As you walk city streets, frustrated at why those other pedestrians behave so frustratingly, be aware that scientists are trying to improve the situation, but are making progress only in slow steps. Dr Taku Fujiyama [pictured here, receiving an award], one of the modern masters in this endeavour, is a lecturer at University College London’s Secret […]
Tag: walking
History Detectives Interpret a Subtle Clue (Walks/Orgasms)
It’s always a good time to look back and ponder on this study about how some people stroll: “A Woman’s History of Vaginal Orgasm is Discernable from Her Walk,” Aurélie Nicholas, Stuart Brody, Pascal de Sutter, and François de Carufel, Journal of Sexual Medicine, vol. 5, 2008, pp. 2119-24. (Thanks to Sam Petuchowski for bringing […]
Implications of ambulatory rapidity – continued
Following on from the recent Improbable article ‘A Quick Take on Fast Walkers’ which examined an hypothesis linking fast-walking in humans with status display, we draw attention to another publication which demonstrates how walking speeds might be influenced by various other psychological factors. Dr. Chris Kirtley MB ChB, PhD, of the Clinical Gait Analysis lab […]
A Quick Take on Fast Walkers
Some scientists struggle to understand walking, as is evident in this study: “Walking Fast—Ranking High: A Sociobiological Perspective on Pace,” A. Schmitt and K. Atzwanger, Ethology and Sociobiology, vol. 17, no. 5, September 1996, pp. 451–62. The authors explain [AIR 15:5]: “We hypothesized that habitual fast walking might be a means to acquire and/or to […]
Why babies tip over
On the heels, so to speak of the Ig Nobel Prize-winning study that explains why pregnant women don’t tip over comes another piece of a puzzle. A study by a different group tries to understand why babies do tip over: “A unifying model for timing of walking onset in humans and other mammals,” Garwicz M, […]
Time-lapse beard
This is time lapse video of a man’s beard growth during the twelve months he spent walking from Beijing to Germany. (Thanks to avowedly beardless investigator Steve Whillett for bringing this to our attention.) The Longest Way 1.0 – one year walk/beard grow time lapse from Christoph Rehage on Vimeo.