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Would you believe we think we can tell other peoples  personalities  based on their faces?  Well, if we have pre-existing beliefs about how personality works, that's how  we judge personality.  It all depends on our pre-existing beliefs about how  personality actually works, newswise.com reports. "We make snap judgments of others based not only on their facial appearance, but also on our pre-existing beliefs about how others’ personalities work, finds a new study by a team of psychology researchers," the web site explains. A new study led by  Jonathan Freeman, the paper’s senior author and an associate professor in NYU’s Department of Psychology and Center for Neural Science,  underscores how we interpret others’ facial features to form impressions of their personalities.  "People form personality impressions from others’ facial appearance within only a few hundred milliseconds,” observes Freeman.  “Our findings suggest th...

We all (or most) may resent the amount of money our CEOs are paid.  But here's a reason to hope yours is as well-compensated at his peers. Tunrs out CEO's who are not paid as well as their peers are more likely to engage in layoffs, according to newswise.com. CEOs who are paid less than their peers are four times more likely to engage in layoffs, says   research led by faculty at Binghamton University, State University of New York. Scott Bentley, an assistant professor of strategy at Binghamton University’s School of Management, worked on the research as a PhD student at Rutgers University. He and fellow researchers Rebecca Kehoe and Ingrid Fulmer, both associate professors at the Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations, sought to find out if CEO pay was related to layoff announcements made by CEOs. “In terms of strategic decisions that a CEO can make that could lead to higher pay, layoffs are one of the easiest to do,” says Scott Bentley, an assistant ...

We all know lying is bad -- well, except for some people. But what about white lies?  When your husband asks if his forehead is receding more, or you, how your jeans fit   . . You get the picture.  But now a new study says that it's never good to lie . According to newswise.com, if  you think you’re helping someone by lying, you may want to think again. T elling a lie in order to help or protect someone—a practice known as prosocial lying—backfires if the person being lied to perceives the lie as paternalistic, says new research from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Chicago Booth Assistant Professor  Emma Levine , Deakin University’s Matthew Lupoli, and UCLA Anderson’s Adam Eric Greenberg, find that well-intentioned lies can spark strong resentment from the person who is deceived. The researchers identify a key factor that determines whether people respond positively or negatively to prosocial lies: the extent to which the...

Everyone gets a little rain in their lives, at some point.  I survived breast cancer, my husband was recently treated for colon cancer (not to mention the aneurysm he has on his aorta and leg, which must be surgically removed) and his recently-acquired rheumatoid arthritis.  We have no relationship with either of our families and our son is growing up (with older parents) pretty much just with us.  I live in fear that we will both be gone when he is still too young to manage on his own (he's 17). But people have other disappointments, too -- losing a job, or a loved one, the failure of a relationship. But a new study says that how you respond to adversity can affect how you get through it, according to newswise.com.   Research on how adults deal with adversity has been dominated by studies claiming the most common response is uninterrupted and stable psychological functioning. In other words, this research suggests that most adults are essentially unfaze...

Who's never been there?  A c o-worker takes credit for your work.  Or tells the boss something he told you in private?  Being rude to these people is hard to resist. It seems rudeness has become a way of life today.  But experts are warning that it may be something really bad we're teaching our children , according to newswise.com. Like most of us, I try to set a good example for my son.  At 17 he's pretty much who he's going to be, but it never hurts to remind our kids of the good, decent behavior we so rarely see in our government officials these days. A new study has found that incivility in the workplace -- big duh -- is associated with more negative parenting behavior. When people are rude to their coworkers or treat them badly, they probably don’t realize the unintended victims in that encounter could be the coworkers’ children. Women who experience incivility in the workplace are more likely to engage in stricter, more authoritarian parenting ...

Now this hardly comes as a surprise, but did you know that older people are less able to recognize when they make a mistake ?  Or admit it (looking at you, President Trump). In a recent study, o lder adults performed just as well as younger adults in tests involving looking away from an object appearing on the screen. But younger adults acknowledged more often than older adults when they failed to look away from the object. And, older adults were more likely to be adamant that they did not made a mistake. “The good news is older adults perform the tasks we assigned them just as well as younger adults, albeit more slowly,” says  Jan Wessel , assistant professor in the University of Iowa Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences and the study’s corresponding author. “But we find there is this impaired ability in older adults to recognize an error when they’ve made one.” The research offers new insight how older people perceive their decisions, and especially...

Who hasn't felt better driving down a dark street knowing you have your cell phone ? Now a new study says smartphones  may also act like a digital security blanket in stressful situations, according to newswise.com. But its possession, not use, of a mobile phone that counteracts feelings of isolation, a University of California, Irvine, (UCI)-led study finds. Not only can your smartphone serve as your wallet, watch and map, it can also be a  comfort . In this new study, researchers found that when people are in awkward social situations, having their phones with them offers comfort and helps relieve feelings of isolation.  “Our results suggest that the mere presence of a phone, not necessarily actually using it, can buffer against the negative experience and effects of social exclusion,” says lead author  John Hunter , a UCI Ph.D. candidate in psychology & social behavior. “It could be that possessing your phone is a reminder of your support sys...

It probably doesn't come as much of a surprise,  But guess who's still seen more as leaders, men or porcupines?  Just kidding.  Of course it's women who are not seen to be in charge as much as their male counterparts. And we're losing more and more female leaders, like the chief executive of Pepsi (last week), and  In May, Denise Morrison stepped down as CEO of Campbell Soup;  in April, Margo Georgiadis stepped down as CEO of Mattel  and l ast year, Meg Whitman resigned as CEO of Hewlett Packard  and Irene Rosenfeld, as CEO of Mondelez, according to marketwatch.com. Despite progress, newswise.com notes, a gender gap still exists.  Hardly news to those of us in the workplace. Women hold just 26 percent of executive-level positions in S&P 500 companies — and sadly that is no accident, according to a new study by researchers in the University at Buffalo School of Management. The research team — led by doctoral student Katie Badura and ...