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<td><span style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:20px;font-weight:bold;">PsyPost – Psychology News</span></td>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/are-ai-lovers-replacing-real-romantic-partners-surprising-findings-from-new-research/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Are AI lovers replacing real romantic partners? Surprising findings from new research</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">May 4th 2025, 10:00</div>
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<p><p>A new study published in the <em><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-025-03143-0" target="_blank">Archives of Sexual Behavior</a></em> offers insight into how romantic relationships with virtual agents—artificially intelligent characters designed to simulate human interaction—might influence people’s intentions to marry in real life. The research found that these virtual relationships can affect marriage intention in both negative and positive ways, depending on the psychological mechanisms involved. Feelings of connection and authenticity in these digital relationships were linked to lower interest in marriage, while emotional satisfaction and a sense of personal competence were associated with more favorable attitudes toward marrying a real partner.</p>
<p>The study was motivated by growing concerns about the declining rates of marriage and family formation, especially in East Asian cultures like China where social norms strongly emphasize marriage and filial duty. As technology evolves, a growing number of people are turning to virtual agents—non-human but human-like characters found in video games and apps—to fulfill emotional and romantic needs. These relationships are particularly common in romantic simulation games, where users engage in conversations and storylines with digital characters. </p>
<p>Some researchers worry this trend may reduce people’s motivation to pursue real-life romantic relationships, while others suggest these digital experiences could help people improve social skills and build confidence for real-world intimacy. The current study aimed to examine both possibilities and uncover the psychological processes that mediate the relationship between digital love and real-life marriage intentions.</p>
<p>To explore these questions, the researchers conducted an online survey between December 2023 and February 2024. The sample included 503 Chinese participants—182 men and 321 women—who had engaged in romantic relationships with virtual agents in the past year. Participants were recruited through snowball sampling, beginning with players of well-known romantic games like “Light and Night,” “Mr. Love: Queen’s Choice,” and “VR Kanojo.” Respondents were asked about the amount of time they spent with their virtual partners, their emotional experiences, and their attitudes toward real-life marriage.</p>
<p>The survey measured several key concepts, including satisfaction of relatedness (how emotionally fulfilling the virtual relationship felt), relationship authenticity (how “real” the connection seemed), and desire for a real-life relationship with the virtual agent. It also included assessments of participants’ emotional responses, feelings of immersion and competence in the relationship, and standard psychological measures of marriage attitudes, perceived social norms, and sense of control over marriage-related decisions. Participants also reported their overall intention to marry a real person.</p>
<p>Analysis showed that time spent with virtual agents was positively associated with feelings of emotional closeness, perceived authenticity of the relationship, and experiences of enjoyment, immersion, and confidence. However, those same feelings were also linked with reduced interest in marriage, especially among male participants. One explanation is that when virtual relationships satisfy people’s need for emotional connection, they may feel less inclined to seek out similar relationships in real life. This pattern was particularly pronounced among men, possibly due to differing motivations or mating strategies.</p>
<p>Another mechanism at play was romantic anthropomorphism—the tendency to perceive virtual agents as emotionally genuine partners. Participants who felt a strong emotional bond with their digital companions were more likely to say they wished their virtual agent could be real. These individuals were also less inclined to want to marry a real person, possibly because their idealized views of virtual romance led them to judge real-life relationships less favorably.</p>
<p>At the same time, the study found that virtual relationships could boost people’s confidence and enhance their attitudes toward marriage. Participants who felt happy and competent during interactions with their virtual agents were more likely to express positive views about marriage and reported a stronger sense of control over their ability to achieve it. These findings suggest that virtual relationships may provide emotional benefits that carry over into real-world attitudes, potentially increasing marriage intention through improved mood and a greater sense of capability.</p>
<p>Interestingly, the researchers had expected that immersion in virtual relationships might disconnect users from real-world social norms, leading to lower marriage intention. But the data told a different story. Participants who reported higher levels of immersion were actually more likely to endorse traditional marriage norms. This finding implies that virtual romantic experiences may reinforce rather than undermine cultural expectations—perhaps because the narratives and character dynamics in romantic games often reflect real-life social scripts.</p>
<p>Gender differences emerged across several pathways. Men were more strongly affected by feelings of relatedness, immersion, and competence in virtual relationships than women. These differences may reflect both cultural norms and underlying biological tendencies. Previous research has suggested that men may be more prone to forming emotional attachments to non-human companions, especially when those relationships offer a sense of control, validation, or idealized connection.</p>
<p>The study has several practical implications. On one hand, it raises concerns that people who find emotional fulfillment in virtual relationships may become less motivated to seek out real-life partners. On the other hand, it also suggests that virtual experiences could be designed to promote healthy attitudes toward marriage. Developers of romantic games could embed themes that highlight the value of real-life commitment, while mental health professionals might help individuals distinguish between digital escapism and genuine relational needs.</p>
<p>Like all research, this study has limitations. It relied on a cross-sectional survey design, which means it cannot determine cause and effect. It’s possible that people with lower interest in marriage are more likely to engage in virtual relationships, rather than the other way around. Future studies using longitudinal or experimental designs are needed to clarify the direction of these relationships. In addition, because the sample was drawn from a single country and relied on a specific recruitment method, the findings may not generalize to other cultural contexts or populations.</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-025-03143-0" target="_blank">Romantic Relationships with Virtual Agents and People’s Marriage Intention in Real Life: An Exploration of the Mediation Mechanisms</a>,” was authored by Jia‑Lin Zhao, Ru Jia, John Shields, Yu‑Jia Wu, and Wei‑Wei Huang.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/dark-personalities-in-politicians-may-intensify-partisan-hatred-particularly-among-their-biggest-fans/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Dark personalities in politicians may intensify partisan hatred—particularly among their biggest fans</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">May 4th 2025, 08:00</div>
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<p><p>A new international study suggests that voters who support political candidates with darker personality traits—such as narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism—may experience stronger emotional divides from their political opponents. But this association appears only among those who feel a close ideological connection with these candidates, and not in response to disliked political rivals. The findings shed light on how the personality traits of leaders might influence public opinion, offering a deeper understanding of how political divisions are fueled not just by policies or party lines, but by the personal qualities of those at the top.</p>
