The creepy-crawlies: spiders and itching

Trigger warning: spiders; itching; psychology.

The creepy-crawlies. The heeby-jeebies. Makes my skin crawl. Many of us have these reactions when we see spiders:

Logically we know that spiders are unlikely to hurt us - in fact we can kill them quite easily - and that spiders are important parts of the ecosystem. Illogically we fear them and may be gripped with an illusory sensation that they are crawling upon us...producing itching that is very real. Why is this?

Some suggest that we may be evolutionarily wired to notice spiders and perceive them as a threat. New and German (2015) asked undergraduate students to perform a perceptual task: indicate if two crossed lines were equal or unequal in size each time they were briefly flashed on a screen. For most of the trials all that appeared on the screen were two lines in a cross shape, but for one trial another image was sneaked in next to the cross. This other image was either: a spider or a spider-like shape; a housefly or a fly-like shape; a hypodermic needle or a shape that was similar to a hypodermic needle. This is an "inattentional blindness" test because the participants have not been instructed to look for these things: their attention has only been directed to the lines so they should be "blind" or not notice other things. If participants do notice the other images, we can know that those images really stood out to grab their attention.

New and German found that the participants were much more likely to notice the spider or spider-like shapes than the other options. This was true even of participants who reported low fear of spiders and participants who reported high fear of needles. The authors believe that this represents an evolutionary wariness of spiders that has been passed down from our earliest ancestors in Africa where venomous spiders likely posed daily threats. In our modern world we are more likely to feel pain from an injection than truly be at risk from a dangerous spider bite - yet, spiders grab our attention more than needles.

If spiders grab our attention and make our skin crawl, when are we most likely to start scratching that imaginary itch? Llyod, Hall, Hall, and McGlone (2012) showed female undergraduates images related to itching, such as insects and skin rashes, and itch-neutral images, such as flying birds. As predicted, when participants viewed the itch-related images their self-reported levels of itchiness were significantly higher.

In addition to the self-reports, Lloyd et al. observed the participants' own scratching behavior and noted any scratching movement that lasted for more than one second. Out of all of the itch-related images, the photographs that included a person scratching him- or herself were associated with the most scratching from the participants. The authors suggest that feeling itch may be automatic but a scratching response may be triggered by a social situation that activates mirror neurons: brain cells that react the same to doing or watching a behavior.

When we put this all together, we know that your eyes are likely to be drawn to this guy if he is hanging out in your living room:

If your skin starts to crawl, you are normal: seeing insects and spiders makes us feel itchy. But you are most likely to scratch if you see your friends start scratching.

Further reading:

The New and German (2015) article is published in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior but is available online in draft form; the Lloyd et al. (2012) article can be accessed through your local college library.

Some individuals suffer from chronic, not just creepy-crawlies-induced itching. You can read more about recent findings related to this debilitating condition in this National Institute of Health article.

If you are thoroughly creeped out and itchy from reading this post, here is a totally unrelated video of a baby laughing to cleanse your palate. You are welcome.

The "Me" in Meme

If you Google "meme" you will find that the term originated in the 1976 book, "The Selfish Gene," by Richard Dawkins (not to be confused with 1976 gameshow host, Richard Dawson) as a way to explain how cultural information can be transmitted through generations in our DNA.  In fact the word meme comes from a Greek word meaning "to imitate."  Internet Memes, like the ones featured on this blog, are distant cousins of this original, biological definition but also tell us about our culture.

