BackgroundChildhood adversity is linked to adverse health in adulthood. One posited mechanistic pathway is through physiological responses to acute stress. Childhood adversity has been previously related to both exaggerated and blunted physiological responses to acute stress, however, less is known about the psychological mechanisms which may contribute to patterns of physiological reactivity linked to childhood adversity.ObjectiveIn the current work, we investigated the role of challenge and threat stress appraisals in explaining relationships between childhood adversity and cortisol reactivity in response to (...) an acute stressor.MethodsUndergraduate students completed an online survey that included general demographic information and the Risky Families Questionnaire 24 h before a scheduled lab visit. In the lab, a research assistant collected a baseline salivary cortisol sample. Following the baseline period, participants were read instructions for the Trier Social Stress Test, a validated psychological lab stressor. Next, they completed a challenge vs. threat task appraisal questionnaire and completed the speech and math portion of the TSST. Twenty minutes following the start of the TSST, a second salivary sample was collected to measure changes in salivary cortisol following the TSST.ResultsLinear regression analyses adjusted for age, sex, childhood socioeconomic status, and baseline cortisol levels, showed childhood adversity associated with changes in cortisol levels [B = –0.29 t = –2.35, p = 0.02, R2=0.07]. Linear regression analyses controlling for age, sex, and childhood SES showed childhood adversity associated with both challenge [B = –0.52 t = –5.04, p < 0.001, R2=0.24] and threat [B = 0.55 t = 5.40, p < 0.001, R2=0.27] appraisals. Significant indirect effects of childhood trauma on cortisol reactivity were observed through challenge appraisals [B = –0.01 ], and threat appraisals [B = –0.01 ].ConclusionChildhood adversity may contribute to blunted cortisol reactivity, a pattern of response which is linked to obesity, addiction, and other behavior-related diseases. Our findings suggest that this relationship is in part a product of stress appraisals. (shrink)

BackgroundChildhood abuse increases risk for high levels of distress in response to future stressors. Interpersonal social support is protective for health, particularly during stress, and may be particularly beneficial for individuals who experienced childhood abuse.ObjectiveInvestigate whether childhood abuse predicts levels of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms related to the COVID-19 pandemic, and test whether the perceived availability of social companionship preceding the pandemic moderates this relationship.MethodsDuring Phase 1, adults (N= 120; AgeM[SD] = 19.4 [0.94]) completed a retrospective measure of childhood (...) adversity along with a measure of perceived availability of opportunities for social engagement immediately preceding the pandemic. Two weeks after the COVID-19 pandemic declaration, participants completed the Impact of Event Scale-Revised (IES-R) with respect to the pandemic. Hierarchical linear regression analyses examined the interaction between childhood abuse and the perceived availability of social companionship preceding the pandemic as a predictor of PTSD symptoms.ResultsAdjusting for covariates, the interaction between childhood abuse and perceived availability of others to engage with before the onset of the pandemic was a significant predictor of IES-hyperarousal (β = −0.19,t= −2.06,p= 0.04, ΔR2= 0.032, CI: [−0.31 to −0.01]).ConclusionLevels of perceived opportunities for social companionship before the pandemic associates with levels of hyperarousal related to the pandemic, particularly for individuals who experienced high levels of childhood abuse. More research is needed to understand how to mitigate the higher levels of distress related to the pandemic for these individuals in order to reduce risk for future psychiatric disorders. (shrink)

Ethical codes help guide the methods of research that involves samples gathered from ?at-risk? populations. The current article reviews general as well as specific ethical principles related to gathering informed consent from partner violent offenders mandated to outpatient treatment, a group that may be at increased risk of unintentional coercion in behavioral sciences research due to court mandates that require outpatient treatment without the ethical protections imbued upon prison populations. Recommendations are advanced to improve the process of informed consent within (...) this special population and data supporting the utility of the recommendations in a sample 70 partner violent offenders are provided. Data demonstrate that participants were capable of comprehending all essential elements of consent. (shrink)

