It turns out that being open to feelings–happy, sad, angry, uncomfortable…– is an important element of mental wellness. But there is a lot to unpack. In the second installment of KUT’s Two Guys on Your Head series on the characteristics of mental wellness, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about a facet of the personality trait of “openness to experience” that has to do with “openness to feelings.” The post Openness To Feelings appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

A recent study suggests there are 4 characteristics that mentally well people share: openness to feelings, openness to emotions, truthfulness, and they’re not neurotic. But what does that really mean? In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head,  Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke unpack this study and talk about what it can teach us about understanding our own and others’ mental health. The post Characteristics of The Mentally Well appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

The idea that money doesn’t make you happy is easy to get behind if you have it, but if you don’t it’s a hard one to buy into (pun intended). Yet the correlation between money and happiness is more complicated than one might think. In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke explain the relationship between money, security, opportunity, and happiness. The post Money and Happiness appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

Why is it hard to have just one of those delicious slices of pound cake over the holidays? Well, it turns out it has less to do with the creamy butter and more to do with the way our brains react to those sweet white grains of sugar. In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke discuss the ways our brains respond to sugar by releasing dopamine. While we may think this dopamine is supposed to make us feel good, what the chemicals in our brains are trying to do is to teach us that this sugar is a good thing and that we want more of it for our survival. This might have been beneficial to us 150,000 years ago, but with sweets in every candy dish, gas station, and coffee shop, craving sugar has its consequences. The post Sugar and The Brain appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

Giving someone a compliment is more complicated than it might seem, but as Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about in this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, the benefits of compliments are extensive. The post Compliments appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

Because we know “how” things work sometimes we think we understand “why” these things work as they do, and that can be a problem. In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about the difference between “how” vs. “why” knowledge, and why it’s important to recognize what you really need to know. The post How vs. Why Knowledge (Rebroadcast) appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

It doesn’t feel good when you can’t express your emotions, but the effect of repressing emotions can have reproductions far beyond just feeling bad. In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about the psychology of repressing emotions. The post Repressing Emotions appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

One could ask, if we need anger management why don’t we also need management for other emotions? Turns out anger management isn’t a new thing at all and, as Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about in this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, for good reason.   The post Anger Management appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

We might not have the most positive associations with anger, and for good reason. Anger can be threatening and lead to destruction, but it can also move us to get off the dime and do something. In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about anger and motivation. The post Anger and Motivation appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.

There are some things that just feel like they’re true. For example, the idea that people who are gifted musicians are also good at learning math, or vice versa. However, there isn’t any data that suggests that there are any links in the brain between these proclivities. As Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about in this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, we underestimate the role emotions play in what we believe to be true. The post Math, Music, and The Brain appeared first on KUT & KUTX Studios -- Podcasts.