What is Psychology?
Before we learn Psychology facts, let’s learn the definition. According to American Psychological Association, psychology is the scientific study of human mind and behavior.
It is broad discipline with multiple sub-fields like areas of human development, cognitive processes, social behavior, sports, health, and even clinical.
Psychology is a new science with most advances happening only over the last 150 years, but it has ancient origins.
The psychology subject is very intriguing. It tells about yourself, why you do what you do, why you feel a certain way and many more. As psychology holds so much knowledge about ourselves, it is extremely important to learn some psychology facts about human beings. Let us begin…
Psychology Facts 1-10
1. According to researches, the way you spend money determines your happiness more than how much you earn. According to the study published in Science, people were happier when they spent money on others than themselves. Another study claims that you will be happier if you spend money on experiences than on possessions.
2. According to studies conducted in 2010 and 2018, your happiness won’t continuously increase with increase in your income.
3. Everyone knows the famous Stanley Milgram experiments. There is a good takeaway from that experiment – we lose our morality if an authoritative figure tells us to do, even after seeing the victim suffering in front of us.
4. Our brain doesn’t consider long term goals as important and focuses on immediate, short-term goals that are unnecessary. For example, you would prefer to watch Netflix or Amazon Prime on any given day than do your taxes or homework! Another study revealed that we feel more connected to the plan if the deadline is in days and not in weeks, months, or years.
5. Our body stores sugars and fat. It is not a new thing, and even our ancestors store sugar and fat in their bodies. They required it because of the uncertainties of the environment. However, we don’t need to store food in such a way, but our bodies are primed to do that.
6. The gory Standford Prison experiment proved that with the power, we turn insensitive to others. The experiment was for two weeks, but the subjects’ (guards) insensitivity towards prisoners (another set of subjects) was so horrible that they had to cut short the experiment to six days.
7. We can convince our brain to do boring tasks if there are no incentives. If the incentives are present, you will do the task only for the incentive. But when you are doing it for free or zero incentive, your brain convinces you that the task is interesting because it doesn’t think it is lying to itself.
8. Social media is designed to be addictive, and most of us fall prey to infinite scrolling, and the brain doesn’t get a stop sign to stop.
9. A famous 1960s study proved that we do well when other people think that we will do well and otherwise. This effect is called the Pygmalion effect.
10. There is something called ‘Cognitive Dissonance.’ It refers to a situation where you have conflicted thoughts or beliefs. When a fact counters our beliefs, we mostly skew the facts than changing our beliefs. For example, suppose someone complains about the bad behavior of your pooch. In that case, you may undermine how bad his behavior was or what naughty feat he performed.
Psychology Facts 11-20
11. We never run out of problems because our brain creates one after the first problem is solved. In research, volunteers were asked to pick threatening faces from computer-generated faces. When the researchers started showing fewer photos, the volunteers widened their definition of threatening. They kept on picking faces as threatening that they called harmless earlier.
12. Did it ever happen to you that you saw an animated face on some inanimate object? You are not the only one. This phenomenon is called pareidolia. Scientists assume that our brain considers recognizing faces an important task for social life. It would rather create one than missing a real-life face.
13. When you are running low on something, you obsess over it. For example, suppose you are running low on money. In that case, you have to have more reminders to pay bills or do other chores because you are still thinking about having less money.
14. All do not believe in the paradox of choice theory, but some studies have shown evidence of this theory. The theory states that the more choice you give to people, the fewer things they select. For example, in speed dating events, singles who met more people with more diversity chose fewer potential dates.
15. Tests do work. A study published in Psychological Science proved that you remember things better if you get tested on them. It also proved that the more tests you take, the better you remember.
16. Chunking is a memory technique used to remember long numbers. For example, it is difficult remembering 985461234785. It is easier to remember the same number if you divide it into chunks like – 985-461-234-785.
17. People make false memories from time to time. Our brain remembers only gists of what is happening and then fills the rest and every time you remember the memory, it fills more and remembers less.
18. The age 12 to 22 is very important for every human being. We bind to the music we listened when we are in high school than the music that we listened as adults.
19. According to a research, if you have fewer friends or stay lonely, your body produces more fibrinogen, a blood-clotting protein. The effect is immense – having 15 friends instead of 25 is as bad as smoking.
