Mortality salience effects (death reminders lead to ingroup-bias and defensive protection of one’s worldview) have been claimed to be a fundamental human motivator; the authors couldn't replicate MS

Sætrevik, Bjørn, and Hallgeir Sjåstad. 2019. “A Pre-registered Attempt to Replicate the Mortality Salience Effect in Traditional and Novel Measures.” PsyArXiv. May 17. doi:10.31234/osf.io/dkg53

Abstract: Mortality salience (MS) effects, in which death reminders lead to ingroup-bias and defensive protection of one’s worldview, have been claimed to be a fundamental human motivator and to be supported in a number of studies. However, empirical support draws mainly from a single task in a single cultural setting, where research robustness and transparency are difficult to evaluate. We wanted to replicate the MS effect in an additional cultural setting (Norway), using both a traditional essay measure of patriotism, a novel measure of a culturally relevant essay about democratic values in the aftermath of a terror attack, and a novel measure of pro-social behaviour. We also included checks of whether the MS manipulation had effects on Stroop processing and psychophysiology. Despite our best efforts, the study failed to replicate the MS effect, both as direct and the conceptual replication. The results on the pro-social measure provided suggestive evidence for increased generosity to non-family members and charity. Surprisingly, we failed to find a significant MS effect on processing speed of social or death related words and on psychophysiological responses. Despite being a relatively small study (n = 100), it indicates that the large MS effect reported in the published literature may be more difficult to reproduce than previously assumed, that it does not transfer easily to other domains, and that if it exist, it might not have a straightforward cognitive mechanism. In future research, the combination of high-powered and pre-registered experiments is needed to detect or reject the MS effect with greater certainty.

We still have no "tests to determine which people have superior lie production abilities"

Personality traits of a good liar: A systematic review of the literature. Monica Semrad, Bridie Scott-Parker, Michael Nagel. Personality and Individual Differences, Volume 147, 1 September 2019, Pages 306-316. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.05.007

Abstract: Although deception is used by many high-risk occupations, including military leaders, lawyers and politicians, there are currently no selection tests to determine which people have superior lie production abilities for these roles. The lack of selection tests is particularly crucial in the high-risk covert roles of undercover operations and human source management within policing. This paper uses the PRISMA systematic review technique to summarise and synthesis the extant literature examining deception theories and lie production. This paper also examines the relationship between lie production and Emotional Intelligence, and the personality traits of the Dark Triad and the HEXACO, to elucidate the characteristics of good liars. The scant research published within this field has been conducted with a variety of experimental designs and dependent variables. Generally, results indicate that the traits, skills and abilities behind sender demeanour, such as believability and honesty, may be fundamental to lie production ability. These characteristics could be considered in selection testing for to identify people with the ability to deceive effectively.

Attitudes Toward Cognitive Enhancement: More likely to support the use of cognitive enhancement by others than by themselves, and more by employees than by students or athletes

Attitudes Toward Cognitive Enhancement: The Role of Metaphor and Context. Erin C. Conrad, Stacey Humphries & Anjan Chatterjee. AJOB Neuroscience, Volume 10, 2019 - Issue 1, Pages 35-47. May 9 2019. https://doi.org/10.1080/21507740.2019.1595771

Abstract: The widespread use of stimulants among healthy individuals to improve cognition has received growing attention; however, public attitudes toward this practice are not well understood. We determined the effect of framing metaphors and context of use on public opinion toward cognitive enhancement. We recruited 3,727 participants from the United States to complete three surveys using Amazon’s Mechanical Turk between April and July 2017. Participants read vignettes describing an individual using cognitive enhancement, varying framing metaphors (fuel versus steroid), and context of use (athletes versus students versus employees). The main outcome measure was the difference in respondent-assigned level of acceptability of the use of cognitive enhancement by others and by themselves between the contrasting vignettes. Participants were more likely to support the use of cognitive enhancement by others than by themselves and more when the use of enhancement by others was framed with a fuel metaphor than with a steroid metaphor. Metaphoric framing did not affect participants’ attitudes toward their own use. Participants supported the use of enhancement by employees more than by students or athletes. These results are discussed in relation to existing ethical and policy literature.

Keywords: cognitive enhancement, neuroethics, cosmetic neurology, neurology, cognitive neuroscience, nootropics

The body-related afferent signals that subserve body ownership (“this body is mine”) might have a key role in human sense of agency (“this action is due to my own will”); body ownership helps building up motor consciousness

The Role of Body-Related Afferent Signals in Human Sense of Agency. Maria Pyasik, Tiziano Furlanetto, Lorenzo Pia. Journal of Experimental Neuroscience, May 16, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1177/1179069519849907

Abstract: At present, most of the neurocognitive models of human sense of agency (ie, “this action is due to my own will”) have been traditionally rooted in a variety of internal efferent signals arising within the motor system. However, recent neuroscientific evidence has suggested that also the body-related afferent signals that subserve body ownership (ie, “this body is mine”) might have a key role in this process. Accordingly, in the present review paper, we briefly examined the literature investigating how and to what extent body ownership contributes to building up human motor consciousness. Evidence suggests that, if required by the context, body ownership per se can act on agency attribution (ie, independently from efferent signals). Hence, a unitary and coherent subjective experience of willed actions (ie, “this willed action is being realized by my own body”) requires both awareness of being an agent and of owning the body.

