PURSUIT

Medical Procedurals Make You Misinformed & Fatalistic

October 14, 2014October 12, 2014 by Merv Mandelbaum

101962_R003_0031 -- GREY'S ANATOMY - "Grey's Anatomy" focuses on young people struggling to be doctors and doctors struggling to stay human. It's the drama and intensity of medical training mixed with the funny, sexy, painful lives of interns who are about to discover that neither medicine nor relationships can be defined in black and white. Real life only comes in shades of grey. (ABC/FRANK OCKENFELS) JAMES PICKENS, JR. AS "RICHARD WEBBER", CHANDRA WILSON AS "MIRANDA BAILEY", JUSTIN CHAMBERS AS "ALEX KAREV", KATHERINE HEIGL AS "ISOBEL 'IZZIE' STEVENS", T.R. KNIGHT AS "GEORGE O' MALLEY", SANDRA OH AS "CRISTINA YANG", ISAIAH WASHINGTON AS "PRESTON BURKE", ELLEN POMPEO AS "MEREDITH GREY", PATRICK DEMPSEY AS "DEREK SHEPHERD" The Anatomists (from left): James Pickens Jr., Chandra Wilson, Justin Chambers, Katherine Heigl, T.R. Knight (rear), Sandra Oh, Isaiah Washington, Ellen Pompeo and Patrick Dempsey. Last Sunday night, after the Super Bowl broadcast, about 45 million people stayed tuned to spend time in the hospital with the medical team. Can be used with Maria Kubacki (Canwest News Service). CNS-TV-MOVIES

You probably know that people who spend a lot of time Googling their symptoms and then deciding what kind of cancer they have are hysterical idiots—right? Well, it’s time to add a new category of people to the medically misinformed: people who watch a lot of TV. Specifically, a lot … Read More

Hiking with a Group Lowers Stress

October 14, 2014October 11, 2014 by Merv Mandelbaum

Have lots of stress in your day-to-day life? Struggling with depression and other mental health issues? Unemployed? Breaking up with your girlfriend? There’s a simple answer to all these things: go on a hike with a group of people. It’ll improve your mood. A study published in Ecopsychology found that group nature … Read More

Need to Pee? There Goes Your Belief in Free Will

October 10, 2014October 10, 2014 by Merv Mandelbaum

Do you believe in free will and self-determination? Actually, answer this question first: do you need to pee? A study published in Consciousness and Cognition has found that people’s belief in free will is, in part, informed by their physical circumstances. In one survey, they compared the belief in free … Read More

You Can Bounce Back from a Misspent Youth

October 9, 2014 by Merv Mandelbaum

Have a bunch of bad habits, from overeating to binge drinking to drug taking? Well, aim to drop them by your late thirties and you might—might—be okay. According to a study published in Circulation, people who drop bad habits in their late thirties and forties can reduce their risk of … Read More

You Probably Don’t Notice Incoherence in Texting

October 8, 2014 by Merv Mandelbaum

Excuse us for dusting off an old chestnut, but texting is stupid, and you may not even notice if some kind of technical glitch happened and you got shunted into a completely different conversation. How do we figure that? Well, researchers tried it. A study published in PLOS One has … Read More