Hypocretin regulates brain reward function and cocaine consumption in rats. The hypocretinergic (Hcrt) system is implicated in energy homeostasis, feeding and sleep regulation. Hypocretinergic cell bodies are located in the lateral hypothalamus (LH) and project throughout the brain. The aim of the present studies was to investigate the role of the Hcrt system in regulating brain reward function and the reinforcing properties of cocaine in rats. Intracranial self-stimulation (ICSS) thresholds provide an accurate measure of brain reward function in rats. Here (...) we show that a single injection of Hcrt-1 (5 µg icv) induced persistent, long-lasting elevations in ICSS thresholds in drug-naïve rats. Indeed, Hrct-1 elevated ICSS thresholds for 36 h, with peak elevations between 6 and 12 hours after injection. Hrct-1-induced threshold elevations were attenuated by an antibody known to neutralize the binding of hcrt-1 to its receptors. Taken together, these observations suggest that Hrct-1 negatively regulates brain reward function in rats. Because Hrct-1 negatively regulates brain reward function, we hypothesized that it may attenuate the increased brain reward function usually observed after cocaine consumption, and thereby alter cocaine self-administration behavior. A daily injection of Hrct-1 (1 µg icv), for 4 consecutive days, slightly increased cocaine self-administration (0.25 mg/infusion) in rats. Overall, these data demonstrate that Hrct-1 negatively regulates brain reward function, and as such may indirectly alter cocaine self-administration. Given the well-established role of hypocretin neurons in regulating feeding behavior and sleep, we hypothesize that hypocretinergic regulation of brain reward function may provide a mechanism by which appropriate and competing behaviors (e.g. sleep or feeding) may be engaged to maintain energy homeostasis. (shrink)

For years, experimental philosophers have attempted to discern whether laypeople find free will compatible with a scientifically deterministic understanding of the universe, yet no consensus has emerged. The present work provides one potential explanation for these discrepant findings: People are strongly motivated to preserve free will and moral responsibility, and thus do not have stable, logically rigorous notions of free will. Seven studies support this hypothesis by demonstrating that a variety of logically irrelevant (but motivationally relevant) features influence compatibilist judgments. (...) In Study 1, participants who were asked to consider the possibility that our universe is deterministic were more compatibilist than those not asked to consider this possibility, suggesting that determinism poses a threat to moral responsibility, which increases compatibilist responding (thus reducing the threat). In Study 2, participants who considered concrete instances of moral behavior found compatibilist free will more sufficient for moral responsibility than participants who were asked about moral responsibility more generally. In Study 3a, the order in which participants read free will and determinism descriptions influenced their compatibilist judgments—and only when the descriptions had moral significance: Participants were more likely to report that determinism was compatible with free will than that free will was compatible with determinism. In Study 3b, participants who read the free will description first (the more compatibilist group) were particularly likely to confess that their beliefs in free will and moral responsibility and their disbelief in determinism influenced their conclusion. In Study 4, participants reduced their compatibilist beliefs after reading a passage that argued that moral responsibility could be preserved even in the absence of free will. Participants also reported that immaterial souls were compatible with scientific determinism, most strongly among immaterial soul believers (Study 5), and evaluated information about the capacities of primates in a biased manner favoring the existence of human free will (Study 6). These results suggest that people do not have one intuition about whether free will is compatible with determinism. Instead, people report that free will is compatible with determinism when desiring to uphold moral responsibility. Recommendations for future work are discussed. (shrink)

We propose a friendly amendment to integrative experiment design (IED), adversarial-collaboration IED, that incentivizes research teams from competing theoretical perspectives to identify zones of the design space where they possess an explanatory edge. This amendment is especially critical in debates that have high policy stakes and carry a strong normative-political charge that might otherwise prevent free exchange of ideas.

Moral cognition, by its very nature, stems from intuitions about what is good and bad, and these intuitions influence moral assessments outside of conscious awareness. However, because humans evolved a shared set of moral intuitions, and are compelled to justify their moral assessments as good and rational (even erroneously) to others, moral virtue and moral progress are still possible.

Debate on free will with Christian List, Gregg Caruso, and Cory Clark. The exchange is focused on Christian List's book Why Free Will Is Real.