When I teach at my university, I purposely search for photographs that represent people from different races, ethnicities, sexes, sexual orientations, and ages to illustrate my lectures.  I want my lessons to reflect the diverse human experience so that all of my students will see a glimpse of themselves in at least some of those images.  Another person who thinks that visual images matter is CEO of Facebook and founder of Leanin.org, Sheryl Sandberg.  Sandberg commissioned a set of more modern and diverse images of women to combat old-fashioned, sexist images or ridiculous favorites like the Tumblr-worthy "women laughing alone with salad."  The collection is introduced this way:

A picture is worth a thousand words. But in an age where visuals are everywhere, what message are those pictures sending? Much of the imagery we see daily portrays a familiar trope: men leading, women sidelined or sexualized, and mom and dad in stereotypical roles. But that paradigm is shifting. LeanIn.Org and Getty Images have teamed up to create the Lean In Collection—a library of thousands of creative images devoted to the powerful depiction of women and girls, families of all kinds, and men as caretakers as well as earners. These images are updated monthly. The goal is to shift perceptions, overturn cliches, and incorporate authentic images of women and men into media and advertising. Join us to help close the image gender gap—one photo at a time.

So as I curate this blog, I would like to show diverse people in memes.  This is proving to be difficult:  the groups that tend to be underrepresented in other forms of popular media also are harder to find in the meme world.  Even worse, when I do find images of women, people of color, senior citizens, people with disabilities, they are often portrayed in negative, stereotypical ways.

For this post I decided to document this phenomenon by using Google Image to search for "top memes."  Here are first 50 results:

I tabulated the characteristics of the main person featured in the meme.  If there were two people in the meme, I noted the features of the person who is portrayed to be speaking or highlighted by the text.  Based on my first impressions, here is what I found in these top 50 memes:

Seventy percent of the memes featured males; 24% featured females; and the remaining percent were unclear or featured an object (although this object was a male action figure toy).

Eighty percent of the memes featured a White person; 10% featured a Black person and 10% featured an Asian person; 2% featured a Middle Eastern person and 2% featured a Native American; while the remaining percent was an object (although this object was a White action figure toy).

Forty-two percent of the memes featured a young adult (ages 18-39); 26% featured a baby or a child; 18% featured a middle-aged person (ages 40-59); 6% featured a teenager (ages 13-17) and 6% featured an older person (ages 60+); with the remaining percent from an object (although this object was an action figure toy portraying a young adult or midlife man).

If we compare these results to data from the Pew Research Center about Social Media - where these memes would be shared - we see some mismatches.  For our example let's look at Facebook, the most popular social media platform with 71% of all Internet users logging on (like us on Facebook here!).  Here are the 2014 Facebook Demographics about Internet users:

66% of these males and 71% of these females are on Facebook.
71% of White users are on Facebook; 67% Black users; 73% Hispanic log on to Facebook.
87% of ages 18-29; 74% ages 30-49; 63% ages 50-64; and 56% ages 65+ are Facebook users.

If the basis of a meme is to tell us something about our culture - even something as simple as what is funny - the messages may over-represent males and Whites compared to their audience.  The premise of this blog is that these pop culture memes often contain ideas that are backed up by psychology - so what does it mean if these memes mostly portray certain types of people?

With the majority of midlife and older adults logging on to social media, this also means that they will be less likely to see their images illustrating these messages.  Young adults won out in meme representation and in social media use, but they are not featured in memes to the extent that they are a presence on Facebook.  If they are also the ones making these memes, it is interesting that babies and children are relatively popular choices of theirs to serve as their messengers.

My count of these memes is not science at its best, but it illustrates a phenomenon that we see elsewhere in media:  the image is male, White, and young adult.  For example, the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism found that, in the top 100 films of 2012, speaking roles were played by:  men (77%); Whites (76%); young adults (49%).  Expanding on the words of The Status of Women in U.S. Media in 2014, we may conclude that:

Unequivocally, it matters when [we] get our just due across the vast media landscape. Only when [we all] are equal partners in the multi-layered work of deciding what constitutes a story and how that story might be told can we paint a more textured, accurate picture of the worlds that we all...inhabit. (p.5).

Further Reading:

View the entire Lean In stock photo collection here.

Want to make some more diverse memes?  Try these online tools:  Meme Generator; imgflip; or imgur.

The Women's Media Center has excellent resources about how sex, gender, race, and age are portrayed in American media.

