Surprising Science — March 21, 2014

Television Shows That Helped Scientific Research

Popular television shows have actually shaped scientific experiments? Mental Floss provides 9 examples of when researchers used TV shows to study test subjects’ behavior.

The shows include classics like Cheers, Miami Vice, SpongeBob SquarePants, and The Cosby Show.

Here’s one example featuring The Simpsons:

The Scientists: Joel Cooper and Grant Cooper, Journal of Applied Social Psychology 32.11, 2002

The Show: The Simpsons

The Conditions: People watched an episode of The Simpsons with subliminal messages related to thirst embedded in it. The messages were verbal or pictorial.

The Result: They got thirstier. The Oversimplified Takeaway: Got a subliminal message to send? The Simpsons can deliver it.

To check out the other experiments, head over to Mental Floss.

a computer generated image of a human brain.

Thinking

The great free will debate featuring Michio Kaku and Steven Pinker

Who — or what — really controls your mind?

Building destroyed by the Halifax Explosion. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.

The Past

The largest accidental explosion of all time

More than a century ago, Halifax suffered an accidental blast one-fifth the size of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

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6 great books with wildly unreliable narrators

Dive into the twisted truths and concealed realities told by literature’s most unreliable narrators.

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The Well

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7 min

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with

Laurie Santos

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