2010 APA Convention Blog

Take-home thoughts

Attendees of APA's 2010 Annual Convention will be flying home with more than pilfered pens and hotel shampoo. Here's a sampling of what psychologists and students took from this year's meeting.

"Seeing so many people gathered together around shared interests inspires me at every APA convention I've come to!"

-- Suzi Marie Clark, Clarion University

"A thought that inspired me was that we need to have more detailed research as far as looking at each population and comorbidity, in order to treat them better."

-- Dorothy Reinagel, Alliant International University

Researchers exploring therapeutic uses of hallucinogens

People struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder who haven't responded to conventional treatments, lifelong smokers, patients with terminal cancer and even the mentally and physically healthy have all shown therapeutic benefits in controlled experiments with hallucinogens, psychology and medical researchers reported at a symposium Saturday.

Working with a group of participants given psilocybin derived from mushrooms, Roland Griffiths, PhD, of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, said that months later, 80 percent of subjects reported the experience as one of the five most spiritually significant of their entire lives, and continued to feel improvements in mood and behavior.

Throwing her weight around

Contrary to most polls, America is not the world's most overweight nation, not by a long shot: that distinction goes to the South Pacific island of Nauru. America? It's number 20 on the list. So why the discrepancy? Dr. Esther Rothblum of San Diego State University thinks she knows the answer, which she outlined today in her invited address "It's Time to Throw Our Weight Around: The New Field of Fat Studies": Jenny Craig wants us to think we're the kings of cholesterol.

And Ms. Craig is serious about it -- after all, in 1995, she, along with Slim Fast and a raft of other diet food companies, fired the opening salvo in the War on Obesity. Now, 15 years later, Rothblum is fighting back. Dubbing her counter-offensive "Fat Studies", she is pushing back on discrimination based on body weight.

What makes us happy: Marriage, kids and money? Well, maybe...

Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert, PhD, had the room in stitches as he bounded around the opening session stage, expounding on the secrets of happiness. And they're not what you think they are.

In a wide-ranging talk entitled "Happiness: What Your Mother Didn't Tell You," Gilbert said his mother told him the secrets to happiness were to get married, make money and have kids. "Was my mom right about any of this, or all of it?" he asked.

Marriage seems to be associated with happiness he said, showing statistics from research indicating that married people report being happier than unmarried people. However, after about 10 years of marriage, people report their happiness declines. "It's not marriage that makes you happy," he said, "it's a happy marriage that makes you happy."