Keywords: Bodily self, body ownership, sense of agency, afferent signals, efferent signals

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When we achieve willed actions, we do not feel as though those acts simply happen to us, we strongly sense to be in charge. Such subjective experience of authorship is known as sense of agency.1 In other words, we are aware of intending, initiating, and controlling our volitional movements (so-called “body agency”),2 as well as their consequences in the external world (“external agency”),2 and this awareness is vital for survival. Indeed, perceiving to be an agent allows distinguishing actions that are self-generated from those that are generated by others. This, in turn, contributes to the key signature of human nature, that is, the phenomenological experience of self-consciousness.3

[...]

It is worth emphasizing, however, that whenever we successfully achieve volitional actions, we feel not only being in control of our movements and their consequences but also that those movements are being executed through our own body (body agency). For instance, if I am thirsty and I quickly get a glass of water, I experience that my own body is moving toward the glass. In the absence of any movement, such an embodied and enduring sense of being aware of our own body, termed body ownership,16 is known to be rooted in multisensory integration. In other words, it arises whenever the body-related afferent sensory signals (ie, visual, tactile, proprioceptive, kinesthetic, auditory, etc) that constantly reach our body are integrated in both spatial and temporal terms. For example, if someone else caresses my arm, I experience that body part as my own because I see and I feel the touches at the same time and in the same place. All in all, the stronger the spatiotemporal congruency among these signals, the higher the feeling of body ownership.17–20 It is thought that in the human brain, body ownership is underpinned by the activity of a network including premotor areas, the occipitotemporal cortex, the primary/secondary somatosensory areas, and the anterior insula.18,21–23

Capitalizing on the above-mentioned considerations, it follows that the coherence, the richness, and the completeness of human subjective experience of being the agent of a given voluntary action necessarily requires both awareness of controlling the actions and awareness of owning the body that achieves them. However, whether, how, and to what extent body ownership has a role in building up such experiences is an issue that only very recently has come to the forefront of the scientific investigations. For these reasons, in this article, we aimed at reviewing all studies that, in one way or another, investigated the possible role of body ownership in building up the sense of agency over the body movements.

[...] In summary, this first set of studies showed that if an external object that is perceived as part of one’s own body moves together with the participant’s body, an illusory sense of agency over the movements of that object arises. This does not happen if the moving external object is not perceived as part of one’s own body.

[...]

Another evidence came from a study employing the full-body illusion showing that when a virtual embodied avatar was walking repeatedly along a route, while the participant remained still, an illusion of walking occurred.40 This did not happen when the avatar was not embodied. It is also worth noting that highly automated actions, as walking, are thought to prime the movements and intentions to move in advance. In summary, this second set of studies showed that, if participants’ motor representations (eg, motor intentions, motor imagery or motor plan) match the movements of an external object perceived as part of one’s own body, an illusion of agency arises. This does not happen if the moving external object is not perceived as part of one’s own body.

[...]

To sum up, here we reviewed evidence supporting the idea that body ownership does have a role in human sense of agency, specifically body agency. The review shows that being aware of one’s own body has a role per se in building and maintaining the sense of agency, namely it can act on agency attribution in the absence of any efferent signals, such as motor intentions and feedforward predictions, and causes preceding effects and so on. First, it is worth noticing that giving any role to body ownership is not trivial but, rather, consistent with human nature. Indeed, our actions are achieved mainly through the physical body,50 and the body is a prerequisite for any successful interaction with the environment.51 Indeed, it is already known that body ownership affects motor control, allowing to estimate limb positions,52 to tune motor commands,53 and to adjust errors.54 Hence, discovering its role also within motor consciousness would not be surprising. Here, we suggest that the signals that give rise to body ownership might have a key role in sense of agency by acting on agency attribution in the absence of any efferent signals. How is it possible to reconcile in a concrete manner this idea with the current neurocognitive model of the sense of agency? As already mentioned, the classical motor control model of sense of agency states that the experience of being an agent arises from the comparison between predicted and actual outcomes.4,7-10 This, in turn, means that action preparation is a necessary condition to have any experience of being an agent. We put forward the idea that under some circumstances, only seeing the own body moving would be enough to activate the neurocognitive processes subserving action preparation. At this point, the feeling of agency over that specific given act would be triggered. Such a process could be exemplified by the inference: “since this is my body part, any action performed by it would be intended by me.” Furthermore, in dynamic conditions, that is when we actually achieve the willed actions, body ownership would provide additional signals to the efferent motor-related signals and would contribute to the subjective experience of being an agent. Within this view, sense of agency is conceived as a very flexible neurocognitive mechanism. Indeed, it is rooted in the dynamic and optimal integration among efferent and afferent signals. Any given source of information would be weighted according to the specificity of the context and the actual availability of signals.55

We have to emphasize that the present review did not aim to investigate the interactions between human body ownership and sense of agency but, rather, it focused on the role of the former in the construction of the latter. Therefore, this article cannot provide an exhaustive picture of the complex interplay between the two senses, and future studies in this direction should allow gaining key hints to understand human bodily self-consciousness.

