In a world without forest and creeks, where do the children play? My new essay explores peer cultures and the strangeness of Western childhood. Heavily inspired by work from @dorsaamir.bsky.social and Sheina Lew-Levy :) open.substack.com/pub/unpublis...

Really enjoyed this podcast with @sheinalew.bsky.social and @dorsaamir.bsky.social on evolution and childhood. Super-smart people talking about a super-interesting topic podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/m...

Another great PhD opportunity: An ERC-funded project on “Children as agents of cultural evolution,” lead by @sheinalew.bsky.social at Durham University. Come do fieldwork with Mayan groups in Belize with her, @dorsaamir.bsky.social, and I! One of three, 3-year PhD positions starting Fall 2026.

1/ Alright, this one’s been sitting in my drawer for a year now, after @mcxfrank.bsky.social and I got turned down for a public commentary. But before I forget about it completely, here’s the preprint: Can we harvest insights for rice theory from two state farms in China? osf.io/preprints/ps...

Spread the word: I'm looking to recruit a PhD student for Fall 2026 to @ucsb.bsky.social! Reach out if you are applying this cycle and hoping to study infant and child social cognition, specifically expectations about friendship and/or groups. Bonus: live in paradise! And.. 1/3

This is a big one! A 4-year writing project over many timezones, arguing for a reimagining of the influential "core knowledge" thesis. Led by @daweibai.bsky.social, we argue that much of our innate knowledge of the world is not "conceptual" in nature, but rather wired into perceptual processing. 👇

Every developmental psychologist Is like “but my lecture slides!”

If you could win a prize by guessing the number on a die 🎲 hidden under a cup, would you want to guess before the die was rolled, or after? The odds of winning are the same in both, but they can feel different. 🧵

While this looks like it could have been painted yesterday, it’s actually a 1,700 year old (!) portrait from a Fayum mummy in modern day Egypt. This is one of ~900 of these portraits from the era, which broke from a more stylized tradition, and represented the subject more naturally.

@durhampsych.bsky.social current has 5 (FIVE!!) PhD studentships being advertised! 3 to work with me on children as agents of cultural evolution 2 to work with @drboothroyd.bsky.social on examining school-based body image interventions. Please share and apply! www.durham.ac.uk/departments/...

Been reading recently about attempts to circumnavigate the globe & how 16th century ships pulled it off. Steering a ship was complicated & relied on hundreds of adjustments to complex rope systems. So, it often took a new sailor a long time to..... "learn the ropes"! So that's where that comes from.

Do you fall for the Müller-Lyer optical illusion? Psychologists had long thought that it depends on your cultural background—the famous "carpentered-world" hypothesis. Now, that hypothesis is widely disputed. Here's why. 🧪 by @norabradford.bsky.social www.scientificamerican.com/article/does...

Why do societies reliably develop strikingly similar traditions like dance songs, hero stories, shamanism & justice institutions? In a new BBS target article, I propose a theory for such "super-attractors" + cultural evolution more broadly. Now open for commentary: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

A little write-up of our Psych Review paper (with @chazfirestone.bsky.social) on culture and visual illusions — out now in Slate! 👇

Thanks so much @dorsaamir.bsky.social and @chazfirestone.bsky.social, along with @mcxfrank.bsky.social, for your input on this! And ofc @sarahexplains.bsky.social and @parshallison.bsky.social for your editing!

How much does the environment we’re raised in change how we see the world? Wonderful piece in @sciam.bsky.social by @norabradford.bsky.social, ft. an interview with @dorsaamir.bsky.social about our work on the 'cultural byproduct hypothesis'. www.scientificamerican.com/article/does...

Children are often cast as passive vessels into which we pour culture. But children create cultures of their own—vibrant ones with special properties. Just one of the topics discussed in our recent episode with @dorsaamir.bsky.social & @sheinalew.bsky.social! Listen: disi.org/varieties-of...

Nothing like having fraternal twins to realize how big individual differences are. All baby advice seems to assume that babies are interchangeable but let me tell you: we treat them exactly the same & it is incredibly clear that they are two _very_ different people with very different preferences.

This was such a fun conversation about childhood, play, and agency across cultures. Thanks for having @sheinalew.bsky.social & I on the show!

New episode!! 🎙️📣 A chat w/ @sheinalew.bsky.social & @dorsaamir.bsky.social about childhood across cultures. Humans everywhere go through childhood—a time of learning, growth, and play. But this universal stage of life can look very different in different places. Listen: disi.org/varieties-of...

i think our arguments are more like precision instruments but ok fine i will accept "sledgehammer" (@dorsaamir.bsky.social @anilseth.bsky.social @theguardian.com)

Look what you could publish (anonymously) in Nature in 1970.

Fish see visual illusions the same way humans do. Flies too. And bees. This changes everything about the WEIRD sampling debate in cognitive psychology. New post on @dorsaamir.bsky.social and @chazfirestone.bsky.social's devastating paper.

🥳🥳 New paper in @nathumbehav.nature.com: “When development constricts our moral circle." Contrary to popular belief, younger kids may start out with broader moral circles than older ones. Check it out here 👉 rdcu.be/eoaSe w/ @mattiwilks.bsky.social @karrineldner.bsky.social & Lucius Caviola

Many of us have heard of Hofstede's cultural dimensions (e.g. the individualistic-collectivist (IC) dimension), but few have looked under the hood of how they were constructed. The data, it turns out, come from self-report surveys of IBM employees ca. 1968-72. Here's McSweeney describing the sample:

Out today!

