The Science of a Convincing Sorry

In this special crossover episode, Science Quickly shares an appearance by host Rachel Feltman on Vox’s Unexplainable. Together with host Noam Hassenfeld, she explores Scientific American’s special issue on impossible questions, diving into some of science’s biggest mysteries, fr ...  Show more

In this episode of Science Quickly, we explore newly released 9/11 records and their revelations about the attacks’ lasting health impacts, unpack a controversial artificial intelligence breakthrough that solved one of mathematics’ biggest problems and examine the growing backlas ...  Show more

What makes an apology sound sincere? Psychologist Shiri Lev-Ari joins host Rachel Feltman to explore how the effort we put into our words—especially through longer, easier-to-understand language—can signal genuine remorse. New research reveals that even subtle linguistic choices ...  Show more

Why is it so hard to say 'I'm sorry?' In part two of our series on forgiveness and apologies, we talk with psychologist Tyler Okimoto about the mental barriers that keep us from admitting when we've done someth ...

How do you fix a word that’s broken? A word we need when we bump into someone on the street, or break someone’s heart. In our increasingly disconnected secular world, “sorry” has been stretched and twisted, and in some cases weaponized. But it’s also one of the only ways we ha ...

Do women really apologize more than men at work? We speak with a psychology professor and a leadership consultant about the impact that saying “sorry” and using other minimizing language has on job success, and what words and phrases to use instead. Guests: Karina Schumann and Sa ...  Show more