close up shot of a toddlers feet

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In: 02. Research Methods, Intro to Psych

In Agnes, a comic strip by Tony Cochran, the protagonist is an eccentric little girl who lives with her grandmother and who often shares her quirky ideas with her best friend, a girl nicknamed Trout. In the May 17, 2025 strip, Agnes is sitting on the floor of her classroom with her shoes off. When asked to get back into her seat, Agnes explains that she was just “giving the toes a bit of the old ‘tug-a-roo’ because doing so “aids cognition and promotes relaxation.” The last panel is a common one for Agnes—she is visiting the principal’s office. In Intro Psych, after covering experimentsRead More →

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In: 02. Research Methods, 05. Consciousness, 06. Development, 07. Learning, 10. Emotions & Motivation, 11. Social Psychology, Intro to Psych

In this New York Times article (gifted to you), the writer Frances Dodds tells us the tragic story of how her sister’s four children came to live with the writer’s parents, the children’s grandparents (Dodds, 2025). Grandparents being responsible for raising their grandchildren is not an unusual occurrence. The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that in 2023, 2.1 million grandparents were doing so. With very little effort, I can think of many “grandfamilies” I currently know or have known, including neighbors, my extended family, colleagues, and students. In my teaching and writing, I try to honor such families by referring to caregivers rather than parents. WhenRead More →

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In: 05. Attitudes, Behavior, & Persuasion, 11. Social Psychology, Intro to Psych, Principles of Social Psych

Regardless of which side of the political divide you or your students stand on, here is a real-world example of cognitive dissonance. “[F]rom 2012-2023, about half of all new [electric vehicle] registrations in the U.S. went to the 10% most Democratic counties” (Davis et al., 2025, p. 1). However, an early 2025 poll found that only 12% of Democrats have a favorable opinion of Elon Musk (Kiley & Asheer, 2025), the owner of Tesla, Inc. Those data make it unsurprising that Tesla sales are in down in states that lean politically toward Democrats, such as California (Sriram, 2025). If the politics of a company’s ownerRead More →

KADAMS flip timer with pen in foreground for scale

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In: 04. Sensation & Perception, Intro to Psych

I am spending so much time looking at my computer screen these days that I was really feeling it in my eyes. Eye strain is real. My eyes were feeling tired and achy. I’ve known how to prevent eye strain for years, but I’ve never needed it. The 20-20-20 rule is straightforward. Every 20 minutes, look at least 20 feet away for at least 20 seconds. Easy peasy. I have a big window in my home office, so it’s easy to look 20+ feet away. I can count to 20, so I had the 20 seconds covered. Now, how best to remind myself to doRead More →

notebook

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In: 05. Consciousness, Intro to Psych

When I cover chronotypes in Intro Psych, I tell my students about the research that found that employees whose work schedules match their chronotypes have higher work satisfaction (Amini et al., 2021). I’ve always been a morning person. Even as an adolescent, I routinely awakened at 6am without an alarm. Now, deep into adulthood, I routinely awake around 4:30am. Interestingly, to me anyway, that time had been 5:30am, but my brain seems to have never adjusted after last fall’s time change. So, 4:30am it is. As a college student, I preferred taking the early morning classes. As a college professor, I preferred teaching the earlyRead More →

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In: 03. Biopsych, 08. Relationships, Intro to Psych

The National Institute on the Teaching of Psychology (NITOP) is later this week. I’ve previously written (Frantz, 2023): I’ll confess that well before I retired my primary purpose for attending conferences was to meet with my friends and make new friends. In SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome, the author and Roman historian Mary Beard tells us that Polybius (200 BCE – 118 BCE) supposedly advised a young man, “Never come back from the Forum…until you have made at least one new friend” (Beard, 2016, p. 184) I was reminded of this recently when I read the (freely available) Working Life essay at the endRead More →

people in a concert

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In: 11. Social Psychology, 12. Stereotypes, Prejudice, & Discrimination, Intro to Psych, Principles of Social Psych

My wife and I took a cruise in 2024. On the last evening, several members of the crew put on a show. Groups of crew members who shared a home country performed popular national dances. This got me thinking about whether the United States had something that could be considered a national dance. If you’d like, take a few minutes to discuss. Does the U.S. have something that could be a national dance? Years ago, we had a friend who visited India. The group she was visiting showed her how to do one of their national dances. Afterwards, they asked her to teach her aRead More →

Breakfast Bagel

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In: 05. Attitudes, Behavior, & Persuasion, 11. Social Psychology, Intro to Psych, Principles of Social Psych

I enjoy a good bagel, and I enjoy a news story that promises to illustrate several social psychological principles. When the headline reads “The Hole in This Bagel Shop’s Business Model? It’s Too Popular” (Balk, 2024), I’m in. Apollo Bagels in New York City’s West village has become so popular that the lines stretch to 100 feet. And that was before the November 30, 2024 New York Times story. After covering the social psychology chapter in Intro Psych, ask your students to read the story (the link is gifted to you, so your students do not need a New York Times account). And, then, asRead More →

man in black shirt and gray denim pants sitting on gray padded bench

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In: 06. Development, 10. Emotions & Motivation, Intro to Psych

My father died of cancer when I was a teenager. He was 52. I didn’t realize how young he was until I surpassed his age. My father died in middle age. It wasn’t his middle age. I’ve never liked covering death and dying at the end of the Intro Psych lifespan chapter. By putting death after discussion of being an older adult, the implication is that that is the right time to die. Everyone who dies before their 80s or 90s has evidently done life wrong. That doesn’t sit well with me. In my Intro Psych textbook, the previous author had placed death and dyingRead More →

snowy pine forest at copper mountain co

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In: 10. Emotions & Motivation, Intro to Psych

The 2024-2025 ski racing season is underway. Mikaela Shiffrin, at the age of 29 holds the record for the most World Cup alpine skiing wins with 97. She blew past the previous record holder, Ingemar Stenmark, who had 86 wins. Stenmark’s record was set in 1989 and was thought to be unbeatable. In alpine skiing, winners are commonly determined by tenths of a second. In a recent race, less than a second and a half separated the top eight racers (Zaccardi, 2024). All racers work to improve their technique in order to improve their speed. Their goal is not to win; their goal is toRead More →

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