Pain during labour and childbirth is a complex combination of physical and psychological factors. Pain comes from the uterus, cervix, pelvic joints and ligaments and, during the actual birth, from the vagina and perineum (the skin between the vagina and anus) stretching to accommodate the baby’s emerging body.
Facial expressions are important parts of how we communicate and how we develop impressions of the people around us. In “The Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals,” Charles Darwin proposed that facial expressions evolved to quickly communicate emotional states important to social survival.
We know a lot about why people choose different brands of dishwashing detergent, because companies spend billions of dollars investigating who buys what. But when it comes to the processes behind perhaps our most significant life choice – choosing a romantic partner – science knows surprisingly little.
The scene described in Nancy Jo Sales’s huge Tinder report published in Vanity Fair magazine featured groups of twenty-something friends and colleagues in a Manhattan bar relaxing after work. But rather than socialising with each other they were engrossed in the more private world of their mobile phones, seeking something completely personal: a sexual partner (albeit not necessarily just for sex).
Matchmaking and dating services used to advertise in small rectangles on tube carriages, next to the vitamin drinks and food delivery services, and in smaller rectangles still on the classified pages of newspapers and magazines.
Five reasons baby boxes are more than cutesy cardboard containers, from offering a safe place to sleep to giving an equal start in life.
Fully 92 percent of American teenagers go online daily. More than half of them do so several times a day and a quarter are online “almost constantly.”
Everyone loves a good story, but can a good story lead to love? Storytelling is a fundamental form of communication, and research has demonstrated the power of narratives to change minds and influence behavior.
I am writing about you. You; wonderfully flawed, perfectly nutty, beautiful, broken-hearted, powerful you. Would you like to impact the planet and be a part of a positive change? Would you like to feel more at peace with yourself and be a happier human being?
Official guidelines say kids aged five to 18 years should spend no more than two hours a day using screens, and children under two years should not use a screen at all. But in a world dominated by tablets and mobile phones, these limits are proving to be virtually impossible to uphold.
We’ve all felt it at some time in our lives. Poets write about it, singers sing about it – and a whole industry has grown up around finding it, expressing it and maintaining it. But what is love? Where does it reside? What triggers it? And what’s really going on in our minds and bodies when we fall “head over heels”?
“Nice guys finish last” is one of the most widely believed maxims of dating. Fleshed out, the idea goes something like this: heterosexual women might say they want nice characteristics in a partner, but in reality what they want is the challenge that comes with dating a “bad boy”.
"Analysis revealed that girls' mathematics anxiety was not related to the level of their mothers' engagement in STEM careers, nor was it related to gender equality in the countries we studied," says David Geary.
The tragic consequences of bullying have become a regular part of the news cycle. In April, an eighth grade girl in Missouri and a sixth grade boy in Pennsylvania committed suicide. Bullying was an important factor, according to their families.
Even armed with a Ph.D. in developmental psychology, I remember the frightening first moments after bringing my newborn daughter home from the hospital. I wasn’t sure what to do – and not at all confident that I was capable of being the parent she needed me to be.
In the United States, the teen pregnancy rate is higher than in any other western industrialized country, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). At the same time, a growing number of American teens and young adults have been diagnosed with sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).
"The biological clock can get thrown off in these women because they are up so much in the middle of the night," says Katherine Sharkey.
If you are a parent or a teacher, you most probably read stories to young children. Together, you laugh and point at the pictures. You engage them with a few simple questions. And they respond.
Emotions play a critical role in everyday life. The ability to express, regulate, and understand one’s own and others’ emotions – known as emotional competence – is linked to good social skills and to doing better at school.
It will come as no surprise that some new fathers will be anxious or highly stressed. However, most people believe only new mums suffer postnatal depression. This is not the case.
Lots of women look forward to motherhood – getting to know a tiny baby, raising a growing child, developing a relationship with a maturing son or daughter. All over the world, people believe that parenting is the most rewarding part of life.
It is perhaps one of the most controversial debates in sexual function: is there or isn’t there a G-spot? And if there is, how do we find it?
"Masculine traits in humans are not the same as, say, in peacocks where the beautiful tail attracts a mate," says David Puts. "For example, beards make men more dominant looking, scarier, and seemingly more dangerous, but most women prefer clean-shaven men."