Criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling are very likely to lead to relationships failing

A licensed therapist shares advice for kindly addressing feelings of irritation in your relationship

All couples are bound to annoy each other, and it's often not caused by ill will. Reflecting on how and when to express pet peeves is important for ultimately building a connection and helping partners not feel attacked. While differences may not always be fully resolved, it can be helpful to discuss paths forward toward a compromise.

AI chatbot use among quarreling couples can aggravate tensions

Chatbots can become a sounding board for venting spouses looking to analyze their relationship and find support for their views. Many couples report the negative influence of chatbots like ChatGPT, with some claiming the tools led to divorce.

'The Father of Positive Psychology' gives tips on building resilience

People differ in how they respond to setbacks. Famed psychologist Martin Seligman outlines three key pillars for resilience: developing mental toughness by interpreting failures as external and temporary, recognizing and using one’s signature strengths, and cultivating strong relationships that offer support and meaning.

Landmark study pinpoints what makes a good relationship

Whether you’re finding a potential partner by swiping right on an app, or thumbing through stacks of biodata a la Netflix’s “Indian Matchmaking,” there may be some wisdom for you in the researchers’ findings.

Marriage is experiencing a general decline

Marriage has taken drastically different forms than in the past. The transformation of marriage from a form of economic dependency for women to an equal partnership has forged demographic shifts. Richard Reeves, author of "Of Boys and Men," explains how economic and educational factors have potentially destabilized partnerships and changed patterns of “marriageability” for middle- and lower-class men.

How grudges mostly hurt ourselves

Grudges feel like revenge against those who have done us some wrong and are very common. In this "Hidden Brain" podcast, psychologists explain how grudges end up only hurting us rather than those we hold them against. By using historical examples, the researchers show the counterintuitive danger of grudges and how people can learn how to avoid them.

A guide to the romance genre's major tropes

This guide breaks down romance's most prominent tropes, or narrative patterns, used by romance writers and adored by their fans. After you learn about "friends to lovers," "marriage of convenience," and "forced proximity," you'll start to see your favorite romance reads in an entirely new light.

Boy culture pressures teens to hide emotions, weakening their friendships over time

Cultural norms about masculinity teach boys to suppress vulnerability and prioritize independence over time, resulting in isolation. Given that humans are social creatures, mental health struggles gradually become more common through this abandonment of connection.

How to bridge political divides

Can people who believe in opposing ultimate views of the world really live in peace together? That's a core requirement of individuals living in pluralistic societies. Law professor Samar Ali and public affairs strategist Clint Brewer don't agree on much, but they're great friends. In this TED Talk, the two share why political polarization in the US isn’t as intractable as we might think. Learn some tips for getting along in the free world here.

'Men's groups' may fail if members aren't truly invested in growth

Individuals who are truly dedicated to the mission of personal growth and want to build connections and community are essential for this type of group's success. The groups require an ongoing commitment, and members must be open to feedback, which can be a challenge. The hope in these groups is to build a bond that extends beyond a weekly or biweekly meeting. One such group is The Alliance, which has hundreds of members divided into local chapters.

Are we too attached to attachment styles?

Attachment theory was developed to help understand the impact of caregiver relationships on children. Recently, the theory has been applied to adults, categorizing them into different attachment styles. Is it accurate? This podcasts takes a closer...

In recent years a child anxiety expert has created and tested a novel phobia and anxiety treatment approach for children, focused on changing how parents respond to the fears.

Science says being a jerk doesn't pay off

The evidence is in: Nice guys and gals don’t finish last, and being a selfish jerk doesn’t get you ahead. A longitudinal study lasting for more than a decade revealed subjects who displayed manipulative, selfish, or combative behavior were less successful professionally than control groups—a finding that held even in highly competitive organizations.

How to win a negotiation

Chris Voss, former FBI hostage chief, explains how logic and argument rarely convince someone; instead, he claims emotional intelligence is the most important factor. Watch this brief video where the expert lays out the three most important skills...

What happens when you can't trust your therapist?

When Marty Markowitz first stepped into his new psychiatrist's office, he triggered a three-decade spiral of abuse that robbed him of his autonomy, relationships, and wealth. Markowitz isn't the only client to lay allegations of abuse at the feet of Dr. Isaac “Ike” Herschkopf, an accomplished New York practitioner with a rolodex of celebrity clients who has since lost his license to practice.

Critic Neil Postman argued modern technology is dystopian

Cultural critic Neil Postman argued in 1985's "Amusing Ourselves to Death" that mass media had made the dystopia of Huxley's "Brave New World" a reality. In 1992, he published "Technopoly," a wider critique of the utopian visions of technology or, as Postman calls it, "all of the machinery that takes people out of public arenas and keeps them fixed in their homes."

Loving bad art isn't always about mockery

Dr. John Dyck, an assistant professor of philosophy at Mississippi State, says admirers of "so good they're bad" works like "The Room" do not do so ironically. "They love it as a gorgeous freak accident of nature, something that turned out beautifully—not despite, but because of the failure of its creators."

'Mutual ignorance breeds mutual distrust.'

