Psychology is all about understanding, explaining, and predicting human behavior. We are fascinated by our own behaviour and those of us around us. By understanding behaviour we hope to gain insights into how our minds work and perhaps how to change our undesirable behaviour. An understanding of human behaviour can also lead to the design of good software, hardware and even guide policy writing relating to technology.

These days technology like the iPhone helps us to track our own personal habits, Twitter gives us an insight into popular topics and analytics give us fascinating web usage statistics. Whilst technology has greatly enhanced our ability to collect interesting data about human behaviour, it’s important to realise that using such data to make conclusions about why we behave in such a way is unwise without investigating the differences between causality and correlation. Take for example the problematic question of whether the Internet is addictive or if addicts use the Internet.

Only thorough psychological research can investigate the motivations behind our behaviour. All of the modern day branches of psychology are governed by extremely strict rules that ensure that only legitimate and ethical research is conducted and published, and said research employs extensive statistical analyses on data derived from various methods including interviews, questionnaires, experiments, etc.

It is for these reasons that I believe that the relationship between psychology and technology needs to be much stronger. If we use psychology to understand and explain our interactions with technology today, we can help our future selves by using this information to make technology more accessible, usable and helpful for everyone.

There is absolutely no escaping the fact that one day you will be old. Most people regard getting older to be a physical decline, a frailty of the body, without considering the cognitive and social changes that occur as you age. It is for this reason that I take an interest in Irish research centres like the NCBI Centre for Inclusive Technology and the CASALA Centre (soon to open in Dundalk IT) who aim to improve future technologies by conducting cognitive and social psychological research with older adults and people with disabilities.

In today’s Irish Times an article describes the recent Business of Ageing conference held in Dublin, highlights some of the fantastic assisted living technologies being developed here in Ireland and suggests this country could be a leader in developing technology for older adults.

Let’s hope this prediction comes true. Not only would I love to work in this area of research and development, I for one would like to continue being an early adopter of new technologies. I would be incredibly angry if, as I got older technology slipped out of my reach, the way the majority of older adults are excluded today.

eBay has really evolved over the years and has quickly become my favourite place to shop online. It should no longer be considered a place for second hand junk or bidding wars, it’s now a place of true commerce with options to “buy it now” or to even haggle with a seller by “making an offer”.

Instead perhaps consider eBay as a gigantic 24hour outlet mall that’s filled with stores like Schuh, that are just desperate to get rid of last season’s Converse. It’s also populated with independent retailers, that can’t afford the online high street rents but compete with the larger stores like Amazon by offering you brilliant price reductions on new products. Then there are the niche stores/individuals that sell really rare or unique items like the HP battery I got for my 5 year old laptop (€36.99 with free P&P from Hong Kong) or my new Vans with the black soles and purple/black checkered pattern (€45 including P&P from Germany, the same price as the high street but very rare so totally worth it).

However, shopping online isn’t easy. It can be time consuming and frustrating. There are just too many choices, and far too many links to click to get to what you’re really looking for. There are just too many variables involved. So I thought I’d write up a few suggestions on how, as an Irish consumer, you can really utilise eBay.

How To Get The Best Out Of

The first step toward getting the best out of eBay is to know what you’re searching for. eBay is not for browsing, there are too many of the same item and you’ll give yourself a headache clicking through page after page of products.  Unless of course you’re just after a last minute bargain, which is purely opportunistic. I recently picked up a Wii Nunchuck Controller for 1c from China (€3.99 P&P but still a bargain). Often when I’m not too sure what I’m looking for I’ll use Amazon to browse instead, as the experience is better with regards to navigation and being able to see similar items is nifty too, but I’ll always price check against eBay if I find something I like. However, even if you just know that you’re looking for Wii accessories or a pair of shoes, that’s a good start.

The second step is to make sure you’re searching the entire European Union by clicking on the option in the left hand sidebar. This broadens your search to include all European countries and also removes non-European countries. This is good, because otherwise you’ll have to pay customs duty on anything over €22 (including the cost of the P&P) to ship  to Ireland from outside of the EU. Forget those international sellers, unless you’re willing to factor in the 21% Vat that will be added later (21% of the total cost, so again that includes the P&P) and the €6 post office handling fee into the overall price of the item. In the past I would have had no problem buying products from outside of the EU and then just requested for the seller to “mark the item as a gift” to dodge the customs duty, but from my experience that rarely works anymore.

