Thank you everyone! I am over the moon to have been chosen as your winner after 2 weeks of excellent fun. I tried my hardest to answer every question in as useful a way as I could – but it is difficult to know if I have answered well. Winning is really encouraging and inspires me to do a lot more to make science open to anyone curious! I think the teachers and the team at I’m a Scientist deserve a huge thank you for making this event so amazing, too!
Psychology is so important for understanding humanity and its future. In our brains lies the capacity for great thought, action and industry, but also the capability for cruelty, prejudice and confusion. Each human has their own view on the world and must work to understand and cooperate with others to leave the world better than when they arrived in it. Students of psychology seek to understand mental illness, transsexuality, different cultures, artificial intelligence, politics, economics, space travel, loneliness, consciousness, and even other psychologists! Seeing all the excellent student curiosity during I’m a Scientist has made me very excited to imagine what future psychologists might do.
Your questions about psychology were brilliant. Some questions asked about current psychology research, like “What is the purpose of mirror neurons?”, “What part of the brain controls emotion and love?” and a lot about social media, dreams and memory. Other questions asked about what it was like to do what I do. I hope I helped students get a feel for how psychology can take many forms, and while I have been a technician, teacher and researcher – there are also many other paths. Some of my favourite questions were the really challenging ones to answer. I was asked if plants have very subtle emotions, if Winnie the Pooh characters represented psychological conditions and how well psychology was represented in thriller movies! Continue reading →