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10. Cellphones and Driving Don't Mix.
It seems like just about every U.S. driver has a story about seeing an accident (or nearly avoiding getting into one) thanks to the inattentive, erratic driving of some jerk on a cell phone. Talking on the phone while driving is dangerous: It's a no-brainer, right? The brains of science agree.
Thanks to one study, we also know it's worse if you're mired in stop-and-go traffic. Cellphone-equipped drivers react 18 percent slower when there are brake lights up ahead. They're also 17 percent slower to get back up to speed, all of which exacerbates the unbearably tedious cycle of stopping and going [source: Strayer and Drews].
So the brilliant conclusion we've reached here is this: If you're going to strap yourself into a four-wheeled death machine and join a herd of other metal monsters, maybe ordering takeout or gossiping about that guy at tennis practice should wait.
9. High Heels Can Make Your Feet Hurt.
Humans have been wearing shoes for some 40,000 years, but it wasn't until more recently that elevation entered the equation [source: Trinkaus]. Footwear changes how people walk and can even cause broader physiological effects. But when you wear high heels, that transformation can become particularly unpleasant.
Sure, given enough dedication to height enhancement, you might eventually end up with smaller calf muscles – good for looking slender, we suppose, although not for any practical purposes -- but the balls of your feet will be smashed, your toes will be squashed together and your feet may eventually curl inward in what we can only suppose is the fetal position a foot assumes under extreme duress [source: Britt]. We know this thanks to a study on 3,300 men and women.
So basically, the lesson here is: When you jam your feet into a pair of heels, that pain you feel is millions of years of evolution punishing you for your efforts.
8. Going Bald is Upsetting.
Apparently going bald makes men unhappy. Like $50,000 sports car unhappy. Understandably, then, it can also get to the point that they experience depression and other psychological issues. But in spite of all that heart-wrenching anecdotal evidence, scientists weren't satisfied. One study set out to find out just how horrible, exactly, men felt about going bald. (We don't really want to imagine what those phone polls were like.)
So, how horrible was it? Hair loss caused 43 percent to be concerned about their attractiveness, 37 percent to be worried about getting older, 22 percent to be anxious about the impact it would have on their social life, 21 percent to be depressed about it and 62 percent to believe it could impact their self-esteem [source: Informa Healthcare].
All right, researchers, you've made your point. Happy now?
7. Employees Hate Meetings.
Meetings at work can be informative. They can also be dreadful, unnecessary bore-fests that seem to last a lifetime. And there are too many of them.
Science solved the riddle of just what "too many meetings" means. Somebody in upper management typically squanders 23 hours a week in meetings. Managers in the middle often spend 12 hours a week wasting away in meetings. And the minions? Still about 6 hours [source: Rogelberg]. And those numbers just keep climbing.
Unfortunately, as research proves, a painstaking meeting schedule has the worst effect on the employees who are the most motivated and productive. They start to feel stressed and bogged down. Slackers, on the other hand, love meetings [source: Rogelberg]. They get to yack with coworkers, avoid dreaded to-do lists, and basically kill time until 5:00.
So how many meetings did these researchers attend in order to come to this conclusion? No idea. But probably more than a few.
6. Friends Are Awesome.
Friends are fun to hang out with? So that's what we keep them around for! And – bonus – not only do friends make us happy, but they're also good for our health, too, since they make our lives less miserable and pathetic.
Lots of research has been conducted to figure out whether friendship is really worth the cost of having friends. Turns out it is. Perhaps the starkest and most macabre study discovered that over a 10-year period, people with lots of friends were 22 percent less likely to die [source: New York Times]. So that's a plus. Friends have also been shown to make compadres more optimistic (enemies aren't often heralded for boosting self-esteem) and they can help lower stress levels, too.
Friendship can be a double-edged sword, however, because friends can also be your downfall. Another study found that if one friend gains weight, others in the close social circle have a 60 percent chance of following suit. After all, it's not like somebody with friends is going to go at the Cheesecake Factory all alone, right?
