Health & Science

How fear leads to magical thinking

When life gets chaotic, it’s natural to crave order. But as the global financial system spins out of control, says Science, people should be aware that the craving for order can lead to magical thinking and self-deception. Scientists in Texas and Illinois recently collaborated on a project that examined how people respond to times of stress. They found that when people feel out of control, they tend to throw out their common sense and start subscribing to conspiracy theories and superstitions, and to see patterns where none exist. Asked to explain why they failed at a task, for example, people who were made to feel insecure were more likely to ascribe what happened to their failure to repeat a “lucky” ritual, such as stamping their foot on the ground three times. These findings support earlier studies that found that during the Great Depression, there was a sudden spike in the popularity of astrology and newspaper horoscopes. Unfortunately, says behavioral economist Dan Ariely, magical thinking tends to overcome us when we need our wits the most. He suggests that people feeling distraught over the economy avoid impulsive actions, and seek advice from financial planners or therapists, not psychics.

A risk-free fetal test

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Couples who are expecting a child face a difficult choice in the early months of pregnancy: Should they test for Down syndrome and other birth defects or not? That question is complicated by the fact that prenatal tests carry a small risk of causing a miscarriage. “I can’t tell you how much parents struggle with that decision,” prenatal counselor Jane Fisher tells New Scientist. Both amniocentesis, for which doctors draw a sample of amniotic fluid, and chorionic villus sampling, which requires a tissue sample from the placenta, are invasive procedures that carry at least a 1 percent risk of miscarriage. Now, a California company and a team at Stanford University have developed a new test for Down syndrome that requires just a sample of mom’s blood. If the fetus has the extra chromosome that causes Down, sophisticated genetic analysis can identify key markers in the fetal DNA and proteins that make their way into the mother’s circulation. An early trial of the test was 100 percent accurate in detecting Down syndrome, as well as three other chromosomal disorders. Stanford scientist Stephen Quake says the new blood tests “will make invasive testing obsolete.”

A rose’s sweetness, times 10

Does a genetically enhanced rose smell as sweet? It sure does, say researchers at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, who have figured out a method of genetically engineering a flower so that it gives off scent at 10 times the natural intensity. Flowers altered by the process also gave off scent 24 hours a day, instead of falling dormant at night. Researcher Alexander Vainstein tells ScienceDaily.com that the same genetic methods could also be used to magnify the aroma and flavors of fruits and vegetables. “Aroma is of major importance for defining the taste of food,” he says.

Drivers love mean cars

Automakers have long understood that consumers see faces on the fronts of cars, with headlights and grilles conveying a distinct personality. A new study by Austrian scientists has bad news for the makers of the Toyota Prius and other cars that look cute and friendly: People prefer cars whose faces look powerful, masculine, and angry. A panel of 20 men and 20 women evaluated the “personalities” of 38 sedans based on their apparent facial expressions, then chose which they’d like to drive. Both men and women went straight for the cars that looked as if they were growling with barely restrained aggression. They liked headlights that tilted in, seeming to scowl, and wide grilles that resembled bared teeth. (BMW’s 5 Series was one widely popular look.) Car companies love studies like this, says LiveScience, because they get to the bottom of what consumers really want in design. “When investing in a new passenger car, you’re talking about billions,” says study organizer Truls Thorstensen. “If you get the wrong styling, you get problems.”

A new strategy for preventing SIDS

Here’s a simple new way to decrease an infant’s risk for sudden infant death syndrome: Put a fan in his room. A new study by the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research has found that adding a fan to circulate air through a baby’s room decreases the chance of SIDS by 72 percent. Scientists still aren’t sure what causes SIDS, but they have speculated that babies suffer crib death when their immature brains don’t wake them up when they experience a sudden lack of oxygen (say, because they are face-down on a mattress). A fan may work by circulating air around the baby and preventing him from breathing only his own exhaled air. Other strategies to prevent SIDS include getting rid of extra-soft bedding and laying babies on their backs to sleep. “The baby’s sleeping environment really matters,” study author Dr. De-Kun Li tells The New York Times. “This seems to suggest that by improving room ventilation we can further reduce risk.”