Life & Letters Magazine

Department of Psychology

Three Ways Kids Can Learn through Play at Home

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Children’s lives revolve around social interactions that help them figure out what it means to be a member of their family and community. But recent shelter-in-place efforts have limited many of these routine yet vital experiences — especially because young kids can’t video call or text their friends as freely as others. “Social interaction is […]

Rebooting Our Lives After COVID-19

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The world’s new reality amid the COVID-19 pandemic is forcing us to confront issues and critically think about how to revive communities slowly, safely and sustainably.

Bring Your Brain to Work

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In Bring Your Brain to Work, Art Markman shares what you need to know to succeed at work. He highlights research from cognitive science that supports strategies to help readers get a job, to succeed at that job once they get it, and to best enhance their career by getting the next job.  You’ve probably heard […]

Breakthroughs in Brain Health: We’re Closer Than You Think

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It might not seem like it when you’ve forgotten your email password for the third time in as many days, but your brain is capable of amazing things. It can instantly process the intricate sensory inputs needed to understand the world while simultaneously conducting motor neurons to navigate these landscapes. It can read complex emotions […]

Here Comes the Song: The Personalities Behind Your Favorite Beatles Lyrics

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If Paul McCartney would have written “Yesterday” based on the first words that came to his mind, the song would sound like a concupiscent teen singing about breakfast: Scrambled eggs, oh, my baby, how I love your legs… The melody of the song, which has been broadcasted on American radio more than 7 million times […]

Rising to the Challenge 

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Five years ago we opened the doors to a new College of Liberal Arts Building in the heart of campus. It was a milestone event, marking the first time students in our college had a place to call home. Departments and other units once scattered across campus were brought together in new collaborative spaces, as […]

Fashion Meets Function

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Though an avid cyclist, Gloria Hwang was never a fan of helmets, referring to them as “sci-fi” nuisances. But after losing a friend through a cycling accident, her perspective changed. Hwang, a psychology alumna, says her mission in founding and launching Thousand, a new brand of cycling helmets, was to save lives, noting that there are […]

Can We Talk?: Why Discourse is Dying in America

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I’ll have to admit that I was a bit perplexed when I heard linguistic anthropologist Elizabeth Keating say, “There is a very strong preference for agreement in conversation in the U.S.” I couldn’t believe my ears — even the Pew Research Center pegged political polarization as the defining feature of modern U.S. politics. And it’s […]

First Class: Rethinking Health Care Through the Liberal Arts

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The doors of the Dell Medical School have opened for its first class of future doctors, and they are on a mission to get the training they need to make a difference in the lives of future patients, their communities and even medicine itself. Of the 50 members in the school’s inaugural class, three graduated […]

The Campaign for Your Vote: Just Add Brand Power

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After months of being bombarded by pollsters, campaign ads and the most outlandish sound bites on repeat, the moment will come for you to finally cast your ballot. Whom will you choose? “The presidency is the one office that represents the American people: all their wishes, dreams, desires, hopes, fears and everything else,” says history […]

Forever Shakespeare: The Making of an Icon

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Editor’s note: As the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s death approaches, five UT Austin scholars share how they celebrate his work and his ultimate staying power. In 10 years, people won’t care about Kim Kardashian’s face-contouring regimen or that she had 35 million Twitter followers. But William Shakespeare? Four centuries after his death he’s still […]

Give it a Rest

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Scientists have already established that resting the mind, as in daydreaming, helps strengthen memories of events and retention of information, but in a new twist, UT Austin researchers have found that the right kind of mental rest and reflection can actually help boost future learning. How our brains capture and store new information is heavily […]

Depression: Making Treatment Personal

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For the estimated 350 million people worldwide who suffer from depression, the health consequences go far beyond “feeling down.” In fact, it is a leading cause of disability worldwide, according to the World Health Organization. Unfortunately, the vast majority of people with symptoms of depression will never receive treatment, and for those diagnosed with major […]

Little Words Can Mean A Lot

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The smallest, most forgettable words in admissions essays — such as the, a, to, I and they — can tell us in advance how students will perform in college, according to a new study at UT Austin that included computerized text analysis of 50,000 admissions essays written by prospective college students. How a student uses small words, the study revealed, is related […]

Boston Bombing Shows the Power of Familial Ties

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For many, the recent trial of Boston bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has relit the inevitable question: “How could they?” One answer lies within something called familial ties, and they’re more powerful and prevalent than most people realize. Although the trial and sentencing may bring some closure, we should also not forget the overwhelmingly spontaneous humanity […]

We Need to Protect Ourselves From Our Phones

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When it comes to cellphones, we are no better than trained rats in a box. Just the other day, I was stuck behind a driver playing with a cellphone while driving. I have gotten used to assuming that everyone doing something silly on the road is driving while distracted. In Austin, San Antonio and several […]

It’s Plainer to an Explainer

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Asking children to come up with explanations — even to themselves — enhances their cause-and-effect learning abilities, according to new research by Cristine Legare, associate professor of psychology. The study, published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, shows that young children who come up with explanations while learning are able to connect new ideas […]

Keeping A Pulse On Population Health

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A few years ago, a Plan II Honors student in Marc Musick’s sociology lecture came to him with a question. Musick had been talking about the shortage of doctors in rural and inner city areas. The student had grown up in the Rio Grande Valley and hoped to go on to medical school. Why, he […]

Championing Student Success

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We hear a lot these days about the challenges facing college students, from loan debt to an uncertain job market. The College of Liberal Arts has consistently taken the lead in creating innovative solutions for these and other challenges, and our efforts are paying off. The university has sought our college’s leadership on a number of student success initiatives. In 2011 we led […]

Mental Rest and Reflection Boost Learning, Study Suggests

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A new study, which may have implications for approaches to education, finds that brain mechanisms engaged when people allow their minds to rest and reflect on things they’ve learned before may boost later learning. Scientists have already established that resting the mind, as in daydreaming, helps strengthen memories of events and retention of information. In […]

Millennial Nation

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A Generational Look at Education, Money and Work Empathetic. Impatient. Innovative. Unfocused. Rational. Naive. Excited. These are the words millennials in the College of Liberal Arts use when they’re asked to describe themselves. However, it’s a question they’re not often asked. Plenty of people, from journalists to researchers to employers, are looking to define who […]

Why Mom Called You ‘Fluffy’

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When choosing baby names, parents often want something that is pleasing to the ear. Some even turn to alliteration when naming multiple children. But according to a new psychology study from The University of Texas at Austin, parents set themselves up for speech errors when they give their children similar-sounding names. The findings, published in […]