1/ Important retraction news 👇📰 A recent article using “national IQ” data to claim that a country’s “national intelligence” causes economic growth has been retracted @rebeccasear.bsky.social was among those who raised concerns - a good example of the importance of responsibility in science 💪 🧪

@brunelcce.bsky.social was well-represented at #ehbea2026. @replicatedtypo.bsky.social presented on ‘The cultural evolution of problem-solving’ and @abbeyepage.bsky.social on ‘When the village predicts the next baby: post-natal social support and fertility intentions in the UK’ (sadly no pic)

1/ 📢 We’re hiring at Brunel Psychology! We have ✨TWO sparkling ✨ new permanent roles in Clinical Psychology as we grow our clinical provision, including our new MSc in Clinical Psychology launching this September. Come and help shape what we’re building 👇 @brunelgradschool.bsky.social 🧪

📢 Re-upping this! 🧠👶 Had a baby in the last 3 months? Researchers at Brunel University of London want to better understand parents’ expectations and experiences of infant feeding 🍼 A short 10-minute survey 👇 Participants are rewarded for their time completing this survey 📣🧪

@ehbea.bsky.social @abbeyepage.bsky.social @pablovarase.bsky.social @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social @eslr.bsky.social

COME AND JOIN OUR MEET & GREET! 📽️❤️‍🔥 Before the start of @ehbea2026.bsky.social , @abbeyepage.bsky.social talks to us about herself, her role in @ehbea.bsky.social, and how much she likes the job🤓 🙌 💯 Have a look and #MeetTheBoard 👇👇👇 youtube.com/shorts/Kmpjn...

Last day to register for EHBEA is tomorrow (1 April). The programme is now published and looks great! Really good to see so many papers focused on advancing methods and theory in the discipline 😊

📢 Participants needed Had a baby in the last 3 months? Researchers at Brunel University of London want to better understand parents’ expectations and experiences of infant feeding 🍼 A short 10-minute survey 👇 brunellifesc.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...

Behavioral ecology and sociobiology since 1975: The growth and diversification of the biology of adaptive social behavior (editorial from the editors of Behavioural Ecology & Sociobiology) link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Absolutely this. Power is an important concept to understand but power analysis for a sample size is almost always a random guess and it’s weird that we pretend it isn’t.

🌍🧠 Shared Horizons Seminar at @brunelpsy.bsky.social We’re excited to welcome Prof Quentin Atkinson (University of Auckland) to Brunel for a talk on: “The history of the world’s languages and why it matters for psychologists.” 📅 25 March 2026 🕑 14:00–16:00 📍 ESGW 111 + online

Some have long thought that humans are universally attracted to specific features: think of symmetrical faces. Are these really universal? @adigitaltanay.bsky.social & Jay explore this and much more with @drboothroyd.bsky.social youtu.be/skwy9yKkytM

passion project - if you are an adult and were raised in the UK, please get in touch to book an interview! 🫶✨💛

1/ 📢 Participants Needed: UK Gender & Sexual Healthcare Study Phase 2 of our research with Gendered Intelligence is now open - and we’re recruiting adults across the UK.

1/ 🎮🌍 Shared Horizons Seminar Series We’re delighted to welcome Dr Patricia Kanngiesser (University of Plymouth) to Brunel Psychology for: “Games for the future: Using experimental games to study sustainable behaviour across ages and populations.” 🗓 25 Feb 2026 | 2-4pm open to all 🔓

Post 1/13 📢🧵 Call for activities proposals ! You are invited to submit proposals for three activities to be held during the upcoming CES2026 conference:

📣 @brunelpsy.bsky.social and the @culturemindslab.bsky.social with @nicolewen.bsky.social and @loraadair.bsky.social is excited to support Nu Know’s Parent-Teen Summit 2026 at Boxpark Wembley 🧡 📣 🗓 Thursday 2nd April 2026 🔗👇

Call for papers closes tomorrow Feb 6th! iacesr.com/conferences/

New paper lead by Dr Nachita Rosun that I am super proud of! We look at religious changes in Mauritius and find that differences in religious socialisation matter the more in predicting religiosity as material security gets higher www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

🚨WINNER ANNOUNCEMENT🚨 EHBEA wants to congratulate @tvpollet.bsky.social on earning the EHBEA Award on Services to the Community 👏

1/ New paper from @brunelpsy.bsky.social CCE in Evolution & Human Behavior looks at secularisation in Mauritius 🇲🇺 Nachita Rosun, @matthewmgervais.bsky.social and @aiyanakoka.bsky.social have been testing big theories outside the usual Western settings 🌏 🔗 👇

Dusted off the ol' blog after years of heavy disuse because I'm h*ckin' excited to tell y'all about some of the exciting things we're trying in our stats/methods/skills curriculum at Brunel! Read! Share! Tell us what you think! #psychscisky 🧪 #philsci #methodology #teaching

@willgervais.com wonderfully showcasing the work of CCE members @replicatedtypo.bsky.social @michealdebarra.bsky.social and @abbeyepage.bsky.social in re vamping the research methods at @brunelpsy.bsky.social 💙 We’re learning as we go but dead excited 📚☠️🤗 Follow for updates 🧪

📢 Talk announcement bringing together @brunelcce.bsky.social and CCN research centres! 📢 Dr Conrad Hackett (Pew Research Center) joins us on 📆29th Jan, 2-4pm to unpack the latest global religion survey and how it diverges from Pew’s influential 2015 projections 🌍📊 Open to all! 🔓

1/ 👩‍🎓 Big shout-out to Brunel PhD student Hannah Mays and supervisor @nelliferenczi.bsky.social from @brunelpsy.bsky.social for contributing written evidence on misogyny in the manosphere and online content to a major policy consultation

Had a really fun chat with James Hodgson at Humanism Now about my book Disbelief....check it out! www.buzzsprout.com/2246305/epis... Book here, bound to make a confusing Christmas gift for many children on your list! www.globepequot.com/978163388925...