So gifted...

In the 1971 movie "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," Gene Wilder plays a much more menacing version of Willy Wonka than you may be familiar with from the 2005 remake. Spoiled children are his biggest pet peeve and he watches them die candy-related deaths with nonchalance (see the demise of Augustus Gloop here) much to the horror of their parents.  So it is no surprise that Wilder's Wonka stars in this week's meme:

Why is this funny?

One possibility is that people believe that giftedness should imply a high level of all skills, including social and behavioral skills (the "harmony hypothesis").  So if a child is labeled as "Gifted" in school, it would be very funny to find that child eating sand at the playground.  This harmony hypothesis is not supported by research.  Intellectual giftedness usually means that the child is a quick learner, has an IQ that is unusually high, and is often able to complete schoolwork at a level that is more advanced their grade level.  Thus, a child who is gifted but has low social skills can exist.  In addition, children who are "Twice Exceptional" are examples of how intellectual giftedness can coexist with learning disabilities and behavior issues that require intervention.

Another possibility is that people believe that gifted children are weirdos who all have emotional and behavioral problems (the "disharmony hypothesis").  For example, in a 2013 study of German school teachers, their implicit stereotypes about gifted students included that they are, "less emotionally stable...less agreeable" (p. 40).  The authors, Baudson and Preckel, point out this stereotype does not match reality: gifted children do not have higher rates of emotional or behavioral problems than average children.

At the same time, reviews of Giftedness research remind us that these children are often very sensitive, which may be misperceived as being over-emotional.  They also may struggle with perfectionism - for example, getting very upset if they receive an A- instead of an A.  Gifted children, like all children, become friends with kids who are similar to them, so these reviews also suggest that gifted children will be most socially successful with other gifted kids.  So maybe these traits have been misunderstood to mean that Gifted children have emotional and behavioral problems.

The final possibility is that this meme is funny because it is making fun of parents who brag that their children are Gifted and exceptional without any evidence to support that claim.  This is my favorite interpretation because the humor is not based on a misperception of gifted kids.

Brummelman, Thomaes, Neleman, Orobio de Castro, and Bushman (2015) detail the creation of their Parental Overvaluation Scale (the POS, which is ironic in American slang).  Overvaluing means viewing your child as somehow more deserving of good things and of being a better person than the average child.  In fact, the paper's title includes the phrase, "My child is God's gift to Humanity" to demonstrate how extreme this perception can be.  The authors found that this warped view was often, but not always, reported by narcissistic parents.  For all parents, overvaluing was demonstrated by irrationally high evaluations of their children's knowledge, compulsive praising of their children's efforts, and over-estimation of their children's intelligence.

For example, Brummelman et al. had parents rate how likely it was that their children were familiar with certain important, historical concepts.  Some of these were real, like "Vietnam War," but others were made up, like "Storming of Austria" (p. 679). The parents who overvalue their children were not only more likely to believe that their kids would be familiar with the real examples, they were also more likely to believe that their children would be familiar with the fictional examples!

The authors also recorded parents' behaviors as they helped their children solve mathematics problems:  overvaluing parents praised their children 62% more often.  This praise was not related to how accurately the problems were solved, so it was not reflecting reality!

Most relevant to our meme, Brummelman et al. asked parents to evaluate their children's intellect, including how much they agree with this statement: "I see my child as gifted" (p. 672).  Even though their children's IQ scores were not higher than other children's, the overvaluing parents were more likely to agree that their children are gifted!

Parents who overvalue their children may be doing more harm than simply being annoying to Willy Wonka:  these behaviors may turn entitled children into adult narcissists who believe that they are superior humans.  Bushman, one of the creators of the POS, has recently gotten wide media attention in the United States for his suggestion that parents lay off of so much praise to avoid creating little narcissists.  Over-simplified headlines reading, "Don't praise your child!  Don't tell your child that he is special!" seemed to spring up overnight!

