The goal of this paper is to study individual variation in participants’ adherence to conflicting moral views. To do this, we elicit participants’ reflective attitudes in an argumentative task and introduce a new Conflict model of moral decision-making. This Conflict model builds on the widely used CNI model of moral judgments (Gawronski et al. [2017, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 113, 343–376]) but improves it in several respects. First, we follow Skovgaard-Olsen and Klauer (2024, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 50(9), 1348–1367) in extending the model to investigate invariance violations of the models’ parameters. Second, we model cases in which participants are conflicted between utilitarian and deontological response tendencies. In Experiment 1, we employ an argumentative paradigm to elicit commitments for moral views from participants to estimate latent classes in participants’ moral views. We then measure a range of egoistic and altruistic covariates used in Kahane et al. (2015, Cognition, 134, 193–209) and Conway et al. (2018, Cognition, 179, 241–265) to investigate whether participants’ acceptance of instrumental harm is associated with a genuine concern for the greater good or whether it is rather driven by antisocial character traits (Bartels and Pizarro [2011, Cognition, 121, 154–161]). Next, we report two validation studies of our new Conflict model. In a preregistered experiment, the discriminant validity of the conflict detection/resolution path of the Conflict model and the construct validity of its conflict parameter are tested. Finally, in a second validation study, we contrast response formats of dilemma judgments and find evidence in favor of using a format in which participants can opt out of difficult moral dilemmas when they feel conflicted, over the traditional format in moral psychology that lacks this possibility. We show that the CNI model is challenged by the finding of asymmetries in experienced conflict across conditions.

Despite growing interest in prediction during simultaneous interpreting (SI), the real-time processing mechanisms supporting it remain underexplored. This study employed the visual world paradigm to investigate whether interpreters can predict upcoming content while simultaneously interpreting multi-sentence paragraphs and to examine the mechanisms underlying prediction. Interpreting students and professionals simultaneously interpreted four paragraphs embedded with sentences containing a critical verb that manipulates the predictability of the target noun, while viewing visual displays containing a target object, two semantic competitor objects and one distractor object. Both groups made predictive eye movements to the target objects before hearing the corresponding word, indicating interpreters’ ability to predict in a challenging task. The observed fixation patterns further suggest the involvement of both prediction-by-production and prediction-by-association during SI. Crucially, professionals showed more flexible attention shifts and efficient cue use, whereas students shifted attention less and used a more cautious prediction strategy.

Maternal tobacco smoking during pregnancy (MSDP) is associated with an increased risk of child externalizing problems. It remains unclear whether these associations are externalizing-specific, or better explained by comorbidity between externalizing and internalizing domains, or vary by age and sex. To address comorbidity and differentiation between domains, we leveraged the severity-directional model of psychopathology. Severity reflects the overall level of psychopathology symptoms across both domains (high levels of severity can only be reached by having symptoms of both types simultaneously), whereas directionality captures the balance/differentiation of internalizing vs. externalizing symptoms regardless of number of total symptoms. Participants included 16,335 children aged 1–19 years old (47.78% female, 58.17% White, 75.46% non-Hispanic) from 55 U.S.-based cohorts within the Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) consortium. MSDP predicted differentiation toward externalizing problems in 2-year age bins 1–2 through 7–8 and 13–14 years; remaining (non-significant) age bins had similar magnitudes. MSDP predicted higher symptom severity in all age bins. Findings likely reflect a combination of MSDP associations with comorbid symptom severity and specificity toward externalizing problems, with little evidence of age or sex differences. Additional analyses explored e-cigarette use, other prenatal substance use, and postnatal smoke exposure; associations were sparse and unsystematic.

This study investigates how personality traits modulate the foreign language effect (FLe) in moral decision-making. Meta-analyses have shown that the FLe has a small-to-moderate effect size, suggesting that individual characteristics may constrain its impact. We hypothesized that traits promoting strong deontological tendencies would moderate this effect. Our results showed that lower conscientiousness and higher emotional stability were associated with more resilient deontological responses, showing reduced susceptibility to the FLe. However, deontological choices associated with lower extraversion were overridden in a foreign language. These findings offer the first empirical evidence that broad personality traits can modulate the FLe. Moreover, our results – statistically significant but modest in magnitude – highlight key methodological considerations, including dilemma types, trait measures, and sample characteristics. Finally, they also underscore the importance of examining more fine-grained personality constructs to better understand individual variability in the extent to which foreign language use shapes moral judgment.

