麻豆约拍 - Radio 4 - All in the Mind

Tennis
How do you psychologically prepare for playing the biggest tennis game of your life? Possibly not a question that many of us need to ask ourselves, but it has been a crucial one for players at Wimbledon for the past two weeks. In this week's programme Claudia Hammond - a keen amateur tennis player - meets one of the sports psychologists for the Lawn Tennis Association on the practice courts at Wimbledon to ask him just that. How do you psyche yourself up to play the world's greats? How do you keep your cool if you are the greatest and are being defeated by a non-seeded player? And are there any tips for the not-so-great players to take home and play with?

Making a Life Change
Many people will want to change one aspect of their lives sooner or later - be it your weight, your job or even just your hairdo. Weightloss is an easy measurement to take to see if someone is being successful in their bid and the two guests in studio this week have been working in that area. Prof Ben Fletcher from the University of Hertforshire and consultant psychotherapist Mandy Cassidy from the commercial weightloss company Lighter Life know what it's like to try and get people to change their lives and have thoughts on how to best go about it. Ben's theory is that we are all creatures of habit, and by changing habits and behaviours we can address the issues we are unhappy with in our lives. Ben has found that his work on changing habits can result in people losing 2lbs of weight a week. Mandy thinks that in order to lose weight you do need to address your relationship with food - and this does mean changing habits, but also means learning about how you deal with those situations where you rely on food.

Conspiracy Theories
Was Princess Diana's death really an accident? Did those moon landings really happen? And did the CIA have something to do with Marilyn Monroe's death? All popular conspiracy theories, but for some reason we seem to be drawn to them. Do these theories have some sort of psychological function or do some of us just have suspicious minds? Patrick Leman from Royal Holloway University of London has been conducting research into this and joins Claudia Hammond to discuss.