10 psychological phenomena that will surprise you
Psychology addresses the complexity of the human being, his behavior and his mental processes.
Among the different facets of the study of this science are the so-called psychological phenomena. What are the most common psychological phenomena? In this article we will discover it.
10 psychological phenomena that deserve to be explained
Our brain works in a somewhat surprising way, sometimes. We have compiled ten psychological phenomena that maybe you did not know and that you may be interested in knowing.
1. Cognitive Dissonance
It means that when we have two contradictory thoughts or beliefs, or we make decisions and behave differently than we think, we will feel bad or we will have anxiety or discomfort . When we become aware of such discomfort or tension, people unconsciously tend to regain balance to reduce dissonance. Then, we can behave or argue in favor of the decision we have made, to give us peace of mind and convince us that we have done well.
Let's take an example: a soldier must go to war but thinks it is wrong to kill another human being. If he has killed someone, he can argue that he has done it to defend the homeland. Another example is the smoker who knows that smoking hurts him and increases the chances of getting cancer and other diseases. Advertising and campaigns that prohibit smoking in public places increase internal tension and contradiction. We know that smoking kills, but we prefer to deny it. There are people who would say: "something has to die", "the doctor told me that my lungs are impeccable", "I control it", etc., and so we reduce the tension.
2. Hallucinations are common
A third of people report experiencing hallucinations at some point in their lives . In the same way, ordinary people often have paranoid thoughts. The brain acts like this to fill in the lack of information. The problem is when that happens very often, because it can be an alarm of problems in certain regions of the brain. It is known that when schizophrenics have hallucinations, it is because the region that would be in charge of sending the message is really activated. The sound, the images or the smells that they perceive, really exist for them, even though there is no stimulus that triggers them.
3. The Placebo effect
It happens when the subject believes that a drug or a medicine has an effect on him, even if this effect has no physiological basis . Examples of placebo are many "magic and miraculous effects" products sold in pharmacies, energy bracelets, and so on.
Researchers have found some curiosities like:
The bigger the pills, the more they heal
They cure more two pills than a single
Blues heal more than red ones
Placebos in pills heal more than certain pills
Injections cure more than pills
There are also placebo tests: X-rays, scanners ...
4. Obedience to authority
Numerous studies show how people in power can control our behaviors and lead us to do things we do not want to do. In Stanley Milgram's famous study, 63% of participants continued to give electric shocks to another human being only because someone in authority told them to do so.
5. Elections mediated by emotions
We are not very good at making decisions or understanding why we make those choices. As the scientific popularizer says Eduard Punset , "We have been taught to be very logical and reasonable in making decisions, but it turns out that there is not a single reasonable decision that is not contaminated by an emotion. There is not a project that does not start with an emotion. And there is not a project that does not end with emotion. "
Also, when we make a decision, even if the decision is not good, we tend to rationalize Why that decision is the best option? Emotional Marketing is responsible for gathering that knowledge and applying it to seduce our emotions and get us to buy a specific product.
6. Fantasizing reduces motivation
Thinking that we have already succeeded in the past can reduce our motivation . In addition, we could take for granted the argument according to which thinking about success leads us unfailing to create the conditions for this to happen, but in reality this is rather counterproductive.
7. Brainstorming does not work
As demonstrated by the studies of B. Nijstad (2006), thinking in a group reduces the power of the brainstorming , because in a group, people are more lazy and worry more about what others think.It is better to think only when it comes to creating ideas.
In this article we explain extensively why Brainstorming does not work.8. We must not suppress thoughts
By stopping thoughts you actually get to think even more about them. It is one of the strategies most used by people who suffer Obsessive Compulsive Disorder , and most assume that this tactic has seldom helped them.
9. We can train multitasking
As usual, Multitasking reduces efficiency because we have to assign different cognitive resources to different tasks simultaneously . But recent studies show that you can learn to multitask at the same time. You just have to train.
10. It's the little things that matter
We think that it is the great events of our life that change us or make us happy, but in reality it is the little things that add up and make us who we are.
Like in The Alquimist to , we must be aware that the life journey must be valued by itself, in each of its circumstances, regardless of the achievement of the achievements to which we aspire.
