New paper: we propose a theory to help explain variation in democratic backsliding. We look at the case of Russia, Israel, & the US. We posit that collective memories about democracy influence models of collective action. advances.in/psychology/1... Led by the brill Neil Lavie-Driver @advances.in

New article! Why do some societies resist democratic backsliding while others remain indifferent or actively support it? Neil Lavie-Driver and @profsanderlinden.bsky.social extend the social identity model of collective action to explore the role of collective memory. advances.in/psychology/1...

Fascinating study on Russian public opinion from August 2022. Researchers caught a rare window for an independent survey before the platform was shut down to academic polling. They found that 69% of respondents construed the war as undermining their social values. A vital look behind the propaganda.

How exactly does artificial intelligence drive individuals toward violent extremism? ​I am excited to share our recent publication in Personality and Social Psychology Review, "Intelligent Systems, Vulnerable Minds: A Framework for Radicalization to Violence in the Age of AI."

What really drives someone to support violent extremism? I am thrilled to share our new article published today in PNAS. Together with an incredible team of collaborators, we conducted a preregistered study across 58 countries with over 18,000 participants. This is what we found.

My latest story is out. Bots get banned on social media. The workaround? Real humans posting AI-generated messages in a gamified system, coordinated by an AI command centre. And it's being offered to your local town councillor. www.nationalobserver.com/2026/02/24/i...

Anthropic trains its models on the entire internet without paying for it. ​Also Anthropic:

"Eighty percent of Americans said voters have a responsibility to keep up with the news, but just 8% said they had a responsibility to pay for it." www.semafor.com/newsletter/0...

📝 New preprint on the threat of cyborg propaganda to democracy. We discuss how the key divide in online influence is no longer bots vs humans. We are entering an era of 'cyborg propaganda': Verified human identities disseminate centrally generated, AI-crafted narratives 🧵 osf.io/preprints/ps...

Kent Psychology is hiring 🎓We have two posts: 1) open area and 2) cog neuro. More details can be found here: jobs.kent.ac.uk/vacancy.aspx... Feel free to reach out with questions!

The distinction between grassroots activism and automated influence is collapsing. We typically worry about "bot farms" or "troll factories." But a distinct, more complex threat is emerging. We call it "Cyborg Propaganda."

Thrilled to announce the Oxford Psychological Networks Summer School (OxPNS)! This is the first-ever psychological network analysis workshop in the UK, to be held in magical Oxford from June 22-26, 2026. To apply and for more information, please visit: oxfordpns.com A brief thread 🧵

Publication Alert: Deconstructing the "Secure" Narrative of U.S. Democracy Many believe that recent authoritarian rhetoric in the United States is a sudden departure from a historically secure democracy. But has it ever been as stable as we think? advances.in/psychology/1...

We have a new paper in Science today on how malicious AI swarms can threaten democracy. AI systems can already coordinate autonomously, infiltrate communities, and fabricate social consensus. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... Led by @kunstjonas.bsky.social & @daniel-thilo.bsky.social!

Resilience or Complacency? While Republicans reported a steady increase in well-being during the start of Trump’s second term, Democrats showed a "rebound" pattern. Does returning to a higher state of well-being provide the strength to persist or reflect complacency? Study link in comments.

📰 New Research: The Politics of Well-Being during Democratic Backsliding @djwu.bsky.social ky.social, @kyleflaw.com, @stysyropoulos.bsky.social y.social, and @sylviapperry.bsky.social show striking partisan differences in well-being during Trump’s second term. advances.in/psychology/1...

Many D&I strategies fail because they assume a "one size fits all" mindset. New data-driven research identifies 5 different response types to D&I policies: Champions, Reluctants, Ambivalents, Bystanders, and Opponents. Link to paper in comments.

Are you a Champion, a Bystander, or a Reluctant? Why D&I support isn’t just "For" or "Against." We are excited to publish "Voices behind walking the talk: Quantified qualitative insights on D&I policy support reasoning" in the latest issue of advances.in/psychology. advances.in/psychology/1...

From the U.S. and Thailand to Hong Kong and Australia, new research confirms a consistent "backfire effect." When counter-protesters use violence to silence a progressive movement, they don't crush it—they amplify it. Full article (open access): advances.in/psychology/1...

New in advances.in/psychology: Did the 2024 election break political solidarity? 🗳️💔 A new study explores "stigma-based solidarity betrayal." Black women felt betrayed by Latino men (solidarity violation), White women felt betrayed by White men (relational violation). advances.in/psychology/1...

Irrespective of their actual economic standing, 15% of White Americans feel they are losing ground to other Whites and competing with Black and Latinx Americans at the bottom of the hierarchy. This subjective sentiment strongly predicts voting for Trump and opposing DEI measures.

Making shared discrimination salient seems to have no meaningful effect on voting behavior among PoC, according to this important new study.

We often describe participation as the heartbeat of democracy. But new research suggests that for the most committed activists, it can also be a source of disillusionment.

"One of the gravest misconceptions in the field is the assumption that measuring individuals over multiple time points is equivalent to adopting a developmental perspective." Read this poignant response to Berry (2025) by Philipp Jugert and Peter Titzmann. advances.in/psychology/1...

📢 The acculturation debate continues: A Direct Response to John Berry's critique was just published in advances.in/psychology! @kbierwiaczonek.bsky.social addresses recent criticisms and reveals crucial, overlooked findings from meta-analytical evidence. advances.in/psychology/1...

