Poll: 10 Widespread Beliefs—True or False?

By Lindsay Lyon

October 13, 2009 RSS Feed Print

A new book, 50 Great Myths of Popular Psychology, takes aim at some of our most cherished notions. How do you feel about the 10 below? Take our poll. We'll explain next week and show how the votes stacked up.

1. When stumped by a multiple-choice question on a test, always trust your first instinct.

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2. Most people have a midlife crisis.

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3. Dreams hold meaning.

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4. Lie detectors are reliable.

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5. People are either right-brained (emotional and artistic) or left-brained (logical and analytical).

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6. Handwriting reveals an individual's personality traits.

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7. A positive attitude can help beat cancer.

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8. Venting is better than keeping anger in check.

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9. Subliminal messages in advertising can influence us to buy products.

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10. Men and women think and talk so differently that "men are from Mars, women are from Venus" is a fact.

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Tags:
psychology

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