<p>The study was published in the <em><a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6765.70002" target="_blank">European Journal of Political Research</a></em> by a team of researchers from the University of Amsterdam, the University of Lausanne, and Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. They investigated how the so-called “dark triad” of personality traits might be linked to a growing emotional gap between political partisans, also known as affective polarization.</p>
<p>The dark triad refers to a group of three personality traits that are socially aversive but not necessarily pathological. These traits are narcissism (characterized by self-importance, entitlement, and a need for admiration), psychopathy (marked by emotional coldness, impulsivity, and a lack of empathy), and Machiavellianism (associated with manipulation, deceit, and a strategic focus on self-interest). While each trait is distinct, they often overlap and are linked to aggressive, exploitative, or unethical behavior—especially in social or leadership contexts.</p>
<p>Affective polarization refers to the tendency for people to feel emotionally connected to their own political party while harboring increasing dislike toward rival parties. This divide can reduce people’s willingness to cooperate across political lines, lower support for democratic values, and strain personal relationships. Recent years have seen a rise in political leaders with combative and self-centered personas, which prompted the researchers to ask: could the personality traits of political elites be contributing to the public’s deepening political animosity?</p>
<p>“I have been working on the dark side of personality and its importance in politics for a few years now. Jürgen Maier, one of my main collaborators, and I recently wrote a book titled <em><a href="https://amzn.to/43dUwZd" target="_blank">Dark Politics</a></em>, which presents an in-depth investigation into the role of dark traits in politicians—what they are, where they come from, and what their consequences can be,” said study author <a href="https://www.alessandro-nai.com/" target="_blank">Alessandro Nai</a>, an associate professor of political communication at the University of Amsterdam.</p>
<p>“The last chapter on that book hints at some nefarious democratic consequences of electing dark politicians, including in terms of democratic backsliding, poor handling of the COVID pandemic, and increased dislike for the out-party. This latter is of particular relevance, as it implied that electing dark leaders could be associated with fostering affective polarization in the public. This is what I then decided to explore further.”</p>
<p>To explore this, the research team brought together data from two major sources. The first was an expert survey known as NEGex, which asked political scientists to assess the personalities of leading candidates in 40 national elections held between 2016 and 2021. This included more than 90 high-profile figures such as Donald Trump, Angela Merkel, Jair Bolsonaro, and Emmanuel Macron. Experts rated these candidates on dark personality traits using a modified version of the “Dirty Dozen” scale, which includes statements like “tends to be callous or insensitive” and “wants to be admired by others.”</p>
<p>The second data source came from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems, a collection of post-election surveys from around the world. These surveys measured the public’s emotional reactions to political leaders using so-called “feeling thermometers,” which ask people to rate how warmly or coldly they feel toward each leader. This allowed researchers to calculate the emotional distance between a voter’s preferred candidate and other candidates—an estimate of how polarized that voter felt.</p>
<p>By combining the two datasets, the researchers created a profile that matched roughly 34,000 voters with the dark personality traits of both their preferred and most disliked political candidates. They also factored in how ideologically close voters felt to these candidates, along with a range of demographic and political variables to account for other possible influences.</p>
<p>The results revealed a clear pattern. The dark personality traits of a voter’s preferred candidate were linked to stronger affective polarization—but only when the voter felt ideologically close to the candidate. In other words, voters who felt aligned with a narcissistic or manipulative political leader were more likely to show stronger emotional rejection of rival candidates. This association was not found for leaders who were ideologically distant or for those in opposing parties.</p>
<p>The effect was especially pronounced for one trait in particular: Machiavellianism. While narcissism and psychopathy also showed similar patterns, it was the tendency to manipulate and deceive—hallmarks of Machiavellianism—that showed the strongest link to increased affective polarization among supporters.</p>
<p>“In politics, we tend to follow what our leaders – that is, the most important political figures that lead the party we feel the most closely associated to – say and do,” Nai told PsyPost. “This is why we elect them in the first place, because we feel that they, somehow, reflect who we are and what we like. Our research shows that this affective attachment to our leaders is one of the causes of the affective polarization in the public, that is, the fact that voters increasingly actively <em>dislike</em> their political opponents, on top of disagreeing with them.” </p>
<p>“What we find is a relatively clear association between the personality traits of in-party leaders and the levels of affective polarization of their voters. Specifically, in-party leaders with a darker personality profile, in particular, Machiavellianism, are associated with increased affective polarization in their voters. This association is only correlational, of course, but it does suggest that electing dark leaders could, possibly, make the public as a whole more politically radicalized.”</p>
<p>Interestingly, the personality traits of disliked candidates did not show the same kind of influence. Even when those candidates scored high on dark traits, they did not significantly increase affective polarization. This suggests that it is not how much voters dislike their opponents that drives polarization, but rather how strongly they support and identify with dominant, dark-spirited leaders from their own side.</p>
<p>To ensure the results weren’t biased by the experts’ own political views, the researchers conducted several additional analyses. They adjusted the personality ratings to account for expert ideology, controlled for expert demographics, and also considered whether candidates used negative or fear-based rhetoric during campaigns. The findings held up across these checks, suggesting the results were robust.</p>
<p>“The clarity of the result surprised us a bit,” Nai said. “And while it makes theoretically sense, the fact that we did not find any strong effect for the dark personality of out-party leaders (that is, the leader of the party we dislike the most) was a bit of a surprise.” </p>
<p>“What seems to be mattering, according to our results, is who <em>your</em> leader is, no matter who the leader of your opponents is. This could have implications for the way we think about current politics in the United States, for instance: the personality of Trump should not be what drives affective polarization in Democratic voters, according to our general trends.”</p>
<p>Still, the researchers caution against interpreting these findings as definitive proof that politicians’ personalities directly cause affective polarization. Because the data is observational, it’s possible that the relationship goes the other way—that more polarized voters may be drawn to darker leaders. Experimental or longitudinal studies would be needed to determine which comes first.</p>
<p>“We should not conclude that the dark personality of leaders drives affective polarization in their base — it is also likely that more affectively polarized voters are more likely to support leaders with dark traits,” Nai noted. “Actually, the two mechanisms likely co-exist in a dark and polarizing spiral, which is something that we are start considering as further study.”</p>
