Alix Spiegel

Credit Doby Photography / NPR

NPR correspondent Alix Spiegel works on the Science desk and covers psychology.

Arriving at NPR in 2003, much of Spiegel's reporting has been on emotion mental health. She has reported on everything from the psychological impact of killing another person, to the emotional devastation of Katrina, to psycho-therapeutic approaches to transgender children.

Over the course of her career in public radio, Spiegel has won awards including the George Foster Peabody Award, Livingston Award, and Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award. Spiegel's 2007 documentary revealing mental health issues and crime plaguing a Southern Mississippi FEMA trailer park housing Katrina victims was recognized with Scripps Howard National Journalism Award and the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award. Her radio documentary 81 Words, about the removal of homosexuality from psychiatry's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, is being turned into a film by HBO.

Originally from Baltimore, Maryland, Spiegel graduated from Oberlin College. She began her career in radio in 1995 as one of the founding producers of the public radio show This American Life. Spiegel left the show in 1999 to become a full time reporter. She has also written for The New Yorker magazine and The New York Times.

When It Comes To Depression, Serotonin Isn't The Whole Story

Credit Paul S. Howell / Getty Images

The antidepressant Prozac selectively targets the chemical serotonin.

By Alix Spiegel

Originally published on Fri February 3, 2012 12:13 pm

Listen

When I was 17 years old, I got so depressed that what felt like an enormous black hole appeared in my chest. Everywhere I went, the black hole went, too.

So to address the black-hole issue, my parents took me to a psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins Hospital. She did an evaluation and then told me this story:

11:01 pm

Sun January 1, 2012

What Vietnam Taught Us About Breaking Bad Habits

Next image Previous image

Credit AP

U.S. soldiers at Long Binh base, northeast of Saigon, line up to give urine samples at a heroin detection center in June 1971, before departing for the U.S.

Credit AP

A GI lights up a cigarette in Saigon in 1971. He poured grains of heroin into the menthol cigarette, from which he had first removed some of the tobacco.

By Alix Spiegel

Originally published on Thu January 5, 2012 2:49 pm

Listen

It's a tradition as old as New Year's: making resolutions. We will not smoke, or sojourn with the bucket of mint chocolate chip. In fact, we will resist sweets generally, including the bowl of M &Ms that our co-worker has helpfully positioned on the aisle corner of his desk. There will be exercise, and the learning of a new language.

It is resolved.

So what does science know about translating our resolve into actual changes in behavior? The answer to this question brings us — strangely enough — to a story about heroin use in Vietnam.

2:50 pm

Fri December 23, 2011

Taj Hotel Staff Were Mumbai's Unlikely Heroes

Next image Previous image

Credit Indranil Mukherjee / AFP/Getty Images

Indian firefighters attempt to put out a fire as smoke billows out of the historic Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai, which was stormed by armed gunmen in November 2008.

Credit Sajjad Hussain / AFP/Getty Images

The reception area of the Taj Mahal Hotel reopened on Dec. 22, 2008, less than a month after devastating attacks that rocked India's financial and entertainment capital.

By Alix Spiegel

Originally published on Fri December 23, 2011 9:18 pm

Listen

12:21 pm

Mon December 5, 2011

For Creative People, Cheating Comes Easier

Credit iStockphoto.com

New research suggests that people who are more creative are more likely to cheat.

By Alix Spiegel

Five months after the implosion of Enron, Feb. 12, 2002, Enron's chief executive, Ken Lay, finally stood in front of Congress and the world and placed his hand on a bible.

At that point everyone had questions for Lay. It was clear by then that Enron was the product of a spectacular ethical failure, that there had been massive cheating and lying. The real question was, how many people had been dishonest? Who was in on it?

2:00 pm

Fri November 25, 2011

Why We Give, Not Why You Think

By Alix Spiegel

Originally published on Fri November 25, 2011 4:16 pm

Listen

Transcript

GUY RAZ, HOST:

This time of year, pleas for donations are as plentiful as eggnog and door-buster sales. Americans give around $300 billion a year to charity. And as NPR's Alix Spiegel reports, psychologists have started to look more closely at when and why we're motivated to give.

3:37 am

Tue September 27, 2011

How Psychology Solved A WWII Shipwreck Mystery

Next image Previous image

Credit AP

A gun turret on the sunken Australian warship HMAS Sydney. All 645 people aboard the Sydney died.

Credit AP

The Australian warship HMAS Sydney is anchored in Sydney Harbor in this undated photograph. The ship sank in November 1941 after a battle with a German vessel. Despite extensive search efforts, the boats were not found until 2008.

Credit AP

A sonar image shows the seafloor wreckage of the German ship HSK Kormoran. The discovery of the ship came 67 years after it sank during a battle in World War II.

Credit AP

A 5.9-inch deck gun from the German raider HSK Kormoran, seen on April 7, 2008, off the coast of western Australia.

By Alix Spiegel

Originally published on Mon April 23, 2012 11:52 am

Listen

In November 1941, two ships crossed paths off the coast of Australia. One was the German raider HSK Kormoran. The other: an Australian warship called the HMAS Sydney. Guns were fired, the ships were damaged, and both sank to the bottom of the ocean.

11:01 pm

Sun September 11, 2011

For The Dying, A Chance To Rewrite Life

Credit Courtesy of Kate Frego

Kate Frego pins the turban of her mother, Aida Esenberg. Before Esenberg died in July of this year, she sat down with a dignity therapist to record the history of her life in what became a 50-page document.

By Alix Spiegel

For several decades, psychiatrists who work with the dying have been trying to come up with new psychotherapies that can help people cope with the reality of their death. One of these therapies asks the dying to tell the story of their life.

This end of life treatment, called dignity therapy, was created by a man named Harvey Chochenoff. When Chochenoff was a young psychiatrist working with the dying, he had a really powerful experience with one of the patients he was trying to counsel, a man with an inoperable brain tumor.

Now Playing

Alix Spiegel

Pages

Shots - Health Blog

11:01 pm

Sun January 22, 2012