Made a "graphic syllabus" this year to encourage students to actually, you know, read the syllabus and maybe even use the information. Stay tuned for results! Here's a link to the Keynote file if you wanna try it out 👇🏼 drive.google.com/file/d/1K6W-...

Looking at Van Gogh’s Starry Night, we see not only its content (a French village beneath a night sky) but also its *style*. How does that work? How do we see style? In @nathumbehav.nature.com, @chazfirestone.bsky.social & I take an experimental approach to style perception! osf.io/preprints/ps...

I'm THRILLED that our book is out. This book, with other 60 contributors from across the globe (!!!) is a love letter to the science we want to do, and a how-to guide for how to do it. Please read it and share it!

Wanted to share a handy little resource with you all (especially those in dev psych) — my lab & I made a "journal submission cheat sheet" that summarizes article types, word limits, & other requirements for the journals we typically submit to. Link below 👇🏼 docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

1/ 🧵 🚨New paper!🚨 Cross-cultural research is expanding in the social sciences — but are we measuring what we think we are? Our recent paper argues that construct validity is an overlooked challenge, especially in developmental research. Let’s break it down. 🌍 🧠 www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

The looks great: “cross-cultural developmental research poses distinct problems for ensuring high construct validity, owing to the nuances of working with children; the standard approach of transporting protocols designed & validated in one population to another risks low construct validity”

Are you a junior faculty member interested in spending 2-4 weeks at Princeton Psych? Please apply for our Microsabbatical program! It’s a fully funded visit for professional development and creating long-term collaborations. psych.princeton.edu/diversity/mi...

Now hiring for two lab manager positions at Stanford! Hyo Gweon and I are coordinating joint searches since our labs collaborate frequently. Please join us! careersearch.stanford.edu/jobs/researc... and careersearch.stanford.edu/jobs/lab-coo...

🏰 PhD position on computational modelling | collective dynamics | cultural evolution 🏰 Get in touch with any questions you might have and join me in beautiful Marburg! stellenangebote.uni-marburg.de/jobposting/c... (Deutsch) stellenangebote.uni-marburg.de/jobposting/3... (English)

The Development of Risk Attitudes and their Cultural Transmission New preprint w/ Alejandro Pérez Velilla & @babeheim.bsky.social. This is one of the best modeling papers I have ever been involved in, tackling developmental, cultural, and class differences in risk attitudes. osf.io/preprints/so...

Two of my favorite cognitive scientists @dorsaamir.bsky.social & @chazfirestone.bsky.social go after one of the mind's most intriguing puzzles. Good stuff and work a read!

Wow! Exemplary research by Dorsa Amir ‪@dorsaamir.bsky.social and Chaz Firestone @chazfirestone.bsky.social, highly relevant to the study of cognition and culture

Can our culture alter how we see the world around us? In a new paper, @dorsaamir.bsky.social and I dig through >100 years of scholarship on this foundational question in psychology, anthropology, and even philosophy. Take a look here (osf.io/preprints/ps...) and follow the story below 👇

I’ve been citing the claim that the Müller-Lyer illusion is influenced by cultural environment since I read about it in the 2010 WEIRD paper. Turns out that might be wrong.

Cool paper from @dorsaamir.bsky.social and @chazfirestone.bsky.social on the universality of a classic visual illusion, often the go-to example for "culture determines everything!" types

Does the culture you grow up in shape the way you see the world? In a new Psych Review paper, @chazfirestone.bsky.social & I tackle this centuries-old question using the Müller-Lyer illusion as a case study. Come think through one of history's mysteries with us🧵(1/13):

🎉Postdoc Alert! I am recruiting a postdoc to start Summer 2025 in the Mind & Morality Lab at Brown. If you're interested, please send a CV, cover letter, and names of at least two references to [email protected] by 2/28. If you have questions, don't hesitate to reach out!

Came across a fun bit of marginalia from Darwin’s personal library: In a copy of “Principles of Geology”, Lyell argues that animal varieties can change over time, but never deviate enough to form new species. “If this were true,” Darwin scrawls in the margin, “adios theory”.

Turns out parenthood is mostly Applied Microbiology. You'll learn all about illnesses that seemingly escaped an 18th century cattle farm (hand-foot-&-mouth disease, fifth disease) & their treatments. If you're lucky (& you're always lucky), you'll also get to experience them firsthand!

We're hiring! Are you a cultural evolutionary modeller who wants to understand how and why children's peer cultures evolve? Here's a postdoc position for you! @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social @durhampsych.bsky.social @ehbea.bsky.social @eslr.bsky.social Apply here: durham.taleo.net/careersectio...

This is a really great article with a whole new perspective on cultural evolution

Excited to share that our BBS target article — "Children as agents of cultural adaptation" — is online & open for commentary! In it, @sheinalew.bsky.social & I argue that children's peer cultures might play an important & understudied role in cultural adaptation. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Kids will be kids -- even if they're Ice Age kids. Maybe especially if they're Ice Age kids. New research by @felixthehauskat.bsky.social and @izzywisher.bsky.social identifies children's contributions to ancient cave art: www.science.org/content/arti... @science.org