{"title":"How to measure negative effects of psychological interventions","authors":"Alexander Rozental , Tomáš Řiháček","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102084","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102084","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Negative effects of psychological interventions, such as deterioration, non-response, and novel symptoms, remain underexamined despite their ethical and clinical significance. This commentary reviews current methods for assessing such effects, highlighting the limitations of relying solely on symptom deterioration and the need for more direct patient-reported measures. Eight commonly used instruments are described and compared in terms of content, coverage, and psychometric properties. Methodological challenges, such as timing of assessment, measurement reactivity, and patients' reluctance to disclose harm, are also discussed. Recommendations are provided for improving the monitoring and reporting of negative effects in both clinical and research settings, with an emphasis on transparency, patient safety, and the inclusion of diverse populations and treatment modalities.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102084"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144513200","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Naomi Ellemers , Dick de Gilder , Matthew J. Hornsey , Jolanda Jetten
{"title":"Organizational responses to whistleblowers: How to overcome willful ignorance relating to social identity processes in organizations","authors":"Naomi Ellemers , Dick de Gilder , Matthew J. Hornsey , Jolanda Jetten","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102080","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102080","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Whistleblowers reporting misconduct often trigger defensive responses within organizations. We attribute this to the experience of <em>social identity threat,</em> a phenomenon that prevents organizational learning and improvement. Theory and research highlight three types of barriers people in organizations need to overcome before responding to potential problems. They have to accept: (1) the validity of the concern (2) their responsibility to act and (3) their ability to address it. We connect these into an integrative framework that offers a new perspective to understand willful ignorance in organizations. It specifies what managers, regulators, and employees can do to deal more constructively with early signals of organizational problems and offers an agenda for how future studies might extend existing knowledge on organizational responsiveness.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102080"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144513197","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Fabian Hutmacher , Marlene Sophie Altenmüller , Kevin Winter
{"title":"Cure or curse? The role of deliberation in shaping willful ignorance","authors":"Fabian Hutmacher , Marlene Sophie Altenmüller , Kevin Winter","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102082","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102082","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>There is a widespread tendency to avoid, disregard, or dispute belief-inconsistent information. The role of deliberation (i.e., the investment of cognitive effort) in shaping this tendency is a contested topic in psychological science. While some posit that more deliberation reduces biased information processing, others argue that more deliberation increases biased information processing. We suggest that these conflicting lines of reasoning can be reconciled by considering the underlying processing goal that is dominant in a given situation. In the case of dominant accuracy goals, more deliberation should reduce biased information processing. In the case of dominant directional goals, exactly the opposite should be true. We offer methodological pointers for future studies that could test these predictions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102082"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144513199","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Jacob L. Orquin , Andrea Pittarello , Joy Geng , Valdimar Sigurdsson
{"title":"Willful inattention: Integrating visual attention mechanisms and willful ignorance","authors":"Jacob L. Orquin , Andrea Pittarello , Joy Geng , Valdimar Sigurdsson","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102083","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102083","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Willful ignorance refers to the intentional avoidance of relevant information, even when access is cost-free. We integrate this concept with the idea that visual attention operates along a continuum and define <em>willful inattention</em> as below-baseline attention to relevant information, driven by avoidance motivation. Willful inattention allows individuals to reduce awareness of visually apparent information and plays a significant role in several domains including dishonesty and harmful consumption. We show how interventions aimed at reducing willful inattention may harm information seeking behavior and vice versa. Policies targeting heterogenous populations must therefore tradeoff capturing the attention of information seekers and avoiders.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102083"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144513213","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Does curiosity make us riskier? The mediating role of willful ignorance","authors":"Maayan Finegold, Yoella Bereby-Meyer","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102081","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102081","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Willful ignorance—the deliberate avoidance of information—plays a pivotal role in shaping how individuals assess and respond to risk. This paper explores how willful ignorance contributes to both active and passive risk-taking, with particular emphasis on the latter, where lack of action can lead to significant harm. We examine the potential of epistemic curiosity to counteract this avoidance by promoting instrumental information-seeking, while also acknowledging its potential to increase active risk-taking through heightened sensation-seeking. We present a dual-pathway model in which curiosity has opposing effects on different types of risk behavior, mediated by information preferences. This framework highlights willful ignorance as a key mechanism in risk-related decisions and offers insights into how curiosity can both mitigate and amplify risk.