Cognitive
Use Mediation Training to Be a Client-Centered Lawyer
March 19, 2014
As a former litigation lawyer, in-house litigation manager and mediation professor, I’ve come to appreciate how learning basic mediation skills can significantly improve an attorney’s overall legal skills. Like most of my colleagues, I was trained in the adversarial system of justice and believed that to be a “zealous advocate,” my role was to fight for my clients’ rights. After a career at a company where I often saw that legal problems were not the only important issues in a dispute,...
March 19, 2014
As a former litigation lawyer, in-house litigation manager and mediation professor, I’ve come to appreciate how learning basic mediation skills can significantly improve an attorney’s overall legal skills. Like most of my colleagues, I was trained in the adversarial system of justice and believed that to be a “zealous advocate,” my role was to fight for my clients’ rights. After a career at a company where I often saw that legal problems were not the only important issues in a dispute,...
Are Rainmakers a Breed Apart?
March 17, 2014
What makes rainmakers different? What do they have that other lawyers don't? The easy answer: They have clients. But, as a developing body of research is showing, they also have tendencies that make business development come as naturally to them as, say, being critical does to their partners. The latest report comes from Lawyer Metrics, an analytics company founded by William Henderson, the Indiana University law professor. Called simply "The Rainmaking Study," it's an effort to identify client-magnet...
March 17, 2014
What makes rainmakers different? What do they have that other lawyers don't? The easy answer: They have clients. But, as a developing body of research is showing, they also have tendencies that make business development come as naturally to them as, say, being critical does to their partners. The latest report comes from Lawyer Metrics, an analytics company founded by William Henderson, the Indiana University law professor. Called simply "The Rainmaking Study," it's an effort to identify client-magnet...
How to Tell if Someone Is Lying
March 10, 2014
Researchers in the academic, business, and military communities have spent years trying to uncover a few simple methods for detecting trustworthiness but, despite their best efforts, continue to come up short. All those books promising to teach you how to spot liars through body language? None has empirical support. The temptation, of course, is to look for one “tell” that indicates someone can’t be trusted. Is it a false smile? Shifty eyes? The reality, though, is that any single cue is ambiguous....
March 10, 2014
Researchers in the academic, business, and military communities have spent years trying to uncover a few simple methods for detecting trustworthiness but, despite their best efforts, continue to come up short. All those books promising to teach you how to spot liars through body language? None has empirical support. The temptation, of course, is to look for one “tell” that indicates someone can’t be trusted. Is it a false smile? Shifty eyes? The reality, though, is that any single cue is ambiguous....
Reasons to Not Be Ugly: A New Freakonomics Radio Podcast
February 28, 2014
Our latest podcast is called “Reasons to Not Be Ugly.” (You can subscribe to the podcast atiTunes, get the RSS feed, or listen via the media player above. You can also read the transcript, which includes credits for the music you’ll hear in the episode.) This episode takes a look at the “beauty premium” and, conversely, the downside of ugly. Do cuter babies get more attention? Are good-looking students graded more charitably? How do ugly people fare in the marriage and labor markets? Our...
February 28, 2014
Our latest podcast is called “Reasons to Not Be Ugly.” (You can subscribe to the podcast atiTunes, get the RSS feed, or listen via the media player above. You can also read the transcript, which includes credits for the music you’ll hear in the episode.) This episode takes a look at the “beauty premium” and, conversely, the downside of ugly. Do cuter babies get more attention? Are good-looking students graded more charitably? How do ugly people fare in the marriage and labor markets? Our...
Can Neuroscience Really Help Us Understand the Nuclear Negotiations With Iran?
February 26, 2014
A few days ago, Iran began multilateral talks in Vienna in search of a compromise about its nuclear ambitions. I’m no expert on international politics, but I’m sure that these vital negotiations will be influenced by the history of the relationships between the countries involved, the state of nuclear proliferation around the world, as well as by local political factors in Iran and its region. Psychology will also come into play in terms of the negotiation partners’ perceptions about what’s...
February 26, 2014
A few days ago, Iran began multilateral talks in Vienna in search of a compromise about its nuclear ambitions. I’m no expert on international politics, but I’m sure that these vital negotiations will be influenced by the history of the relationships between the countries involved, the state of nuclear proliferation around the world, as well as by local political factors in Iran and its region. Psychology will also come into play in terms of the negotiation partners’ perceptions about what’s...