How do humans discover causal relations when the effect is not immediately observable? Previous experiments have uniformly demonstrated detrimental effects of outcome delays on causal induction. These findings seem to conflict with everyday causal cognition, where humans can apparently identify long-term causal relations with relative ease. Three experiments investigated whether the influence of delay on adult human causal judgements is mediated by experimentally induced assumptions about the timeframe of the causal relation in question, as suggested by Einhorn and Hogarth (1986). (...) Causal judgements generally decreased when a delay separated cause and effect. This decrease was less pronounced when the thematic context of the causal relation induced participants to expect a delay. Experiment 3 ruled out an alternative explanation of the effect based on variations of cue and outcome saliencies, and showed that detrimental effects of delay are reduced even more when instructions explicitly mentioned the timeframe of the causal relation in question. Knowledge thus mediates the impact of delay on human causal judgement. Implications for contemporary theories of human causal induction are discussed. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: The Physician's Covenant: Images of the Healer in Medical Ethics. By William F. May.

What does it mean to consider the world of AI through a Christian lens? Rapid developments in AI continue to reshape society, raising new ethical questions and challenging our understanding of the human person. Encountering Artificial Intelligence draws on Pope Francis’ discussion of a culture of encounter and broader themes in Catholic social thought in order to examine how current AI applications affect human relationships in various social spheres and offers concrete recommendations for better implementation. The document also explores questions (...) regarding personhood, consciousness, and the kinds of relationships humans might have with even the most advanced AI. Through these discussions, this book investigates the theoretical and practical challenges to interpersonal encounter raised by the age of AI. (AI Research Group for the Centre for Digital Culture of the Dicastery of Culture and Education of the Holy See). (shrink)

In June 2020, representatives of eight photography organizations addressed ongoing challenges to the industry by introducing the “Photo Bill of Rights,” asserting “the rights of all lens-based workers and defining actions that build a safer, healthier, more inclusive, and transparent industry.” The bill centers what “lens-based workers” are owed by the media organizations that employ them. This study analyzes the bill’s contents and the explicit and implicit values within it, finding that the bill presents a normative view of the work (...) environment lens-based workers should expect as a baseline. In so doing, the bill connects what lens-based workers owe their respective publics to what their employers owe those same workers. The bill highlights the enabling environment that these workers need to satisfy their obligations to the public. The bill reminds employers of their duty to create an equitable environment that can enable the fulfillment of public responsibility. (shrink)

The present article proposes an integration between cultural psychology and developmental science. Such an integration would draw on the cultural-psychology principle of culture-psyche interactions, as well as on the developmental-science principle of person↔︎context relations. Our proposed integration centers on acculturation, which is inherently both cultural and developmental. Specifically, we propose that acculturation is governed by specific transactions between the individual and the cultural context, and that different types of international migrants (e.g., legal immigrants, undocumented immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers, crisis migrants) (...) encounter quite different culture-psyche interactions and person↔︎context relations. We outline the ways in which various acculturation-related phenomena, such as acculturation operating at macro-level versus micro-level time scales, can be viewed through cultural and developmental lenses. The article concludes with future directions in research on acculturation as an intersection of cultural and developmental processes. (shrink)

Elevations in brain stimulation reward (BSR) thresholds have been observed in rats undergoing nicotine withdrawal and have been proposed as a sensitive measure of the negative affective state associated with nicotine withdrawal. mGluR are presynaptic autoreceptors that decrease glutamate release when stimulated. The aim of this study was to examine the role of glutamate neurotransmission in nicotine dependence. The mGluR agonist LY314582 (2.5–7.5 mg/kg) precipitated nicotine withdrawal as measured by elevations in BSR thresholds in nicotine-treated rats but not in controls. (...) It was hypothesized that LY314582 precipitated nicotine withdrawal by decreasing glutamatergic tone at postsynaptic glutamate receptors. Therefore, the effects of MPEP (0.5–2 mg/kg), an mGluR antagonist, and MK-801 (0.01–1 mg/kg), an NMDA receptor antagonist, were examined. MPEP elevated BSR thresholds by an equal magnitude in control and nicotine-treated rats. At low doses, MK-801 (0.01–0.2 mg/kg) lowered BSR thresholds to a similar extent in control and nicotine-treated rats. At higher doses, MK-801 (0.25–1 mg/kg) disrupted performance in nicotine-treated and control rats. These data indicate that mGluR and NMDA receptors regulate BSR in opposite directions in non-dependent animals, and chronic nicotine treatment does not alter these effects. Most importantly, the data demonstrate that the mGluR is involved in nicotine dependence, but mGluR and NMDA receptors do not mediate mGluR actions in nicotine dependence. (shrink)

