“Playing the video game Tetris could reduce the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, scientists have claimed. Experts from Oxford University found the block-dropping action can positively alter the way negative thoughts are created after a distressing event. This means it could help prevent flashbacks and other unwanted traumatic memories. Researchers from the university’s psychology department tested a group of people with no previous mental health problems. They were all shown a video containing disturbing images such as fatal road accidents and human surgery. Then 30 minutes later, the participants were split into three groups. One played Tetris, one played a game called Pub Quiz and the third was told to just sit quietly. During this 10-minute period, the scientists found those in the Tetris group reported the fewest number of flashbacks compared to the other two groups.” w/ photos

“Men feel instantly relaxed and are less aggressive when they look at cooked red meat, scientists have claimed. Boffins from McGill University in Canada conducted a study involving 82 men and found looking at cooked red meat made them significantly less aggressive. The researchers – thinking about historical competition between hunters – had initially expected seeing meat to prompt aggression between people. But after using standard aggression measuring techniques they found that looking at images of cooked red meat had the opposite effect. It’s now though this calming effect could be traced back to early humans who would have been relaxed while eating in the company of family members.” w/ photos

“Baseball… keeping illegal immigrants busy for generations.” — fr3d420

“Slate’s power recap of the movement that shaped an election.”

“The benefits of quitting smoking… Thank god I don’t smoke.”

“Online travel firm Expedia has found that data analytics can deliver a multi-million dollar kick to a company’s bottom line… The answer, it turns out, was quite simple: “We had an optional field on the site under ‘Name’, which was ‘Company’,” Megibow said. “It confused some customers who filled out the ‘Company’ field with their bank name.” After putting in their bank name, these customers then went on to enter the address of their bank, rather than their home address, in the address field. “When it came to address verification to process the credit card, it failed because it was not the address of credit card holder,” Megibow said. “After we realised that we just went onto the site and deleted that field – overnight there was a step function [change], resulting in $12m of profit a year, simply by deleting a field.” w/ photos