“Volunteers performed three 1-minute sequences of continuous chest compressions on a manikin accompanied by No Music, repeated choruses of ‘Achy Breaky Heart’ and ‘Disco Science’.” This and other country music insights — and lots of other things — turn up in this week’s Improbable Research podcast.
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This week, Marc Abrahams tells about:
- The effect of country music on suicide. (“The Effect of Country Music on Suicide,” Steven Stack and James Gundlach, Social Forces, volume 71, number 1, September 1992, on pp. 211-8. / “Comments on Stack and Gundlach’s “The Effect of Country Music on Suicide:” An “Achy Breaky Heart” May Not Kill You,” Gary W. Mauk, Matthew J. Taylor, Karl R. White, and T. Scott Allen, Social Forces, vol. 72, no. 4, 1994, pp. 1249-1255. / “Achy Breaky Makey Wakey Heart? A Randomised Crossover Trial of Musical Prompts,” Malcolm Woollard, Jason Poposki, Brae McWhinnie, Lettie Rawlins, Graham Munro, and Peter O’Meara. Emergency Medicine Journal, 2011. Featuring a dramatic reading by Jean Berko Gleason.) Here’s video of a young man effectively singing country music about suicide:
And here’s Billy Ray Cyrus singing the experimentally-interesting song “Achy Breaky Heart”:
- Medical Research Review. (“Acute Conjunctival Inflammation Following Contact with Squashed Spider Contents,” Geoffrey K. Isbister, American Journal of Ophthalmology, vol. 136, no. 3, September 2003, pp. 563-4. / “Ear Candles — Efficacy and Safety,” Daniel R. Seely, Suzanne M. Quigley, and Alan W. Langman, Laryngoscope, vol. 106, no. 10, October 1996, pp. 1226-9. / “Nonarteritic Ischemic Optic Neuropathy Developing Soon After Use of Sildenafil (Viagra): A Report of Seven New Cases,” Howard D. Pomeranz and Abdhish R. Bhavsar, Journal of Neuro-Opthamology, vol. 25, no. 1, March 2005, pp. 9-13. Featuring dramatic readings by Daniel Rosenberg.)
- Guéguen and the goad of small things. (“Women’s Bust Size and Men’s Courtship Solicitation,” Nicolas Guéguen, Body Image, vol 4, no. 4, December 2007, pp. 386–90. / “Bust Size and Hitchhiking: A Field Study,” Nicolas Guéguen, Perceptual and Motor Skills, vol. 105, no. 3, part 2, December 2007, pp. 1294–8. / “The Effect of Touch on Tipping: An Evaluation in a French Bar,” Nicolas Guéguen and Celine Jacob, International Journal of Hospitality Management, vol. 24, no. 2, 2005, pp. 295–9. / “The Effect of Perfume on Prosocial Behavior of Pedestrians,” Nicolas Guéguen, Psychological Reports, vol. 88, 2001, pp. 1046-8. Featuring dramatic readings by Robin Abrahams.)
The mysterious John Schedler perhaps did the sound engineering this week.
The Improbable Research podcast is all about research that makes people LAUGH, then THINK — real research, about anything and everything, from everywhere —research that may be good or bad, important or trivial, valuable or worthless. CBS distributes it, both on the new CBS Play.it web site, and on iTunes and Spotify).