The third step is to vary your search terms. Even if you know the *exact* name (or colour and size, etc.) of what you’re trying to track down, it might not be listed that way on eBay. Don’t forget that all eBay listings are written by different individuals and unlike places like Amazon there are no strict rules governing how to describe an item. Imagine you’re searching for a pair of shoes, in some instances the size of the shoe may not be apparent from the one line of text describing the item, but will be mentioned in the full description of the item once you’ve clicked on its page. In some instances the seller may not have even put their item in the right category or have even spelt the name of the item incorrectly. Though this can sometimes make tracking down a rare item difficult, it can work in your benefit too. By varying your search terms you might find a bargain that has gone unnoticed, has had no bids or had no page views. I recently “made an offer”, a haggle, on an item with only 20 page views and got a 25% further discount because the buyer could see only 19 other people had even looked at the item.

The forth step is to make sure you use European sizes. If you’re only searching the UK & Ireland it’s fine to think in size 5 shoes, but in Europe that’s a size 38. Check a European size guide to help with your search for the right size (obviously this only applies to buying clothes, shoes etc).

The most important thing about any online shopping is of course safety. The best advice I can give is to always use Paypal, not only does it stop your credit card information being shared with a seller on eBay but PayPal buyer protection and their buyer complaint policy protect you if something goes wrong. Also, you should always make sure that before clicking on the “buy it now” or “place a bid” buttons that you have checked the feedback on the person/company you are purchasing from. Though eBay makes it pretty easy these days to really quickly see who is a legitimate and experienced seller, with their stars and power sellers icons, so familiarise yourself with these.

For me, finding a bargain on eBay is really rewarding but it also offers up far more options to me as a consumer. Yes I’ve had to get refunds or replacements, just like in real life, but I can’t say that I’ve ever had a bad experience on eBay, despite having purchased countless goods there over the last 5 years. Though I have come across some truly bizarre items, such as sex aids listed as adult Halloween costumes.

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever seen on eBay? What tips would you add to this guide?

While everyone else online has been overreacting about how “annoying” or “pointless” Google Buzz is I’ve been busy trying it out, having some fun and discovering something I like.

I was replying to a Google Latitude friend request at lunchtime and realised something pretty interesting. I can update my Buzz status from within the mobile versions of many of the Google webapps, including Gmail, Gtalk, Docs, Calendar, Tasks, and of course Latitude. It’s just a real pity that it’s currently missing from the Google service I use most regularly on my iPhone – Google Reader. Except that I can of course share items I read on Google Reader to Buzz, along with or without a comment.

If Google roll out this little feature across all of the mobile versions of their products they’ll be bringing a tiny bit of multi-tasking to the iPhone. Being able to update your status from within the webpage you’re on (and not having to go through the process of either switching between Safari pages, or closing Safari and going into Tweetie and then back to Safari again – both relatively  slow processes on the iPhone) is something very interesting. This will bring a little bit more of the desktop browsing experience to your iPhone and will work great on the iPad. Also, the little colourful icon always on the top of your webpage is a great reminder of the service you’re forgetting to play with.

It will take time to see if Google Buzz pays off, but for now I hope someone takes this little iPhone webapp multitasking work-around and implements it for Twitter, or someone in Facebook realises how nice it would be to be able to update your status from any page within the site.

A big thank you to Damien Mulley,  Willie White from the Project Arts Centre and Alexia Golez for the hours of fun we had participating in and winning the Dublin Tweasurehunt on Saturday.

Team “Invasion of the Booty Snatchers” was a combination of old friends and new ones led by the lovely Dena. Though we were exhausted by the very end, it was worth every heart pounding second, taking us all over Dublin 1 to places I’d certainly like to revisit (possibly at my own pace though!). Overall a great bit of exercise and loads of fun. Check out the #tweasure hash tag on Twitter to read all the buzz about it and check out the brilliant video below.

Dublin Tweasure Hunt from Jentertainment on Vimeo.

