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.

Anyone who knows the comic will know about the characters and what they represent: 1) The Joker = chaos, 2) The Batman = order; 3) Two Face = pure chance. There are many lines in the film which "spank your face" with these metaphors, and if the acting was not so good, the joker's lines could have easily been over the top in making the deeper, existential questions within the film too obvious and contrived for most moviegoers.

Yesterday’s New York Times ran an article titled “Poll Shows Racial Division on Obama’s Candidacy.” The story included several examples of divergence between White and Black Americans’ perceptions of the presidential campaign; for example, more than 80% of Black respondents reported a positive impression of Barack Obama, compared to closer to 30% of Whites. Some of the most interesting findings, however, have nothing to do with presidential politics, but rather speak to the persistent divide in how Americans think about race, a divide that too frequently is only discussed by behavioral researchers.

Sometimes watching the news feels like reading the old Dick and Jane books. Run, spot, run! There they are, the presumed candidates, running, running, running.

My life and work are divided between the social and economic extremes that have always characterized the state in which I reside. Recently, no matter what the presenting issue or the on-going work, my conversations with patients invariably come back to money and the economy, job loss, work slowdowns, foreclosures and bankruptcies. People are afraid, and what I am beginning to witness is that the fear the current economic condition is generating is coming out sideways.

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

Now that the presidential primary season that wouldn't end has ended, now that we've had a few weeks for the tempers and tensions within the Democratic party to subside at least somewhat, can we all agree that there are few domains better than politics for demonstrating the top-down manner in which people often perceive the world?

The New York Times reports that " One in five adults in Europe have used marijuana or related drugs like hashish, the European Union’s drug agency said." As per their usual ignorant fear-mongering, recent reports from the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy warning of the new, stronger strains of marijuana being produced get things not just wrong, but 180-degrees wrong.

Watching the late Tim Russert interviewing Obama recently, I was struck by an unusual detail in Obama's cognitive process.

Atheism is said to pose a major threat to morality. Some theists claim that disbelief leads to moral relativism and undermines the motivation to do good deeds. Recent research can help us see what is true and false about these anxieties.

Above all else, George Carlin loved language. Though it was far from his most penetrating bit, The Seven Words You Cannot Say on Television is surely his most well-known routine, having landed him in jail. So, in his honor, let's take a look at the peculiar American tendency to take offense at words.

Okay, Barack Obama is not Han Solo, but his cyber minions could be, and are even now fighting off Republican pulsars…oh, no, wait a minute, I’m confusing Star Wars and Star Trek…let’s pause for a moment…

The American Drive-In movie theater celebrated its 75th anniversary last week. Well, "celebrate" might not be the right word to describe this event as far fewer people trek to the drive-in today compared to the past. During its peak, drive-in theaters were all the rage. In 1958, there were approximately 5,000 American drive-ins; whereas today, there are only about 400.

New research in experimental philosophy explores the psychology behind our political preferences

Everyone wondered what Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's farewell would sound like as she prepared to deliver her "exit" speech.

There are an estimated 45 million landmines still scattered around the world.  A Danish biotech company has developed a rather ingenious way to detect their presence using a simple weed.  Do we line up with the "dark green" side of the environmental movement, which is pushing us toward a romantic, back to nature approach to saving the planet? Or do we move toward the "bright green" side of the environmental movement that is looking toward innovation in the application of technology to fix what we have broken?

Character does matter, all would agree, whether it is the character of our nation's leaders or the character of ourselves, our family members, our friends, our colleagues, and our fellow citizens. Election 2008 has seen no shortage of discussion of character and no lack of strong opinions and pronouncements.

Take a look at the video clip of the interview where Hillary Clinton says it’s premature to ask her to leave the race because, after all, Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated in June. Give her the benefit of the doubt. Accept that she was not trying to suggest that Barack Obama might meet a similar fate. Still, isn’t her pronouncement further evidence that Hillary has a tin ear?

The Clintons suffer from the delusional state known in psychology as "feelings of reference."

Many of us wonder, why would Hillary Clinton continue to compete for what seems to be a lost cause? Ambition? Power? Or maybe a true desire to help others?