Update Schedule

Contrary to evidence, this blog is not abandoned! I will be traveling quite a bit for the rest of the summer, so updates will likely be few until things stabilize. But I will try to do better than last week from here on out. In the meantime, please enjoy this photo of my cat:

Jun 2013

Psychological Scales of Yesteryear

When psychologists create scales (such as the many personality tests you may be familiar with), they try to use language and examples that would be relevant and accessible to their participants. Although this helps in reducing the possibility that participants will be alienated or confused by the items in a scale, it also means that […]

Jun 2013

New Journal: Secularism and Nonreligion

A new interdisciplinary journal in the area of scientific study of religion (broadly defined) has begin accepting submissions. The journal Secularism and Nonreligion defines its scope as follows: Secularism and Nonreligion is an interdisciplinary journal published with the aim of advancing research on various aspects of ‘the secular.’ The journal is...

Jun 2013

Getting into Graduate School

This is the first week of my first semester as a teaching assistant at Illinois. I held office hours this week, even before leading a discussion session, and was surprised to have a student use them. This student wanted advice on what steps he could take to make himself a strong applicant for a psychology […]

Jun 2013

Religious Studies Project

Hello again, Internets! Twice in the past week, someone has mentioned my blog to me, which, of course has made me feel terrible at its state of abandonment. So let’s get back into it. A new resource for those interested in the study of religion has just launched: The Religious Studies Project. It’s a fantastic […]

Jun 2013

The Cognitive Approach to Religion

Greetings from SPSP! I’ve been quiet this week as I am at the largest conference in my field, the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. It’s been a great experience so far. Yesterday, I attended a symposium on religion and prosociality that was extremely exciting and has inspired my next blog topic: the supernatural punishment […]

Jun 2013

Getting Into Graduate School

A while ago, I posted some advice for applicants to graduate schools. Today, The Religious Studies Project has posted a revised and expanded version of this advice that includes links to other online resources for grad school applicants. Here is an excerpt of that new post: Generally speaking, the key to graduate admissions is fit—which means […]

Jun 2013

New Year’s Challenge

Since the last time I updated this blog, a lot has happened: I passed the qualifying exam in my doctoral program. The Religious Studies Project posted another podcast response by me, this time on why women are more religious than men. My husband and I adopted two dogs. I saw the Mississippi River for the […]

Jun 2013

New Year; Old Regrets

The New Year can be as much a time of regret as of renewal. While you are setting new resolutions, you might reflect on failed resolutions from the past—that weight you were supposed to lose or that language you were supposed to learn. And as you are returning to your normal schedule after the holidays, […]

Jun 2013

Make the Most of Your Regrets

Regret feels bad. That fact is so obvious that it hardly needs explaining. When you think about how you could acted differently to make things better, that just feels bad. Perhaps because regret feels bad, you can find lots of people advocating living without regret. (A Google search for “live life without regrets” turns up […]

Jun 2013