Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-05-01Epub Date: 2026-04-03DOI: 10.1177/09567976261434113
Gal R Chen, Zaheera Maswadeh, Leon Deouell, Ran R Hassin
{"title":"Conscious Detection of Spoken Words Depends on Their Valence.","authors":"Gal R Chen, Zaheera Maswadeh, Leon Deouell, Ran R Hassin","doi":"10.1177/09567976261434113","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261434113","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Conscious experiences appear to play a central role in human behavior, yet most neural processing occurs outside of consciousness. Understanding how the mind prioritizes information for consciousness is, therefore, crucial for theories of cognition. Prior research has largely focused on vision, but generalization is tenuous given the vastly different characteristics of the senses-particularly for audition, which lacks foveation and cannot be intentionally stopped. We examine the affective domain, for which prioritization is not well understood. In three experiments (two preregistered), 101 Hebrew-speaking adults completed a visual task with a stream of auditory pseudowords in the background. Occasionally a meaningful word appeared, and participants were asked about its presence. Using objective and subjective awareness measures, we found that neutral words were prioritized over negative words, regardless of task difficulty, intelligibility, and low-level features. These findings challenge theorizing and modal intuitions, and we discuss ways in which those can be reconciled.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"303-317"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147616543","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-05-01Epub Date: 2026-04-15DOI: 10.1177/09567976261434817
Manuel Bohn, Christoph J Völter, Daniel Hanus, Nico Eisbrenner, Johanna Eckert, Jana Holtmann, Daniel Haun
{"title":"Individual Differences in Great Ape Cognition Across Time and Domains: Stability, Structure, and Predictability.","authors":"Manuel Bohn, Christoph J Völter, Daniel Hanus, Nico Eisbrenner, Johanna Eckert, Jana Holtmann, Daniel Haun","doi":"10.1177/09567976261434817","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261434817","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Understanding variation in cognitive abilities is critical to understanding both the evolution and development of cognition. In this study, we examined the stability, structure, and predictability of individual differences in cognitive abilities in great apes across a broad range of domains, including social cognition, reasoning about quantities, executive function, and inferential reasoning. We administered six tasks to 48 individuals from four species, spanning 10 sessions over 1.5 years. Task performance was most strongly predicted by stable, individual-specific characteristics rather than transient or group-level variables. Using additional data from the same individuals in other tasks, we found substantial positive correlations between nonsocial tasks. In contrast, tasks measuring social cognition were not correlated either with each other or with nonsocial measures. Future studies should work toward mechanistic models of great apes' cognitive processes to build an understanding of the evolution of cognition based on process-level commonalities across species.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"331-346"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147691885","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-05-01Epub Date: 2026-04-20DOI: 10.1177/09567976261435965
Ziyu Ren, Leigh H Grant, Boaz Keysar
{"title":"Can Italians Understand Spanish? Language Closeness Exacerbates the Illusion of Understanding.","authors":"Ziyu Ren, Leigh H Grant, Boaz Keysar","doi":"10.1177/09567976261435965","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261435965","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>People often understand parts of languages that are closely related to their native tongue. But do they understand what the speaker intends to convey? We discovered that linguistic similarity induces an illusion of understanding, leading people to believe they understand more than they actually do. In Study 1, adult native Italian speakers overestimated their understanding of a speaker's intent more when they listened to Spanish (close language) than to Northern Jiangsu Chinese (distant language). In Study 2, adult native Mandarin Chinese speakers overestimated their understanding more when they listened to Northern Jiangsu Chinese (close language) than to Spanish (distant language). When listening to the closer language, listeners were more confident, and this mediated their overestimation of understanding. An illusion of understanding, then, increases not despite language closeness but because of it. This has theoretical implications for the role of calibration in communication and practical implications for miscommunication in international settings.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"365-374"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147729814","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-05-01Epub Date: 2026-04-02DOI: 10.1177/09567976261417325
Adam W Broitman, Michael J Kahana