In rodents: Probing learning by omitting reinforcement (treats) uncovers latent knowledge & identifies context -not “smartness”- as the major source of individual variability

Dissociating task acquisition from expression during learning reveals latent knowledge. Kishore V. Kuchibhotla et al. Nature Communications, May 2019. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-10089-0

Abstract: Performance on cognitive tasks during learning is used to measure knowledge, yet it remains controversial since such testing is susceptible to contextual factors. To what extent does performance during learning depend on the testing context, rather than underlying knowledge? We trained mice, rats and ferrets on a range of tasks to examine how testing context impacts the acquisition of knowledge versus its expression. We interleaved reinforced trials with probe trials in which we omitted reinforcement. Across tasks, each animal species performed remarkably better in probe trials during learning and inter-animal variability was strikingly reduced. Reinforcement feedback is thus critical for learning-related behavioral improvements but, paradoxically masks the expression of underlying knowledge. We capture these results with a network model in which learning occurs during reinforced trials while context modulates only the read-out parameters. Probing learning by omitting reinforcement thus uncovers latent knowledge and identifies context -not “smartness”- as the major source of individual variability.

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Popular version -- Study: Treats Might Mask Animal Intelligence. Chanapa Tantibanchachai. News Releases, May 14, 2019. https://releases.jhu.edu/2019/05/14/study-treats-might-mask-animal-intelligence


Rewards are necessary for learning, but may actually mask true knowledge, finds a new Johns Hopkins University study with rodents and ferrets.

The findings, published May 14 in Nature Communications, show a distinction between knowledge and performance, and provide insight into how environment can affect the two.

“Most learning research focuses on how humans and other animals learn ‘content’ or knowledge. Here, we suggest that there are two parallel learning processes: one for content and one for context, or environment. If we can separate how these two pathways work, perhaps we can find ways to improve performance,” says Kishore Kuchibhotla, an assistant professor in The Johns Hopkins University’s department of psychological and brain sciences and the study’s lead author.

While researchers have known that the presence of reinforcement, or reward, can change how animals behave, it’s been unclear exactly how rewards affect learning versus performance.

An example of the difference between learning and performance, Kuchibhotla explains, is the difference between a student studying and knowing the answers at home, and a student demonstrating that knowledge on a test at school.

“What we know at any given time can be different than what we show; the ability to access that knowledge in the right environment is what we’re interested in,” he says.

To investigate what animals know in hopes of better understanding learning, Kuchibhotla and the research team trained mice, rats and ferrets on a series of tasks, and measured how accurately they performed the tasks with and without rewards.

For the first experiment, the team trained mice to lick for water through a lick tube after hearing one tone, and to not lick after hearing a different, unrewarded tone. It takes mice two weeks to learn this in the presence of the water reward. At a time point early in learning, around days 3-5, the mice performed the task at chance levels (about 50%) when the lick tube/reward was present. When the team removed the lick tube entirely on these early days, however, the mice performed the task at more than 90% accuracy. The mice, therefore, seemed to understand the task many days before they expressed knowledge in the presence of a reward.

Masculine/feminine colors, toys, & objects as more suited for boys/girls or both & boys/girls playing with gender counter-stereotypic toys: The older boys sanctioned counter stereotypical behavior more often than accepted it

Boys Just Don’t! Gender Stereotyping and Sanctioning of Counter-Stereotypical Behavior in Preschoolers. Milica M. Skočajić et al. Sex Roles, May 15 2019. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11199-019-01051-x

Abstract: Although children start to adopt gender stereotypes by the age of three, there is less evidence about how early they start to sanction other children’s counter-stereotypical behaviors. The present study explored the two processes in a single design, comparing younger/older preschool boys and girls and using a two-task procedure involving (a) categorization of pictures of masculine/feminine colors, toys, and objects as more suited for boys/girls or both and (b) descriptions and evaluations of boys/girls playing with gender counter-stereotypic toys. One hundred Serbian children aged 3–4 or 6–7 years-old, balanced by gender, were individually interviewed. Although all three sets of stimuli were stereotyped, toys were stereotyped more often than colors and objects. Overall stereotyping, as well as stereotyping of colors and toys, was more frequent in the older group. Gender differences were more complex, showing some gender x age interactions wherein boys stereotyped masculine stimuli more often than girls did; the older boys, but not the other groups, sanctioned counter stereotypical behavior more often than accepted it; and boys’ behaviors were sanctioned more often than girls’. Finally, stereotyping and sanctioning were strongly positively related. Our study shows that, at early preschool ages, children are not only aware of gender norms, but also ready to sanction peers violating them. Boys seem to be more likely to stereotype, particularly the masculine stimuli, and be sanctioned for not conforming to stereotypes. The findings can help educators and media identify groups that need to be empowered to explore behaviors beyond gender-prescribed roles.