🧠🌍 New in advances.in/psychology! How does anxiety about the future shape young people’s politics? A UK–Greece study finds that future anxiety links to stronger democratic support — but among young men, it’s also tied to more right-conservative views. Full article: advances.in/psychology/1...

Retorikken rundt LLM ser ut til å være mer finansiell fantasi enn empirisk faktum; imponerende språk, sparsom produktivitet—keiseren har fortsatt ikke fått på seg arbeidsklær. Sett med mine teknolog-øyne ikke overraskende. Glimrende innlegg av @kunstjonas.bsky.social www.dn.no/innlegg/kuns...

🇳🇴 Ny kronikk: Innvandrere er mer åpne for #psykisk #helsehjelp enn vi tror – og enn de tror selv. 🇬🇧 New op-ed: Migrants in Norway are more open to #mental #healthcare than we assume – and than migrants themselves assume. www.dagensmedisin.no/forskning-ps... @kunstjonas.bsky.social

🚀Just released my first R package on CRAN: LLMTranslate! Automates forward–back survey translations w/ LLMs, including reconciliation + change logs. No more weeks of manual reviews. cran.r-project.org/web/packages...

I have some points of disagreement with John’s commentary, but I respect the depth of thought he brings to the topic. It's important to engage with different views as we push the field forward.

Forgive and forget… if it’s your party? A new article in advances.in/psychology reveals how partisan loyalty shaped forgiveness of political leaders in the 2024 UK General Election. advances.in/psychology/1...

🚨Publication Alert: Can emotional acculturation, usually seen as beneficial, have hidden costs? Immigrant minority students who internalize majority emotional norms report more social contact but less school engagement—especially when facing discrimination. advances.in/psychology/1...

Violent Extremism can take many forms. It can be cultural, structural, institutionalised and direct - or any mixture of these. New book about the subject bsky.app/profile/kuns...

This book looks great! Can't wait to read. (and thrilled to be a part of it. @nourkteily.bsky.social & I have a chapter on dehumanization you might be interested in!) #PrejudiceResearch #PsychSciSky Congrats to the Editors on curating such a strong list of chapters.

Newly accepted in PSPB! We examined whether Asian and Black Americans perceived one another through a zero-sum lens. Inspired by the SCOTUS affirmative action decisions, I wanted to know if Asians thought they were losing to Black people and how this mindset affects coalition osf.io/preprints/ps...

Thrilled to share that The Cambridge Handbook of the Psychology of Violent Extremism is now available. Milan Obaidi's and my goal was to create the book we missed as students—a complete overview over every major perspective in the field.

This new study reveals that using bivariate proxies to test interaction effects in meta-analyses systematically inflates effect sizes—clarifying why earlier syntheses, including those assessing the acculturation “integration” hypothesis, overstated their conclusions.

🚨 Just published in advances.in/psychology: “Cross-lagged panel networks” combine network theory and SEM to track dynamic, item-level effects across constructs like self-esteem and school commitment. advances.in/psychology/1...

A friendly reminder that submissions for the special issue, which I am co-editing with John F. Dovidio, are due by the end of the month. Please consider submitting—and feel free to share the call with colleagues who might be interested.

📢 New in advances .in/psychology: How do mobile phones, social media & digital diasporas shape modern migration experiences? Explore emerging research on digitally mediated acculturation by Jaimee Stuart, Colleen Ward, @jkarl.bsky.social, and Ronald Musizvingoza. advances.in/psychology/1...

The combination of #artificialintelligence and #socialmedia poses a threat to democracy. Our new paper explains how AI swarms can fabricate grassroots consensus, fragment shared reality, engage in mass harassment, interfer with elections, and erode institutional trust: osf.io/preprints/os...

📢 New in advances.in/psychology: Who gets to say, “This country is ours”? This research unpacks territorial vs. epistemic ownership of a nation—comparing majority Finns & second-gen immigrants. advances.in/psychology/1...

New preprint! We meta-analyzed data from 1,114 studies to identify the strongest correlates of migrants' adaptation to living abroad. Co-authored by Kiki Vu, George Tong, Mike Cheung, Nora Benningstad, Evita van Duin, Karine Lindholm, Colleen Ward, and @kunstjonas.bsky.social osf.io/preprints/ps...

Please reshare: Reminder – Submissions Due End of June! APC waived.

Call for papers: “The Psychology of Pushback: Understanding Resistance and Compliance During Democratic Decline.” Edited by Jonas R. Kunst and John F. Dovidio. advances.in/psychology/1...

Please reshare: Reminder – Submissions Due End of June!

This might be my new favorite paper on acculturation! It challenges us to ask whether widely celebrated concepts like multiculturalism truly serve all communities—especially Indigenous Peoples.

new open access piece in the European Review of Social Psychology by @kunstjonas.bsky.social reporting a review and meta-analysis of majority-group acculturation www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Why has acculturation research focused only on minority groups when it's defined as mutual cultural change? My meta-analysis of 37 studies (N = 11,000+) reveals how majority groups also transform—and how colonial mindsets in academia created this blind spot. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

A major paper @nature.com this week found a significant decline in dementia after an outdated Shingles vaccine. I've reviewed the study and many other relevant ones here erictopol.substack.com/p/the-shingl...