The 2 Best Social Science Bites Podcast Episodes
1) Susan Michie on Behavioral Change
With each new year comes a wave of good intentions as people aim to be better. They want to lose weight, exercise more, be nicer, drink less and smoke not at all. They want to change behavior, and as ...Show More
2) Michele Gelfand on Social Norms
Living in a loosely regulated society, the very term “social norms” can be vaguely threatening, as if these norms are a threat to freedom always lurking on the periphery. But cultural psychologist Mic...Show More
3) Paul Bloom on Empathy
In 2016 psychologist Paul Bloom wrote a book titled Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion (a naming decision he still wrestles with). In the book, as in his career and in this Social Scie...Show More
4) Devyani Sharma on Accents
What does your accent – and yes, every speaker has one – say about you? Or perhaps the better question is, what do others hear in your accent? These are the sorts of questions that Devyani Sharma, a p...Show More
5) Frank Keil on Causal Thinking
As a practical matter, how much effort do you put into pinning down the causes behind daily occurrences? To developmental psychologist Frank Keil, who studies causal thinking, that answer is likely al...Show More
6) Setha Low on Public Spaces
Having been raised in Los Angeles, a place with vast swathes of single-family homes connected by freeways, arriving in Costa Rica was an eye opener for the young cultural anthropologist Setha Low. “I ...Show More
7) Victor Buchli on Life in Low-Earth Orbit
As an anthropologist, Victor Buchli has one foot in the Neolithic past and another in the space-faring future. A professor of material culture at University College London, his research has taken him ...Show More
8) Ramanan Laxminarayan on Antibiotic Use
Let’s say you were asked to name the greatest health risks facing the planet. Priceton University economist Ramanan Laxminarayan, founder and director of the One Health Trust, would urgently suggest y...Show More
9) Leor Zmigrod on the Ideological Brain
Flexibility is a cardinal virtue in physical fitness, and according to political psychologist and neuroscientist Leor Zmigrod, it can be a cardinal virtue in our mental health, too. How she came to th...Show More
10) David Autor on the Labor Market
When economic news, especially that revolving around working, gets reported, it tends to get reported in aggregate – the total number of jobs affected or created, the average wage paid, the impact on ...Show More