Keywords: Gender role Gender-stereotypes Counter-stereotypical Sanctions Preschool Child development

The Social Price of Constant Connectivity: Smartphones Impose Subtle Costs on Well-Being

The Social Price of Constant Connectivity: Smartphones Impose Subtle Costs on Well-Being. Kostadin Kushlev, Ryan Dwyer, Elizabeth W. Dunn. Current Directions in Psychological Science, May 16, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721419847200

Abstract: Smartphones provide people with a variety of benefits, but they may also impose subtle social costs. We propose that being constantly connected undercuts the emotional benefits of face-to-face social interactions in two ways. First, smartphone use may diminish the emotional benefits of ongoing social interactions by preventing us from giving our full attention to friends and family in our immediate social environment. Second, smartphones may lead people to miss out on the emotional benefits of casual social interactions by supplanting such interactions altogether. Across field experiments and experience-sampling studies, we find that smartphones consistently interfere with the emotional benefits people could otherwise reap from their broader social environment. We also find that the costs of smartphone use are fairly subtle, contrary to proclamations in the popular press that smartphones are ruining our social lives. By highlighting how smartphones affect the benefits we derive from our broader social environment, this work provides a foundation for building theory and research on the consequences of mobile technology for human well-being.

Keywords: subjective well-being, social interactions, smartphones, cyberpsychology, mobile computing

The Frozen Effect: Objects in motion are more aesthetically appealing than objects frozen in time

The Frozen Effect: Objects in motion are more aesthetically appealing than objects frozen in time. Malerie G. McDowell, Jason Haberman. PLOS, May 16, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0215813

Abstract: Videos of moving faces are more flattering than static images of the same face, a phenomenon dubbed the Frozen Face Effect. This may reflect an aesthetic preference for faces viewed in a more ecological context than still photographs. In the current set of experiments, we sought to determine whether this effect is unique to facial processing, or if motion confers an aesthetic benefit to other stimulus categories as well, such as bodies and objects—that is, a more generalized ‘Frozen Effect’ (FE). If motion were the critical factor in the FE, we would expect the video of a body or object in motion to be significantly more appealing than when seen in individual, static frames. To examine this, we asked participants to rate sets of videos of bodies and objects in motion along with the still frames constituting each video. Extending the original FFE, we found that participants rated videos as significantly more flattering than each video’s corresponding still images, regardless of stimulus domain, suggesting that the FFE generalizes well beyond face perception. Interestingly, the magnitude of the FE increased with the predictability of stimulus movement. Our results suggest that observers prefer bodies and objects in motion over the same information presented in static form, and the more predictable the motion, the stronger the preference. Motion imbues objects and bodies with greater aesthetic appeal, which has implications for how one might choose to portray oneself in various social media platforms.

New evidence on the link between genes, psychological traits, and political engagement

New evidence on the link between genes, psychological traits, and political engagement. Aaron C. Weinschenk et al. Politics and the Life Sciences, Volume 38, Issue 1, Spring 2019, May 16 2019. https://doi.org/10.1017/pls.2019.3

Abstract: We investigate the link between genes, psychological traits, and political engagement using a new data set containing information on a large sample of young German twins. The TwinLife Study enables us to examine the predominant model of personality, the Big Five framework, as well as traits that fall outside the Big Five, such as cognitive ability, providing a more comprehensive understanding of the underpinnings of political engagement. Our results support previous work showing genetic overlap between some psychological traits and political engagement. More specifically, we find that cognitive ability and openness to experience are correlated with political engagement and that common genes can explain most of the relationship between these psychological traits and political engagement. Relationships between genes, psychological traits, and political engagement exist even at a fairly young age, which is an important finding given that previous work has relied heavily on older samples to study the link between genes, psychological traits, and political engagement.

A behavior's environmental impact is judged differently depending on the intention; is judged less effective when based on environmental than selfish motives; this bias is driven by moral comparison (the feeling of moral reproach)

When good intentions go bad: The biased perception of the environmental impact of a behavior due to reliance on an actor's behavioral intention. Gea Hoogendoorn, Bernadette Sütterlin, Michael Siegrist. Journal of Environmental Psychology, May 16 2019. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2019.05.003

Highlights
•    People are subject to intention actor-observer bias when judging environmental impact.
•    A behavior's environmental impact is judged differently depending on the intention.
•    A behavior is judged less effective when based on environmental than selfish motives.
•    The intention bias is driven by moral comparison, i.e., the feeling of moral reproach.
•    The costlier it is perceived to conduct a behavior, the larger the moral gap.

Abstract: People engage in pro-environmental behaviors for various reasons. Depending on the intention underlying their behavior, they are perceived differently by others. Thus, the question arises whether the reason why a person performs a behavior not only influences how observers perceive that person, but also how observers evaluate the environmental impact of that person's behavior. We conducted two experiments, in which participants (i.e., observers) read a text describing a person (i.e., actor) engaging in a pro-environmental behavior for either self-serving or environmental reasons. We found that the environmental impact of an identical pro-environmental behavior was judged differently depending on the underlying behavioral intention of the actor. When the behavior was performed by the actor for pro-environmental reasons, the positive environmental impact was perceived to be lower than when the behavior was performed for self-serving reasons. These findings suggest that people are subject to an observer intention bias when judging the environmental impact of others' behavior. In two follow-up experiments, we identified moral comparison to be the mechanism underlying this observer intention bias. When reading about an environmentally motivated actor, participants experienced a stronger feeling of being judged as less moral by the actor, than when they read about an actor conducting the same behavior out of self-serving motivation. To cope with this feeling of being judged by others, people downplay the positive impact of the observed morally superior person's actions.

