The Brainspin blog has a list of ‘Ten Psychology Studies from 2009 Worth Knowing About’ that covers a mix of well-known studies and hidden gems from the last year.
The descriptions, as you might expect, are a little brief and give just the punchline without some of the possible drawbacks but all are linked to the original study so you can them in full (well, at least as far as your access allows).
One of my favourites was number 7, which provides evidence against the common idea that people who connect better with others might be better at detecting lies:
A study in the journal Psychological Science tested the hypothesis that emotional mimicry—the tendency to mirror the emotions of someone we’re interacting with—makes it difficult to identify liars. Nonmimickers were significantly better at identifying liars than mimickers, and thus were harder to fool with the old flim flam sales routine. The reason is that mimicry reduces psychological distance and lowers defenses. Even if someone probably isn’t lying to you, it’s best to keep the cushion in place just in case.
Link to ‘Ten Psychology Studies from 2009 Worth Knowing About’.
Mind Hacks 