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Your Best Ideas Turn Up in the Shower for a Reason. Science Has Six of Them
Hot water is not the secret. A task that is just engaging enough is, and you can build one into any day without running the taps.
Latest
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Fixing Your Own Clothes Feels Oddly Good. Here Are 6 Projects to Start With
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Two Identical Jackets, One Costs More. Your Brain Is Paying for Where the Cloth Came From
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Luxury Fashion Lost 60 Million Shoppers in Three Years. Its Future Looks Very Different
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You Trust That Fashion Creator Like a Friend. Psychologists Predicted It in 1956
Relationships
Love, friendship, family and the everyday dynamics between people.
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Playing Hard to Get Can Work, Briefly. Then the Science Turns Against You
Not knowing if he liked them made women more attracted in one famous study. Fifty years of other research adds…
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You Don’t Grow to Look Like Your Partner. You Probably Looked Alike From Day One
A face-recognition test of 517 couples married for decades found no drift towards each other. The resemblance was there at…
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Do Long-Distance Relationships Work? The Surprising Research on Couples Apart
Couples living apart often report more intimacy than couples who share a postcode. The harder test, research suggests, comes when…
Psychology
How people think, feel and behave, explained through research and real life.
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The Songs From Your Teens Still Hit Hardest. Your Brain Filed Them Somewhere Special
Spotify data puts the age your taste sets at 13 or 14, and your parents’ records may have sneaked into…
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That Cringe Memory From Years Ago Isn’t Random. Your Brain Replays It for a Reason
Unbidden memories surface several times a day. The embarrassing ones sting hardest, and a short self-kindness exercise can take the…
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Decision Fatigue: The Hungry Judges Study and the Truth About Willpower
Parole judges seemed to grow harsher as lunch approached. The famous study behind decision fatigue looks shakier under cross-examination.
Worth your time
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Pink Was Once for Boys. What a Century of Unisex Clothing Says About Your Wardrobe
A 1918 trade paper told parents pink suited boys. Today about half of Gen Z shoppers buy across…
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Mixing Patterns and Textures: The Colour Science That Makes a Clash Look Deliberate
A study of 992 colour pairings, plus 7 practical rules, shows how to wear stripes, florals and knits…
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The Average UK Wardrobe Hides 31 Unworn Items. A Smaller Set of Basics Costs Less
Clothes are worn 36% less than 15 years ago. Here is how a few well-fitting basics cut the…
Modern Life
Work, technology, money habits and the way we live now.
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Your Sunday Dread Is Real, but Monday Is No Worse Than Tuesday. Here’s What Helps
A five-minute list, written at the right moment, helped people fall asleep about ten minutes faster in one sleep-lab study.
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The $75,000 Happiness Ceiling Everyone Quotes Was Only Half Right. Here’s the Rest
Two rival scientists teamed up in 2023 and found money keeps lifting most people’s moods, with one telling exception.
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Is Your Phone’s Blue Light Ruining Your Sleep? The Evidence Is Weak
Night Shift, amber glasses, screen curfews: we rated five popular claims about phones and sleep against the research. The light…
Self-Growth
Habits, confidence, resilience and building a life that fits.
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Walking Made 81% of People More Creative. Your Desk Chair May Be the Problem
Four Stanford experiments found walkers produced far more fresh ideas, even on a treadmill facing a blank wall. Here’s how…
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That Conversation You Keep Replaying Went Better Than You Think. Here’s the Science
Strangers in five studies liked their partners more than they guessed. In one, the gap lasted most of a university…
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Should You Tell People Your Goals? Two Lines of Research Disagree
One famous study says announcing a goal saps your drive. A meta-analysis of 19,951 people says going public helps. The…
Style & Living
Style, home and the small rituals that shape how we live.
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Your Best Ideas Turn Up in the Shower for a Reason. Science Has Six of Them
Hot water is not the secret. A task that is just engaging enough is, and you can build one into…
-
Fixing Your Own Clothes Feels Oddly Good. Here Are 6 Projects to Start With
Keep a garment nine months longer and its carbon, water and waste footprints fall by about a fifth to a…
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Two Identical Jackets, One Costs More. Your Brain Is Paying for Where the Cloth Came From
Tweed, indigo, kente, ikat and khadi survive partly because we pay extra for origin. Here’s the psychology, and how to…
Recently updated
Stories our editors have revisited with new research, figures and sources.
More stories
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Your Wardrobe Was Shaped by Six People You Never Met. Here’s How Their Taste Spread
A Chanel dress Vogue compared to a Ford, a Diana jumper that sold for $1.1m: the psychology of how one…
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Smart Clothes and AI Stylists Promised a Revolution. Here’s What You Actually Got
Online shoppers send back almost one in five purchases, and most fitness gadgets end up in a drawer. The reasons…
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Heritage Craft Is Back, and Your Brain Is Pricing the Hours, Not the Cloth
People valued their own clumsy origami nearly five times more than strangers did. That bias explains a lot about handmade…
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Pink Was Once for Boys. What a Century of Unisex Clothing Says About Your Wardrobe
A 1918 trade paper told parents pink suited boys. Today about half of Gen Z shoppers buy across the gender…
-
Mixing Patterns and Textures: The Colour Science That Makes a Clash Look Deliberate
A study of 992 colour pairings, plus 7 practical rules, shows how to wear stripes, florals and knits together without…
-
The Average UK Wardrobe Hides 31 Unworn Items. A Smaller Set of Basics Costs Less
Clothes are worn 36% less than 15 years ago. Here is how a few well-fitting basics cut the cost of…