Strategies for Reducing Failures of Self-Control

Beyond Willpower: Strategies for Reducing Failures of Self-Control. Angela L. Duckworth, Katherine L. Milkman, David Laibson. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, February 13, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100618821893

Abstract: Almost everyone struggles to act in their individual and collective best interests, particularly when doing so requires forgoing a more immediately enjoyable alternative. Other than exhorting decision makers to “do the right thing,” what can policymakers do to reduce overeating, undersaving, procrastination, and other self-defeating behaviors that feel good now but generate larger delayed costs? In this review, we synthesize contemporary research on approaches to reducing failures of self-control. We distinguish between self-deployed and other-deployed strategies and, in addition, between situational and cognitive intervention targets. Collectively, the evidence from both psychological science and economics recommends psychologically informed policies for reducing failures of self-control.

Keywords: self-control, behavior change, behavioral economics, self-regulation

First Study To Investigate How Attachment Style Changes Through Multiple Decades Of Life

Chopik, W. J., Edelstein, R. S., & Grimm, K. J. (2019). Longitudinal changes in attachment orientation over a 59-year period. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 116(4), 598-611. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/pspp0000167

Abstract: Research on individual differences in attachment—and their links to emotion, cognition, and behavior in close relationships—has proliferated over the last several decades. However, the majority of this research has focused on children and young adults. Little is known about mean-level changes in attachment orientation beyond early life, in part due to a dearth of longitudinal data on attachment across the life span. The current study used a Q-Sort-based measure of attachment to examine mean-level changes in attachment orientation from age 13 to 72 using data from the Block and Block Longitudinal Study, the Intergenerational Studies, and the Radcliffe College Class of 1964 Sample (total N = 628). Multilevel modeling was employed to estimate growth curve trajectories across the combined samples. We found that attachment anxiety declined on average with age, particularly during middle age and older adulthood. Attachment avoidance decreased in a linear fashion across the life span. Being in a relationship predicted lower levels of anxiety and avoidance across adulthood. Men were higher in attachment avoidance at each point in the life span. Taken together, these findings provide much-needed insight into how attachment orientations change over long stretches of time. We conclude with a discussion about the challenges of studying attachment dynamics across the life course and across specific transitions.

Popular version: First Study To Investigate How Attachment Style Changes Through Multiple Decades Of Life. Christian Jarrett. Research Digest, May 9 2019. https://digest.bps.org.uk/2019/05/09/first-study-to-investigate-how-attachment-style-changes-through-multiple-decades-of-life

[...]

The data come from five historic projects, involving personality surveys of 628 US citizens born between 1920 and 1967. The shortest of these was 9 years and the longest was 47 years. They all involved participants being assessed repeatedly over many years using the California Adult Q-sort – a measure that includes 100 personality items. Chopik and his team focused on 14 key items from this measure, allowing them to compile scores for “anxious attachment” and “avoidant attachment” for each participant. People who score highly on “anxious attachment” fear rejection and constantly seek reassurance. People who score highly on “avoidant attachment” find intimacy uncomfortable and find it difficult to provide emotional support to others. Low scores on both anxiety and avoidance is a sign of having a secure attachment style.
The researchers stitched the data from the five historic samples together, so that they had scores for anxious and avoidant attachment spanning 59 years. Past research has already looked at how people of different ages vary in their attachment scores, but one problem with that kind of cross-sectional research is that any differences between people of different ages could be due to generational differences, rather than due to developmental trends. The new research largely overcome that problem, with Chopik and his team able to identify clear age-related trends in the same individuals over time.
Specifically, the team found that people’s anxious attachment tended to be high in adolescence, increasing into their young adulthood, before then declining through life into their middle and old age. Avoidant attachment showed less change with age, but started higher in adolescence and then declined in linear fashion through life.
The researchers surmised that attachment anxiety and avoidance may be high in adolescence due to the stressful transition from having primarily close bonds with parents to having meaningful relationships with peers and first romantic relationships. They also pointed out that mid-life – when anxiety and avoidance tend to decline – is arguably the time when we are most invested in various social roles and relationships and that “…increases in security often result from people becoming more comfortable in their relationships, gaining more evidence that the relationship will last, and having spouses who serve attachment needs and functions that promote close relations.” Meanwhile, in later life, when attachment anxiety and avoidance are typically lowest, they said people tend to be very focused on the here and now – “declines in anxiety and avoidance may reflect the efforts of older adults to become closer to their close friends and family,” they said.
Another finding from the study was that at all times of life, being in a close romantic relationship tended to go hand in hand with scoring lower on attachment anxiety and avoidance. “Romantic partners reward appropriate behaviour and admonish inappropriate behaviour … ,” the researchers said. “By investing in these social roles, individuals adhere to the rules and appropriate behaviour of close relationships and may change how they approach relationships accordingly, perhaps becoming more secure.”
It’s worth noting that this research looked at group averages, which inevitably masks the idiosyncratic ways that some people may change in their attachment style through life. The study is also limited by only involving participants from the US, the fact that it relied on extracting attachment scores from a measure not designed for that purpose, and that data was stitched together from multiple samples so as to cover the period from adolescence to later life. In a way, however, that last point is also a positive: “given the many ways in which these samples differed, the amount of consistency across the samples in estimating changes over time in attachment is even more remarkable. The converging evidence is a testament to the robustness of these results, such that they were found under different conditions in samples collected between 1936 and 2016,” the researchers explained.

[...]