<p>There are also limits to how widely the findings can be applied. The study focused on top-level politicians such as party leaders and presidential candidates, leaving open the question of whether similar patterns exist among local or regional officials. Since people often have more personal contact with local politicians, these dynamics might be even more pronounced at lower levels of government.</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6765.70002" target="_blank">Ripping the public apart? Politicians’ dark personality and affective polarization</a>,” was authored by Alessandro Nai, Frederico Ferreira da Silva, Loes Aaldering, Katjana Gattermann, and Diego Garzia.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/avoidant-attachment-to-parents-linked-to-choosing-a-childfree-life-study-finds/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Avoidant attachment to parents linked to choosing a childfree life, study finds</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">May 4th 2025, 06:00</div>
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<p><p>A large new study published in the journal <em><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/01461672251322842" target="_blank">Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin</a></em> sheds light on why some people choose not to have children—and how their close relationships may shape that decision. Researchers found that individuals who are more emotionally distant from their parents were significantly more likely to identify as childfree. On the other hand, people who expressed more anxious attachment toward their parents were slightly less likely to opt out of parenthood. The study also found that people with different attachment styles reported different reasons for choosing not to have children, ranging from mental health concerns to a desire for personal freedom.</p>
<p>The decision to be childfree is becoming more common, especially in industrialized societies. While some individuals remain childless due to circumstances beyond their control, childfree people are defined by their active and deliberate decision not to have children—biological, adopted, or otherwise. </p>
<p>Past research has focused on societal trends and personal motivations, such as concerns about finances, health, or the environment. But fewer studies have examined how a person’s early emotional bonds, especially with parents, relate to the desire to remain childfree. The current research sought to better understand these psychological factors and explore whether different types of attachment—secure, anxious, or avoidant—are associated with specific reasons for not wanting children.</p>
<p>Attachment styles describe the ways people relate to others in close relationships, shaped by early interactions with caregivers. People with a secure attachment style generally feel comfortable with closeness and trust others. In contrast, those with an anxious attachment style often worry about being abandoned, while those with an avoidant style tend to be emotionally distant and uncomfortable with dependency. These patterns can carry over into adult relationships, including with romantic partners, friends, and parents.</p>
<p>“Broadly, I wanted to better understand why some people make the choice to not have children. A lot of the research on the reasons for being childfree has been qualitative, and while that’s very valuable research, I wanted to better understand how common each of the major reasons is within the childfree community,” explained study author <a href="https://childfreeresearch.com/" target="_blank">Sara Glass</a>, a PhD student at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.</p>
<p>“I was also interested in exploring the personalities of childfree people. Previous research suggests that there are no major Big Five personality differences between childfree and non-childfree people. However, the decision to have children is often an interpersonal one, so I thought that a model of individual differences that may provide more insight into the lives of childfree people would be attachment theory.”</p>
<p>The study drew on data from more than 18,000 adults around the world, with over half of participants based in the United States. Participants completed a comprehensive online survey assessing their attachment patterns to key figures in their lives—mothers, fathers, romantic partners, and close friends—using a widely accepted measure known as the Relationship Structures Questionnaire. They were also asked about their parental status and intentions, which allowed researchers to classify them as parents, aspiring parents, undecided, childless, ambivalent, or childfree. Those who indicated they did not have and did not want children were categorized as childfree.</p>
<p>About 12% of the sample identified as childfree. These individuals were then asked to select from a list of 18 possible reasons for not wanting children. The most commonly endorsed reason was the desire to keep one’s freedom, selected by two-thirds of childfree respondents.</p>
<p>“Most childfree people said that they didn’t want to have children because they wanted to keep their freedom and because having kids just isn’t compatible with their lifestyle or goals,” Glass told PsyPost. “Other common reasons were being worried about the state of the world and the environment, financial reasons, career related reasons, to avoid losing their personal identity, mental health reasons, and not liking children, or only liking them in ‘small doses.'”</p>
<p>The researchers found that attachment avoidance—particularly toward one’s mother or father—was the strongest predictor of being childfree. People who scored higher in parental attachment avoidance were significantly more likely to opt out of parenthood. In contrast, individuals who were more anxiously attached to their parents were slightly less likely to be childfree. This pattern did not hold for attachments to romantic partners, which were not significantly related to childfree status. Interestingly, greater attachment insecurity toward close friends was also linked to a higher likelihood of being childfree, though to a lesser extent than parental relationships.</p>
<p>The study also looked at how attachment styles influenced the specific reasons people gave for being childfree. People with high attachment anxiety—characterized by fear of rejection and a strong need for reassurance—were more likely to cite mental health concerns and global instability as reasons for avoiding parenthood. In contrast, individuals high in attachment avoidance—marked by discomfort with closeness and dependence—were more likely to choose reasons related to lifestyle and personal freedom.</p>
<p>For example, childfree participants who were more anxiously attached to their friends or parents were significantly more likely to say they didn’t want children due to mental health reasons. Those same individuals were also more likely to report worries about the future and the state of the world as influencing their decision. By contrast, participants who were more avoidantly attached to their parents were more likely to say they wanted to keep their personal freedom and avoid a loss of identity.</p>
<p>“Generally, people who are more anxious in their relationships were more likely to be childfree because of worries and fears, such as being worried about the environment or their mental health,” Glass said. “People who are more avoidant in their relationships were more likely to be childfree for lifestyle related reasons, such as wanting to keep their personal freedom.” </p>
<p>“Our results also suggest that people’s relationships with their parents predict being childfree more so than their relationships with their romantic partners. People who were more anxiously attached to their parents were less likely to be childfree, and people who were more avoidantly attached to their parents were more likely to be childfree.”</p>
<p>The researchers caution that the study’s design does not allow for conclusions about cause and effect. While attachment avoidance was linked to being childfree, the relationship may be complex and bidirectional. For instance, choosing not to have children might contribute to emotional distance from parents if those parents expected grandchildren. It is also possible that other factors not measured in the study could explain both attachment style and reproductive decisions.</p>