1/ In a recent @britishacademy.bsky.social video @rebeccasear.bsky.social from @brunelpsy.bsky.social takes a clear-eyed look at the 21st‑century rise of eugenics - an ideology that should have been left behind, yet is now re‑emerging in a number of troubling ways ⚠️🧬 🧪 Watch the full talk here 🎥👇

My nursery bill is nearly double my mortgage...

EHBEA 2026 has extended the deadline till the 9th January #holidaymircale

So the traditional explanation for fertility decline - that fertility declines once children become net consumers rather than producers - isn't quite right, though part of the explanation is likely increased costs of children over time Paper here books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp...

@michealdebarra.bsky.social and @aiyanakoka.bsky.social discuss all about this research in this short video 📹 👏🎬

1/ 🧵 New PNAS paper by CCE’s @michealdebarra.bsky.social @aiyanakoka.bsky.social with Angel V Jiménez and Nachita Rosun🎉 📄 Why do people turn to religious or supernatural cures? 🧪🏺 #evolpsy #evolanth #evolutionarybehaviouralsciences #culturalevolution

Many congratulations to the newly-minted Dr Baafi @josephineabaafi.bsky.social 🎉🥳 who passed her PhD viva yesterday! A very positive experience thanks to examiners Monica Magadi and @joestrong.bsky.social, and Chair @1verofilippi.bsky.social 🙏

🧵 1/ Excited to share this work from CCEs Francisco Gómez Jiménez, whose research explores gender diversity across cultures 🌍 Francisco introduces the muxes of the Istmo Zapotec community in Oaxaca, Mexico - a remarkable example of longstanding, culturally grounded gender diversity 🏳️‍🌈 🎥👇

1/ 🎙️ New paper by Dr Aiyana Willard argues it’s time to retire HADD = “we’re hardwired to see agents EVERYWHERE” and replace it with something that *actually* fits the evidence 🪦➡️📚 @brunelpsy.bsky.social 🔗 Read it 👇

Brunel's press release about our (@hggaddy.bsky.social @anthrolog.bsky.social) recent publication, showing that high levels of polygyny don't necessarily lock men out of the marriage market www.brunel.ac.uk/news-and-eve...

The deadline has been extended - there is still time to get your abstracts in to join us in Morocco!

🚨 ABSTRACT SUBMISSION 🚨 #EHBEA2026 will be held in Leiden! Do not forget to submit your abstract before December 15th in order to attend and share your research! More in the official account: @ehbea2026.bsky.social 👇👇👇

For a while (many years!) back, @eseb.bsky.social gave us €€€ to form a Special Topic Network. Formally, the network no longer exists, but informally for sure AND we can now pick the fruits of our labours! Here is one and the next post shows another... Thank you ESEB! 🙏

Come and do a PhD at Exeter with me and Chico Camargo (Computer Science) on human-genAI coevolution "Leveraging Natural Language Processing for Data-Driven Agent-Based Modelling of Online Cultural Dynamics" www.exeter.ac.uk/v8media/recr... More details here: www.exeter.ac.uk/study/fundin...

Seems the NYT likes Leiden as much as we do 😉 www.nytimes.com/2025/11/12/t... BTW did you know that EHBEA 2026 will take place right in the middle of the renowned Dutch flower season? 🌼🌼 If you consider staying for one extra night you can enjoy the annual parade (“bloemencorso”) on the 18th 😇

Only 2 days left to get your abstracts in!

New Phil Trans B issue on the ‘Evolutionary functions of consciousness’ royalsocietypublishing.org/toc/rstb/202...

1/ 🩸 New Research by former CCE Tristin Agtarap and CCE member Julieta Baker 📣👏 A new paper in *Sexuality Research & Social Policy* explores how menstrual product choices and menstrual-care practices shape empowerment, autonomy and connection to the body

The increasing rate at which @rebeccasear.bsky.social and others are posting this absolute shame and failing of peer review and the rip off publishing system should be a canary in the mine about a diffusion of racists and race science within mainstream science and as a result everyday thought 🚨

Two postdoctoral opportunities in evolutionary anthropology at Duke University! The Pontzer Lab is hiring for projects on human ecology, energetics, and aging & health. More info: www.hbes.com/two-postdoct...

Armed with THAMES, 80% of my students predicted that my shitty old Science study wouldn't replicate 🤘 Concerns cited: Cute assumptions, validity, weak results, cultural alternatives. This was a lot of fun

The eternal struggle

Behavioral data can be very detailed but are usually aggregated and normalized in ways that smother the dynamics. Ben wrote a continuous-time Markov model to improve on this, and also wrote simulations for exploring and validating pipelines. All the code is here: github.com/BenKawam/ASN...