The Neuroscience Guide to Negotiations With Iran
February 26, 2014
“Imagine being told that you cannot do what everyone else is doing,” appealed Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif in a somber YouTube message defending the country’s nuclear program in November. “Would you back down? Would you relent? Or would you stand your ground?” While only 14 nations, including Iran, enrich uranium (e.g. “what everyone else is doing”), Zarif’s message raises a question at the heart of ongoing talks to implement a final nuclear settlement with Tehran:...
February 26, 2014
“Imagine being told that you cannot do what everyone else is doing,” appealed Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif in a somber YouTube message defending the country’s nuclear program in November. “Would you back down? Would you relent? Or would you stand your ground?” While only 14 nations, including Iran, enrich uranium (e.g. “what everyone else is doing”), Zarif’s message raises a question at the heart of ongoing talks to implement a final nuclear settlement with Tehran:...
What Makes Humans Unique
February 23, 2014
I'm going to talk about some new findings in my field, comparative cognition. I'm interested in what makes humans unique. There are findings that I think are fantastically cool, in that they might be redefining how we think about human nature, but first they're going to pose for us some really interesting new problems. I'm doing this, in part, because I think already having redefined human nature in the last couple of years is sort of a tall order, and that scared me, but also because I think...
February 23, 2014
I'm going to talk about some new findings in my field, comparative cognition. I'm interested in what makes humans unique. There are findings that I think are fantastically cool, in that they might be redefining how we think about human nature, but first they're going to pose for us some really interesting new problems. I'm doing this, in part, because I think already having redefined human nature in the last couple of years is sort of a tall order, and that scared me, but also because I think...
Can Watching a Movie Improve Your Relationship? Motivate You to Write a Will? Resolve Your Conflict?
February 23, 2014
Here's the news release from University of Rochester. (Click to see the list of movies and discussion questions used in the study, and to read the study itself.) Divorce Rate Cut in Half for Couples Who Discussed Relationship Movies January 31, 2014 Contact: Susan Hagen susan.hagen@rochester.edu 585.276.4061 A new study finds that watching and discussing movies about relationships is as effective in lowering divorce rates as other, more intensive early marriage counseling programs. Discussing...
February 23, 2014
Here's the news release from University of Rochester. (Click to see the list of movies and discussion questions used in the study, and to read the study itself.) Divorce Rate Cut in Half for Couples Who Discussed Relationship Movies January 31, 2014 Contact: Susan Hagen susan.hagen@rochester.edu 585.276.4061 A new study finds that watching and discussing movies about relationships is as effective in lowering divorce rates as other, more intensive early marriage counseling programs. Discussing...
Electrical Brain Stimulation Can Instantly Improve Self-Control
February 22, 2014
Neuroscientists have successfully used a new type of brain stimulation to act on a mental braking system located in the prefrontal cortex, the area of the brain above the eyes. The study, published in The Journal of Neuroscience, gave participants a simple test of self-control (Wessel et al., 2013). * * * One of the study’s authors, Nitin Tandon, M.D., explained: “There is a circuit in the brain for inhibiting or braking responses. We believe we are the first to show that we can enhance...
February 22, 2014
Neuroscientists have successfully used a new type of brain stimulation to act on a mental braking system located in the prefrontal cortex, the area of the brain above the eyes. The study, published in The Journal of Neuroscience, gave participants a simple test of self-control (Wessel et al., 2013). * * * One of the study’s authors, Nitin Tandon, M.D., explained: “There is a circuit in the brain for inhibiting or braking responses. We believe we are the first to show that we can enhance...
James Surowiecki: The Costs of Working Too Much : The New Yorker
February 19, 2014
For decades, junior bankers and Wall Street firms had an unspoken pact: in exchange for reasonably high-paying jobs and a shot at obscene wealth, young analysts agreed to work fifteen hours a day, and forgo anything resembling a normal life. But things may be changing. Last October, Goldman Sachs told its junior investment-banking analysts not to work on Saturdays, and it has said that all analysts, on average, should be working no more than seventy to seventy-five hours a week. A couple of weeks...
February 19, 2014
For decades, junior bankers and Wall Street firms had an unspoken pact: in exchange for reasonably high-paying jobs and a shot at obscene wealth, young analysts agreed to work fifteen hours a day, and forgo anything resembling a normal life. But things may be changing. Last October, Goldman Sachs told its junior investment-banking analysts not to work on Saturdays, and it has said that all analysts, on average, should be working no more than seventy to seventy-five hours a week. A couple of weeks...
