
Hidden Brain
Airs Tuesdays at 9 pm & Sundays at 11 am
Hidden Brain helps curious people understand the world – and themselves. Using science and storytelling, Hidden Brain's host Shankar Vedantam reveals the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, the biases that shape our choices, and the triggers that direct the course of our relationships.
>> Hidden Brain's official website.
Distributed by: NPR
Latest Episodes
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Unpredictable things happen to us all the time. As part of our annual You 2.0 series on personal growth and reinvention, we revisit two of our favorite stories of loss and the change it brings.
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"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal." These words, penned by Thomas Jefferson more than 240 years ago, continue to inspire many Americans. And yet they were written by a man who owned hundreds of slaves, and fathered six children by an enslaved woman. As we mark Independence Day this week, we return to a 2018 episode with Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Annette Gordon-Reed. We explore the contradictions in Jefferson's life — and how those contradictions might resonate in our own lives.
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This week on Hidden Brain, research about prejudices so deeply buried, we often doubt their existence. We'll begin with police shootings of unarmed Black men. We also look at how biases affect judges.
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Recessions typically damage workers' long-term earnings. NPR's Hidden Brain podcast explains how a study found that students graduating from high school during a recession may be an exception.
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We don't always behave the way economic models say we will. We don't save enough for retirement. We give money to charity. This week, why we act in ways that go against our "rational" self-interest.
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On this week's radio show, we trace the history of fake news. Plus, in a time when accurate information is so important, we ask who ultimately bears the cost when no one wants to pay for local news.
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What helps to contain an epidemic? A study of the Ebola crisis suggests that patients' trust in health workers can encourage patients to report illnesses and receive treatment.
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Why are we so often pulled into memories of the past? This week, we bring you a 2018 episode about our ruminations on what we could have done differently, and what we wish we could do again.
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When disaster strikes, we want to know, who screwed up? This week we explore the psychology of warnings: Why some warnings get heard, and why some of us are better at seeing what lies ahead.
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What's the point of money? The answer might seem obvious: we need it to get paid for our work, and to buy the things we need. But there's also a deeper way to look at the role of money in our lives.