- Businessman Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919)

The culture Ray Dalio created at Bridgewater Associates is often criticized

Despite large returns, former employees report meticulous logs of mistakes, intense public questioning of junior-level staffers, recordings of all meetings being made available to all employees, and highly confrontational meetings—many of which are attributed to the book of more than 100 principles Dalio gives each employee. (Some users may experience a paywall)

Completing the stress cycle to avoid burnout

Emily and Amelia Nagoski cowrote the book "Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle." In this podcast, they discuss their own experiences with burnout, how emotional and mental stress wreak havoc within the body, and societal barriers that intensify burnout.

CBT helps rewire the brain's false beliefs by challenging negative thoughts

Cognitive behavioral therapy identifies how specific situations can trigger distorted core beliefs—often formed early in life—that negatively shape thoughts and behavior. It frequently uses structured questioning that promotes self-reflection to uncover distorted thinking and guide people toward more balanced perspectives.

Freud and Jung were once friends. What drove them to break up?

Austrian psychologist Sigmund Freud and Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung were fast friends, immediately hitting it off the first time they met in 1907. This four-minute video dives into the intellectual divide that drove them apart.

Extreme grief elevates cardiovascular risk and lowers immune system function

A 2014 analysis of cardiovascular risk and bereavement after a lost partner found that grief elevates the risk of stroke and heart attack for the 30 days following death of a partner and the risk then attenuates after that.

HBO’s biggest flops

Although HBO is known for its high-quality programming, that doesn’t mean it hasn’t missed the mark from time to time. Shows like “The Mind of the Married Man” and “John From Cincinnati” missed the mark in numerous ways, with both critics and audiences.

What ancient goat teeth reveal about ancient human-animal relationships

About 4,000 years ago, several goats with terrible teeth managed to outlive their better-teethed brethren. With such intense dental damage, the goats were likely fed higher-quality feed than the more dentally gifted herd members, a dietary shift that would've contributed to the difference in life span. These goat teeth underscore the hard truth that humans may inflict harm on the animals they care about most, regardless of intention.

Y Combinator Cofounder Jessica Livingston once interviewed her husband and cofounder, Paul Graham

Two of Y Combinator’s cofounders, Jessica Livingston and Paul Graham, were in a romantic relationship before they started the accelerator. They later married, and much later, Livingston started a podcast. In an episode of her podcast, Livingston and her cohost interview Graham about the beginning of YC and more.

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

20,000 letters to the advice columnist 'Dear Abby' provide insight into prevailing sex, religion, and LGBTQ fears, anxieties, and concerns from the 1950s onward.

Gerrymandering works through two techniques: cracking opposing voters across districts to dilute their power, and packing them into a few to waste their votes in lopsided majorities.

Prince's sexually explicit 1984 track 'Darling Nikki' attracted the ire of the Parents Music Resource Center, an advocacy group that inspired the Parental Advisory sticker, even though the song ends with a Christian message.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

Frank Lloyd Wright's houses are historically hard to sell because they're old, subject to local landmark commissions, and often unfashionable

To reduce wrinkles in clothing, research recommends gentle wash cycles with more water and tumble drying with smaller loads and longer times.

Apeirophobia is an overwhelming fear of living forever, perhaps stemming from the brain's inability to conceptualize an infinite life.

Indefinite cloning of some endangered species may not sustain their longevity because cloning success rates decrease as genetic mutations accumulate.

Cultural norms about how to handle the bodies of loved ones in communities in West Africa have hampered Ebola responses.

The Brothers Grimm were lawyers before they were storytellers, but became interested in fairy tales as they began investigating how rules and customs had been passed down through cultures.

American dance legend Martha Graham, sometimes called 'the Picasso of dance,' refused to perform at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and conceived the piece 'Chronicle' in response to the experience.

Explore an interactive map built from more than 100,000 survey responses on where people find joy in their lives

After her fellow cult members tried to kill her with an LSD-infused hamburger, one member of the Manson Family, the murderous cult led by Charles Manson, decided to testify against the group's leader.

Listen to an in-depth conversation on the links between Parkinson's disease and herbicide exposure and the challenging pace of scientific investigation.

The 19th-century painters of the Hudson River School were among the first American romantics, with portraits that displayed the natural beauty of the young country.

Corals are themselves not coral reefs—the term refers to the tiny marine invertebrates that build the rigid reef.

Watch how algorithms can be designed to train themselves and self-improve without human input, to the point where the optimized code is too complex for programmers to understand.

While the sun's gravity keeps the planets in orbit, their gravity also pulls on the sun, causing it and everything else in the solar system to orbit around a mutual balance point called the barycenter—the true center of the solar system.

Hotels in Cannes, the glamorous city on the French Riviera, hire hawks to ward off seagulls during the city's famous film festival.

The rivalry between Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson centered on federalism—the question of how much power the federal government should hold relative to the states.

The United States has had a tumultuous relationship with Cuba since its 1959 revolution, highlighted by a nuclear crisis and a decades-long trade embargo.

Domino's Pizza's 30-minute delivery guarantee was responsible for the chain's 1980s surge, but it was discontinued after the company was found liable for delivery driver accidents.

The first steps to rebuilding your credit score include getting to know exactly what's on your credit report and figuring out how far you are from the '700 club,' or 'good score' range.