How do you know that you are in pain? Or that grief feels the way it does? Or that a colour, a song, a memory, a beloved person has a particular quality in your experience? Philosopher Matt Duncan explores what Bertrand Russell called ‘knowledge by acquaintance’ – grounded in conscious awareness

This moving and powerful Portrait follows Ervin Staub, a Holocaust survivor turned psychologist who has spent his life examining a simple question with vast consequences: how to be good in bad times and encourage altruism in the face of evil buff.ly/V25ZUvX

‘People have different colours and patterns and textures, for they have tried different uniforms.’ Through paint on fabric and stop-motion animation, this short film explores the interplay between clothing and identity, using garments as a canvas for themes of constraint, freedom and womanhood

‘A church for the dispossessed, rave culture offered a way to find ecstasy amid agony, community from abandon, and meaning through resilience.’ For its adherents, rave culture functions as a kind of spiritual technology, producing the kinds of experiences that humans have long called sacred

Why do so many of us stay silent when something feels wrong? In this Guide, organisational psychologist and professor of management Sunita Sah explores what it means to act according to your values when doing so means stepping outside the norm

I knew I was committing a small social crime. But we hadn’t truly been friends for a long time. A Turning Point by David Sleeth-Keppler

When is a typically celebrated practice – working out – more like an addiction? Researchers have found some patterns. An Idea by Ashrene Rathilal

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Screen-based life is deadening. Try some simple adventures and exercises to reconnect with the world’s sensory richness. A Guide by Tereza Violet Stehlíková

In this Idea, the psychology researcher Jessica M Choplin tackles the legal concept of ‘lucid intervals’, through which people with cognitive impairments can make legally binding decisions when they appear lucid – a notion that is at odds with the current state of neuroscience

In its simplest form, mindfulness is our innate capacity to be aware of our experience as it happens. On #WorldMeditationDay, we’re revisiting this Guide on how to find your way of mindfulness and become a scientist in the laboratory of your own mind

There are always at least multiple versions of you, created by your self-perception and that of others. To find out how much these differ between romantic partners, researchers in Germany conducted a study. In this Note to Self, the Psyche editor Matt Huston reflects on their findings

Threshold Choir is an international charity that provides people with soothing, non-religious songs of peace as they transition from life into death. The filmmaker Florence Brown’s short documentary captures the group’s gentle kindness and warmth as they provide comfort to the dying

For some people, a healthy exercise habit can morph into an unhealthy addiction. In this Idea, the researcher Ashrene Rathilal stresses that to build a solid diagnostic framework and more effective treatment strategies for this, we need to understand the key drivers behind it

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Do you ever feel like you’re just performing friendship with someone, or find yourself dreading a scheduled hang out? Sometimes the guilt of letting relationships fade is less painful than the slow suffocation of maintaining them

Merely seeing the word ‘AI’ can be enough to make some people recoil – doubly so if it’s paired with the word ‘art’. But, as the thinkers in this video from @moma.bsky.social argue, AI systems and their datasets must be approached with creativity and criticism rather than written off or ignored

Many of us spend so much of our lives on screens that the sensory world begins to recede into the background. In this Guide, the artist and educator Tereza Violet Stehlíková reflects on this familiar malaise and offers a series of gentle, imaginative exercises for reconnecting with your senses

The ineffable in music resides in the gap between saying and not saying. Music neither states nor conceals. It hints. An Idea by Elena Gigante

I hate talk of resilience: it places an expectation on people to return to how they were. That’s not how real recovery works. An Idea by Philip T Starks

For years I watched people through cameras and screens, filling in the blanks and calling it truth. A Turning Point by Tyler Thier

This short film features a husband coming to terms with his wife’s newfound hypersexuality as a result of her dementia. Balancing dry wit with emotional depth, it offers a rare perspective on the day-to-day dissonances that couples who are dealing with dementia must weather

For many of us, talking to strangers may feel a little awkward. But research shows that moments of small talk throughout the day – with a person on the street, the barista making your morning coffee, a fellow traveller on the bus – can boost your mood and improve your sense of belonging

Music can lift our spirits, soothe our soul, irritate us, make us feel alive – but how? In this Idea, the composer and psychoanalyst Elena Gigante reflects deeply on what music means to humanity, marveling at the mystery of its ineffable nature

If you are finding the menopause transition is affecting your wellbeing, this Guide by clinical neuropsychologist Caroline Gurvich and provisional psychologist Rachel Furey shares practical strategies to help you move through this time with clarity and confidence

Awkwardness can be deeply anxiety-inducing. In this delightful montage of everyday cringeworthy moments, the animator Nata Metlukh reminds us that it’s just part of the human experience – and invites us to cringe and laugh at it together