So we guess the takeaway is, um, to paraphrase "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade": Choose wisely, for true friends will give you like and false ones will take it from you.
5. Sword Swallowing Can be Dangerous.
Lots of professions are dangerous. Firefighting is certainly risky. Piloting can be perilous under particular circumstances. Mining is alarmingly hazardous. One thing those all have in common, though, is that they're vital occupations. Sword swallowing? Yeah, not so much.
Nonetheless, some people practice sword swallowing as a profession. So researchers have, of course, studied these performers to see what medical complications they run into and why. Very unsurprisingly, sore throats and chest pains are often issues, especially when sword swallowers are learning the trade or if they're booking lots of gigs. Well, that's to be expected.
But sometimes a trick goes awry. Sword swallowers can puncture their esophagus (saw that one coming) although they usually end up making pretty good patients. Gastrointestinal bleeding is another grievance that happens in the sword swallowing community (which is why most people think of swords as for external use only) but usually they can be patched up [source: Witcombe].
So what's the why in these scenarios? Sword swallowers are more prone to serious injury when they aren't paying enough attention. Yup – if you aren't focused on the fact that you're shoving a long sharp object down your throat, you may have a problem. Other red flags: trying a new sword or trying to swallow multiple swords at once.
Shocking stuff.
4. When It's Cold, People Bundle Up.
Unless you're one of those polar bear plunge people who enjoys jumping into icy water wearing nothing but an elegantly-fitted Speedo, you probably pull your coat out of the closet the first cold day of winter and leave it on until spring.
Well, you're not alone. We know this thanks to a study on adaptive thermal comfort, which plotted out the relationship between temperatures and the thermal resistance of people's clothes [source: van der Linden]. Basically, when the temperature gets colder, people dress more warmly. A further stunning revelation is this: People are most swayed by the outdoor temperature at around 6:00 a.m. [source: De Carli].
So, there you have it. There's proof behind that wintertime whine, "It's cold out. I don't want to get up!" and that search for a warm sweater when you're feeling chilly.
It seems like just about every U.S. driver has a story about seeing an accident (or nearly avoiding getting into one) thanks to the inattentive, erratic driving of some jerk on a cell phone. Talking on the phone while driving is dangerous: It's a no-brainer, right? The brains of science agree.
Thanks to one study, we also know it's worse if you're mired in stop-and-go traffic. Cellphone-equipped drivers react 18 percent slower when there are brake lights up ahead. They're also 17 percent slower to get back up to speed, all of which exacerbates the unbearably tedious cycle of stopping and going [source: Strayer and Drews].
So the brilliant conclusion we've reached here is this: If you're going to strap yourself into a four-wheeled death machine and join a herd of other metal monsters, maybe ordering takeout or gossiping about that guy at tennis practice should wait.
9. High Heels Can Make Your Feet Hurt.
Humans have been wearing shoes for some 40,000 years, but it wasn't until more recently that elevation entered the equation [source: Trinkaus]. Footwear changes how people walk and can even cause broader physiological effects. But when you wear high heels, that transformation can become particularly unpleasant.
Sure, given enough dedication to height enhancement, you might eventually end up with smaller calf muscles – good for looking slender, we suppose, although not for any practical purposes -- but the balls of your feet will be smashed, your toes will be squashed together and your feet may eventually curl inward in what we can only suppose is the fetal position a foot assumes under extreme duress [source: Britt]. We know this thanks to a study on 3,300 men and women.
So basically, the lesson here is: When you jam your feet into a pair of heels, that pain you feel is millions of years of evolution punishing you for your efforts.
8. Going Bald is Upsetting.
Apparently going bald makes men unhappy. Like $50,000 sports car unhappy. Understandably, then, it can also get to the point that they experience depression and other psychological issues. But in spite of all that heart-wrenching anecdotal evidence, scientists weren't satisfied. One study set out to find out just how horrible, exactly, men felt about going bald. (We don't really want to imagine what those phone polls were like.)
