Why Venting Makes You Angrier, Neanderthals Preferred Human Women, and Fetuses Hate Kale"

About this episode

This episode explores the effects of venting on anger, Neanderthal mating preferences, fetal taste preferences, and potential improvements to pokie machines.

Venting might be making you angrier, Neanderthals apparently had a type, and unborn babies are already forming strong opinions about kale. This week we bounce from modern psychology to ancient DNA to fetal facial expressions, with a quick detour into pokie machines and how they might be made a little less addictive. We start with a meta analysis suggesting venting is not the healthy release we have been sold. Instead of calming you down, it can keep your body fired up and make the anger stick around longer. The less satisfying fix is also the more effective one, doing things that lower arousal like breathing, yoga, and anything that stops you replaying the same rant on loop. Then we head back to prehistory, where research suggests Neanderthal DNA patterns point to pairings that may have involved Neanderthal men and human women more often than the reverse. The details are complicated, but the headline is simple. Neanderthals are not just history, they are part of us, and the human story has always been messier than we like to admit. Finally, we look at a study that might explain why some people hate vegetables with the passion of a thousand suns. Fetuses exposed to carrot flavours…

People in this episode

Host: A Little Bit Of Science

Topics covered

• venting
• Neanderthals
• fetal development
• taste preferences
• addiction
• psychology

Keywords

• venting
• anger
• Neanderthals
• fetal taste
• kale
• addiction
• psychology

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: pokie machines

Products: kale, carrot

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