Perfectionism is increasing over time; culprits are neoliberalism, meritocracy... and Texan Big Oil :-)

OK, the paper says nothing about Big Oil or Big Pharma... I was just channeling...

The full paper is interesting throughout if you have axes to grind with meritocracy, etc.

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Curran, T., & Hill, A. P. (2019). Perfectionism is increasing over time: A meta-analysis of birth cohort differences from 1989 to 2016. Psychological Bulletin, 145(4), 410-429. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/bul0000138

Abstract: From the 1980s onward, neoliberal governance in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom has emphasized competitive individualism and people have seemingly responded, in kind, by agitating to perfect themselves and their lifestyles. In this study, the authors examine whether cultural changes have coincided with an increase in multidimensional perfectionism in college students over the last 27 years. Their analyses are based on 164 samples and 41,641 American, Canadian, and British college students, who completed the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (Hewitt & Flett, 1991) between 1989 and 2016 (70.92% female, Mage = 20.66). Cross-temporal meta-analysis revealed that levels of self-oriented perfectionism, socially prescribed perfectionism, and other-oriented perfectionism have linearly increased. These trends remained when controlling for gender and between-country differences in perfectionism scores. Overall, in order of magnitude of the observed increase, the findings indicate that recent generations of young people perceive that others are more demanding of them, are more demanding of others, and are more demanding of themselves

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Multidimensional Perfectionism
Perfectionism is broadly defined as a combination of excessively high personal standards and overly critical self-evaluations [...] One well-studied model of multidimensional perfectionism is that proposed by Hewitt and Flett (1991). In their model, perfectionism is understood in terms of the direction of perfectionistic beliefs and behaviors. When directed toward the self, individuals attach irrational importance to being perfect, hold unrealistic expectations of themselves, and are punitive in their self-evaluations (self-oriented perfectionism). When perceived to come from others, individuals believe their social context is excessively demanding, that others judge them harshly, and that they must display perfection to secure approval (socially prescribed perfectionism). When perfectionistic expectations are directed toward others, individuals impose unrealistic standards on those around them and evaluate others critically (other-oriented perfectionism). [...]

[...]

[...] Socially prescribed perfectionism is the most debilitating of the three dimensions of perfectionism. This is because the perceived expectations of others are experienced as excessive, uncontrollable, and unfair, making failure experiences and negative emotional states common (Hewitt & Flett, 1991). The debilitating nature of socially prescribed perfectionism is evident in research on college students, which has found this dimension of perfectionism to be positively associated with major psychopathology (e.g., anxiety, depressive symptoms, and suicide ideation; Martin, Flett, Hewitt, Krames, & Szanto, 1996; Hewitt, Flett, & Weber, 1994; Sherry, Hewitt, Flett, & Harvey, 2003). These relationships have been replicated in longitudinal and experimental studies (e.g., Flett, Endler, Tassone, & Hewitt, 1995; Hewitt, Flett, & Ediger, 1995; O’Connor, O’Connor, O’Connor, Smallwood, & Miles, 2004). Like self-oriented perfectionism, the reviews of Smith et al. (2016, 2017) showed that socially prescribed perfectionism predicted increases in depressive symptoms and suicide ideation over time, but to a much greater degree.

[...]

Cultural Change and Perfectionism Development
[...]

