Quirkology

Quirkology-The curious science of everyday lives – Richard Wiseman

That’s the title of one of the books I finished recently. Happened to come across this one in my office library and I could sense I have an interesting book on my hands. This is the second memorable book for on the strange behavior of people, or rather I might say a book on “Why we behave the way we do”. (The first one was Experiments with people: Revelations from Social Psychology, ISBN-13: 978-0805828979)


Truly an enjoyable book. This will provide you some understanding of somethings that we see in our everyday lives. Some of the quirks investigated by the author and liked by me are listed below:
1. Trust everybody but cut the cards: The psychology of lying and deception
>. A small tip on deciding if someone is lying or not – Its not the eyes but the ears that can help you out.
2. Making up your mind: The strange science of decision making
>. He does describe an experiment where people’s decision making after reading Personal Ads is studied. Inspiring tip for all unmarried people. (70:30 is the magic figure to get someone interested)
>. Here is some statistics from his experiment on chat up lines. 45% of women made up their minds in under 30 seconds, compared to just 22% of men’s decisions. So guys we have really little time impress..
>. And here’s a line I need an answer, “If you were a pizza topping what would you be?”
3. World’s funniest joke: Explorations into the psychology of humor
>. There was actually a competition that was won by a sardarji !!!
4. Sinner or saint: The psychology of when we help and when we hinder
>. Take a tip and understand whom to ask for help when in trouble.