A lot of people (IFLScience included) rely on Wi-Fi every single day, for our jobs, accessing the news, accidentally spending three hours on TikTok – and we can now do so in more places than ever before. But while it might be heading towards ubiquity, how many of us actually know what the term stands for?There are definitely a few good guesses floating around. The way it’s written would indicate that it’s short for something and the most similar term to be found with that in mind is “hi-fi”, which stands for “high fidelity”. Wi-Fi must stand for “wireless fidelity” then, right?Wrong (although it’s very reasonable logic). In fact, Wi-Fi actually doesn’t mean anything at all, according to Phil Belanger, a founding member of the Wi-Fi Alliance.“Wi-Fi doesn't stand for anything. It is not an acronym. There is no meaning,” said Belanger.So what does it mean?It turns out that the term Wi-Fi was magicked up by marketing firm Interbrand, who were tasked with coming up with a name that would be memorable to everyone. After all, the technical term for it was IEEE 802.11 – all well and good if you know what technical standards are, but not exactly the catchiest name in the world.Interbrand brought the Wi-Fi Alliance a list of 10 different names, but in the end, Wi-Fi was the winner. What it stood for wasn’t meant to have a direct meaning; it was more about what it would conjure up in consumers’ heads.“We proposed the name Wi-Fi, as customers told us that its similarities to the already widely understood concept, hi-fi, short for “high fidelity” helped them grasp the concept,” said Interbrand. “The name reflects that, even without cables, Wi-Fi delivers a high-quality, lossless connection wherever you go.”Why has the “wireless fidelity” myth persisted?So Wi-Fi and hi-fi sound similar and elicit similar thoughts about the products they represent, but according to Belanger, there’s more to why some people are so adamant that Wi-Fi means wireless fidelity.“The only reason that you hear anything about "Wireless Fidelity" is some of my colleagues in the group were afraid. They didn't understand branding or marketing. They could not imagine using the name "Wi-Fi" without having some sort of literal explanation,” Belanger explained. “So we compromised and agreed to include the tag line "The Standard for Wireless Fidelity" along with the name.”“It was a clumsy attempt to come up with two words that matched Wi and Fi. That's it.”That tag line was later dropped by the Wi-Fi Alliance after Wi-Fi began to grow in success, but clearly it’s got some long-lasting sticking power when it comes to popular thought.

People with high levels of psychopathic personality traits may move their heads less when they’re talking than those with lower degrees of psychopathy, new research has revealed. According to the study authors, this subtle pattern of nonverbal communication had previously been identified in male psychopaths, and their findings suggest that the same tendencies also apply to women.Psychopathy is characterized by a constellation of affective deficits such as callousness and a lack of remorse, as well as dysfunctional behaviors like pathological lying and manipulation. Excessive impulsivity and irresponsibility are also frequently demonstrated by individuals who fit the label, although it can sometimes be difficult to spot a psychopath due to their ability to hide these antisocial characteristics.However, prior work has identified a number of surprising tell-tale signs in the body language of psychopaths. For example, men with high levels of psychopathy tend to use more hand gestures than those with lower scores, while short bursts of blinking have also been linked to the condition.Reduced head movement during interviews has been identified as yet another potential give-away for psychopathic men, although very little research has been conducted on women. To fill this void, the study authors filmed clinical interviews with 213 incarcerated women, during which they administered a psychopathy questionnaire in order to assess the degree to which each participant meets the criteria for this diagnosis.An automated detection algorithm was then used to monitor each woman’s head movement in every frame of video. Overall, the researchers found that women with higher psychopathy scores tended to keep their heads more still than those with lower scores.On average, participants spent 40 percent of the interview with their head within the “range of moderate movement” away from its average position. However, psychopathic women kept their head within a “range of minimal movement” away from its average position for the majority of the interview.Spending more time with one’s head within this minimal movement range was positively correlated with psychopathy scores, while time spent in the moderate range was negatively associated with the condition.Based on this observation, the study authors state that their results “help identify a unique pattern of head dynamics characteristic of women scoring high on psychopathy, specifically, exhibiting more stationary head positioning during clinical interview administration.”Noting that it can often be difficult to spot a psychopath using behavior alone, the researchers go on to explain that keeping an eye out for nonverbal cues may be “of particular importance when studying a constellation of behaviors that are inherently deceptive.”The study has been published in the journal Personality and Individual differences.

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40,000 expected to attend tonight's rally...