Emergence of Neoliberalism and Perfectionism
Cultural values in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom have undergone a remarkable change in recent decades. From the late 1970s onward, several events have brought about significant social and economic transformation. The postwar New Deal (United States and Canada), Consensus (United Kingdom), and the emergence of neoliberalism in the industrialized world has reshaped the cultural, political, and economic landscape (Blyth, 2002). Neoliberalism is a model of social studies and economics borne of revived (neo) 19th-century capitalist (liberal) principles. It elevates the market, and market-based systems of interpersonal evaluation, to the level of state-endorsed norms (Davies, 2014). Accordingly, market distortions fashioned by state interventionism (e.g., collective bargaining and public ownership) are minimized under neoliberal governance, replaced instead by efforts to foster unconstrained competition between self-interested individuals (e.g., deregulation and privatization; Harvey, 2005).
As young people internalize the cultural frames of neoliberalism, changes in how they construe a sense of self and identity are evident in various ways. Perhaps most notably, neoliberalism has seen the dominance of collectivism progressively give way to a wave of competitive individualism. For example, more recent generations of college students in the United States report higher levels of narcissism, extraversion, and self-confidence than previous generations (e.g., Twenge, 2001a; Twenge, Campbell, & Gentile, 2012; Twenge, Konrath, Foster, Campbell, & Bushman, 2008). At the same time, communal traits have waned. This is evident in that more recent generations of college students show less empathy toward others and are more likely to blame victims when things go wrong (e.g., Konrath, O’Brien, & Hsing, 2011; Malahy, Rubinlicht, & Kaiser, 2009; Twenge et al., 2012). Young people also appear now to be more self-interested and spend less time doing group activities for fun and more time doing individual activities for instrumental value or sense of personal achievement (see Twenge, 2014).
In the same fashion, behaviors associated with competition and the attainment of social standing have risen (Kasser, Ryan, Couchman, & Sheldon, 2004). In recent years, data suggests that individuals across the industrialized world have become preoccupied with upward social comparison, experience considerable status anxiety, and adopt materialism as a means of perfecting their lives in relation to others (e.g., De Botton, 2004; Marmot, 2004; Scott, Martin, & Schouten, 2014). The increase in materialism is particularly evident in the shifting values and behaviors of young people. Eighty-one percent of Americans born in the 1980s report that getting materially rich is among their most important life goals, a figure that is almost 20% higher than those born in the 1960s and 1970s (Pew Research Center, 2007). More recent generations of young people also borrow more heavily than did older generations at the same period of life span and spend, on average, a far greater proportion of their income on status possessions and image goods than did their parents (e.g., luxury vehicles and designer labels; Bricker, Ramcharan, & Krimmel, 2014; Jiang & Dunn, 2013; Parment, 2013).
Not only more dissatisfied with what they have, young people are also seemingly more dissatisfied with who they are (Eckersley, 2006). Platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat have become ubiquitous, occupying 2 out of every 5 min spent online (GlobalWebIndex, 2016). The popularity of these platforms is, in part, explained by how they allow users to curate a perfect public image (Mendelson & Papacharissi, 2011). Yet rather than alleviate presentational and interpersonal anxieties, studies indicate that exposure to others’ perfect self-representations within social media can intensify one’s own body image concerns and sense of social alienation (Grabe, Ward, & Hyde, 2008; Paik & Sanchagrin, 2013). Other data suggests that young people are struggling to cope with a visual culture which emphases unrealistic body ideals. The most recent cohort data from the United States and the United Kingdom show that incidence of body dysmorphia and eating disorders has risen by approximately 30% among late adolescent girls since the advent of social media (e.g., PwC, 2015; Smink, van Hoeken, & Hoek, 2012; Thompson & Durrani, 2007). In the same countries, increasing numbers of young people are turning to plastic surgery and its promise of bodily perfection (e.g., British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons, 2015; American Society of Plastic Surgeons, 2016; Thomas, 2015).
With general social malaise as a backdrop, neoliberalism has succeeded in shifting cultural values so to now emphasize competitiveness, individualism, and irrational ideals of the perfectible self (Verhaeghe, 2014). These ideals are systemic within contemporary language patterns, the media, and social and civic institutions, and are evident in the rise of competitive and individualistic traits, materialistic behavior, and presentational anxieties among recent generations of young people. Revisiting Hewitt et al.’s (2017) model, it is interesting to consider how young people are coming to construct a sense of self and identity in this kind of culture. The notion of a flawed and disordered self appears especially relevant (Banai, Mikulincer, & Shaver, 2005). That is, a sense of self overwhelmed by pathological worry and a fear of negative social evaluation, characterized by a focus on deficiencies, and sensitive to criticism and failure. This sense of self is a close match to the sense of self constructed by perfectionists and is reflected in many of the recent changes to self, identity, and behavior observed in young people. Young people appear to have internalized irrational social ideals of the perfectible self that, while unrealistic, are to them eminently desirable and obtainable. Broadly speaking, then, increasing levels of perfectionism might be considered symptomatic of the way in which young people are coping—to feel safe, connected, and of worth—in neoliberalism’s new culture of competitive individualism.

The Rise of Meritocracy and Perfectionism
The caveat emptor of neoliberalism lies in its meritocratic starting point. The perfect life and lifestyle—encapsulated by achievement, wealth, and social status—are available to anyone provided you try hard enough (Frank, 2016). According to neoliberal meritocracy, those who reach the top schools and colleges, or gain entry to occupations offering the most profitable employment, receive their due rewards of wealth and social status. For those who do not reach such educational and professional heights, the doctrine of meritocracy dictates they are less deserving and their poor achievement reflects their inadequate personal abilities (e.g., skills, intelligence, and efforts; Hayes, 2012). The doctrine of neoliberal meritocracy therefore falsely and insidiously connects the principles of educational and professional achievement, status, and wealth with innate personal value (e.g., Clark, 1965; Ehrenreich, 1989; Guinier, 2015). In turn, because individuals cannot avoid being sorted, sifted, and ranked by schools, universities, and the workplace, neoliberal meritocracy places a strong need to strive, perform, and achieve at the center of modern life.
Most acutely, the merging of academic and economic meritocracies has redefined the purpose of education. Whereas education has historically sought to provide young people with a broader repertoire of skills and knowledge, neoliberal meritocracy stresses that skills and knowledge are worthless unless they confer economic value (Verhaeghe, 2014). This places considerable pressure on young people to strive, compete, and meet increasingly higher expectations in school and college—less they wish to damage their future market price. The effects of merging academic and economic meritocracies are reflected in the escalating educational expectations of young people. In the United States, where cohort data is available, approximately half of high school seniors in 1976 expected to attain at least some college degree, by 2008 that figure had risen to over 80% (Jacob & Wilder, 2011). Yet actual degree attainment has failed to keep pace with rising expectations. The gap between the percentage of high school seniors expecting to obtain a college degree and the percent of young people with a college degree doubled between 1976 and 2000 and has continued to rise (Johnson & Reynolds, 2013; Reynolds, Stewart, MacDonald, & Sischo, 2006). Together, this research suggests that the expectations of many young people are increasingly unrealistic (Baird, Burge, & Reynolds, 2008).
As young people’s expectations have increased, so have the educational demands placed on them. Intense competition for elite college admission has meant that, relative to previous generations, current high school students in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom are subjected to more numerous and stringent standardized tests (Guinier, 2015). At the same time, although the number of students going to college has increased, the wage premium associated with a college degree has stagnated over the last 20 years (Moretti, 2013). One reason for this stagnation is a saturation of the graduate job market and underemployment among graduates in developed countries (i.e., holding jobs that do not require a degree), which is currently much higher among recent generations of college graduates than it was for older generations at the same period of life (Abel, Deitz, & Su, 2014). Instead, research in the United States and the United Kingdom shows that the college premium is now almost entirely attributable to the income of those with postgraduate degrees (Brynin, 2013; Shierholz & Mishel, 2013). Just 10% of the U.S. workforce, 7% of the Canadian workforce, and 11% of the U.K. workforce have postgraduate qualifications (Lindley & Machin, 2013; Statistics Canada, 2012). Young people, therefore, must complete a college degree, and now must also obtain a postgraduate qualification, if they are to demonstrate their economic merit.
Over time, then, meritocracy raises the bar of society’s expectations such that they become unattainable to the majority—especially for young people, and especially in terms of educational achievement. Perceptions of unrealistic achievement standards are common in models that seek to explain the development of perfectionism. Although written some time ago, Hamachek (1978) stated on the link between the need to achieve and perfectionism that “[perfectionists] may over-value performance and undervalue the self. He learns only through performance that he has a self” (p. 29). The notion that perfectionists come to overvalue accomplishment is also echoed and expanded upon in the recent writing of Hewitt et al. (2017). Here, perfectionism is conceived as a misguided attempt to procure others’ approval and repair feelings of unworthiness and shame through displays of high achievement. Hewitt et al.’s description of perfectionism development is allied to the machinations of meritocratic culture in that striving for high achievement standards and the attainment of perfection are actively encouraged and rewarded. Young people are taught that the principles of meritocracy are good, fair, and just. In response, they are compelled to demonstrate their merit, set increasingly higher and unrealistic goals, and come to define themselves in the strict and narrow terms of personal achievement.

