Ep. 9: Your Mind on Curiosity
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Do you consider yourself to be a curious person? If you are, you might have better relationships, be less aggressive, and less affected by rejection. Sounds nice right? On this episode of Minds Matter, Beth Fisher and Ava Ma de Sousa discuss curiosity, and whether this is a trait that can be trained.
Tune in for a deep dive into the brain on curiosity, how it helps memory, and why so many people are fascinated by morbid content, like car crashes and true crime.
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Academic Articles & Books
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Curiosity and memory through dopamine: Gruber, M., Gelman, B. and Ranganath, C., 2014. States of Curiosity Modulate Hippocampus-Dependent Learning via the Dopaminergic Circuit. Neuron, 84(2), pp.486-496.
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Curiosity and close relationships: Kashdan, T. and Roberts, J., 2004. Trait and State Curiosity in the Genesis of Intimacy: Differentiation From Related Constructs. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 23(6), pp.792-816.
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Curious people are less aggressive: Kashdan, T., DeWall, C., Pond, R., Silvia, P., Lambert, N., Fincham, F., Savostyanova, A. and Keller, P., 2013. Curiosity Protects Against Interpersonal Aggression: Cross-Sectional, Daily Process, and Behavioral Evidence. Journal of Personality, 81(1), pp.87-102.
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Curious people are less affected by aggression: Kawamoto, T., Ura, M. and Hiraki, K., 2017. Curious people are less affected by social rejection. Personality and Individual Differences, 105, pp.264-267.
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Monkeys sacrifice reward for information, coded in the orbitofrontal cortex: Blanchard, T. C., Hayden, B. Y., & Bromberg-Martin, E. S. (2015). Orbitofrontal cortex uses distinct codes for different choice attributes in decisions motivated by curiosity. Neuron, 85(3), 602-614.
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Seeing sad movies makes people feel happy and grateful – depending on how much they empathise Knobloch-Westerwick, S., Gong, Y., Hagner, H., & Kerbeykian, L. (2013). Tragedy viewers count their blessings: Feeling low on fiction leads to feeling high on life. Communication Research, 40(6), 747-766.
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Horror fans are more resilient during the pandemic: Scrivner, C., Johnson, J. A., Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, J., & Clasen, M. (2021). Pandemic practice: Horror fans and morbidly curious individuals are more psychologically resilient during the COVID-19 pandemic. Personality and individual differences, 168, 110397.
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Why people are morbidly curious: Niehoff, E., & Oosterwijk, S. (2020). To know, to feel, to share? Exploring the motives that drive curiosity for negative content. Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 35, 56-61.
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Morbid curiosity in the brain: Oosterwijk, S., Snoek, L., Tekoppele, J., Engelbert, L. H., & Scholte, H. S. (2020). Choosing to view morbid information involves reward circuitry. Scientific reports, 10(1), 1-13.
Lighter Reading & Other Resources
Videos:
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TedX Talk by Mattias Gruber: This is Your Brain on Curiosity
Articles:
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The ‘Why’ Behind Asking Why: The Science of Curiosity: Astrophysicist and author Mario Livio discusses his new book on curiosity.
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Curiosity Prepares the Brain for Better Learning, Scientific American
Check out how curious you are: Kashdan Curiosity Scale