20. Our ancestors had to conserve energy and our bodies are more inclined to save energy and made us a little lazy. This holds true even now and that is the reason why we find it difficult to lose weight.
Psychology Facts 21-30
21. We believe in confirmation bias – an interpretation of facts in such a way that confirms our beliefs. It is the reason why you cannot convince your friends on politics or other issues.
22. We also suffer from ‘optimism bias,’ i.e., we always believe that our future is bright.
23. According to a study published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, we are not good at multitasking as we think we are. You can’t listen to songs and simultaneously read a novel. You are either reading or listening at that point in time.
24. It was proved in the 1950s experiment that we second guess our opinion if others disagree. We do this even when we are right; we follow the lead and go for the wrong option.
25. Researchers at the University of Glasgow found out that we turn boring speeches interesting.
26. Research published in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience found that we get a little aggressive when we see unbelievably cute things. We feel a bit of aggression to balance those extra positive emotions that we feel when we see a cute puppy.
27. According to a Harvard school’s study, reward centers of the brain light up when we talk about ourselves than when we talk about others.
28. There is a phenomenon called ‘reactance.’ It is negative motivational arousal to certain rules, persons, offers, or regulations that threaten certain freedoms. It is found that when a rule threatens our freedom, we try to break not just that rule but break other rules as well.
29. We inadvertently follow the ‘rule of reciprocity’ that is we are programmed to help others who had helped us.
30. Research published in Nature found that it is less stressful to know that something negative is going to happen than being in dilemma about what’s going to happen. It is mostly because our brain will focus on negating the negative outcome rather than stressing on what’s going to happen.
Psychology Facts 31-40
31. Tell this psychology fact to your spouse so that he/she can prepare food for you. Food tastes better when someone else makes it for you. The study published in the journal Nature found that when you are preparing a meal, it takes long enough that you lose the excitement when you sit for eating.
32. We also suffer from negative bias, i.e., we remember bad news more than the good ones. You quickly forget compliments but remember insults or jibes. To negate one negative comment, you need to get 5 compliments.
33. University of Pennsylvania study found that we are wired to help the person in front of us. When the problem gets bigger, we realize our minuscule part and don’t partake in helping.
34. Another study from Frontiers of Human Neuroscience found out that we remember either the beginning of the ends but never the middle parts of a lecture or presentation.
35. If you want to get a task done, don’t have a plan B. University of Pennsylvania researchers found that volunteers who had a plan B for a task performed plan A worse than the volunteers who didn’t have a plan B.
36. People who use swear words more often are honest, loyal, and upfront with their friends and family.
37. You can remember a maximum of three to four things at a given point in time.
38. People who are interested in serial killers are good conversationalists.
39. Shopping and chocolate are more addictive than steroids and drugs like LSD.
40. Good liars can easily detect other’s lies.
Psychology Facts 41-50
41. According to research, the optimal length for reading speed on screen is 100 characters long. People can read faster, but they prefer 45 to 72 characters per line.
42. If you announce your goals to someone, you are less likely to accomplish them.
43. You can die from a broken heart. The condition is called stress cardiomyopathy.
44. You make far better rational decisions when you think in another language.
45. There is something called the Dunning-Kruger effect. It is a cognitive bias where smart people underestimate themselves, and ignorant people overestimate themselves.
46. People of the age range 18 to 33 are the most stressed. The stress levels start decreasing after 33.
47. Your brain reacts to rejection, the same as physical pain.
48. Funny people and comedians are more depressed than normal folks.
49. People who can understand sarcasm well are good at reading people’s minds.
50. Women have twice the number of pain receptors as men, but they can tolerate pain better than men.
Psychology Facts 51-60
51. The happier we stay, the less sleep we require. Doing things that you are scared of will make you happier.
52. People look far more attractive when they talk about things that they are genuinely interested in.
53. People who speak two or more languages unconsciously change their personalities when switching from one language to another.
54. Intelligent people have fewer friends. Higher the intelligence, selective they become.
55. People who try to keep everyone happy end up being the loneliest.
56. Men are not funnier than women, but they make more jokes and least bothered whether others like their jokes.
57. The way we communicate with people affects our emotions and not the other way round.
58. The person who gives the best advice has the most problems.
59. Traveling improves brain health and reduces the risk of depression and heart attack.
60. The way you dress is connected with your mood. Dressing well keeps you happy.
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