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July 4th in Second Life

July 6, 2008 By 1 Comment
Fireworks in Second Life

I hadn’t been in Second Life for several months. But I was invited by a friend to visit his class on Social Media Marketing and talk about the psychology of website design (I’ll post the talk when I get it cleaned up--we had some technical issues), so I was forced to go out and go shopping because my avatar had absolutely nothing to wear. Gosh, I was still in my "newbie skin." (The uncustomized, out-of-the-box avatar look is a marker of a newbie.) It’s amazing how brave I am when I’m shopping. So with this new found bravery, I thought it would be fun to go exploring and see if there were any fireworks displays. The thing that always impresses me in Second Life is the amount of creativity and skill displayed by the range of resident-generated content. Heady psychological issues like social connection in new media and identity aside, I was struck by the idea of Second Life as a continual participatory art piece. People are spending huge amounts of energy creating … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Psychology, Social Media & Networks Tagged With: , , ,

Imagination Influences Visual Perception

July 4, 2008 By Leave a Comment

In new study out of Vanderbilt, reported in Science Daily "Mind's Eye' Influences Visual Perception," researchers Pearson, Tong, and Clifford report that what we imagine (see in our "mind's eye) directly impacts our visual perception. (The actual article appears in Current Biology). This is the first research that shows that the images we make up changes our vision both while we are imaging and also later on. This confirms previous research showing that mental imagery causes the visual areas of the brain light up.  Pretty cool but not surprising. Artists have worked for centuries to create images that force/allow us to see things in a new way.  The researchers at Vanderbilt have just proved what cognitive psychologists have known for a long time: that our expectations of how things and events will unfold influence how we understand them.   A cognitive therapy technique has individuals model new and desired behaviors for themselves by imagining situations where they pull it … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Culture & Society, Emerging Technologies Tagged With: , ,

Is Amazon’s Kindle the Solution to my FedEx bill?

July 2, 2008 By Leave a Comment
Amazon's Kindle

Okay, I have to admit I am a gadget-freak. My husband continually gives me grief because I can justify any technology purchase by saying “but I’m a Media Psychologist. I HAVE to know PERSONALLY how it feels to use these things.” So, right after I got the Wii and the iPod touch, I decided I should investigate Amazon’s Kindle. Two things, or maybe three, pushed me over the edge. First, Amazon lowered the price. I may be a world-class rationalizer, but I am not insensitive to price points. Second, a friend showed me his, demonstrating the feature that allows you to increase the type size so you can read it on a treadmill. This allowed me to rationalize that it would encourage me to exercise. I thought that was a particularly good one. Third, every time I travel from Boston, our world headquarters, to the west coast, where I escape every time I find the weather challenging on the east coast (i.e. a lot!), I end up FedEx-ing the pile of articles that I am using in whatever … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Emerging Technologies Tagged With: ,

How Technology Can Impact Children’s Learning

July 2, 2008 By Leave a Comment

Our colleague at Fablevision, Peter Reynolds, lead an interactive investigation with actor Eric Close at the National Educational Computing Conference to demonstrate how technology can impact learning and excite children about education. The event was hosted by Verizon Foundation's Thinkfinity.org, which offers elementary through high school teachers resources across eight academic disciplines, from science to English to mathematics, to improve student achievement. Peter, well-known for the children's books "The Dot," and "Ish" among the array of fabulous and creative Fablevision products, said: "My mission is to inspire creativity and self-expression - and so I'm continually exploring new ways to invite young people to the literacy party...Technology has opened exciting new doors for classrooms to produce digital film makers, animators, staff writers, and publishers - preparing them to be the next-generation of technically literate citizens and employees" Needless to say, we're … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Education Tagged With: , ,
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