Jamil Zaki
@zakijam
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Psychologist, professor @Stanford , director of the @StanfordSNL . Level 2 dad. My new book, HOPE FOR CYNICS:
Joined March 2009
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I'm elated to announce that my new book, HOPE FOR CYNICS, will be published on September 3rd!
It explains why people have lost faith in one another, and how we can build a sturdier, data-driven hope.
You can find more information and pre-order here:
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My new favorite "German has a word for everything" word.
Herzensbildung: training one's heart to see the humanity of another.
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Graduate school application season is here!
I've been advising people on this process forever, and have prepared a guide on the process: finding advisors, writing a statement, interviewing, etc.
A short 🧵...
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Halloween costume idea: Reviewer 2. Dress in totally nondescript fashion and savagely critique everyone else's costume.
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Just saw a t-shirt with “Crazy Rich Bayesians” written on it and have never envied a piece of clothing more in my life
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After this year, it's (very) easy to feel cynical. But cynicism traps us, bringing out the worst in people and stalling progress.
We can escape this trap by re-calibrating our thinking. Cynical beliefs become self-fulfilling; so do hopeful ones.
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My colleague Steven Roberts was recently invited to comment on a "debate" about diversity at a
@PsychScience
journal.
His experience was troubling and surreal, and lays bare the very biases he studies. He describes it in this important pre-print.
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It's the best kind of surreal to announce that THE WAR FOR KINDNESS is out today!
I truly hope this book can be useful, illuminating, and empowering to readers, and can't wait to hear your reactions.
Much more at:
✊🌻❤️
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The 2022 World Happiness Report (WHR) just pubbed. Lots of powerful insights, but I want to highlight one that doesn't seem to show up in the news:
Around the world, people have become *much* kinder during the pandemic, and that kindness is likely supporting our reslience.
🧵
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This pandemic is the largest collective trauma anyone alive has experienced.
Thinking about it through that lens has helped me process what we're going through, and surprisingly generated some hope, too.
Here is some of the relevant research:
(1/n)
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Impossible to adequately express my gratitude to colleagues, friends, and family.
No one gets here without a lot of luck, and *no one* gets here alone.
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Americans are extraordinarily wrong about who is around us.
Respondents estimate there are 60 million people in the US making more than $1M / year, and 100 million NYC residents!!!
Is this availability heuristic? Inattention to base rates? How?!
h/t
@CFCamerer
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A new meta-analysis including more than 25,000 participants finds that witnessing prosocial acts consistently inspires others to act kindly themselves.
Another reason to highlight / elevate the behaviors we want to become contagious...
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I am thrilled to announce that my first book, THE WAR FOR KINDNESS will be published on June 4th, and is available for preorder now!
Here are some reflections on the (3+ year!) process of writing it:
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Does anyone else immediately "unsmile" the second they log off of a Zoom call?
We need a name for that. "Rapid facial neutralization?" "Resting offline face?"
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Graduate application season is here again, so I'm re-sharing a guide I wrote for prospective students.
It's two years old at this point, but still matches what I'd tell folks now.
GOOD LUCK everyone!
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People waiting in line to vote is "inspiring" in the same way as stories about kids, e.g., mowing lawns to pay for medical treatment.
Both highlight individuals' strength and resolve and also systems that have utterly failed them (and everyone).
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In grad school I tried to schedule at least one meeting that scared me per conference.
I'd find a researcher whose work I admired and invite them to coffee.
It shocked me back then how many accepted! Now as an old person it doesn't. It's fun talking with the next generation.
Academics - Can you help me encourage doctoral students in my class to network/reach out to scholars they admire at upcoming in-person conferences?
Stories and advice for HOW to reach out/introduce yourself in a conference environment are appreciated. Thanks!
@AcademicChatter
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Finally! Only one way to describe the feeling...
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One side of the COVID crisis we should discuss more is the emotional impact of social distancing.
We're being asked to overcome the desire for human connection during a stressful time.
This could produce widespread loneliness and spur non-compliance with recommendations.
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We interrupt your chaos scrolling to bring you two goofballs in the woods.
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The pandemic as a social crisis:
New study finds that the COVID has collapsed trust in institutions, and increased anomie (meaninglessness).
Anomie, in turn, tracks people's desire to destroy political systems, likelihood of sharing fake news, etc.
Bleak closing paragraph...
Western societies were already frail when COVID-19 hit.
In a new paper, we show that the pandemic, and the fatigue from it, eroded trust in democracy further:
With omicron, stronger restrictions are again put in place & the erosion will deepen.
🧵(1/7)
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I'm overjoyed to announce I'm working on a new book!
