C.V.

Consumer Psych

More evidence that things don’t go viral

I don’t think that things go viral (aside from viruses). Scott Galloway probably agrees. Check the first minute of this video that talks about “pay-to-play” on YouTube. (His L2inc video series is excellent, btw). In sum: if you want millions of views, pay for it with advertising.

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Repost: Things don’t go viral (except viruses)

You have heard the stories about viral videos that receive millions of views. One part of those stories, however, is not true. Things don’t go viral the way that viruses that do. .…………………………..Not the way it happens Academics, business people, and the man on the street commonly believe that interesting

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I take it back.

After my last sabbatical, I reported in a blog post what might be my post-Humor Code life might look like. I am now taking back one of the plans that I presented in the report: 3) Draw on the benign violation theory and related behavioral science research to examine how we

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Another Benign Violation: Roast Me

Being publicly degraded is distressing.  However, a popular subreddit on Reddit, /r/roastme, is populated by people asking to get roasted by  strangers. The results are… pretty funny. actually: The Benign Violation Theory helps explain what makes this process so funny. Humor arises when something is wrong yet okay, threatening yet safe,

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Repost: Humor and haunted houses

Are you visiting a haunted house in the couple weeks? I’ve observed two kinds of comedy associated with haunted houses: You observe people being scared and then laugh about it. You laugh at people’s reactions to being scared. Both seem to be happening here. Check out more here. Alf Lamont,

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Would your life be better if you were funnier?

The nice people at ESPN’s 538 site came to Boulder to look at our research examining how to make people funnier. I hope to have more results soon. In the meantime, come to our Humor Hackfest (5/12), which is part of Boulder Startup Week.

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T-hacking: Another ethics problem for science?

In recent years, scholars, policy makers and the general public have learned about unethical behavior across academic disciplines — creating a crisis of confidence in the reliability of research findings. Whether due to publication pressures or the pursuit of fame, researchers have been caught performing data acrobatics ranging from “p-hacking,”

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SOLO | Gordon Morris | Singles Advocacy
Podcast - Solo

Unmarried Equality

  This episode seeks to explore the singles advocacy movement with Gordon Morris, who is aiming to breathe new life into Unmarried Equality, a nonprofit

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Podcast - I'm Not Joking

Curtain Call

  Welcome to the final episode of I’M NOT JOKING. Comedian JD Lopez returns from Episode 1 to debrief and reflect on Peter’s experience building

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