People over 65 are less able to detect and understand sarcasm, according to an immensely valuable study just published in Developmental Psychology. You might think it is obvious when somebody is saying the opposite of what they mean for comic effect. Indeed, you probably find the device so funny that you never tire of it. However, quite a lot of research now suggests that ageing tends to make people less good at perceiving emotional cues and understanding the intentions of others, thereby excluding some in later life from sarcasm’s playfulness and charm. For this study, led by Professor Louise >>>

Brad Barket/Getty Images for 90sFESTMillennials!When Jeffrey Jensen Arnett was starting out as a research psychologist, he asked hundreds of people a simple question: "Do you feel like you've reached adulthood?" As a 30-something, he expected people to talk about what psychologists call role transitions, like starting a career, getting married, and buying a house. Instead, his 18 to 29-year-old subjects listed ways they felt like adults and ways they didn't. This led him to coin the term "emerging adulthood" — that tumultuous period through the 20s where you're not quite >>>

January 12, 2016 Do you want to understand more about your own thoughts and motivations? Do you wish you had a better understanding of what motivates other people and drives their decisions? Has psychology always fascinated you, but you’ve been missing a way to apply those lessons practically in your day-to-day life? "The Science of Success" is redOrbit's newest podcast, featuring entrepreneur and investor Matt Bodnar, who explores the mindset of success, the psychology of performance, and how to get the most out of your daily life. With gripping examples, concrete explanations of psychological >>>

Provocative new research challenges the belief that people experience happiness on a U-shaped curve over the life course with the low point becoming known as the “mid-life crisis.”For more than 50 years, a number of studies have claimed that happiness declines for most from the early 20s to middle age (40 to 60).Today, the “mid-life crisis” is a generally accepted phenomenon, a theme for songs and sitcoms and the subject of advertising propaganda the world over. New research, however, suggests the concept is a myth as researchers used data drawn from two longitudinal studies by University >>>