This parent-blaming reminds me of a song from "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory":

However, Bushman's claims are guesses in the longterm - we don't know if overvalued children actually turn into narcissistic adults - and the average parent is unlikely to be an overvaluing parent.  You also know that irrationally excessive praise is only one part of overvaluing behaviors.  So if your praise is justified and if you tell your child that he or she is special because EVERY human is unique and special, it is unlikely to cause a problem.

Either way - Gifted or not - if your children are eating sand like Augustus Gloop eats chocolate, you should talk to their pediatrician about pica!  This can be a sign of nutritional deficiencies.


 Further Reading:

The Brummelman et al. (2015) article in JPSP is available through your college library, but a version of the authors' related study that spawned Bushman's media frenzy is available online.  The published version in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States can also be accessed through your college library.

Hoagies Gifted Education Page and the National Associate for Gifted Children are good sources for parents and teachers who want to learn more about intellectual giftedness.

Have to deal with overvaluing parents?  Help from WebMd: Talking to parents who brag about their kids.

This man claims that his biggest phobia is a fear of Willy Wonka!

Saying "I love you"...

For this post I have to revert to preschool scatological humor for just a moment...

so if a brief, funny reference to poop is offensive...

read no further.

I have often thought that diarrhea is really the perfect excuse if you want to leave a boring situation.  If anyone tries to stop your departure, whispering, "I have diarrhea," will be the instant get-out-of-jail-free card because everybody has been there and -- for goodness sake -- nobody wants you to stick around in that state.  

With this shared human experience we introduce this week's meme:

When I searched this meme on the Internet I found a curious thing:  like this version starring Optimistic O'Connell, the other versions display a male making this statement.  Ignore the diarrhea part for now - what interested me was that this is a meme of about a confession of love.  And some versions -- like this one -- convey that this confession is being expressed to a female.

Past research suggests that, in heterosexual dating relationships, men tend to tell their partners, "I love you," earlier women do.  A pair of studies by Ackerman, Griskevicis, and Li (2011) confirm that trend, and demonstrate that this reality is the opposite of our stereotype.  Sixty-four percent of college students (who were stopped on a street corner and offered, "candy and juice drinks" (p. 1082) for their insights - I guess that is all it takes...) actually believed that the reverse was true:  that women say "I love you" first.

Ackerman et al. (2011)  includes other laboratory studies about how people feel when their partners just can't hold it in and blurt out "I love you."  Not surprisingly:  they like it.  But does the timing matter and what do we interpret that "I love you" to mean?  Because the authors come from an Evolutionary Psychology point of view, they were particularly interested in the variable of sex.

The authors' final studies determined that men are happiest when their female partners say "I love you," before the relationship has become sexual; women are happiest when that confession of love occurs after sex has been initiated.  This gender difference meshed well with the participants' reported interpretations of "I love you" at different points in the relationship:  men interpreted women's pre-sex "I love you" to mean, "I will probably have sex with you in the future;" while women interpreted a pre-sex "I love you" to mean, "I am trying to convince you to have sex with me."  If instead men's first "I love you" occurs after sex is introduced into the relationship, women interpret that same phrase to mean, "I will stick around for you."

Ackerman et al. invoke Evolutionary theory to interpret these findings.  The basic idea, put forth by researchers such as Buss, is that men have evolved to look for baby-makers - so they would like it if they get the signal that sexual reproduction might be possible.  Women have evolved to look for a mate who will stick around when they are pregnant and nursing babies - so they would like it if they get the signal that a guy is in it for the long-haul and not just looking for one night of reproduction of the fittest.

Evolutionary theory is one way to look at gender differences.  An alternative point of view, Social Role Theory, comes from Eagly and Wood (1999).  They suggest that today's gender stereotypes may have their roots in the long history of men having more power than women.  This inequality came from some biological differences (men are stronger and faster; solely women contend with pregnancy and breast feeding) that gave way to common roles that men and women took on in society.  Seeing thousands of years with more men in leadership positions we still leap to conclusions that all men are better leaders than all women; seeing thousands of years with more women than men caring for children we still leap to conclusions that all women are more nurturing than all men.