What do we mean when we praise someone’s resilience? In this Idea, the behavioural ecologist Philip T Starks suggests that we need to shift the concept’s definition from ‘bouncing back’ back to its ecological meaning – and allow ourselves to heal properly

We often think we are observing others, when in reality, we are looking into a mirror. This Turning Point is a provocative look at the ‘detective work’ we do in our daily lives and how easily we jump to conclusions that say more about our own inner world than the people we’re scrutinising

There’s a way of responding to threats that involves appeasement. Recognising this has helped me stop people-pleasing. A Note to Self by Olivia Hains

I was a child when Newfoundland’s fishing collapsed. Will I see the same happen to human connection? A Turning Point by Mandy McLean

The sense that a dead person is still with us is both eerie and common: can we find a naturalistic explanation for it? An Idea by Alicja Nowacka

In online wellness spaces, junk abounds: quick fixes, sponsored ‘advice’ and pseudoscience. This can obscure the real science behind a ‘brain-healthy diet’ – which, as the psychiatrist and educator Tracey Marks explains in this short, can be achieved with simple, science-backed tweaks

‘Political apologies can obfuscate historical memory.’ In this Idea, the philosophers Alfred Archer and Benjamin Matheson contend that for a political apology to be effective, it must avoid consigning harm prematurely to history – and instead be part of an ‘ongoing process of atonement’

You’ve heard of fight or flight, and you’ve probably heard of ‘freeze’, too – our automatic responses when presented with danger. But there’s actually a fourth response, which is all too often overlooked: fawning, as this gentle Note to Self explains

Researcher and writer Mandy McLean grew up in the shadow of the loss of the Newfoundland fisheries due to the introduction of new technologies. In this Turning Point, she warns against letting the technologies of today deplete human connection in the same way

Some questions split otherwise similarly minded people into two fiercely opposed camps. Newcomb’s paradox is one of them. Once you know the rules, you’ll likely arrive at an answer that feels obvious to you – and obviously wrong to your friends. This video by Veritasium explores why

Does your partner misplace keys, leave the lights on or hang the toilet paper the wrong way? Every relationship brings up pet peeves, but they needn’t become landmines. In this Guide, the marriage and family therapist Faith Drew lays out how to address and navigate them

Hollywood often frames the sense of a ‘presence’ as a supernatural jump-scare, but the reality is much quieter and more common. While these moments can feel supernatural, a psychology researcher proposes a psychological account of why we feel our loved ones nearby and why these moments matter

Rediscovering an André Breton essay about the value of embracing randomness, I realised this has been my life philosophy. A Note to Self by Anandi Mishra

The great historian came of age at the end of British rule in India. Now 94, she continues to defy a regime determined to forget the pluralism and dissent of India’s past. A Portrait by Raghu Karnad

New research has mapped people’s contrasting conceptions of the truth. No wonder so many arguments feel irresolvable. An Idea by Lukas S Huber, David-Elias Künstle & Kevin Reuter

While conventional wisdom often views screen time as a restriction, massive game worlds like Minecraft might actually serve a vital purpose. As physical spaces for independent play shrink, children are turning to digital landscapes to satisfy their instinctual urge for adventure and autonomy

Over decades honing the classical guitar, the grammy-nominated, chart-topping concert guitarist Craig Ogden has accumulated a wealth of knowledge on building mastery. Going beyond the adage ‘practice makes perfect’ in this delightful Guide, Ogden shares his key insights

For @psyche.co I wrote about embracing the random in life, work, just as in art. The idea of randomness has been my intuitive practice since forever and reading André Breton’s ‘Manifesto of Surrealism' further fueled me in this direction: psyche.co/notes-to-sel...

In this insightful video, Tara Donker, associate professor of psychology at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, discusses how a phone application could help people with mysophobia overcome their fear of contamination

How might André Breton’s ‘Manifesto of Surrealism’ and its embrace of randomness be applied not only to art but to our everyday lives?

At 94, the renowned Indian historian Romila Thapar has witnessed a turbulent slice of history – but she has rarely spoken publicly about how this has shaped her personal life. In this Psyche Portrait, the journalist Raghu Karnad invites readers to sit with Thapar as she reflects on her life

In this short video, the Booker-prize winning US author George Saunders deconstructs what he believes makes for an effective story: the importance of conversing with your characters, the pitfalls of fixing your intentions in place, and why good storytelling is a bit like being in love

Why do some arguments feel completely impossible to resolve? It might not be about evidence at all. Researchers are finding that people differ in their basic mental conception of what ‘truth’ is

The fear of missing out can fill us with unease over a perceived lack, but it might also serve a valuable social purpose. An Idea by Bex Rowson