Since the time of ancient Greece, political scientists and campaign managers alike have been studying society for clues on how political attitudes and behaviors are shaped. But could the nature of our politics be less about society and more about us? Could it all come down to biology? Inheritance We inherit many attributes from our [...]

Envy is painful: someone has more than you, is better at their job than you and the only relief from the agony of their success is to see them fall. But why does jealousy feel painful and schadenfreude bring selfish glee? Surprise surprise, it’s all in the strange way our brain interprets the social world. [...]

Your brain is a social brain. It can tell what your friends are thinking, how they feel and it can even predict the future. It’s this intimate connection to others that lets us work together to build everything from sports teams to civilizations. But this is our social brain in the physical world. What happens [...]

Back in September of 07 Mark Earls asked his readers why do you think that crocs, (the brightly colored plastic shoes) had become so popular? How did this viral trend spread? The answers to seemingly simple question reveal a lot about how the human brain works and how ideas spread between people without you even [...]

Humans are social animals. We tend to gather together in crowds in the physical world and now more often than ever, online. A crowd is joined by common interests like a rock concert, or staving off boredom on Digg and StumbleUpon. But how does behavior and information flow through the crowd? Why is it that [...]