“Prospective memory”—the ability to remember to act on our intentions—declines with age. But older people can perform on a par with younger ones when they use their extended minds: that is, when they rely on the external environment to provide cues and reminders. This process is known as “cognitive offloading.” It involves moving the intentions […]
Learning how to use our extended minds Continue Reading >
At Barnard, a women’s college, most of the employees are women—”but a lot of the ones who show up at the office these days are men,” writes Barnard president Sian Beilock in a recent piece for the Washington Post. Remote-work arrangements may end up hurting women, she says, if it means that female employees are
An important cue of belonging: the people who are present Continue Reading >
We know that the capacity to self-regulate—to focus one’s attention and control one’s behavior—is really important. Self-regulation in early childhood is linked with later academic success and general well-being. But we tend to think of self-regulation as something that’s generated internally, through an exertion of will or “grit.” A new study suggests that the resources
Exposure to nature helps kids to self-regulate Continue Reading >
Bias exists not only in people’s minds, but in physical settings. Recognizing this fact can help us answer an urgent question: Why are women so underrepresented in fields like computer science? In a recent paper, psychologists Sapna Cheryan and Hazel Rose Markus propose an interesting explanation, pointing to the presence of what they call “masculine
A lack of belonging, by default Continue Reading >