We make flexible choices in new situations by knitting together information from separate relevant memories. But what governs which memories are retrieved and when? In a new preprint, we captured how people build decision variables from different memories by tracking their gaze on a blank screen.

We've known that socioeconomics (SES) matters for the 🧠. New & 🤯 is that SES drowns out all other brain associations, incl. IQ. If you train an algorithm to predict IQ from brain data, it's still way better at predicting SES. Science Mag: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... @smarek0502.bsky.social 👀🧵👇

Was chatting with a colleague recently about how academics navigate different stages of careers, and it reminded me of this great post from Elliot Berkman that I found helpful when I was getting started (and that I revisit periodically): www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-...

Cancel culture has taken over social media... or has it? In a new paper, Randy T. Lee, Jabin Binnendyk, @gordpennycook.bsky.social, Ovul Sezer, and I found that people overestimate support for "cancellation": doi.org/10.31234/osf...

Sharing a recent blog post on how PhD students can make a difference in the fight to defend American science. Hosted on PsychPress, a blog from Northeastern Psych PhD students created by me and @zoekross.bsky.social. psychpress.sites.northeastern.edu/2026/06/12/s...

⭐️From Elizabeth Lapidow, Amberley Stein, Giovanni Thomas & Caren Walker: Young Children Use Causal Knowledge to Guide Question Asking

Human cooperation is strong among individuals but fragile between groups Perspective by Paul A. M. Van Lange & Paul K. Bergmann bit.ly/4eFHMjK #psychscisky #socialpsych

Postdoc position available at postlab.psych.wisc.edu. Pls send cv to [email protected]

We made an open repository of close relationships measures. Our goal is to catalogue all of the published self-report measures in relationship science. You can help us expand the database by suggesting measures you tend to use in your research, or by uploading your own measures! relascale.com

We're recruiting postdocs to study how people build structured knowledge from experience & use it to act flexibly. Behavioral work, fMRI, computational & AI models, with a lifespan focus. You don't need experience with every method; fit & curiosity matter most. Please repost & share! 🧠

New paper with @mohitmukherji.bsky.social, Mona Lebrun, and @marjorierhodes.bsky.social @JEP:G! Did you ever wonder whether saying things like “boys can wear dresses too” is effective at reducing stereotypical inferences? We find that they’re probably not—check out more here: doi.org/10.1037/xge0...

Out in PNAS pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... Inequality is not only hard to solve. Sometimes, it is hard to *see*. We ask a simple question: Do people notice when members of minority groups are absent? Across field studies and experiments, the answer was often no.

When you look at a complex scene, you perceive various ensembles — sets of items of various sizes, numbers, etc. Are some more salient than others? In a new paper (w/ samiyousif.bsky.social), we provide an answer to this question! osf.io/preprints/ps...

The drop in support for marriage equality last year was not a blip, it has declined further, dropping 6 points from its high of 71. Whether or not gay or lesbian relations were "morally acceptable" dropped 9 points. Support for LGBTQ rights broadly is diminishing. news.gallup.com/poll/710810/...

The LUMeN Lab at Emory is hiring ✨ We’re seeking a full-time RA/lab manager and a postdoc to work on new NIH-funded studies! Formal job ads/apps forthcoming. We’re eager to hit the ground running so please share these flyers and/or reach out if interested!

“The result is a horror show for US science research. Not only is peer review made a secondary consideration, but the new rules would allow any federal agency to cancel any grant at any time based on the vague assertion that it isn’t in the “national interest.” 1/2 🧪 arstechnica.com/science/2026...

This rule also requires that grants must “...demonstrably advance the President’s policy priorities.” All of this effectively puts politics over expertise, giving political appointees veto power over research that challenges, conflicts with, or doesn't follow the administration’s ideologies. 5/n

tl,dr; Scientists no longer allowed to use federal funding to publish, attend meetings, or talk to the public. They cannot collaborate internationally. Grants can be cancelled for any reason, at any time, political appointees have a final say over what gets funded, and who gets funded.

Important explanation of a myriad of different ways that the act of doing science will be prohibited by this administration. Topics of study, attending conferences, public communications, open access journals, and so much more.

Americans say they want less inequality. Why don’t they support policies to reduce it? New paper: across 31 nationally representative survey waves (N=384,248) and a preregistered experiment (N=1,009), Americans favor PREdistributive over REdistributive policies 🧵 osf.io/preprints/so...

The National Science Foundation is terminating and suspending grants again, and at Grant Witness we need you to help to track them! 🧪 We can only identify research being suppressed by under-the-radar suspensions directly from researchers. Please report! grant-witness.us/posts/2026-0... #NSF

✨New paper out @nature.com ✨ For 8 weeks around the 2024 US election, we randomly assigned 2,000 people to use social media algos we built ourselves. Do engagement-based algorithms amplify intergroup, moral & emotional (IME) content—and does that distort how we see political norms? 🧵🔗 👇

We are looking for a research assistant to help with scanning an ongoing R01 project at MGH. The project involves working with older adults, and physio/fMRI data collection. Please send interested recent grads our way! northeastern.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/careers/job/...