Chronic stress can lead to physical and mental health conditions. This study aimed to identify the different stress profiles and stress relief methods among Filipinos living in the Philippines using latent class analysis. A secondary analysis of a cross-sectional study was employed in this study. The stressors and stress-relief practices among Filipinos were investigated using the I-HEART-FILIPINOS data set. Latent class analysis was used to identify the different profiles of stress causes and management methods among 1,196 Filipinos residing in the Philippines, specifically the Northern Luzon area. Four stress-related profiles were identified: (1) low financial stress relieved by eating and exercise; (2) work-related stress relieved by self-care; (3) familial and economic turmoil relieved by eating, exercise and prayer; (4) high financial stress relieved by staying at home and remaining indoors. The four-class solution explained 58% of the variation in the data through classification. Disparities were observed between classes in terms of emotional distress and sociodemographic variables, implying how sociocultural factors could affect stress presentation and management in Filipinos. The findings of this study inform the development of stress management interventions specifically designed to address the needs of underserved populations in the Philippines and neighboring countries to improve overall health.

Studies on bimodal bilingualism showed that bimodal lexical access is not costly compared to unimodal lexical access, but that it can be even advantageous. We asked whether the same can be observed in unimodal bilinguals as long as some bimodal conditions are provided. We exploited the ecological bimodal setting of subtitled videos and designed four versions of a semantic categorization task, with unimodal (spoken or written language) and bimodal (speech and captions) stimuli. Regardless of the status of the language (L1/L2) and regardless of the bimodal stimuli being also bilingual, answers to bimodal stimuli were systematically faster than speech-only stimuli and slower than written-only stimuli. These results indicate that: i) bimodal stimuli were processed differently from unimodal stimuli, ii) both modalities were taken into account simultaneously, iii) the integration between modalities occurred automatically, even if focusing on one modality only would have been advantageous.

Auditory comprehension (AC) develops during the first years of life; however, not all children exhibit typical performance, which may result from the interaction of multiple factors. Therefore, our study aimed to identify the predictive factors of AC in infants with prenatal and perinatal risk factors for atypical brain structure. To test this, a longitudinal study was conducted with 51 participants (28 females; mean age = 36.8 ± 1.4 months). Clinical, demographic, anthropometric, motor, neuropsychological and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data were collected from birth to 36 months. A regression model revealed that the age at achievement of fine motor milestones, gestational weeks, corpus callosum volume and maternal age were predictive of AC at 36 months. Moreover, the mental development index (MDI) of the Bayley Scales of Infant Development-2 (BSID-2) assessment at 12 months predicted AC scores at 36 months. We concluded that AC is influenced by caregivers’ interactions and motor development, thereby facilitating new learning opportunities, but is also affected by the neuropathological patterns associated with their risk condition. In addition, early identification of predictor factors may enable targeted interventions during sensitive developmental periods.

Suicidal ideation and trauma exposure are significant health challenges worldwide, and their interaction increases their burden on individuals and communities. However, limited research has been devoted to these conditions in low- and middle-income countries, where the majority of the burden of these disorders exists. Additionally, unique cultural factors that may contribute to differential relationships in these symptoms and disorders make this an important area to explore. This study examines relationships between the number and types of adverse exposures, PTSD symptoms and severity, depression and suicidal ideation in a sample of Cambodian women with experiences of trauma using logistic and linear regressions. Overall, PTSD severity significantly contributes to suicidal ideation, with hyperarousal symptoms playing a particularly influential role in this association. Further, adverse experiences, including physical abuse and parental mental health problems, contributed significantly to increased suicidal ideation. Lastly, depression severity partially mediates the relationship between PTSD severity and suicidal ideation. These results illustrate the significant role of PTSD in the experience of suicidal ideation, particularly within regions like Cambodia with high trauma loads. These findings point to psychological constructs that may be especially important to include in suicidality screening tools and to target within prevention and intervention efforts.

This study elicits iconicity ratings for Hong Kong Sign Language (HKSL) from L1 HKSL Deaf signers and L1 Cantonese hearing non-signers, as well as non-signer guessing accuracy, and compares these norms with other sign languages. Iconicity ratings were collected for 972 HKSL signs from Deaf signers and hearing non-signers and correlated with guesses made by hearing non-signers in three guessing paradigms, that is, three-alternative forced choice (3AFC) translation selection, 3AFC video selection and an open-ended (open cloze) response task. HKSL signs were rated for iconicity comparably to American Sign Language (ASL) and Israeli Sign Language (ISL), with Deaf signers rating signs with higher iconicity overall. We also correlated HKSL iconicity ratings across signs with synonymous translations from languages with available ratings, ASL (634 signs), ISL (158 signs) and British Sign Language (99 signs). Guessing accuracy was found to correlate with higher HKSL iconicity ratings. As for semantic transparency, 3AFC guessing results indicate that many signs are in fact ‘translucent’, whereby inference based on the context provided by answer choices allows hearing non-signers to select the target answer with high accuracy. Our open-ended guessing task yielded considerably lower accuracy; however, accurate responses (2,183 of 15,228) were found to correlate with higher iconicity ratings.