This paper advances a continuing line of research investigating the potential of web-based educative curriculum materials (ECMs) to facilitate teachers’ development of professional teaching knowledge (PTK). Our ECMs consisted of online lesson plans scaffolded with embedded digital resources to promote teacher understanding of a particular wise-practice pedagogy: problem-based historical inquiry (PBHI). Our research question was: Can a 2nd generation of web-based ECMs encourage social studies teachers’ development of PTK for PBHI? Participants reacted positively to several educative scaffolds, especially videocases of (...) experts modeling historical thinking. Evidence suggested that multiple experiences with planning and implementing instruction with our ECMs helped teachers recognize value in some of the materials’ underpinning concepts (e.g., scaffolding and inquiry-based instruction). However, planning instruction individually, the novelty of planning resources enhanced with digital resources, and certain contextual features of schooling such as inadequate focused time for planning seemed to frustrate the ECMs potential to promote teacher-learning. Here we suggest that ECMs function less effectively as stand-alone supports; however, employed in more formal contexts that feature collaboration, they may be able to provide valuable support for teachers’ professional development. (shrink)

The last several decades of research on counterfactual conditionals in the fields of philosophy and linguistics have yielded a predominant paradigm according to which the notion of similarity plays the starring role. Roughly, a counterfactual of the form A > C is true iff the closest A-worlds are all C-worlds, where the closeness of a world is a function of its similarity, in a certain sense, to the actual world. I argue that this is deeply misguided. In some cases we (...) may only care about the closest A-worlds, but quite often we care about some broader variety of A-worlds varying in closeness. After presenting several problem cases for the similarity-based paradigm, some new and some known, I propose an alternative paradigm for the semantics of counterfactuals, which introduces the notion of A-scenarios, understood roughly as different ways of making A true. According to this view, A > C is true iff all the contextually relevant ways of making A true also make C true. I then more carefully spell out a working view that formalizes this idea with greater precision, and explore the consequences of that version of the view. (shrink)

Pursuant to the Doctrine of Consumer Sovereignty, we believe that tobacco companies should be compelled to disclose their ingredients so that the public health community can make more informed recommendations in order to protect consumer autonomy and sovereignty. However, a recent decision by the First Circuit precludes such a disclosure since it would be unduly burdensome to the industry, while granting only minimal gains to the public. We argue that many of the Court’s key claims rest on a misunderstanding of (...) the science and chemistry of tobacco products. In our view, a mandatory disclosure of ingredients would more effectively protect the public interest, whilst posing minimal burdens on the tobacco industry. (shrink)

A hippocampal patient is described who shows preserved item recognition and simple recognition-based recollection but impaired recall and associative recognition. These data and other evidence suggest that contrary to Aggleton & Brown's target article, Papez circuit damage impairs only complex item-item-context recollection. A patient with perirhinal cortex damage and a delayed global memory deficit, apparently inconsistent with A&B's framework, is also described.

In this paper, we propose that an increasingly regarded theoretical framework in neuroscience—the predictive processing framework—can help to advance an understanding of the foundations of critical thinking as well as provide a mechanistic hypothesis for how education may increase a learner’s subsequent use of critical thinking outside of an educational context. We begin by identifying a lacuna in the understanding of critical thinking: a causal account of the internal triggers to think critically. We then introduce the predictive processing framework to (...) address this lacuna, and unpack the implications of this framework for understanding the deployment of critical thinking skills in situ, in the real world. (shrink)