So it may be that evolutionary reproductive urges are guiding the timing and interpretation of "I love you."  It could also be that Social Role Theory is guiding these behaviors.  In that case, men's history of greater power and our stereotype of them as being leaders allow them to take more risks in relationships by saying "I love you" first and not being scared off if women say it before sex has occurred.  Likewise, women's history of less power and our stereotype of them as caregivers might encourage them to hold back that "I love you" until they have evidence (like sex) that their partners will be glad to hear this.

At this point we cannot say which perspective is right.  But what you can know for certain is this:  if somebody tells you "I love you," and you don't feel the same way...just tell them you have diarrhea and they will get out of your way.

Further Reading:

A post on a related topic from the Science of Relationships blog:  "Who Falls in Love First"?  This study is also explained using Evolutionary theory; can you imagine how Social Role Theory might interpret the same findings? 

Click here for home remedies for diarrhea and for a broken heart.

You can find a version of this article on Joshua Ackerman's website and obtain the published article through your local university library:  Ackerman, J.M, Griskevicius, V., Li, N.P. (2011) Let's get serious: Communicating commitment in romantic relationships. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 100(6),1079-1094. 

Welcome to That's Psych!

No syllabus required here - just an interest in Psychology!  Part of why I love teaching Psychology is that it is a topic that we can all relate to:  why people do the weird things that they do. Let's face it, people - especially OTHER people - are funny.  And where there is humor there is usually a meme.

But what is behind that meme?  Often it's Psychology!

Each week I'll post a meme or a hot topic and relate it to Psych.  Real Psychology based on theory and research findings.  The big ideas in everyday language.

Why?  For fun and for my students.  And for anyone who likes Psychology. 

In fact, I invite you to send me things you see online that relate to Psychology.  Send me an email thatspsych@gmail.com if you see something online and think - That's Psych!

To start us off...

Back in the 1950s and 60s, Jean Piaget would say that this little guy is probably in the first stage of Cognitive Development:  the Sensorimotor Stage from birth until age two.  Piaget believed that at the beginning of this stage kids are missing something called "Object Permanence," meaning that once a kid can't see something - she believes that it has gone *poof* and disappeared out into the Universe.  He thought this was true because very young babies will give up searching for a rattle if it is covered up by a blanket - even if the rattle sound keeps going!  It is not until the child is about a year and a half old that she will understand that out of sight does not mean "gone forever" and will continue her quest for the rattle under the blanket.  At that point she would have developed Object Permanence.

Piaget's ideas came from observing children's behavior.  In the 1980s Renee Baillargeon and her colleagues tested Object Permanence in a lab and found results that suggest that a baby might not search for a hidden rattle even though, at least at some gut level, he believes that the rattle still exists in the Universe.  Baillargeon created an experiment in which four-and-a-half month old babies witnessed a screen rotating over a solid box.  Sometimes it would rotate over the box and stop as if it were blocked by the box. This is normal in our world and did not seem to surprise the babies.  Sometimes it would rotate all the way flat as if the box had disappeared (in fact, a trusty assistant had sneaked it out from behind the screen without the child seeing) - now THIS surprised the babies very much - they looked a lot longer at this impossible event!  I bet they looked like the little guy pictured above! If, as Piaget had thought, those babies had assumed that the box was gone once it was covered by the screen, they should not have been surprised when the screen rotated all the way down.

This demonstration suggests that the little boy in the picture may have a gut feeling that you don't actually disappear when you are playing peekaboo - even if he doesn't search behind your hands to see your face.  If that is true - can you think of why babies laugh so hard when you play peekaboo with them?

Further reading:

Piaget's Sensorimotor Stage

Baillargeon's study