<p>“We cannot say, for example, whether attachment avoidance towards parents causes people to be childfree, being childfree causes people to become more avoidantly attached to their parents, or if there is some third variable that causes both,” Glass noted.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, the study offers a deeper look into the psychological foundations of an increasingly common life choice. The results highlight that for many people, the decision to be childfree is not just about money, career, or personal goals—it may also reflect long-standing patterns in how they relate to others. The researchers suggest that people’s early relationships with their parents may shape how they imagine themselves as future caregivers and influence their motivations for embracing a childfree life.</p>
<p>Future studies could explore how these attachment-based motivations evolve over time and whether childfree individuals experience changes in their relational dynamics, mental health, or well-being as they age. Researchers could also examine the overrepresented of nonbinary individuals among childfree participants.</p>
<p>“Nonbinary people were about three times more common in the childfree subsample compared to the non-childfree subsample,” Glass said. “I believe exploring this finding more to better understand why nonbinary people are so much more prevalent within the childfree community would be a very interesting avenue for future research.”</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/01461672251322842" target="_blank">Attachment Orientations Predict the Likelihood of Choosing to be Childfree and the Reasons for Not Wanting Children</a>,” was authored by Sara Glass and R. Chris Fraley.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/these-5-recent-neuroscience-psychology-studies-reveal-surprising-insights-into-autism/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">These 5 recent studies reveal surprising insights into autism</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">May 3rd 2025, 18:00</div>
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<p><p>Autism spectrum disorder is a developmental condition that affects how people communicate, interact socially, and respond to the world around them. It exists on a spectrum, meaning individuals experience a wide range of strengths and challenges, from difficulties with social cues to deep focus on specific interests. While the exact causes of autism are still being explored, research points to a mix of genetic and environmental influences.</p>
<p>In recent years, scientists have been uncovering new and often surprising insights into the brain, behavior, and emotions of people with autistic traits. Here are five recent studies that offer a fresh look at how autism shapes perception, learning, and development.</p>
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<h3>1. <a href="https://www.psypost.org/emotional-recognition-difficulties-may-stem-more-from-alexithymia-than-autistic-traits/"><strong>Alexithymia, not autism, may drive emotion recognition difficulties</strong></a></h3>
<p>A study published in <em>Development and Psychopathology</em> challenges a long-standing assumption: that people with high autistic traits struggle to read emotions in faces because of autism itself. Instead, researchers found that another trait—alexithymia, or difficulty identifying and describing one’s own emotions—was the true driver of these challenges. In a sample of 247 adults, participants completed emotion recognition tasks involving both human and anime-style faces. Although autistic traits were linked to poorer recognition of emotions in human faces, this link vanished when alexithymia was taken into account. Alexithymia alone predicted lower accuracy for both human and anime faces, suggesting it may be the more important factor behind these difficulties.</p>
<p>Interestingly, people with higher autistic traits did not struggle as much with anime faces, possibly because exaggerated emotional cues in anime are easier to interpret. The findings offer a more nuanced view of emotion processing in autism and suggest that interventions should target alexithymia directly. Study author Bridger Standiford also speculated that the popularity of anime among autistic individuals might stem from its clearer emotional signals. Though the study had some limitations—including a non-clinical sample and non-validated anime stimuli—it strengthens a growing body of evidence that alexithymia plays a key role in emotional processing, independent of autism.</p>
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<h3>2. <a href="https://www.psypost.org/brain-imaging-method-detects-genetic-markers-of-autism-with-over-90-accuracy/"><strong>Machine learning identifies autism-linked genes through brain scans</strong></a></h3>
<p>In a groundbreaking study published in <em>Science Advances</em>, researchers used brain imaging and machine learning to detect genetic variants associated with autism—reaching up to 95% accuracy. Focusing on a well-known genetic region called 16p11.2, they used a technique called transport-based morphometry to analyze brain structure in 206 individuals. This method revealed distinct brain patterns in people with deletions or duplications in the 16p11.2 region, both of which are known to increase autism risk. Remarkably, the system could classify individuals into the correct genetic group based solely on their brain scans, far outperforming traditional demographic measures.</p>
<p>Beyond classification, the researchers visualized how these genetic variants changed brain structure. For example, those with deletions had larger brain volumes and more gray matter, while duplications were linked to smaller brains and less gray matter. These brain differences were not confined to isolated regions but were widespread, affecting areas tied to language, emotion, and sensory integration. They also related to behavioral outcomes—such as speech disorders and cognitive abilities—showing that these structural patterns have real-world significance. Although the study was limited to one genetic region and a specific sample population, it points to a future where autism could be detected using biological markers rather than relying solely on behavioral observation.</p>
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<h3>3. <a href="https://www.psypost.org/new-study-finds-online-self-reports-may-not-accurately-reflect-clinical-autism-diagnoses/"><strong>Self-reported autism traits don’t always match clinical diagnoses</strong></a></h3>
<p>A study in <em>Nature Mental Health</em> examined whether people who report high autistic traits online resemble those diagnosed with autism through clinical evaluations. The answer: not entirely. Researchers compared 56 individuals diagnosed through in-person clinical interviews with two online groups—one with high self-reported autistic traits and one with low traits. All participants completed social cognition tasks and personality questionnaires. While the self-reported high-trait group appeared similar on paper, they differed significantly in behavior and mental health profiles.</p>
<p>The online high-trait group, for example, reported more symptoms of social anxiety and avoidant personality traits, suggesting that their difficulties may stem more from anxiety than autism. In social simulation tasks, those with a clinical diagnosis showed unique patterns, including reduced ability to influence social interactions and a tendency to behave more distantly, regardless of their internal feelings. The findings underscore a major challenge in online psychiatric research: self-report surveys may not reliably identify diagnostic groups. While self-reports can still offer valuable insights into lived experience, the study makes a strong case for including clinician evaluations in autism research and cautions against overgeneralizing from online samples.</p>
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<h3>4. <a href="https://www.psypost.org/researchers-uncover-a-hidden-cognitive-strength-associated-with-autistic-traits/"><strong>Preference for predictability may boost curiosity-driven learning</strong></a></h3>
<p>A new study in <em>PLOS Computational Biology</em> offers a fresh look at how autistic traits shape curiosity and learning. Researchers observed how 70 young adults explored an online task involving cartoon animals that hid according to probabilistic rules. Participants with higher levels of “insistence on sameness”—a trait often linked to autism—persisted longer in the task and used learning progress as a guide for whether to continue or quit. This persistence, often seen as a disadvantage, actually led to superior performance when learning complex patterns.</p>
