At work, it’s healthier and more productive just to be yourself, according to a new study from Rice University, Texas A&M University, the University of Memphis, Xavier University, Portland State University and the University of California, Berkeley.

The study, “Stigma Expression Outcomes and Boundary Conditions: A Meta-Analysis” will appear in an upcoming edition of the Journal of Business and Psychology. It examines 65 studies focusing on what happens after people in a workplace disclose a stigmatized identity, such as sexual orientation, mental illness, physical disability or pregnancy.

Eden King, a co-author of the study and an associate professor of psychology at Rice, said the decision to express a stigmatized identity is highly complicated.

“It has the potential for both positive and negative consequences,” she said.

However, the research overwhelmingly indicates that people with non-visible stigmas (such as sexual orientation or health problems) who live openly at work are happier with their overall lives and more productive in the workplace. King said self-disclosure is typically a positive experience because it allows people to improve connections, form relationships with others and free their minds of unwanted thoughts.

What’s an s-shaped animal with scales and no legs?  What has big ears, a trunk and tusks? What goes ‘woof’ and chases cats? The brain’s ability to reconstruct facts – ‘a snake’, ‘an elephant’ and ‘a dog’ – from clues has been observed using brain scanning by researchers at Aalto university. Their study was published today in Nature Communications.

In the research, test subjects were given three clues to help them guess what familiar objects the clues described. In addition to well-known animals, the clues depicted vegetables, fruits, tools and vehicles. The familiar objects and concepts described in the clues were never presented directly to the test subjects.

The researchers at Aalto University demonstrated that brain activation patterns contained more information about the features of the concept than had been presented as clues. The researchers concluded that the brain uses environmental clues in an agile way to activate a whole range of the target concept’s properties that have been learned during life.

An international team of researchers has identified, for the first time, the cell types, areas and biological processes in the brain that mediate the genetic risk of insomnia. This was made possible by assessing DNA and sleep features in no less than 1.3 million people. The findings are a major step towards getting a grip on the biological mechanisms that cause insomnia.

Insomnia is one of the most common disorders. Many people occasionally have a bad night of sleep. One out of ten people chronically experience poor sleep and suffer severely from the daytime consequences. Worldwide, 770 million people have chronic insomnia.

In 2003 a landmark study revealed what psychologists had long suspected: that people who experience positive emotions are at a reduced risk of disease.
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Researchers assessed a group of 334 people aged 18 to 54 for their tendency to experience positive emotions like happiness, pleasure and relaxation along with negative emotions like anxiety, hostility and depression. Participants were then injected with nasal drops containing the common cold.
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People who expressed more positive emotions were less likely to develop the common cold, and the relationship was so strong that it held across age, gender, education, race, body mass and even season.
Since then, psychologists have continued to probe the link between feeling good and being well in a new field of research called ‘positive psychology’. Importantly, this new discipline extends beyond disease models of health such as whether we have a cold and seeks to define what it means to be healthy in positive terms.

Many of us welcome easy access to technology, lured by the promise of better connection with others, greater engagement and a more efficient life.

But psychological research confirms that social media can actually increase stress, disconnection, inefficiency and feelings of inadequacy.
So how can we harness technology to boost wellbeing and create a healthy digital life?

Thriving in the digital age requires making the most of our ability to connect but avoiding overload, according to the Australian Psychological Society, which has released tips for evading the pitfalls of the online world for Psychology Week 2017. Psychology Week is an annual initiative of the Australian Psychological Society that aims to increase public awareness of how psychology can help Australians lead healthier, happier and more meaningful lives. This year the focus will be Thriving in the digital age and ways to help Australians improve their happiness and wellbeing.

Social media has become a really important means of communicating and is basically integral to most of our lives in one form or other. However, we have also seen it affect people’s behaviour in some less than positive ways. Disagreeing and name calling have become common online and that behaviour can easily become anti-social drifting into trolling, stalking or cyberbullying, while constant notifications can leave us anxious and distracted.

Here are 8 simple strategies that can help ensure you have a positive experience online and you aren’t being ruled by your technology. 

Insights from positive psychology reveal the factors that can help people be happier and more satisfied.

Wellbeing has many facets. One theory of wellbeing – set out by Martin Seligman, one of the pioneers of positive psychology, in his 2012 book Flourish – identified five key elements which underpin people’s happiness and life satisfaction. These are positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning and accomplishment, or PERMA for short. Psychologists have since built on this, adding a plus – healthy behaviours – which also contribute to wellbeing.
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Though we live in a complex and demanding world, people may experience higher levels of wellbeing if they focus on these important factors in life.

Welcome to winter and the middle of the year! I hope the first half of the year has been filled with experiences that have been enjoyable and/or experiences that we can learn and grow from.

I've recently attended the first International Conference of Neuropsychotherapy and pre-conference workshops, held at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital in Brisbane from 23 to 26 May 2017. The conference was brought about from an ever increasing global interest of professionals working from a brain-based perspective. The main theme of the conference was "Neuroscience Research to Applied Practice" and focused on scientific evidence-based research and its practical application in various domains including: psychopathology, resilience, pain, grief and loss, sport and performance maximisation, attachment and development through the lifespan, education and wellness. Leading world renowned experts from Australia, Canada, USA, South Africa, United Kingdom, Singapore, Indonesia and New Zealand addressed the attendees in their specialist field.

Recent Neuroscience research has given us an understanding into the many factors that improve mental health and well-being. Neuropsychotherapy focuses on the neural processes that underpin human responses including memory, thoughts, sensations, behaviors, emotions, and social interactions and it gives guidelines and strategies to address unhelpful functioning in these areas and improve overall wellbeing based on current neuroscience research findings.