So, how horrible was it? Hair loss caused 43 percent to be concerned about their attractiveness, 37 percent to be worried about getting older, 22 percent to be anxious about the impact it would have on their social life, 21 percent to be depressed about it and 62 percent to believe it could impact their self-esteem [source: Informa Healthcare].
All right, researchers, you've made your point. Happy now?
7. Employees Hate Meetings.
Meetings at work can be informative. They can also be dreadful, unnecessary bore-fests that seem to last a lifetime. And there are too many of them.
Science solved the riddle of just what "too many meetings" means. Somebody in upper management typically squanders 23 hours a week in meetings. Managers in the middle often spend 12 hours a week wasting away in meetings. And the minions? Still about 6 hours [source: Rogelberg]. And those numbers just keep climbing.
Unfortunately, as research proves, a painstaking meeting schedule has the worst effect on the employees who are the most motivated and productive. They start to feel stressed and bogged down. Slackers, on the other hand, love meetings [source: Rogelberg]. They get to yack with coworkers, avoid dreaded to-do lists, and basically kill time until 5:00.
So how many meetings did these researchers attend in order to come to this conclusion? No idea. But probably more than a few.
6. Friends Are Awesome.
Friends are fun to hang out with? So that's what we keep them around for! And – bonus – not only do friends make us happy, but they're also good for our health, too, since they make our lives less miserable and pathetic.
Lots of research has been conducted to figure out whether friendship is really worth the cost of having friends. Turns out it is. Perhaps the starkest and most macabre study discovered that over a 10-year period, people with lots of friends were 22 percent less likely to die [source: New York Times]. So that's a plus. Friends have also been shown to make compadres more optimistic (enemies aren't often heralded for boosting self-esteem) and they can help lower stress levels, too.
Friendship can be a double-edged sword, however, because friends can also be your downfall. Another study found that if one friend gains weight, others in the close social circle have a 60 percent chance of following suit. After all, it's not like somebody with friends is going to go at the Cheesecake Factory all alone, right?
So we guess the takeaway is, um, to paraphrase "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade": Choose wisely, for true friends will give you like and false ones will take it from you.
5. Sword Swallowing Can be Dangerous.
Lots of professions are dangerous. Firefighting is certainly risky. Piloting can be perilous under particular circumstances. Mining is alarmingly hazardous. One thing those all have in common, though, is that they're vital occupations. Sword swallowing? Yeah, not so much.
Nonetheless, some people practice sword swallowing as a profession. So researchers have, of course, studied these performers to see what medical complications they run into and why. Very unsurprisingly, sore throats and chest pains are often issues, especially when sword swallowers are learning the trade or if they're booking lots of gigs. Well, that's to be expected.
But sometimes a trick goes awry. Sword swallowers can puncture their esophagus (saw that one coming) although they usually end up making pretty good patients. Gastrointestinal bleeding is another grievance that happens in the sword swallowing community (which is why most people think of swords as for external use only) but usually they can be patched up [source: Witcombe].
So what's the why in these scenarios? Sword swallowers are more prone to serious injury when they aren't paying enough attention. Yup – if you aren't focused on the fact that you're shoving a long sharp object down your throat, you may have a problem. Other red flags: trying a new sword or trying to swallow multiple swords at once.
Shocking stuff.
4. When It's Cold, People Bundle Up.
Unless you're one of those polar bear plunge people who enjoys jumping into icy water wearing nothing but an elegantly-fitted Speedo, you probably pull your coat out of the closet the first cold day of winter and leave it on until spring.
Well, you're not alone. We know this thanks to a study on adaptive thermal comfort, which plotted out the relationship between temperatures and the thermal resistance of people's clothes [source: van der Linden]. Basically, when the temperature gets colder, people dress more warmly. A further stunning revelation is this: People are most swayed by the outdoor temperature at around 6:00 a.m. [source: De Carli].
So, there you have it. There's proof behind that wintertime whine, "It's cold out. I don't want to get up!" and that search for a warm sweater when you're feeling chilly.