Altered Parental Practices and Perfectionism
As we have described, neoliberalism and its doctrine of meritocracy have combined to shape a culture in which everybody is expected to perfect themselves and their lifestyles by striving to meet unrealistic achievement standards.

Intercourse frequency decreased with increased length of relationship; ratings of relationship passion were strongly associated with frequency; while men in general might desire sex more, men might be compromising more than women do

How intercourse frequency is affected by relationship length, relationship quality, and sexual strategies using couple data. By Grøntvedt, Trond Viggo; Leif Edward Ottesen Kennair; Mons Bendixen. Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences, Apr 29 , 2019. https://psycnet.apa.org/buy/2019-23163-001

Abstract: The frequency of sexual intercourse within couples is associated with a variety of factors, such as relationship length, sexual and relationship satisfaction, and perceived quality of the relationship. Love, as a commitment device, might reduce interest in extrapair sex. Therefore, one can expect a negative association between measures of passion and sociosexual desire. Further, we wish to explore the effects of decoupling love and sex as measured by sociosexual attitudes on sexual frequency; as there might be a greater willingness to compromise on frequency of sex if sex is less related to expression of emotions and relational quality. We examined how men and women’s sociosexuality, relationship length and various dimensions of relationship quality impact couples’ intercourse frequency. Structural Equation Modeling analyses were performed on data from 92 romantically involved, heterosexual couples recruited at a Norwegian university. Participants’ age ranged from 19 to 30 years. The current relationship length ranged from 1 month to 9 years (M = 21 months). Intercourse frequency decreased with increased length of relationship. Both men and women’s ratings of relationship passion were strongly associated with frequency of having sex, but negatively associated with desire for extrapair sex. Intercourse was more frequent in couples where women reported less restricted attitudes, while men’s level of sociosexuality had no effect on intercourse frequency in any of the models. These novel findings suggest that while men in general might desire sex more, in this sample from a highly egalitarian nation, men might be compromising more than women do.

Investigating Individual Differences in Chimpanzee Mirror Self-Recognition and Cortical Thickness: Further evidence for the neuroanatomical foundations of mirror self-recognition abilities in chimpanzees

Investigating Individual Differences in Chimpanzee Mirror Self-Recognition and Cortical Thickness: A Vertex-Based and Region-of-Interest Analysis. William D. Hopkins et al. Cortex, May 16 2019. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2019.05.004

Abstract: Mirror self-recognition (MSR), a recently evolved cognitive trait, is one of the most significant abilities that separate humans and great apes from more distantly related nonhuman primates. MSR may serve as the foundation for a number of related but more complex social cognitive abilities unique to humans and great apes including imitation, empathy, theory-of-mind, perspective taking and deception. However, our understanding of the neural basis of MSR in nonhuman primates remains largely unknown. The current study aimed to begin to fill this gap in the literature by investigating the neuroanatomical foundations of MSR in a sample of 67 captive chimpanzees. Vertex-based and region-of-interest analysis revealed significant differences in cortical thickness, particularly in males, in the cingulate cortex, inferior frontal gyrus and superior temporal and frontal cortex. The current study provides further evidence for the neuroanatomical foundations of mirror self-recognition abilities in chimpanzees.