Possibly the coolest free iPhone app since, well, forever. Logitech seem to have taken a leaf out of Joby’s book (I discussed this a while back in the post called “Novelty vs. Practicality: iPhone Apps for Effective Brand Awareness“) and released a free app that will have some longevity in your app collection.

The Logitech Touch Mouse app links your iPhone or iPod Touch and your Mac or PC using your wireless network, allowing you to use the touchscreen as a mouse pointer and keyboard. All you need to do is download the app itself as well Logitech Touch Mouse Server (it sounds more complicated then it actually is) the associated piece of software for your computer. Then you simply link the two by inputting your computer’s IP address into the app on your iPhone or iPod Touch. You don’t even have to worry about figuring out your IP address as the Logitech Touch Mouse Server software will find it for you.

I’ll definitely get some use out of this. I always have my iPhone in my pocket, and being able to control my PC using it is a nice feature that I was never bothered to try out because I would have had to pay for it. Granted I already have a remote and wireless mouse/keyboard, but the iPhone, like I said, is already always in my pocket, giving it another function certainly appeals to me.

It works perfectly for me running 64bit Windows 7 Pro and an iPhone 3G.

Sleep seems to be a reoccurring topic here (see my previous post on good sleeping habits), which isn’t surprising seeing as it’s such an interesting subject, even more so when it’s related to technology. Tommy Collison wrote a great post this week about an iPhone app called Sleep Cycle that helps you wake up more naturally and since trying it out I’ve been acutely aware of the scepticism online surrounding its validity and usefulness.

Sleep Cycle is an app that turns you iPhone into a bio-alarm clock. Using the accelerometer built into the iPhone it reads specific movements common during sleep and wakes you up when you are sleeping lightly, aiming to give you a more refreshing awakening. Haven’t we all felt the frustration of being woken up during an especially interesting dream, and then felt dreadful for the day because of it?

This type of movement based bio-alarm clock has been around for awhile. You often find them as glorified watches with internal accelerometers, or overcomplicated devices that require placing motion detecting electrodes under your pillow case. The reason bio-alarm clocks work is due to the extensive sleep research that tells us how our body moves or doesn’t move during sleep.

Software like Sleep Cycle looks out for the right breathing patterns or muscle activity to determine what stage of sleep we are at. For example, during the REM stage of sleep (when we are dreaming) your body is essentially paralysed, this stops your body from acting out and hurting itself during a dream, but during light sleep your muscles will occasionally twitch. Another example is how during the deepest stage of sleep your breathing becomes rhythmic, but during REM sleep your breathing is rapid and shallow. These are distinct and measurable differences and are the biological indicators that bio-alarm clocks are looking out for.

The Sleep Cycle app on the iPhone doesn’t just wake you up though; it also produces a graph of your sleep pattern, so you get a general idea of how restful your sleep was. These graphs are more of a novelty than anything else and though I wouldn’t recommend you use them to make inferences about how healthy your sleeping behaviour is, it could provide you with a valuable insight when paired with keeping track of your routines, helping you to figure out what works best for you for a good night’s sleep.

Christmas was very good to me.

I’ve already flown through the latest Buffy graphic novel (which isn’t that good I’m sad to report) and am half way through “What The Dog Saw” by Malcom Gladwell (bedside reading, one chapter before bed each night, it’s wonderful). But below is the remaining books I have left to both start and finish.

Really looking forward to “And Another Thing…” as I have been re-reading the Hitch-hikers series to set myself up and I’m almost finished now. I’ve really enjoyed my forth read of the trilogy of five, fingers crossed for the sixth.

I’ve made myself a book inbox before, and I was delighted that other people followed suit. Would love to see what’s in your book inbox now.

When I was little I caught a fluffy bumblebee.

I put him in a glass jar and was careful to punch air-holes in the the lid and I left him overnight in the backgarden on the windowsill.

The next day he had died, and I was really sad to see him go. Myself, my brother and the little girl and boy next door decided to give him a proper burial. We dug a little hole in the flowerbed in the next door neighbour’s backgarden and had a funeral for our dearly departed insect friend. In the middle of the ceremony the bee climbed up out of the hole in the ground and scared the bee-jesus out of us. We ran screaming from that garden as the zom-bee flew away never to be seen again.

It’s one of my earliest childhood memories and it still creeps me out a little bit.

What’s your earliest memory?