Many forms of research lead naturally to quantitative data. A study of happiness might measure the number of times someone smiles during an interaction, and a study of memory might measure the number of items an individual can recall after one, five, and ten minutes. Asking people how many times in a year they are sad will also yield quantitative data, but it might not be reliable. Respondents' recollections may be inaccurate, and their definitions of 'sad' could vary widely. But asking How many times in the past year were you sad enough to call in sick to work? prompts a concrete answer. Similarly, instead of asking people to rate how bad a procrastinator they are, ask, How many of your utility bills are you currently late in paying, even though you can afford to pay them? Questions that seek concrete responses help make abstract concepts clearer and ensure consistency from one study to the next.

How much we suffer relates to how we frame the pain in our mind. When 1500m runners push themselves into extreme pain to win a race - their muscles screaming and their lungs exploding with oxygen deficit, they don't psychologically suffer much. In fact, ultramarathon runners - those people who are crazy enough to push themselves beyond the normal boundaries of human endurance, covering distances of 50-100km or more over many hours, talk about making friends with their pain. When a patient has paid for some form of passive back pain therapy and the practitioner pushes deeply into a painful part of a patient's back to mobilise it, the patient calls that good pain if he or she believes this type of deep pressure treatment will be of value, even though the practitioner is pushing right into the patient's sore tissues.

The common accounts of human nature that float around in society are generally a mixture of assumptions, tales and sometimes plain silliness. However, psychology is different. It is the branch of science that is devoted to understanding people: how and why we act as we do; why we see things as we do; and how we interact with one another. The key word here is 'science.' Psychologists don't depend on opinions and hearsay, or the generally accepted views of society at the time, or even the considered opinions of deep thinkers. Instead, they look for evidence, to make sure that psychological ideas are firmly based, and not just derived from generally held beliefs or assumptions. In addition to this evidence-based approach, psychology deals with fundamental processes and principles that generate our rich cultural and social diversity, as well as those shared by all human beings. These are what modern psychology is all about.

Punishing a child may not be effective due to what Alvaro Bilbao, a neuropsychologist, calls 'trick-punishments.' A trick-punishment is a scolding, a moment of anger or a punishment in the most classic sense of the word. Instead of discouraging the child from doing something, it encourages them to do it. For example, Hugh learns that when he hits his little brother, his mother scolds him. For a child who feels lonely, being scolded is much better than feeling invisible, so he will continue to hit his brother. In this case, his mother would be better adopting a different strategy. For instance, she could congratulate Hugh when he has not hit his brother for a certain length of time. The mother clearly cannot allow the child to hit his little brother, but instead of constantly pointing out the negatives, she can choose to reward the positives. In this way, any parent can avoid trick-punishments. -> A trick-punishment reinforces the unwanted behavior of a child, which implies that parents should focus on reducing the attention to negatives while rewarding positive behaviors.