We hear a great deal about self-esteem. But what is self-esteem, really? Self-esteem is our opinion of ourselves, based on others' perceptions. So, how is it that we all, or at least many of us, have such a distorted and negative self perception? Good question.

Is Obama a flip-flopper? The asymmetry between the information people use to make judgments about themselves and others has an impact on the way people assess candidates who change their opinion on issues over time.

People-pleasers are proficient at pleasing everyone . . . but themselves. They are master accommodators, intuiting what is wanted of them and--in both word and deed--bestowing on others the attentiveness and care they’ll typically deny themselves.

So far, we have talked about some differences in the way people think across cultures. Then, we took a look at reasons why it is important to study cultural differences. In this post, we'll consider some factors that might lead to differences in thinking across cultures.

You probably have a pretty good idea of what a narcissist is. They're arrogant, self-absorbed, and generally speaking they're not too pleasant to be around. If you're like most people, you probably also assume one more thing--that narcissists dislike themselves deep down inside. A recent study, however, challenges this assumption.

Who first told you only children were lonely and bossy? When was that? Not to worry if you don't remember. "As the source is forgotten, the message and its implications gain strength."

Brain research explains stereotypes...

In the first post in this series, I talked about some basic cultural differences in thinking that have been uncovered over the past 20 years. Before we start a discussion about why these differences might occur, there is another why question to ask. Why bother studying cultural differences in the first place? After all, this work is hard to do, and it is often expensive as well. Besides, we're still learning a lot just by doing research with Western University students.

Do you think that our society is starting to take a turn for the worse? If you do, you've got company. We discuss why this perception is so widespread.

With the Olympics coming, there have been lots of news stories about China and Asia. This seemed like as good a time as any to talk a bit about cultural differences in thinking. I realize that this blog is mostly about motivation. It turns out that cultural differences in thinking are probably deeply bound up with cultural differences in motivation, though it may take us a couple of entries to get to that point. To start, I'll just highlight some of the ways that thinking differs across cultures.

A sure-fire way to destroy your relationship is to diagnose your partner with a personality disorder or other character disease. Unfortunately, a cottage industry of self-help books exists to encourage you to do just that.

In the "Ugly Duckling", a young swan goes from awkward and ugly to graceful and beautiful. This kind of transformation is also seen in abilities, and those who go from average to extraordinary are typically labelled "late bloomers". How are late bloomers possible? How can a nuanced understanding of genes contribute to our understanding?

Dara Torres broke all stereotypical thinking over the weekend. At 41, she has the world in awe as she beat her own record from only a couple of decades earlier. . . Both men and women look up to her and wonder: she was 17 in her first Olympics and she's ready for the next, 24 years later.

Perhaps more than anything else, our mental and emotional well-being depends on our willingness to confront obstacles in life. The all-too-common alternative, of course, is simply to retreat from them. If, however, we're genuinely to progress and feel good about ourselves, we need to resist the ever-present temptation to withdraw from whatever we'd prefer not having to deal with.

Would you feel like you'd still like to be president after you have just been liberated from six years of captivity?

What psychology experiment would you love to carry out if neither ethics nor practical reality stood in your way? For the August issue of Psychology Today, I asked several PT bloggers this question and printed four responses. Here's a more complete roundup of their insights.

Every season, hundreds of thousands of contestants audition for the myriad of television talent shows that exist.

To make it far in these shows, you have to possess an "X Factor", a certain unidentifiable quality that makes you stand out from the rest.

What is this elusive X-Factor, and how may a nuanced view of genes contribute to our understanding of this factor?

Daily I look around me and observe how people shy away from genuine, self-revealing communication--almost as though to embark on such a path would be like walking into a minefield, where a single misstep might be fatal. But the communication we all long for--a powerful, expressive dialogue that might spiritually connect us to each another--is in fact fraught with danger and uncertainty. So almost all of us experience the need to carefully monitor just how much of ourselves we divulge to others.

For years, the DSM has been criticized as a codification of human behavior that has been given too much credence as a measure of dysfunction. Like Freud-speak, Shakespeare and the Bible, its vernacular has weedled its way so deeply into our language, consciousness and culture that its labels and categories have become almost ubiquitous. So ubiquitous in this case, in fact, that there has come to be an increasing imperative on the part of some professionals to justify the veracity of what could easily be construed as nominal observations with official sounding language.

Addressing this topic generally, the immortal Dagwood Bumstead once claimed: "You can't teach people to be lazy--either they have it, or they don't." So what is laziness anyway? Is it about being slow to do something (what we typically call procrastination)? . . . Or about doing something slowly? . . . Or about not doing it at all? . . . Or, finally, is it about not sufficiently wanting to do something? And if this last alternative is true, when we label someone lazy are we really talking about that person's being indolent, sluggish, or slothful? Or is there something else going on that hasn't yet been appreciated?