<p>The study’s findings challenge deficit-based narratives about autism. Participants with strong predictability preferences didn’t just stick with tasks longer—they showed adaptive, goal-driven learning strategies. Rather than fleeing from uncertainty, they embraced it strategically, continuing only when progress was possible. By contrast, those with lower autistic traits were more prone to switching tasks to avoid making mistakes, even when they had more to learn. These different approaches highlight how autistic traits can foster valuable learning behaviors in the right environment. The authors emphasize that understanding these individual differences is key to building inclusive educational strategies that leverage neurodiverse strengths.</p>
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<h3>5. <a href="https://www.psypost.org/neurotransmitter-switching-in-early-development-predicts-autism-related-behaviors/"><strong>Temporary neurotransmitter shifts in early life may lead to lasting autism-like behaviors</strong></a></h3>
<p>A study in <em>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</em> uncovered how early brain chemistry disruptions can have long-term effects on social behavior. Researchers exposed pregnant mice to environmental risk factors known to increase autism likelihood—such as valproic acid or simulated immune responses. In their offspring, they discovered a temporary neurotransmitter switch: neurons that normally produce the inhibitory neurotransmitter GABA began producing the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate. This imbalance occurred in the medial prefrontal cortex, a brain region central to social behavior.</p>
<p>Although the neurotransmitter switch was brief and reversed weeks later, its effects were long-lasting. As adults, the mice exhibited autism-like behaviors, including repetitive grooming and reduced social interaction. But when the researchers intervened early by introducing a gene that prevented the neurotransmitter switch, these behaviors did not develop. The findings suggest that even transient chemical disruptions during key developmental periods can alter brain wiring in lasting ways. While mouse models can’t capture the full complexity of human autism, the study sheds light on how environmental exposures might contribute to developmental conditions and opens doors to early intervention strategies.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/unexpected-results-from-a-ketamine-study-might-reshape-depression-research/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Unexpected results from a ketamine study might reshape depression research</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">May 3rd 2025, 16:00</div>
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<p><p>A recent study published in the <em><a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2025.04.008" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Journal of Affective Disorders</a></em> has found that chronic opioid use may interfere with the brain’s ability to generate a placebo antidepressant response, but does not seem to reduce the effectiveness of ketamine. In a reanalysis of data from a 2023 trial, researchers found that patients on prescription opioids experienced less relief from depression when given a placebo—but showed a normal response when given ketamine. These findings point to a possible interaction between opioid medications and the brain’s natural mood regulation systems, and may help researchers better understand how both drugs and expectations influence mental health outcomes.</p>
<p>The motivation behind this study came from an unexpected observation. In a recent trial, researchers investigated whether ketamine could still produce antidepressant effects even when its psychoactive effects were eliminated by general anesthesia. Surprisingly, patients who received placebo during surgery experienced improvements in depression nearly equal to those who received ketamine.</p>
<p>“In 2023, we published a surprising result from a study about the antidepressant effect of ketamine. In <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s44220-023-00140-x">that study</a>, we attempted to ‘take the trip out’ of ketamine by administering it to depressed patients who were receiving general anesthesia for surgery,” explained study author <a href="https://heifetslab.stanford.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Boris D. Heifets</a>, an associate professor of anesthesiology, perioperative and pain medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine and co-director of the Exploratory Therapeutics Laboratory.</p>
<p>“That study was designed to be truly blind, in the sense that participants wouldn’t know which treatment they received (a rarity in studies with psychedelic-class drugs), and designed to test the idea that ketamine might have antidepressant effects independent of its acute psychoactive effects (the ‘trip’).”</p>
<p>“We found that patients who got ketamine under anesthesia did very well (>50% treatment response, ~30% remission from depression). We also found that the placebo group did similarly well – in fact, there was no difference between ketamine and placebo, which some took to mean that ketamine is no better than placebo.</p>
<p>“To me and Theresa Lii, the lead author of both, we thought the most interesting result was the massive placebo effect – which suggested that when you drive large expectations (as is often done in psychedelic studies), but never have a ‘moment of betrayal’ where participants discover they got placebo, you can achieve powerful and perhaps lasting antidepressant effects. This new study, published last month, is a reanalysis of our data from 2023 and takes a much closer look at the placebo effect.”</p>
<p>Opioids, such as morphine and oxycodone, activate the brain’s opioid receptors and are commonly used to treat chronic pain. Ketamine, originally developed as an anesthetic, has gained attention in recent years for its rapid antidepressant effects. Both opioids and ketamine appear to influence mood through pathways involving the brain’s endogenous opioid system—a network that helps regulate pain, pleasure, and emotional responses. Past research has suggested that this system also plays a role in placebo responses, including those seen in antidepressant trials.</p>
<p>Because chronic opioid use can alter the sensitivity of the opioid system, the researchers wondered whether such use might reduce the placebo response in depressed individuals. To test this idea, Heifets and his colleagues reexamined data from their 2023 study involving 40 adults with major depressive disorder who were undergoing routine surgery under general anesthesia. Half of the participants received a single intravenous dose of ketamine, while the other half received a saline placebo. The researchers then assessed depression symptoms using the Montgomery–Åsberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS) over the two weeks following treatment.</p>
<p>In this new analysis, participants were categorized based on whether they were using prescription opioid medications at the time of screening. Of the 40 participants, 16 were opioid users. Importantly, people taking high opioid doses or medications that act differently on opioid receptors were excluded. Pain levels before and after surgery were measured to ensure that any mood changes were not simply due to differences in physical discomfort.</p>
<p>The analysis revealed that patients who were taking opioids at the start of the study experienced less improvement in depression symptoms after receiving placebo. On average, their MADRS scores dropped much less than those of non-opioid users, indicating a weaker placebo response. In contrast, among patients who received ketamine, there was no meaningful difference in depression outcomes between opioid users and non-users.</p>
<p>The findings indicate that “long term opioid use may interfere with the placebo antidepressant response,” Heifets told PsyPost. “Endogenous opioids (like ‘endorphins’) are known to play a role in the placebo analgesia response, but so far there isn’t much known about the placebo antidepressant response. This study suggests that these different types of placebo response may share a mechanism.”</p>