THE HOPEFUL SKEPTIC will examine why people are steadily losing faith in each other, what that's doing to us, and what we can do about it.
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An incredible (and hopeful) new study on honesty:
Across 40 countries, people are more likely to return planted wallets when they contain money, esp a lot of money.
A pattern economists didn't predict, and consistent with broad altruistic concern.
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Our new paper is out today in
@NatureHumBehav
!
We used computational models and neuroimaging to explore why people see what they want to see.
PDF:
Commentary by
@affectivebrain
:
Short summary: (1/8)
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An important new paper exposing myths about the evolution of a "triune brain" (and some misconceptions that come with it), with a PANTHEON level title:
"Your brain is not an onion with a tiny reptile inside."
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This finding is so important.
For decades psychologists have told people to remain objective in the “control” condition of empathy studies.
It turns out our default is more like the “empathy” condition, and the unusual experience is to artificially *not* empathize!
Is empathy the default response to suffering?
A meta-analytic evaluation of perspective taking’s effect on empathic concern
People generally empathize with others unless they actively refrain from considering their perspective.
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Social distancing is vital to slowing coronavirus, but also threatens to create an epidemic of loneliness.
My new piece on keeping human connection alive in these strange and difficult times:
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One excellent current trend in psychology: people seem far less obsessed with “novelty” and more interested in robustness, and impact.
When I was in grad school, a senior prof said using someone else’s theory was like using their toothbrush: everyone should have their own.
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Private security bot rolling through the smokey haze in SF.
I was always a fan of the Star Trek future; looks like we’re headed for Blade Runner instead.
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Is silence simply the absence of sound? Or its own experience?
Brilliant new work suggests the latter, by demonstrating that people show auditory illusions for different "kinds" of silence.
Paper:
NYT story including demos:
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Since THE WAR FOR KINDNESS published, the most common request I've received is for practical exercises to build empathy and kindness.
On August 10th, you can try some out in an event I'm calling the Kindness Challenge.
(1/n)
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Might sounds odd, but this is a truly inspiring spreadsheet!
Hundreds of social scientists have mobilized to study coronavirus' effects, public health messaging, etc.
This transparency and open collaboration should be the new normal for our fields.
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These are such sad and resonant graphs. People want to *hear from* old friends, but are reluctant to *reach out,* because they don't think others are interested in reconnecting.
We don't realize others miss us as much as we miss them, so we keep missing each other.
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A 30m intervention encouraging parole officers to create empathic relationships with people on parole decreased recidivism by 13%.
A powerful demonstration of what human connection can do even within a dehumanizing system (which must also be changed).
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Thankfully, this is wrong.
Yes, power *can* decrease empathy. But it doesn’t have to (e.g., perspective taking can reverse this effect), and certainly doesn’t make anyone “physically less capable” of caring.
Irresponsible claim but one we don’t have to accept!
FYI: Becoming rich and powerful actually damages the empathy parts of your brain in such a way that you are physically less capable of caring about other people.
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Academic conferences are rightly being canceled all over the world.
I think trainees especially should still list accepted talks / posters they would have given on their cvs, and will “count” those presentations when evaluating folks.
No one should be penalized for a pandemic.
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Florida has effectively banned the teaching of AP Psychology.
Depriving students of knowledge about the human mind-including mental health / illness, relationships, and the brain-will harm future generations in the name of culture war. Shameful.
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An unusually poetic finding from neuroscience:
When people "take" pain to protect their romantic partner, that pain produces less suffering and more positive thoughts.
These effects are mediated by prosocial quieting of pain-related brain activity.
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An elegant new study finds that people learn more effectively to avoid choices that hurt others, versus themselves.
The analysis is sophisticated but the point is simple: prosocial care is a powerful motivator.
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Self compassion is a powerful tool for facing suffering.
In a new paper, we find people can equate it with laziness or self-indulgence, hurting their ability to cope.
But when they learn about self-compassion's utility, they use it more.
Terrific work from
@ChristinaChwyl
!
Our new paper in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin is out!
@zakijam
Why can many of us be so kind to others, yet so hard on ourselves? What are the consequences of treating ourselves kindly vs. harshly during times of adversity?
Preprint: 1/8
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Just finished up 7h of Zoom meetings in the same chair and I feel great
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This brilliant article captures what's long bothered me about Harris and others in the IDW: the fetishizing of pure reason, without critical assessment of how their own reasoning reflects what they want to believe.
h/t
@daviddesteno
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This will be a fun one:
@steverathje2
and I will join the incredible
@Phillipasoo
for a conversation about theater arts and empathy next Sunday!