{"title":"Neural-Context Reinstatement of Recurring Events.","authors":"Adam W Broitman, Michael J Kahana","doi":"10.1177/09567976261417325","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261417325","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Episodic recollection involves retrieving context information bound to specific events. However, autobiographical memory largely comprises recurrent, similar experiences that become integrated into joint representations. In the current study, we used scalp electroencephalography (EEG) to extract a neural signature of temporal context and investigate whether recalling a recurring event accompanies the reinstatement of one or multiple occurrences. We asked 52 young adults (aged 18-30) from the Philadelphia area to study and recall lists of words that included both once-presented and repeated items. Participants recalled repeated items in association with neighboring list items from each occurrence, but with stronger clustering around the repetition's initial occurrence. Furthermore, multivariate spectral analyses of EEG data recorded just prior to the recall of these words revealed stronger patterns of context reinstatement of the first occurrence than the second. Together, these results suggest that the initial occurrence of an event carries stronger temporal-context associations than later repetitions, as predicted by retrieved-context frameworks of episodic memory.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"318-330"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13137876/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147609899","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-05-01Epub Date: 2026-04-15DOI: 10.1177/09567976261436988
Coco Xinyue Liu, B Ariel Blair, Elizabeth R Tenney
{"title":"Registered Report: Can Agentic Black Women Get Ahead? An Experiment Revisited.","authors":"Coco Xinyue Liu, B Ariel Blair, Elizabeth R Tenney","doi":"10.1177/09567976261436988","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261436988","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In 2012, Livingston et al. found that Black women were buffered against gender backlash; whether Black women were dominant or supportive toward an employee did not affect people's perceptions of them as leaders in an organization. Conversely, White women incurred a status penalty for being dominant. Twelve years later, no direct replication has been published, and related research reached different conclusions: that Black women experience the most gender backlash for being dominant (as politicians) or that race does not affect gender backlash (for expressing anger). Given the seemingly contradictory results and limitations of previous research, the relationship between race and gender backlash warrants reexamination. In this registered report, we conducted a high-powered direct replication and extension of Livingston et al. with adult participants online (<i>N</i> = 1,996). We found that both Black and White women (as well as men) suffered a status penalty for displaying dominance, suggesting a failure to replicate Livingston et al.'s findings. We discuss implications for theories of intersectional gender backlash.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"347-364"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147691893","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-03-20DOI: 10.1177/09567976261425576
Bastian Jaeger, Maarten Bosten
{"title":"The Relation Between Attributions of Mental Capacities and Moral Standing Across Six Diverse Cultures.","authors":"Bastian Jaeger, Maarten Bosten","doi":"10.1177/09567976261425576","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261425576","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Whose welfare and interests matter from a moral perspective? This question is at the center of many polarizing debates, for example, on the ethicality of abortion or meat consumption. A widely cited hypothesis holds that attributions of moral standing are guided by which mental capacities an entity is perceived to have. Specifically, perceived <i>sentience</i> (the capacity to feel pleasure and pain) is thought to be the primary determinant, rather than perceived <i>agency</i> (the capacity to navigate the world and social relationships) or other abilities. This has been described as a general feature of moral cognition, but the evidence for this is mixed and overwhelmingly based on Western participants. Here, we examined the link between attributions of mind and moral standing across six culturally diverse countries-Brazil, Nigeria, Italy, Saudi Arabia, India, and the Philippines-using a sample of 1,255 participants (aged 18-74 years old) who were recruited via the online platform Toloka. In every country, entities' moral standing was most strongly related to their perceived sentience.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"243-254"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147491539","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-03-23DOI: 10.1177/09567976261427747
Dunigan Folk, Elizabeth Dunn