<p>To strengthen their findings, the researchers ran several sensitivity tests. They used an alternative self-report depression measure known as the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), which includes both mood and anxiety items and is commonly used in hospital settings. Results from the HADS supported the initial finding: the dampening effect of opioid use on the placebo response became more pronounced over time, while no such effect was seen with ketamine.</p>
<p>Importantly, the team ruled out pain as a possible explanation for their findings. There was very little correlation between patients’ reported pain levels and their depression symptoms after treatment. Even though opioid users did tend to report more postoperative pain, this did not explain their reduced placebo response.</p>
<p>So why would opioid use weaken the brain’s response to placebo, but not to ketamine? One possibility is that chronic exposure to opioid medications might desensitize or disrupt the body’s natural opioid system. Since this system is thought to play a role in the placebo effect, such changes could reduce a person’s ability to experience mood improvements from positive expectations alone. Ketamine, on the other hand, may work through mechanisms that bypass or even reverse these opioid-related changes, restoring the brain’s sensitivity to mood-regulating signals.</p>
<p>“The ‘placebo effect’ is a complex and powerful response with a biological mechanism,” Heifets said. “Ketamine may act by ‘resetting’ placebo sensitivity. We and others have proposed that psychedelic-class drugs, like ketamine, might work through the same biological pathways that placebo uses. As you can imagine, that would make it difficult to untangle what is “placebo” and what is ‘drug effect” in a psychedelic trial – this question has been a major challenge for studies involving drugs like psilocybin and MDMA.”</p>
<p>The researchers acknowledged some limitations. This was a post hoc analysis, meaning the study was not originally designed to examine opioid effects specifically. The sample size was small, with just 7 opioid users in the placebo group and 9 in the ketamine group, increasing the chance of statistical noise. The researchers also did not have precise data on how closely participants followed their prescribed opioid regimens, or when they last took their medication before the study.</p>
<p>“This was a reanalysis of a small study,” Heifets noted. “It is far from proof of the ideas we are putting forward, but it does support some new thinking about how psychedelic-class drugs work, and how strong placebo effects work.”</p>
<p>Despite these limitations, the findings raise important questions about how common medications like opioids may interfere with both drug-based and placebo-based treatments for depression. Many individuals with depression are also prescribed opioids, and yet this overlap has received relatively little attention in clinical research. If opioids suppress the brain’s natural placebo responses, they could unknowingly dampen the effectiveness of both experimental treatments and standard care.</p>
<p>The authors suggest that future research should directly investigate how opioid exposure—both short- and long-term—interacts with treatment outcomes in antidepressant trials. They also propose that tools like opioid antagonists (which block opioid receptors) could be used to probe the brain’s placebo pathways and better understand how expectations, neurochemistry, and treatment responses are connected.</p>
<p>These findings also have implications for the design of clinical trials, especially in the emerging field of psychedelic therapy. Traditional double-blind studies often struggle to separate drug effects from expectation effects when mind-altering substances like ketamine or psilocybin are examined. If placebo responses themselves can be harnessed and modulated through biological systems, this could open the door to more personalized and effective treatments—even ones that don’t rely solely on pharmacology.</p>
<p>“One of the major challenges for studying psychedelic therapies is that the classic ‘randomized double blind trial’ does not really work well – participants usually know what they got, and attempts to confuse participants about what they received could actually work against one of the nominal goals of psychedelic therapy, which involves gaining insight into one’s condition and one’s self,” Heifets explained. “We think that understanding the mechanism of placebo will give us insight into how to maximize the potential benefits of psychedelics.”</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2025.04.008" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Opioids diminish the placebo antidepressant response: Observational post hoc findings from a randomized controlled ketamine trial</a>,” was authored by Theresa R. Lii, Josephine R. Flohr, Robin L. Okada, Lisa J. Cianfichi, Laura M. Hack, Alan F. Schatzberg, and Boris D. Heifets.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/conservatives-less-trusting-of-science-compared-to-liberals-in-the-united-states/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Conservatives less trusting of science compared to liberals in the United States</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">May 3rd 2025, 14:00</div>
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<p><p>A new study published in <em><a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-025-02147-z" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nature Human Behaviour</a></em> reveals that in the United States, political conservatives tend to trust scientists less than liberals across a wide range of scientific fields—not just in politically charged areas like climate change or public health. Despite attempts to bridge this ideological trust gap using targeted interventions, researchers found that brief messaging strategies were ineffective at increasing conservatives’ trust in scientists.</p>
<p>Previous studies had established a general ideological divide, with liberals tending to express more trust in scientists than conservatives. However, it was unclear how this gap played out across different scientific occupations—some of which are more tied to hot-button issues like climate change, while others focus on fields like geology or mathematics.</p>
<p>The new study also aimed to address whether targeted interventions could reduce this ideological gap. If distrust in scientists stems not from science literacy but from perceived value conflicts, perhaps interventions could reframe science in ways that resonate with conservatives’ worldview.</p>
<p>“We initially had a dataset that included questions on political ideology and trust in as many as 45 types of scientists,” explained study author Vukašin Gligorić, who recently received a PhD in social psychology from the University of Amsterdam. “When we analyzed it, we noticed consistent gaps in trust between liberals and conservatives in the United States, across most of the 45 different scientific occupations. This granularity gave us a unique opportunity to examine how trust varies by field. From there, we started asking ourselves: How can we bridge this ideological divide? Is it possible to increase trust in scientists among conservatives?”</p>
<p>The study involved 7,800 participants in the United States, recruited to form a large and ideologically diverse sample. Participants were classified as liberal or conservative based on a 10-point political ideology scale. Each person rated their level of trust in scientists from four of 35 different scientific occupations, including climatologists, mathematicians, marine biologists, and petroleum geologists. Trust was measured using two items on a 7-point scale: credibility and trustworthiness.</p>
<p>Liberal and conservative participants both completed the trust ratings. However, only conservatives were randomly assigned to one of six experimental conditions: a control group or one of five intervention strategies. These strategies were designed to align scientific work with conservative values and worldviews. They included framing science in terms of shared values, emphasizing economic co-benefits, showcasing conservative scientists, highlighting the trust of prominent conservatives in science, and presenting conservative social norms in support of science. The goal was to see whether any of these approaches could increase conservatives’ trust in scientists.</p>
