Does your psychology study impact on your daily life?

cranks

Not too sure if the title of this thread is appropriate but hopefully you'll get my drift. There is a line that I came across somewhere about how it's 'not quite nice' to use psychology on those closest to you which touches on what I'm asking here.

Basically, I'm curious to know if there are aspects of the psychology that you've studied that you find yourself 'using' on a day-to-day, non-work related basis? Are there theories that jump out at you when you're listening to the radio or t.v., interacting with friends, an acquaintance, a spouse or lover, a stranger, or even a boardsie etc.

To clarify a little further:
I'm fond of Attribution theory and I do find myself latching on to suggestions of stable/unstable, fixed/static, internal/external etc attributions that others make for their successes or failures, for example. It gives me a little insight.

Cognitive biases, heuristics, thinking distortions are always fun to try and spot.

Expressions of, and insistence upon, 'should' 'must' and 'ought to' in someone's discourse intrigue me and make me think 'is this an angry person?'.

Sometimes I consciously try to use the primacy and recency effects to my advantage to when relating my wants from the shop to another - e.g. beer at the beginning; munchies at the end; things that would be nice, but-I-can do-without-and-I'll assume-will-be-forgotten, in the middle.

I might try to use extreme statements as a means to change attitudes.

I'm impressed with John Gottman's claim to predict 95% of relationship breakups based upon expressions of contempt made between couples and sometimes latch on to same to form an opinion.

From a psychoanalytic perspective, deliberate misinterpretation of words used (fixing on a double meaning in place of the intended meaning) can often yield unexpectedly pleasing insights.

And so on.

To be honest, most of the time I couldn't be ars*d and just let the psychology of life, outside of my work, wash over me. Please don't ask for links to the research because I won't provide them. I'm just curious to know about the times when others consciously 'think psychology' outside of the lecture/tutorial/work environment.

Cheers in advance.

Valmont

Whenever I hear someone say they are a "good judge of character" I think of the self-fulfilling prophecy involved in having said judgement proved. A thinks B is not very nice and acts accordingly, B picks up on this and responds in kind, reinforcing both A's original unfounded assessment of B and their judgement skills. For people quick to categorise others and who claim to be a "good judge of character", I think the above process to be quite an interesting way to look at it.

WesternNight

I'm not sure if I 'use' psychology as such, but my studies have certainly influenced my day-to-day interactions and reactions. I'm far less inclined to make assumptions, and will caution others against making assumptions where appropriate. I tend to be able to see different sides of arguments, though I'm not sure that's solely down to studying psychology.

I also often find myself saying "well, it's not quite as simple as that.." when someone comments about something they've declared themselves an authority on having watched a few episodes of Criminal Minds or the like...
(though I'm constantly realising how little I know, I also sometimes find that I know more than I think I do when presented with some of the nonsense people come out with!)