Mouse click to marriage

More and more marriages begin online, and UChicago researchers suggest that they may also be happier and more enduring. A survey of nearly 20,000 people found that  6 percent of those who met their spouses online later broke up, compared to 7.6 percent of those who met in other venues such as work, school, church, bars, parties, through friends, and on blind dates. Publishing their findings in the June Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the research team was led by UChicago psychology professor John Cacioppo, a scientific adviser to the dating site eHarmony, which commissioned the study. The researchers theorized that online dating may offer a larger pool of prospective partners, greater selectivity, and more advance screening.

A different tune

A study published June 11 in Psychological Science suggests that the concept of perfect pitch falls flat. About one in 10,000 people have the ability to identify a musical note just by hearing it, but psychology graduate student Stephen Hedger, AB’09, AM’12; postdoc Shannon Heald, AB’02, AM’05, PhD’12; and professor Howard Nussbaum found that their perceptions might be out of tune. The study originated after Heald tricked Hedger, who has perfect pitch based on objective tests, with subtle adjustments of pitch on an electronic keyboard. “Astounded” that he didn’t notice the gradual change, he joined Heald and Nussbaum to develop tests to determine whether others would make the same mistake. Conducting two experiments with 27 subjects deemed to have perfect pitch, the researchers found that the listeners did not recognize a change in gradually “detuned” notes. The group has also begun experiments indicating that pitch recognition can be improved among people with limited ability to identify notes. 

On the origin of species

Biodiversity begins in the tropics. David Jablonski, the William R. Kenan Jr. professor in geophysical sciences, is the lead author of a study published in the  June Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that helps confirm the “out of the tropics” model, documenting it over the past 12 million years. The process appears to be driven by “bridge species,” or evolutionary lineages that straddle warmer and cooler regions. Studying marine bivalves, Jablonski’s team identified the tropics as the teeming origin of most bridge species, which allowed the evolutionary lineages to expand outward. “Somehow they left their tropical cradle, adapting to the colder temperatures and more variable climates of the temperate zones,” Jablonski says. “It is impressive that they apparently expanded their ability to tolerate these harsher conditions.”