Pointing out that “everyone else is already doing it!” is a classic way to motivate prosocial behavior. But how can we encourage actions which aren't popular yet? In a new paper in @jexpsocpsych.bsky.social, Mike Norton and I had a lot of fun testing a method using "collective streaks." (1/5)

Our Bartels Science Illustration Program is calling for applicants! This is a full-time, paid, in-person appointment. Residency begins in the fall and spans 6–12 months. Please note, Visa sponsorship is not available. Deadline for applications is May 29, 2026. www.birds.cornell.edu/illustrators/

"Out of 177 faculty respondents, close to half reported significant concern about being disciplined by the university for their public engagement. One-fifth indicated that they had been asked by an administrator to change language related to their courses, research, or website."

Psychology & Neuroscience Professor Elizabeth Kensinger, known for her research on emotion and memory over the human lifespan, was elected to the @aaas.org, a prestigious honorary society that recognizes cross-discipline merit and stewardship that improves society.

“Cutting off fundamental, curiosity-driven science is like eating the seed corn. We may have a little more to eat next winter but what will we plant so we and our children will have enough to get through the winters to come?” ― Carl Sagan

“We will do everything in our power to make whole those who were persecuted for political purposes. This includes stripping DOJ’s website of partisan propaganda.” www.nbcnews.com/politics/jus...

New in @polbehavior.bsky.social: over the first half of this decade, people came to believe that white people experienced more discrimination and black people less. And Republicans now think that whites are more discriminated against than Black folks (though partisan trends are ~ parallel)

Hiring! Athulya Aravind and I are looking for a full-time Postgraduate Associate at Yale (Linguistics/Psychology). The position is designed as preparation for PhD applications in linguistics, cog sci, or psychology, including structured mentoring and research training. tinyurl.com/mrxjya5t

We just got approved to hire a teaching professor in Quantitative Methods! This is the *very* rare tenure track teaching position at Berkeley. I'll be chairing the search committee. Official job ad coming later this summer!

Why do rituals persist? They are often treated either as attempts to influence uncertain outcomes or as practices that regulate group life. But these functions are usually blended together. In our new paper, we argue that reinforcement learning helps explain this blending.

The NSF's SBE Directorate is at risk of being eliminated. Officials have chosen to dismantle SBE without notice, explanation, Congressional consultation or approval, or stakeholder input. 📢 Visit our #SaveSBE page, containing resources you can use to help ➡️ cossa.org/action-cente...

What is a psychological theory? Here's our take on this tricky and controversial question in this week's Experimentology chapter summary. Many things called "theories" in psychology aren't actually theories — they're frameworks. 🧵 experimentology.io

Q: Are the snakes big? A: We have lots of different snakes. The quality of your work determines which snake you will fight. The better your thesis is, the smaller the snake will be.

All the partisan gerrymandering was always (in part) racial gerrymandering, because the parties' politics were always (in part—but large part) about race. So when you tell Southern legislatures "you can do partisan gerrymandering, but no racial gerrymandering," they know it means they can do both.

🎉New positions!🎉 Postdoc and Research technician openings in our lab @yale for computational psychiatry research. Technician position a great stepping stone to grad school. More info: rutledgelab.org/positions Work w/big data from our smartphone apps and large clinical samples happinessquest.app

There has been a LOT of research on misinformation over the last decade. In a new paper (for Annual Review of Psychology), @dgrand.bsky.social and I attempt to distill the key points of consensus, highlight major disagreements, and point to future directions. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

If you've ever sought NSF funding for anything behavioral sciences related, do this now: cossa.org/action-cente...

🧠We are looking for enthusiastic postdoctoral researchers working at the intersection of machine learning, neuroscience, and embodied intelligence. Please help spread the word! 🚀

interesting new fellowship for people studying child development, available for early-career folk (10 years since PhD, US$300K over 3 years, worldwide eligibility)

Can gratitude interventions make the world happier? We tested 6 gratitude practices across 34 countries with 10,696 participants to find out — and the answer is more interesting than a simple yes 🧵 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

I went to go look, and this time last year, NSF SBE had funded 216 awards. This year, they have funded 2.

Thrilled this is out! www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.... 🧵 Do we have 2 kinds of beliefs? Some beliefs seem insensitive to evidence and rarely guide behavior, etc. To explain this, several theories divide belief into 2 types. I argue the explanation isn't in the *mind* but in the *world*

📢 Calling all students still on the market for this fall. 🚨 Post-doc opportunity working on how to adapt interventions to different cultures, with Catherine Thomas at the University of Michigan. Due June 15: careers.umich.edu/job_detail/2... @iaccp.bsky.social @umich.edu @spspnews.bsky.social

FINALLY HR has the posting up for a postdoc opening in my lab ! Particularly interested in folks with electrophysiology, photometry, or behavioral experience. www.gwu.jobs/postings/125...

The ASSIST Lab @ UW–Madison is hiring a full-time Research Specialist! This position is a great fit for someone interested in clinical psychology research, suicide prevention, intensive longitudinal methods/EMA, and digital approaches to understand mental health. jobs.wisc.edu/jobs/researc...

National identity reconfigures brain responses from “them” to “us” Briefly priming national versus ethnic identity increases ventromedial prefrontal cortex activation for ethnic out-group faces, a pattern typically reserved for self and in-group processing. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Justice Alito relied on misleading data to support his claim that “Black voters now participate in elections at similar rates as the rest of the electorate." Using the DOJ’s data, Alito omitted the fact that the racial voter gap is actually widening. trib.al/QIDuIYb