Videoconferencing cognitive behavioural therapy (VCBT) has gained increased attention in recent years. While in-person CBT is well-studied, there is limited research on therapists’ attitudes towards delivering CBT through videoconferencing. A cross-sectional online survey on preferences and attitudes towards videoconferencing was distributed to CBT clinicians, mainly psychotherapists, psychologists, and counsellors, during the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 140 complete responses were analysed using descriptive statistics. Most respondents expressed positive or very positive attitudes towards VCBT, considering it a time efficient option, suitable for building a therapeutic alliance. Agenda setting, goal formulation, assigning and reviewing homework, providing booster sessions, and guided self-help support were the CBT components most respondents perceived as best fitted for the videoconferencing format. In contrast, role-play, exposure with response prevention, and interpersonal skills training were rated as the least suitable techniques. VCBT was considered most appropriate for treating insomnia, stress-related conditions, and anxiety disorders, and least appropriate for bipolar disorder, trauma-related conditions, and specific phobias. The findings indicate that Swedish CBT clinicians largely viewed videoconferencing as a viable format during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly for diagnostic groups commonly treated with face-to-face CBT and with the use of structured and highly verbal CBT techniques. However, the use of VCBT for more complicated conditions, as well as using interpersonal, experiential and skills training techniques, was perceived as less suitable. Further research is needed to examine clinician preferences and training needs, and the development and delivery of specific CBT components through video, including for more complex cases and younger age groups.

Key learning aims

1. (1) CBT clinicians had generally positive attitudes towards working with VCBT during the COVID-19 pandemic.

2. (2) CBT clinicians preferred structured and verbally provided techniques, over interpersonal and more experiential techniques, when using the videoconferencing format.

3. (3) CBT clinicians perceived VCBT to be suitable for diagnoses commonly treated with face-to-face CBT, such as insomnia, anxiety disorders, and stress.

4. (4) Most CBT clinicians also perceived VCBT as time saving and suitable for maintaining a therapeutic alliance.

5. (5) A session length of at least 30 minutes was preferred among CBT clinicians.

Personality tests are commonly used to hire suitable employees but this process is susceptible to strategic misrepresentation by job-seekers. This article uses a lab experiment as an analogy of such a hiring process by using a repeated public goods game (PGG) as a proxy for a cooperative work environment. Participants first complete a Big Five personality test, focusing on the trait of ‘Agreeableness’, which some previous studies have associated with prosocial cooperation in the PGG. Two groups are formed: a high Agreeableness group and a low Agreeableness group. The experiment manipulates the timing of revealing the group formation rule, as knowing the rule before the personality test allows for misrepresentation of Agreeableness. I find no evidence of substantial misrepresentation when the group formation rule is revealed before the personality test. I do find that Agreeableness group formation increases contributions for both high and low groups, but only when it is described to participants before the PGG. I find no evidence that Agreeableness is related to contributions in the PGG.

Using the fields of memory studies and digital humanities, this article argues that there has been a shift from more collective and social memory to more personalised and individual memory. This shift, it is argued here, can be conceptualised through the psychoanalytic concept of ‘psychosis’. While the causes of the changes in our patterns of memory have been located in capitalist and neoliberal principles, the effects of the changes in our memory habits might be found in psychosis. From falling in love with machinic AI replicas to indulging in conspiracy theories to acting as if we are social media influencers or backing ourselves to win out in impossible job markets, we are inclined towards personal fantasy, often at the expense of participating in social life. But why do we do this? Why is it easier to believe a farfetched conspiracy theory or wild personal dream than it is to participate socially and collectively in the world we live in? Part of the reason, at least, is found in our increasing habitual reliance on new and emergent technologies. Often presented to us as a brand-new form of Artificial Intelligence, these generative tools are the latest update to a longer pattern in our digital world: the trend of developing ‘relationships’ with algorithms that, to larger and smaller degrees, we come to rely on for habits of cognition and recognition. By affecting our patterns of memory, these technologies produce a kind of isolation that lends itself to individual and fantastical – rather than shared and realist – thinking.

This study investigated the origins of mood vulnerability in heritage language (HL) grammar. Prior research on adult heritage speakers (HSs) shows that subjunctive use with sentential complements is highly vulnerable, hypothesized to stem from language-internal (type of selection, modality) and language-external (HL experience) factors. We examined Spanish subjunctive use in complements to factive emotive predicates (Presupposition) and nonassertive predicates (Nonassertion), where mood selection is pragmatically conditioned. We also tested two categorical contexts (Volition, Control indicative). Data from 78 school-age HSs indicated that reduced subjunctive use in sentential complements derived from children with insufficient exposure to and capacity with the HL to master the categorical, modally simple volition context. Most of the child HSs relied on nonsubjunctive felicitous and infelicitous responses as alternative or innovative ways of expressing modal meanings in these contexts. We propose that bilingual children in central Texas may be developing a distinct HL grammar for modality.