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102081"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144513218","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Flashbulb memories","authors":"Olivier Luminet , Aline Cordonnier","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102079","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102079","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper reviews the intriguing category of flashbulb memories (FBMs), which are detailed memories of the reception context. After examining the different measures and operationalizations of the construct, we present the arguments in favor and against labeling FBM as a special category of memory. Explanatory models underscore a) the complementary role of cognitive, emotional, and social factors, b) the development of direct versus indirect pathways and c) a temporal distinction between immediate and long-term responses. The paper examines brain underpinnings, applications to clinical groups, and individual differences in age and culture. The links with the collective memory and its interdisciplinary relevance are then developed.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102079"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144513201","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"National memory","authors":"Jeremy K. Yamashiro, Zizhan Yao","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102078","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102078","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Ernest Renan defined a nation as a community sharing a rich legacy of memories, the desire to live together, and the desire to build on their mutual heritage. We review psychological research on how representations of the national past are molded to help memory fulfill these identitarian functions. Specifically, we examine nationalistic overclaiming of historical influence, the ideologically normative function of charters in the form of origin stories, schematic frameworks for meaning making in the form of national narrative templates and implicit temporal trajectories, transformations of national memory across generations in response to contemporary priorities, identity positioning in relation to shameful histories or memories of victimhood, and the relation between national memory and imagination for the national future.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102078"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144335497","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Collective memory and social media","authors":"Robbert-Jan Adriaansen , Rik Smit","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102077","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102077","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This review examines how the field of digital memory studies analyzes social media's transformation of collective memory. We trace theoretical reconceptualizations of collective memory to concepts like connective memory and memory of the multitude, showing how platformization reshapes remembering and forgetting through algorithmic curation. The review identities new mnemonic practices enabled by social media – hashtag commemoration, memetic memory, and digital memory activism – which demonstrates how platform features both democratize and manipulate historical narratives. We identify key challenges: methodological and data access limitations, Western-centric bias, and artificial intelligence as emerging memory agents. As social media platforms continuously evolve as primary sites for memory construction, digital memory studies must constantly adapt its approaches to understand how societies remember in changing networked environments.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102077"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144335512","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"More nuanced assessments improve predictive and explanatory accuracy","authors":"Samuel J. Henry , René Mõttus","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102074","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102074","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>A major advancement in recent personality research is the extension of the trait hierarchy from a few broad domains and their facets to more numerous nuances. These are now an established phenomenon among personality psychologists, with wide-reaching empirical evidence backing their status as distinct traits. However, we believe that nuances' implications for psychological assessment remain underappreciated in psychology more broadly. Here, we briefly summarize their discovery and subsequently amassed evidence base, offer a conceptual interpretation of their phenomenology, address possible critiques, and highlight recent work demonstrating their benefits. Explicitly considering nuances facilitates effective and efficient assessment, improves prediction of important life outcomes, and helps elucidate traits’ links with other variables. We suggest that other areas of psychology may also benefit from addressing the nuances of their constructs.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102074"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144335495","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Lars Veldmeijer , Gijs Terlouw , Nynke Boonstra , Jim van Os
{"title":"Opening doors or building cages? The adverse consequences of psychiatric diagnostic labels","authors":"Lars Veldmeijer , Gijs Terlouw , Nynke Boonstra , Jim van Os","doi":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102076","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.copsyc.2025.102076","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Psychiatric diagnostic labels can no longer be considered mere neutral descriptors for mental distress; the weight of evidence indicates that they shape reality, often in problematic ways. Providing accurate information about the scientific status of diagnostic labels helps minimize many of these problems. Academic psychiatry and psychology must therefore learn to resist the temptation to reduce human complexity to fixed labels, provide accurate information when labels are applied, consider to separate diagnoses from experienced distress, recognize patients’ experiences as legitimate perspectives, and, most importantly, develop the conceptual competence to design and integrate alternative human-centered approaches that go beyond diagnosis-centric practices.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48279,"journal":{"name":"Current Opinion in Psychology","volume":"65 ","pages":"Article 102076"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-06-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144335496","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}