood disorders and, in particular, stress.

Therapeutic Discourse and the American Public Philosophy: On American Liberalism's Troubled Relationship with Psychology

I explore the main currents of postwar American liberalism. One, sociological, emerged in response to the danger of mass movements. Articulated primarily by political sociologists and psychologists and ascendant from the mid-fifties till the mid-seventies, it heralded the "end of ideology." It emphasized stability, elitism, positive science and pluralism; it recast normatively sound politics as logrolling and hard bargaining. I argue that these normative features, attractive when considered in isolation, taken together led to a vicious ad hominem style in accounting for views outside the postwar consensus. It used pseudo-scientific literature in labeling populists, Progressives, Taft conservatives, Goldwaterites, the New Left and others "pathological," viz. mentally ill. Hence, "therapeutic discourse." I argue that philosophical liberalism, which reasserts the role of political theory in working out norms and adjudicating disagreement, is a more profitable way of thinking about and defending from critics liberalism. I take the philosopher John Rawls as the tradition's modern representative. This inquiry is important because the themes of sociological liberalism are making a comeback in American public discourse, and with them perhaps the baggage of therapeutic discourse. I present a cautionary tale.

Upregulation of Sadness During Films

Testing the relative effectiveness of reappraisal and exaggeration in upregulating sadness.