{"title":"How Does Turning to AI for Companionship Predict Loneliness and Vice Versa?","authors":"Dunigan Folk, Elizabeth Dunn","doi":"10.1177/09567976261427747","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261427747","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Advances in AI have enabled chatbots to provide warm, personalized support. Yet little is known about the long-term consequences of AI companionship. Across a 12-month longitudinal study with more than 2,000 adults from four Western countries, we examined the bidirectional relationships between social chatbot use and loneliness.We found evidence that increased social chatbot use predicted increased loneliness, using a single-item measure of emotional isolation. When we used a broader and more stable measure of social connection, we found evidence that feeling less socially connected predicted subsequent increases in social chatbot use; however, chatbot use did not significantly predict decreases in social connection. Taken together, these findings provide initial evidence that being lonely may spur people to seek companionship through chatbots but that such use may, over time, exacerbate feelings of loneliness. We urge caution, however, in drawing strong conclusions given the exploratory nature of our analyses.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"276-286"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13068143/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147504658","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Does Income Inequality Predict Adolescent Depressive Symptoms?","authors":"Sondre Aasen Nilsen, Kyrre Breivik, Kjell Morten Stormark, Tormod Bøe","doi":"10.1177/09567976261432207","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261432207","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Income inequality is frequently cited as a forceful determinant of mental health and as a possible contributor to the rising trend in adolescent depressive symptoms. However, research findings often rely on low-powered cross-sectional designs. We conducted a preregistered study of the within-municipality effect of income inequality on adolescent depressive symptoms in Norway, covering ≈550,000 respondents nested within 863 municipality years and 340 municipalities. Using multilevel modeling and equivalence testing, the overall within-municipality effect of income inequality was neither statistically significant nor practically meaningful and did not significantly interact with family financial situation. A significant gender interaction showed that rising inequality predicted slightly higher depressive symptoms among females and slightly lower among males; however, the main gender effects were also probably too small to be meaningful. We conclude that changes in income inequality likely do not meaningfully predict nor help explain changes in adolescent depressive symptoms in Norway from 2010 to 2019.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"255-275"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147575136","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-03-18DOI: 10.1177/09567976261430288
Yue Zhang, Nicholas Gaspelin
{"title":"From Capture to Control: Initial Capture Increases Learned Suppression.","authors":"Yue Zhang, Nicholas Gaspelin","doi":"10.1177/09567976261430288","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261430288","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Salient stimuli have the potential to distract us from our immediate goals. Much research has therefore aimed to understand how we learn to use attention to resist distraction by salient stimuli. We propose a new hypothesis whereby an initial instance of distraction can improve future suppression of salient stimuli. Across three experiments (<i>N</i> = 120 college students, aged 18-35 years), we provide evidence for this hypothesis using a new eye-tracking approach. The results demonstrated that an initial instance of distraction occurred before salient distractors were suppressed. Notably, if this initial instance of distraction was eliminated or weakened via experimental manipulations, learned suppression of the distracting stimuli was greatly reduced. Together, these findings suggest that attentional capture can serve as a learning signal that improves future attentional control. They also indicate that learned suppression emerges rapidly, which has strong implications for models of attention and cognitive control.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"227-242"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147481409","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Psychological SciencePub Date : 2026-04-01Epub Date: 2026-04-03DOI: 10.1177/09567976261433459
Nicholas A Coles, João Francisco Goes Braga Takayanagi, Gabrielle L Grant, Dana M Basnight-Brown
{"title":"The Rise, Impact, and Imbalances of Big-Team Psychology.","authors":"Nicholas A Coles, João Francisco Goes Braga Takayanagi, Gabrielle L Grant, Dana M Basnight-Brown","doi":"10.1177/09567976261433459","DOIUrl":"10.1177/09567976261433459","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The present work evaluates the rise, impact, and imbalances of big-team psychology via an analysis of 3,023,895 articles published in the 21st century. Results indicate that big teams-ranging from 10 to more than 100 authors-are relatively unusual (<i>n</i> = 49,695) but increasing in popularity. More notably, such collaborations generate unusually high impact in terms of yearly mentions in scholarly articles (<i>n</i> = 39,788,158), the news (<i>n</i> = 1,018,639), social media (<i>n</i> = 5,971,965), and policy documents (<i>n</i> = 69,959). An examination of country-level sociocultural indicators revealed that first authors, in general, tend to be in regions that are relatively WEIRD: Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic. However, this imbalance is slightly more pronounced among larger teams. In summary, results suggest that big-team science is an emerging trend in psychology-one that is unevenly deployed across world regions to generate high-impact scientific insights.</p>","PeriodicalId":20745,"journal":{"name":"Psychological Science","volume":" ","pages":"287-297"},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2026-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147616557","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}