<p>The results confirmed earlier findings: liberals, on average, showed significantly higher trust in scientists than conservatives. This trust gap was not limited to a few controversial fields. Liberals expressed more trust across all 35 occupations studied. The difference was most pronounced in fields such as climatology, virology, and environmental science, but it also appeared in less politically charged areas like economics.</p>
<p>Notably, even in scientific disciplines that contribute directly to economic growth—like industrial chemistry or petroleum geology—conservatives still expressed lower trust than liberals. This finding challenges the idea that conservatives are more trusting of scientists whose work aligns with market-based goals.</p>
<p>To test whether trust could be increased, the researchers examined the effects of the five brief interventions. Each strategy was based on theories of science rejection that emphasize the role of ideology, group identity, and perceived values. For example, one strategy presented scientists as sharing core conservative values like tradition and patriotism. Another highlighted how scientific advancements benefit economic prosperity. Despite these efforts, none of the interventions had a significant effect. Conservatives who received the messages did not report greater trust in scientists than those in the control group.</p>
<p>“There are three main takeaways,” Gligorić told PsyPost. “First, liberals tend to trust scientists more than conservatives do. Second—and this is crucial—those differences are not as dramatic as many assume. Even the most conservative participants reported relatively high trust in scientists, with an average score of 4.93 (on a 7-point scale), compared to 5.75 among the most liberal. So overall, most people do trust scientists, which is reassuring. Finally, none of the interventions we tested—designed based on previous literature—actually increased conservatives’ trust. That’s more of a takeaway for researchers, but it shows how challenging this issue really is.”</p>
<p>The team also examined whether political identity strength moderated the effect of the interventions. The idea was that strongly identified conservatives might respond differently to messages tailored to their worldview. But again, the results showed no meaningful differences. The interventions failed across the board, regardless of how strongly participants identified with their political ideology.</p>
<p>“We were somewhat surprised that none of the interventions we tested led to an increase in trust,” Gligorić said. “Given prior findings in the literature, we expected at least some effect. This suggests that researchers working on attitude change and science communication may need to rethink their strategies and explore more robust or long-term approaches.”</p>
<p>These findings suggest that brief, one-shot messaging strategies are unlikely to change deeply rooted attitudes about science and scientists—especially those shaped by political ideology. The study adds to a growing body of evidence that short interventions, such as consensus messaging or value-based appeals, typically have only small and unreliable effects. This is especially true when addressing entrenched beliefs tied to identity and ideology.</p>
<p>“Meaningful attitude change likely requires more sustained engagement, perhaps through dialogue or repeated exposure,” Gligorić told PsyPost. “So it’s possible that different formats or longer-term approaches would yield different results.”</p>
<p>One limitation of the current research is that it focused solely on U.S. participants. The United States is uniquely polarized in terms of political ideology, and it remains to be seen whether similar patterns of ideological trust gaps exist in other countries.</p>
<p>Gligorić emphasized that the findings should not be interpreted as evidence that all conservatives deeply distrust science. On average, trust in scientists was still relatively high across the sample. The issue may lie more in the messaging of conservative elites—such as politicians and media figures—who deliberately cast doubt on scientific findings for their own gain.</p>
<p>“One of my main goals is to better understand the disconnect between the general conservative public and conservative elites when it comes to trust in science,” he said. “Our data shows that conservatives still express relatively high levels of trust in scientists. The issue seems to be less about widespread public distrust and more about how certain conservative elites—politicians, think tanks, and corporate actors—intentionally politicize science to serve their own interests.”</p>
<p>“What we’re seeing in the United States isn’t an isolated phenomenon. In countries like the Netherlands and Serbia (where I’m from), conservative elites are also increasingly targeting academia and the broader scientific community. They present universities and researchers as ideologically biased or out of touch, trying to frame science as part of a ‘liberal agenda.’</p>
<p>“But in my experience, this rhetoric doesn’t reflect the views of many ordinary conservatives,” Gligorić continued. “I have conservative friends who are genuinely appalled by these attacks—they value expertise, evidence, and open inquiry, just like anyone else. This growing hostility toward science is not a grassroots movement; it’s being orchestrated from the top by political and media actors looking to score short-term gains, even if it comes at the expense of long-term trust in democratic institutions and public knowledge.”</p>
<p>“This is especially evident in areas like climate change and public health, where denial and skepticism are often not rooted in grassroots sentiment, but in top-down messaging designed to protect economic and ideological agendas. In many ways, these elites are manufacturing polarization, actively pitting their base against the scientific community. It’s a form of strategic doubt, reminiscent of tactics used by the tobacco industry. I believe future research needs to focus not just on individual attitudes, but on how elite discourse shapes public opinion and undermines collective action on urgent scientific issues.”</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-025-02147-z" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Political ideology and trust in scientists in the USA</a>,” was authored by Vukašin Gligorić , Gerben A. van Kleef, and Bastiaan T. Rutjens.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/negative-images-hijack-attention-and-linger-in-memory-new-study-shows/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Negative images hijack attention and linger in memory, new study shows</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">May 3rd 2025, 12:00</div>
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<p><p>Emotionally disturbing images can significantly impair people’s ability to stay focused, according to a new study published in <em><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/s13428-025-02641-2" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Behavior Research Methods</a></em>. Using a newly developed task, researchers found that negative emotional distractions — such as images of distressed people or threatening animals — disrupted participants’ sustained attention more than neutral or positive visuals. These negative images also led to more negative feelings and were more likely to be remembered afterward.</p>
<p>Sustained attention is a basic mental function that allows people to maintain focus over time. It’s central to everyday activities such as reading, driving, or working and is often impaired in conditions like depression, anxiety, and attention disorders.</p>
<p>While past research has explored how internal factors like motivation or fatigue can interrupt sustained attention, far less is known about how external distractions — especially emotional ones — influence this process. Emotional stimuli, especially negative ones, tend to capture our attention more easily. Yet, researchers lacked a reliable way to test how these emotional distractions affect the ability to concentrate over extended periods.</p>