Open to all, free or pay what you can with proceeds benefiting
@AAAJ_AAJC
. Join us!
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A fascinating paradox: People rate AI responses to their emotional problems as more empathic than human responses, but not if they *know* the response comes from AI.
They feel most "heard" by an AI they think is human, least by a human they think is AI.
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A transition team of epidemiologists and other researchers. Be still my heart.
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My latest, and first piece at
@HarvardBiz
! On building empathic organizational cultures through the power of social norms.
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For some reason, several people have asked me lately about gender and empathy. It's a big topic / question, so thought I'd share some relevant work.
Punchline: women do tend to empathize more than men, but this often has to do with motivation, not ability.
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Request deadline extensions. Cancel meetings. Do whatever you need right now.
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A spate of new (and surprising) studies find that loneliness *hasn���t* risen much during the pandemic.
Speculative reasons: community solidarity, creative online connections, and a lack of FOMO—because, after all, everyone is missing out, together.
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Thrilled to share our latest lab paper, in which
@steverathje2
documents how attending live plays affects empathy and prosocial behavior.
Steve put enormous effort into this, building an unusual collaboration across arts and social sciences.
Now In Press at Journal of Experimental Social Psychology!
With
@zakijam
and
@leorhackel
, we show across three field experiments (n = 1622) that seeing live theatre improves empathy, changes socio-political attitudes, and leads to prosocial behavior.
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A new study of empathy in daily life finds:
🟡 People empathize 3x as often with positive, versus neg, emotion.
🟡 "Pieces of empathy"-like sharing and thinking about others' feelings-usually co-occur.
🟡 Empathy typically tracks increased well being
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Extremely cool / powerful new paper. After learning about their peers' support of diversity:
-Students express more positive attitudes towards diversity themselves.
-URM students report greater belonging.
-Academic achievement gaps shrink.
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Psych nerd / dad humor at dinner last night:
Friend: "Elizabeth Loftus just won a big award!"
Me: "Are you SURE that really happened?!"
(I'll show myself out.)
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Three beliefs we give more credit than they deserve:
(1) People are inherently selfish.
(2) Selfishness is inherently adaptive.
(3) Outcomes between people are zero-sum.
These assumptions don't hold, and yet believing them can poison our view of people's actions.
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RIP to Walter Mischel. He was an incredible scientist and thoughtful mentor. More than anything, his enjoyment of psychology was palpable.
He accomplished so much but somehow never made it look like work.
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A new meta-analysis of almost 200k people finds that kindness reliably tracks well being.
Interestingly, acting kindly was more strongly linked with "eudaimonic" well being (a sense of meaning) than "hedonic" happiness (positive emotion).
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I had the honor of speaking at Stanford's Psychology graduation today.
I focused on embracing doubt and vulnerability, and on recognizing their importance to science, compassion, and personal growth.
Here's the transcript:
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This is a profound finding. Across 26 countries, people believe the other side views them more negatively than they actually do.
This "phantom polarization" can be mitigated by showing people the other side's real responses.
(Building on
@Leesplez
&
@profcikara
amazing work)
We are not as polarized as we think.
PREPRINT: Across 26 countries & 10,000 participants, our team of 80 collaborators find high replicability & generalizability of
@Leesplez
and
@profcikara
's work on what we think the other side believes.
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Giving the Super Bowl trophy to the team’a owner is like awarding a Nobel Prize to Elsevier.
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Today, somehow, marks ten years since arrived in California and the
@StanfordSNL
was born. I know bc I put *everything* in my calendar.
Here's the first picture I took of the Pacific, and some thoughts about how psychology, my lab, and I have changed since then.
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Just ran my 1,000th pandemic mile. I swear this loop has kept me sane. Thank you, loop.
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.
@profcikara
and I have a new piece out in
@TIME
today, in defense of "virtue signaling," and more specifically, publicly supporting the fight for equity and justice
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First time in the office in 522 (!) days, and found this gem of a gift from my late, wonderful colleague Al Bandura. Origin unknown.
(Al was also totally hilarious.)
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Can’t we all just get along?
Always great to hang out (and disagree) with
@paulbloomatyale
, the best frenemy a guy could have.
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I wrote a short academic review of "catastrophe compassion:" the surprising prosocial behavior that arises during disasters, its roots, and what we can learn from it.
In press now at
@TrendsCognSci
Preprint here:
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I wrote about how privilege can sap empathy, and how we might transform the empathic momentum of this movement into something more lasting, for the
@washingtonpost
:
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Yearly NSF fellowship reminder that SO MANY of us have been rejected, and being turned down doesn’t mean the reviewers are right.
