All In The Mind

The quirks of psychology that influence when we give to charity … and when we don't.

Dolls can tell us a lot about how kids see the world – especially when it comes to race.

One American researcher spent months watching pre-schoolers play with dolls and what she observed shocked her.

Plus, did you know the very first study of children and their thoughts about dolls actually changed the course of American history?

First broadcast 4 April 2021.

Anxiety and alcohol misuse are a common pairing. How do the two egg each other on and what can be done to halt the cycle?

Plus, the personality traits that shape our likelihood of harmful alcohol use.

Grief is deeply painful but it's something the majority of us …eventually … find ways to live with.

But research is starting to emerge on how the pandemic may have changed the way we grieve - making the experience more intense, more debilitating. 

As places like Australia and the US move on from the harshest restrictions of the last two years… is how we grieve returning to baseline? Or is it still too early to know? On All in the Mind this week, how the COVID pandemic has changed the nature of grief. 

About one in five Australians experience a mental illness in any given year. But what about when mental health issues occur ... together?

On All in the Mind this week, we look at a massive Scandinavian epidemiological study series which considers why having one mental illness puts you at greater risk of developing subsequent ones, and explore what that might mean for the treatment and prevention of mental health issues.

What are the constructive things our minds do when they wander?

And when does mindwandering cross over … into not-so-constructive territory?

If you’re lucky enough to have fallen in love at some point in your life, you’ve  probably also had your heart broken.

The experience can be excruciating, protracted, disorienting … but can it cause you lasting psychological – even physical – harm? 

Chris Hadnagy’s job involves breaking into banks. But he’s not after money, gold or jewels. He’s searching for weaknesses – in systems, in security, and in people. 

And he doesn’t use weapons or threats of violence to get past guards and into vaults. He uses a smile - and a few tricks from his toolbox of psychology and social engineering techniques.

Chris is the founder and CEO of Social Engineer LLC and lectures about social engineering around the globe.

On All in the Mind this week, the psychology of influence and what makes some people more vulnerable to being ‘hacked’ than others.[This episode originally aired on 01 August 2021]

Why do we laugh, and what makes something funny? A psychologist, a neuroscientist and satirist Mark Humphries weigh in on humour and the brain.

An excerpt from a new ABC podcast called What the Duck?! Each week the ABC's resident nature nerd Ann Jones explores the most unusual elements of our natural world — the ones that make you go What the Duck?!