We've all had the experience of losing our temper when being treated unfairly by someone else. And while anger isn't the most pleasant emotion, it can be a useful social tool to signal to another person that we're not happy with how they're acting towards us. But what about when we suffer because of bad luck, rather someone else's actions? In that case it would seem to make little sense to get mad. And yet, a new study in Personality and Individual Differences finds that a certain group of people are more likely to show anger in such situations: those who feel like they are particularly entitled in the first place. Psychological entitlement is essentially a belief that you deserve more than others. People who score highly in entitlement tend to think that others should be accommodating of their own...

Today on MindMatters we interview Alan Francis, a longtime Fourth Way practitioner, teacher and author of the book Secrets of the Fourth Way. Alan is the founder of the Russian Center for Gurdjieff Studies as well as the International School of the Fourth Way, planned to open this coming winter. Our discussion covers a range of topics, from Alan's early life experiences that led him to the Fourth Way, basic Fourth Way topics like kundabuffer and Gurdjieff's take on kundalini, addiction, and fear, to 'powers and principalities', Taoist alchemy and its possible significance in relation to Gurdjieff's ideas and practice, concluding with a demonstration of a unique Fourth Way gymnastics exercise. Alan's Facebook group is accessible here. Running Time: 01:42:06 Download: MP3 — 93.5 MB ...

Where do dreams come from? It's an age-old question, something people have been wondering and theorising about for millennia. Whereas ancient civilisations may have interpreted dreams as having supernatural or spiritual origins, in modern society, we're more likely to analyse our dreams in terms of our waking life, looking for meaningful connections linking the content of dreams with lived experiences from our day-to-day existence. "Research has repeatedly provided strong support for what sleep scientists refer to as the 'continuity hypothesis of dreams': most dreams are a continuation of what is happening in everyday life," researchers led by computer scientist Alessandro Fogli from Roma Tre University in Italy explain in a new study. "It turns out that everyday life impacts dreaming (e.g. anxiety in life leads to dreams with negative affect) and vice versa (e.g. dreaming impacts problem-solving skills)." These psychological...

Narcissism, machiavellianism and psychopathy are the three components of what psychologists and social scientists call the 'Dark Triad' - personality traits that inform how one thinks and what one does. And dark they are because these personality features represent some of the very worst that humanity has to offer itself. As we continue to see the chaos and destruction being savaged on Western society by far left groups who claim to be fighting for justice and equality, some new studies go to show that their "liberal" sentiments belie a deeper pathology. What these activists are actually doing is acting out their Dark Triad tendencies - which fly in the face of the very values they claim to espouse and closely resemble their supposed political 'enemies' on the far right. This week on MindMatters we delve into the world of extremist...