I got rejected twice, the first time bc R1 was confident one can’t learn *anything* about empathy through the brain.
🤦♂️ 🤷🏻♂️ 🧠 🤓
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"Peace" means different things to different people, especially when power is unequal.
In new research, Jewish Israelis more often defined it as harmony between groups (positive peace); Palestinians more often as equity and justice (structural peace).
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Today many wonderful young scientists received fellowships, and MANY more wonderful young scientists did not.
If you're in the latter category, remember no rejection is stronger than you.
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The one where I now teach :)
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I've been a *huge*
@HiddenBrain
fan for years, which made it a special pleasure to take part in this episode.
They masterfully connect research on empathy with the chaos and opportunity of modern life.
Check it out!
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Just realized it’s exactly 12 years since I defended my dissertation (👨🎓—>👴🏼)
Academia is many things to many people. I am lucky that for me it’s been first and foremost a stimulating community of kind, curious people.
Thanks forever to Kevin Ochsner for taking a chance on me.
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I’m writing a book! CHOOSING EMPATHY will argue that people can grow their capacity to care, & tell the stories of cops, doctors, etc who do
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This piece captures something I've been struggling with.
As a researcher, teacher, and dad I want to be helpful in this moment, but the idea of being "productive" right now feels eerie and even inappropriate.
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New lab paper: when people use technology to record and share experiences, they ironically remember those experiences less well.
Great to work with
@etemp17
,
@DianaTamir
, and
@adrianfward
!
paper:
open materials:
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Hard to believe it, but the
@StanfordSNL
turns 8 years old today. If our lab was a person, it'd be in 3rd grade! Here's its baby picture.
Whether times are good or... 2020, I'm always grateful to work with the kind, brilliant scientists who have come through our little community
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Here's my new theory paper: an attempt to bridge empathy and interpersonal emotion regulation.
One punchline: prosociality ~= making others feel good.
I've been working on this for a *long* time. Open to thoughts and hope it provokes some as well!
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This poem is called “First lines of emails I’ve received while quarantining.”
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A provocative essay relevant to psychology and beyond:
We tend to focus on "i-frames:" individual, nudge-like solutions to social problems.
This can obscure, and even decrease support for "s-frames:" systemic change needed to truly address them.
🧵
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My brilliant colleague Steven Roberts has a forthcoming review on the psychology of American racism. Necessary reading anytime, and necessary now.
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During the pandemic, "self-care" became wildly popular, and it should be.
But self-care alone might not give us the meaning we need right now. We should focus on, and systematize "other care," too.
My latest, for
@TheAtlantic
:
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sexy low voter turnout
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New CDC data find an explosion of mood disorder symptoms.
24% of respondents report significant depression; 30% report significant anxiety: both more than triple rates recorded in early 2019.
Worse among younger adults, women, and low income groups.
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Beautiful new work on "social homeostasis:"
Much like a thermostat monitors temperature and adjusts, animals monitor how much social contact they have, and loneliness drives them to seek out more.
(1/2)
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This week we launched a brand new and sort of experimental seminar at Stanford: Becoming Kinder. (1/4)
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Once in a while, researchers will debate whether science should involve "storytelling" or not.
To me, this is semantically confused, akin to debating whether science should include verbs. Storytelling could mean sensationalizing / fabricating (bad), or narrative clarity (good)
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MTurk is the Monsanto of psychological science.
By making large-sample research so convenient, it's turned our work into a monoculture, driving out "small batch" approaches, and guiding researchers only towards questions they can answer online.
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Super interesting new work: people who live in diverse countries or zip codes act more prosocially, in part bc they identify more with people of all sorts.
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Steven (not on Twitter) explains this better than I can, but the very process of this "debate" signals how far we have to go as a field in creating an open, inclusive scientific community.
Please consider reading and sharing his response.
/end
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"Social craving" in the brain: after isolation, midbrain responses to social cues resemble responses to food cues after fasting.
Fascinating and hugely relevant now. Great work as usual from
@rebecca_saxe
,
@kaymtye
et al., with
@livia_tomova
leading.
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High schoolers did this. Please, no more bemoaning their “lost generation.” They’re showing us all of us how to make change.
Delta is reaching out to the NRA to let them know we will be ending their contract for discounted rates through our group travel program. We will be requesting that the NRA remove our information from their website.
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Heartbroken to hear of John Cacioppo's passing. An intellectual hero to virtually everyone in our field, who will live on in the generations of science and people he inspired. RIP, John.
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Empathy researchers disagree on definitions a lot, but I think we can all agree on what "compassion" isn't:
Sessions says ending DACA is "the compassionate thing to do"
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