<p>“Sustained attention, the ability to maintain focus on a specific task for an extended period without significant lapses in concentration, is a foundational cognitive process that underlies many other cognitive functions, impacts daily functioning and is commonly impaired across a range of clinical populations,” said study author Michael Esterman, principal investigator at the National Center for PTSD at VA Boston Healthcare System, co-director of the <a href="http://www.bu.edu/ballab" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Boston Attention and Learning Lab</a>, and associate professor at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine.</p>
<p>“While upsetting thoughts and experiences can disrupt one’s ability to focus attention while performing everyday tasks, translating this phenomenon to the laboratory has remained elusive. We were inspired to design a paradigm that could capture this experience in the lab so we could better study it.”</p>
<p>The researchers developed a new version of a well-established attention task called the gradual-onset continuous performance task (gradCPT). This version, dubbed the “emogradCPT,” involved a neutral digit-based attention task overlaid on emotional images. The goal was to see how the emotional content of these background images affected people’s ability to focus.</p>
<p>Participants in the first experiment included 64 individuals who were asked to perform a 9.6-minute task where they had to respond to a stream of digits, pressing a button for every number except the digit “3.” These digits were presented one after the other with gradual visual transitions. Behind the digits, task-irrelevant background images were continuously displayed. These images were categorized as negative, positive, or neutral. Importantly, the images were not related to the task and were not supposed to be attended to, but they remained visible throughout the task duration.</p>
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<p>To validate their emotional effect, the researchers ensured that the images significantly differed in how negative or arousing participants perceived them to be. Negative images included scenes such as injured animals or distressed people, while positive images showed smiling babies or cute pets. Neutral images were devoid of emotional content, such as landscapes or everyday objects.</p>
<p>In addition to tracking accuracy and reaction time, the researchers incorporated self-report thought probes that asked participants about their focus and emotional state after each block of images. Later, participants completed a surprise memory test to assess how well they remembered the images, even though they were told during the task to ignore them.</p>
<p>The researchers found that negative background images impaired attention more than positive or neutral ones. Participants made more errors and had slower reaction times during blocks with negative images. They also reported feeling worse and being more distracted in those blocks. For instance, average accuracy during negative image blocks was significantly lower than during positive or neutral blocks, and reaction times were slower by around 20 to 30 milliseconds.</p>
<p>These effects weren’t just fleeting impressions. Participants were more likely to remember negative images in the surprise recognition test conducted 30 minutes after the task, even though the images were never directly relevant to their goal. The fact that these images left a stronger memory trace suggests they captured attention more effectively, interfering with the primary task.</p>
<p>“This is the first study to show that when people are sustaining attention, distractions that are upsetting or unpleasant are most likely to disrupt that focus,” Esterman told PsyPost. “These kinds of emotionally negative distractions also make us feel worse, and we are more likely to remember them later,”</p>
<p>The researchers also found that people’s subjective experience matched their performance. When participants reported being more distracted or feeling worse, they also performed worse on the task. These associations held across multiple blocks of the task, providing further validation for the emogradCPT as a tool to measure the impact of emotional distraction.</p>
<p>“I was genuinely surprised that the more upsetting distractors were more likely to be remembered, even when we told participants to actively try to ignore the distractors,” Esterman said.</p>
<p>To further confirm the reliability of the findings, a second experiment was conducted with 50 new participants. This time, the researchers replaced the neutral images with blank backgrounds to test whether any visual image — even a neutral one — was distracting. Again, negative images disrupted attention more than either positive or blank backgrounds, and they were remembered more often. The results from this second group largely matched those from the first experiment.</p>
<p>In a third round of testing, a subset of participants performed the task again inside a brain scanner. Even months later, the negative distraction effect persisted. Performance on the emogradCPT remained consistent, providing evidence that the task could be used in future neuroimaging studies to understand how emotion and attention interact in the brain.</p>
<p>Together, these results highlight that emotionally negative distractions have a measurable and lasting impact on attention. Unlike many tasks that measure short bursts of attention, the emogradCPT captures how focus is maintained over time — a more naturalistic reflection of real-world demands, such as staying attentive during a long drive or focusing at work while surrounded by emotional news or social media.</p>
<p>The researchers argue that their new task offers a useful tool for understanding how emotional content disrupts focus in both healthy individuals and clinical populations. People with anxiety or trauma-related conditions often show stronger reactions to emotional material, and this task could help researchers investigate whether they are particularly vulnerable to distraction by emotionally negative cues.</p>
<p>The study has some limitations. The set of images used was specific to the current experiments and may not generalize to other visual materials or contexts. Participants might have become aware of the blocked structure of the task, which could influence both performance and self-reports. Additionally, although reliability of the task was good, it could be improved with additional testing sessions or more focused experimental designs.</p>
<p>“One limitation, and area for future research, is to determine if distractibility as measured by this new task (the emogradCPT) is related to clinical conditions (like PTSD and ADHD) as well as distractibility in more real-world settings,” Esterman noted.</p>
<p>Despite these limitations, the emogradCPT offers a new way to investigate how emotion and attention interact in a sustained manner. It may prove especially valuable for clinical research aimed at understanding emotional biases and attentional control in people with psychological disorders. Future studies could also adapt the task to explore personalized distractions — such as substance-related cues in addiction — or use eye-tracking and brain imaging to pinpoint the exact cognitive processes involved.</p>
<p>“The world is full of distractions, from intrusive memories, worries about the future, reminders of things to do, and our phone lighting up all day long,” Esterman said. “This study represents a new tool that could help characterize the ability to resist these types of everyday distractions.”</p>
<p>“We believe this study will help scientists measure how distractible a person is, what is most distracting to them, and whether those distractions intrude in their memories. We also believe it can open new windows to studying attention in clinical populations and their neural mechanism alongside brain imaging, both of which are directions we are currently pursuing.”</p>
<p>“Specifically, we hope these findings will assist in characterizing and treating anxiety and posttraumatic stress disorders,” he explained. “We are currently pursuing a VA-funded study using these tasks to better understand PTSD.”</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-025-02641-2">Characterizing the effects of emotional distraction on sustained attention and subsequent memory: A novel emotional gradual onset continuous performance task</a>,” was authored by Michael Esterman, Sam Agnoli, Travis C. Evans, Audreyana Jagger‑Rickels, David Rothlein, Courtney Guida, Carrie Hughes, and Joseph DeGutis.</p></p>
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<p><strong>Forwarded by:<br />
Michael Reeder LCPC<br />
Baltimore, MD</strong></p>
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